Bucket list in a jar

When I wrote a Facebook post about a Lockdown idea I never expected it to have the far-reaching and overwhelmingly positive response that it did and I am so grateful to everyone who has engaged with it, shared their family’s story and why they want to do it, and supported me along the way.

As it looks like we are in this thing for the long haul now, I have decided I’d like to document what we are doing so that my family and I can look back on it and the long-term plan is to gradually show how we are working through (what I expect is going to be) a pretty long bucket list.

For those interested in how this idea came about, it started the first day of official Lockdown in the UK.

Explaining to toddlers what is going on right now is not easy. But what’s really important to me is to make our home a positive place so that my two and four year-old feel safe.

I know when they look back they won’t remember details, but they might remember how our home felt.

I’d had a jar sat on the window sill in the kitchen for four years, which was supposed to be for us to write down happy memories to take out at the end of each year and look back and smile. It didn’t get the momentum behind it we’d intended (not least because we had a newborn baby to take care of).

As Lockdown loomed, I quickly realised that we were going to have to say no to lots of things (and let’s face it no is a word that toddlers love to say but not to hear). It breaks my heart to say that they can’t hug their Grandparents, see their friends or even play on the swings.

So, we started a new thing. Instead of saying no, we would say yes to everything – one day.

Every time we wish we can do something, go somewhere, treat ourselves, see someone we love, visit a new place, invite people to visit us, we write it down on a post it note and put it in a jar.

When all this is over it will be our bucket list and we’ll work our way through the jar and be more grateful than ever for the little and lovely things in our lives. We’re including:

• The everyday things we take for granted (visiting Grandparents, going to the zoo, playing with friends, going swimming and to baby ballet/tumble bees)
• Things we had planned that are now cancelled (building sandcastles on holiday, going to birthday parties, family meals/celebrations)
• Dream list ideas to make every moment count (e.g. Disney World)

It’s essentially turning a negative (we can’t do that) into a positive (one day we will) and instead of missing everything we can’t do, it’s giving us hope and helping us to look forward to the day we can.

Until then we’re going to enjoy watching the jar fill up with magical things to look forward to.

If you’re still reading well done for getting through this really long post and I really can't thank everyone enough for all their support.

I’d love to hear everyone’s ideas and see the pictures of everyone doing their jars  along the way and I’ll try and share what I can in between the madness of work and childcare.