If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a hundred times. I am a summer girl. I love summer, and I live through months of cold, Minnesota winters with one thing on my mind. Summer. Sunny days, warm evenings, swimming, sunburns, gardening, farmer’s markets and flip-flops. I am most myself in the summer. I can’t explain this phenomenon, really. But I know that there is something about this season that fills me with a sense of being alive, like nothing else on earth. I want to bottle it up and savor every moment of each summer, so I may relive and relish my summer memories on the coldest days of winter.
I also happen to love lists. Adore them, actually. I have post-it notes everywhere, books of lists, lists on scraps of paper, in email drafts and in Word documents. Lists help me define my day, and they outline my goals. They keep me efficient and moving forward, whether I am on a mission to finish my grocery shopping in a hurry or get through my day in an organized fashion.
Today, I am combining my love of summer with my love of lists. Today, I am making the bucket list of summer 2010. These are the things I want to cram into the next three months, before the chill returns to the Minnesota air, and I find myself accessorizing with a scarf instead of sunglasses. These are the ways that I want to LIVE this summer.
spend a night on the boat, under the stars | bike to ben & jerry’s for 7-layer-bar ice cream | go fishing with dad and catch dinner | run barefoot through the sprinklers | skip stones on a beach on the north shore | watch the sunrise | watch the sunset | teach emmy to jump off the dock like a proper lab should | buy a new camera and learn to take better photos | eat and shop locally, more than i do now | take a boat tour of lake minnetonka | go to an outdoor concert | have dinner on the patio, as often as possible | hear mat kearney live at the varsity | eat blueberry pie at the blueberry festival | celebrate my mom’s birthday with a bang | go to a festival or art fair in the city | spend at least a full week up north | celebrate four years of marriage to my best friend with a trip, somewhere | eat something new and unexpected at the state fair | have a garage sale and rid my home of unneccessary junk | make fresh squeezed lemonade | pick strawberries and raspberries and bake a pie | hang a swing from one of the trees in the yard | go for a long hike in a beautiful place | make a meal entirely from my vegetable garden | wear out another pair of teva flip flops | drive with the windows down, singing at the top of my lungs | do a cannon-ball off the boat, or ten | climb a tree | eat at fletcher’s, the chocolate moose, angry trout cafe, coho cafe and fred & fuzzy’s | pick cherries in door county and dip my toes in lake michigan | shop niccolet mall and eat at a sidewalk cafe | watch the fireworks and play with sparklers | swim in lakes, as often as possilble | go to a baseball game at the new twins stadium | wear my cowboy boots to a real rodeo | give, love, sing, grow, do, feel, see, live. more. even more. as much as i possibly can
I’m going strawberry picking soon. Come with me! My buddy Roxanne will probably be going too, we do it every year!
You list is lovely! Mine consists of loving up my 2 boys and knitting Christmas gifts!
oooh, I’d go in on a garage sale with you. I’ve got a pile of stuff, but not quite enough to do my own sale.
Wow-The first paragraph–It’s EXACTLY how I feel. This is the BEST time of year! I try to savor every morsel of it.
I absolutely loved your list. Sometimes the very best memories are the simple (sometimes even free) things we do together with our loved ones. Each day on the last day of school, (we homeschool) I have my kids write down 10 things they really want to do over the summer. It’s always so fun to see what they write!
give, love, sing, grow, do, feel, see, live. more. even more. as much as i possibly can.
Interesting lists, perfect summer life plan!