Chances are you have a personal bucket list. Maybe you’d like to travel to Europe or Hawaii; go skydiving, parasailing, or scuba diving. Or, if you’re like me, you prefer adventures that are a little less hazardous. A tropical island getaway is on my personal wish list!
While dreaming of seemingly lofty goals, perhaps you find yourself saying: “Someday…maybe when the kids are all grown up.”
But, have you ever wondered what would be on your children’s lists?
Or, how your whole family could be living out your dreams together?
Find out how to put together a family bucket list with help from my friend and fellow writer Lara Krupicka, the author of the ebook Family Bucket Lists: Bring More Fun, Adventure & Camaraderie into Everyday.
Read on for a summary of the book and my interview with Lara.
Synopsis of Family Bucket Lists by Lara Krupicka
Do you have a list of “someday” things – a list of what you’d like to do or see, famous people you’d like to meet, roles you’d like to fill? A bucket list of goals for your lifetime?
What if you combined that “someday” list with today’s list of things “to do”? If you’re thinking it sounds too expensive or would take too much time, think again. When you allow your bucket list to converge with everyday life, you’ll find a whole host of benefits unfold in your life. And when you bring your family along… well, let’s just say your life will never be the same.
Family Bucket Lists gives families a chance to:
- dream together of what they want to do before the children are grown.
- set off on adventures, big and small, together and individually.
- enliven weekends and vacations with plans that match what they want most from life.
- discover new things about one another as each person unearths and shares their dreams and aspirations.
- find simple ways to incorporate life goals into everyday living.
- make the most of the years they have together.
Parents who read Family Bucket Lists will be encouraged to:
- honor themselves and their own their life goals now, even in the midst of raising children.
- support their children in taking appropriate risks and trying new ventures.
- let go of the desire to steer their children’s paths and enjoy watching their children carve a path to the future.
- define family fun according to their crew’s unique bent.
What inspired you to write the Family Bucket Lists ebook?
LK: Bucket lists can be a whole lot of fun, but I was also seeing in my family how they functioned in some dynamic ways beyond just the achieving of goals. They brought us closer together, they enabled us as parents to identify and support our kids’ interests, and they made our life richer in general. I wanted to share that with other families.
What do you think makes the process of creating a family bucket list empowering for the family?
LK: For one, as parents it helps you sort out what’s paramount to you from all the mess of opportunities available. You get a chance to say to yourselves, “this is what we want most to see happen in our family before our kids grow up.” And then the process of brainstorming ideas as a whole family gives kids a forum for sharing their hopes and their crazy ideas as well. In a way a shared bucket list can both reflect and define your family’s identity.
What observations do you notice most as families go through this process together?
LK: It’s not necessarily a fast process. You and I can name a list of life wishes relatively quickly because we’ve had years to think about it and accumulate ideas. And kids will come up with a handful of random thoughts off the top of their heads. But often the most meaningful targets surface over time. It helps to ask the questions without expecting the best answers right away. As families warm up, the discussions roll more.
Ultimately the best results happen when bucket lists become a part of a family’s lifestyle (and in many cases they probably already are, we just haven’t given them a name and paid particular attention to filling them and fulfilling them).
What should parents expect when creating a bucket list with their children?
LK: Expect some goofiness and out-there responses, along with a few standards (every kid is going to put Disney World on their list, even if they’ve already been there). And you might get some grousing about the goals mom and dad have for the family. That’s okay. Kids won’t always get what we’re after in the selections we make for our family’s bucket list, precisely because they haven’t yet experienced them.
How should a parent respond to what seems like an outrageous, unrealistic or improbable bucket list item from their child?
LK: In the Family Bucket Lists e-book I encourage parents to have their child create a personal bucket list. When the unrealistic item relates to the child’s own list, it’s good to be supportive. Let them write it down. Then ask your child what they think needs to take place for that goal to be realized. Help them brainstorm intermediate steps, backing it up to the present in the form of a reachable short-term goal. Then include those more reasonable items on the list as well.
What I like best about having kids create life lists is being able to tap into their creativity and hear their unfiltered ideas. I believe very strongly that the seeds for their future are already there. A bucket list can be a way of teasing those out and recording interests at their earliest stages. I hope that kids with bucket lists will have fun as adults looking back on their ideas and seeing how those early dreams played out.
About Lara:
Lara Krupicka is one of those people who dreamed of being a writer when she grew up. Fast-forward several decades through business school, a short marketing career, and the birth of three kids and she is finally living her dream job as a journalist and speaker. She wrote Family Bucket Lists to encourage others to seize everyday opportunities to live out their life dreams. Lara’s writing has been published in over 75 publications across the United States and Canada and online on nationally-known sites such as mops.org and kyria.com. She and her husband, Mike, live with their three daughters in the suburbs of Chicago.
