<p>So I don’t know if there has been a thread on this topic, so excuse me for repeating if there was.</p>
<p>I find I’m using the expression and thinking about the expression “bucket list” fairly often. I’m thinking a lot about what I want to do before I can no longer can. I’m in my 50’s. </p>
<p>We just paid (hopefully) our last tuition check after 8 years. Hurray! For 4 of them we were paying two tuitions. All private schools. No debt for kids or us. But now I feel like there is so much extra money to do things until retirement (besides saving).</p>
<p>I went on a 27 mile jet ski trip in Key West a month ago. I had never been on a jet ski as a passenger or driver. I was the driver. It was tough to have your first experience in the Atlantic ocean. But I did it. Check.</p>
<p>I had an enjoyable lunch with some close long time lady friends recently and we discussed this. We do not live very near each other, but within several hours. We decided to do a river raft trip together this spring. That would also be a check.</p>
<p>What would you love or are planning to do before you can’t? What’s on your bucket list?</p>
<p>We toured Iceland last summer after the last tuition check. It was a geology nerd nirvana. Volcanoes, glaciers, thermal springs, rift zones…
Key West is on our list.
If you haven’t rafted the Grand Canyon, bump that to the top of the list!</p>
<p>What a great topic: Things to look forward to!!! </p>
<p>We still have kids in college (freshman and junior) but we just fully funded #2’s 529, and #1 is set as well- so as of April 2012, WE’RE DONE!!!</p>
<p>First in line, a few home improvement projects we set on the back burner, a backyard landscape project, new furniture for the den which used to be an office. Then there’s the traveling- kids are scattering and one is in Europe this summer, would love to see him for 10 or so days…Not looking to jet ski- although that sounds fun if you’re into that! </p>
<p>In a strange way it feels like the dam has burst. We’ve been in such a savings mode for so long and suddenly the pressure’s not there anymore. It’s very liberating and disorienting- I think we need some time to adjust! Machu Pichu, African Safari, golf at St. Andrews, …our Bucket List is evolving, would love to hear others’ plans as well!</p>
<p>Plus we all need to give ourselves a HUGE pat on the back for the many years we’ve done without and sacrificed so that our kids could have the greatest opportunities possible. It’s high time we had a little splurge, I think we all deserve it! :D</p>
<p>I’d LOVE to do this someday! But we’ll be doing things for the house for a while, once tuition checks no longer suck up our money.</p>
<p>One of the first things…new flooring for the house! We have the original 1986 carpeting–and it has not aged gracefully, like the house’s inhabitants…</p>
<p>We went on a three week trip to visit our daughter in the Peace Corps. Got granite counters, new sink, new faucet. Went to see son across the country. Going on a cruise in January. Planning a trip to Australia. Getting a new car. </p>
<p>This is all a drop in the bucket compared to paying for private school costs for two college kids!</p>
<p>I have on my bucket list a visit to family homelands, preferably after someone has tracked down geneoligical sites. I am adopted, so I would want to visit the Sutch and French for my adoptive parents the English and Scottish of my birth parents and the English, Irish and Estern European roots for my DH. I would prefer to have a child or grandchild along to enjoy the history.</p>
<p>We are already scheduled to go on a cruise from Seattle to Alaska later this year. I’d like to go to Europe next year as well. May go to a conference in Chicago next year too. Have heard the Galapagos are lovely to visit–may go there. Have always wanted to go to Australia & New Zealand. H wants to go back to Yellowstone. Will probably visit the kids a lot–in DC & LA.</p>
<p>We did a raft trip at the Tetons–it was very nice but COLD.</p>
<p>H & I have to start thinking of what we want. He’s thinking of buying a Buick, for some reason, “just because.” We paid private U tuitions for 6 years as well–4 of them were for 2 kids in college at the same time. Maybe we’ll hire someone to help do some of the things I’m not convinced H will ever get around to finishing. :)</p>
<p>We’re going to Petra in Jordan next month as part of a trip to Israel, one of my favorite places. I’d love to go back to Greenland. We’re doing home improvements too. A new roof and insulation. A family reunion in MN this year; hoping for one next year in Norway.</p>
<p>Youngest S graduates next Saturday. We did home improvements (lots) on our house in order to sell it. We close today! Two years ago we went out on a limb and built our dream retirement/second phase of life home in a place we’ve always wanted to live. After today’s closing we can pay it off! We are also planning to buy a new car and take a trip (undetermined destination) this summer to celebrate our 30th anniversary.</p>
<p>Love this thread. Not sure I want to call it a ‘bucket list’ as the movie made me cry. My Dad and his brother had a list, but they waited too long to do a lot of the things on it. I wish he were still around, we could do some of those things together, now that the kids are grown…</p>
<p>Not only did we pay our last tuition after 8 straight years of private school tuition, but we also paid off our mortgage. I can’t remember when our monthly expenses were this low.</p>
<p>So far, the extra $ is going into long overdue home improvements, a new car for me (altho I’ve been looking for years & can’t find one I like more than my old car). We’d love to do more traveling, but, with an elderly mother in a nursing home who’s health can turn suddenly (I’m an only child), it’s difficult to comfortably leave the country or take a cruise. We can only go places it would be relatively easy to get back home quickly.</p>
<p>We had thought we would have tons of money after kid2 graduated, then I up and quit my job. ;-). Luckily, started a new but lower paid one two month later, and have just now moved up to a position that pays almost as well as my old one. So, time for a new car and to work on getting the house paid off in the next 5 years, save more for retirement. I do not have any burning desires to travel, except to see family and friends.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Remodel. New kitchen - new floors, new cabinets, new countertops. It will still be a pretty small kitchen, but it will be a NICE small kitchen.</p></li>
<li><p>Travel. This summer we’re all going to Austria and Germany - D included - before D starts her new job. D has always wanted to see Vienna, I love the “Sound of Music,” and H likes beer, so there’s something for everyone. I’m hoping it’s just the first of many trips overseas - I’m thinking of a river cruise next year.</p></li>
<li><p>Career change. In a year or so I will quit my full-time job to student teach, and then I’ll be looking for a position as a high school chemistry teacher. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>I paid our last tuition payment a few weeks ago, and I’m STILL smiling!</p>
<p>After our last tuition payment (only 4 years - we have only one kid!), we remodeled the kitchen and put hardwood down on the first floor. This needed to be done from the day we moved into the house before Kid was born. </p>
<p>We’re doing the Alaska cruise this summer from Anchorage to Vancouver for our 30th anniversary, and I’m cruising to Bermuda myself soon, since DH can’t come.</p>
<p>Probably going back to Italy next year. Hoping to get to Israel soon. Kid is in NY, so we’re traveling down a lot for visits and theater.</p>
<p>I love to travel, and I’m going to do at least one big trip per year, along with smaller weekend type trips.</p>
<p>It also helps that kid is gainfully employed and almost self-supporting!</p>
<p>I have no plans for anything new. Here is my life before, during and after:
Work full time until I am kicked out
Exercise for 2 hrs/day every day
Pottery - hobby
very fansy/expansive vacations every year
trips to NYC every year</p>
<p>When I am kiccke out of my job, I imagine myself going straight to the box and under the ground. There is no way I will be able to fill the most entertaining 8 hrs as I hate to read, watch TV, do house shores, shopping, travel, movies, cooking, gardenning…</p>
<p>2 years ago I felt like a squeezed through a narrow (and closing) window when I went on a 1 week bike ride with my son. 10 years (or even 5) from now I am not sure if I will be physically up for something like that, and he will be even less likely to go on a bike trip with his Dad. Right now the most pressing item on my bucket list is fixing the toilet in the powder room, so here I go. (oh, not thatbucket)</p>
<p>When we’re doing with tuition I’m getting a new kitchen and I’m going to personally sledgehammer the wall between the kitchen and the dining room.</p>
<p>Graduation 3 years away but I already had my contractor here last week to discuss putting on a master bedroom/bathroom addition. I am going to make the smallest bedroom a hallway lined with closets on both sides (one just for shoes) leading into the new bedroom. </p>
<p>After that we plan to do lots of traveling as we will be able to afford boarding our 3 dogs at chic chic doggie hotel.</p>