Summer Fun List 2022
This essay originally appeared in the Monday morning newsletter on 5/23/22.
Wow – this coming weekend is Memorial Day Weekend. I can’t believe it!
Like many, I consider MDW the unofficial start of summer. I was thinking about summers of years past and realized just how many of my memories from growing up are tied to the season…
The first time I spent the summer in Sharon (PA) with grandma.
The summer my two cousins were born (one day apart!).
The summer I had my driver’s license and could drive to the beach with my friends.
The summer my mom and our best friends road tripped to NYC from PA on a whim.
The summer my dad took my brothers, grandmother and me to Hilton Head.
The summer I did my first semester at UF.
With the exception of holidays, it doesn’t feel like there’s another season that’s as comparable in terms of memory making. And it makes sense: memories form when we experience something novel or intense and, especially in our younger years, summer = a big break in routine (school’s out!).
In my stage of life right now, I still love summer (hello, weather that I wait all year for!), but I no longer have that noticeable, built-in change in routine. Work continues on as normal. I’m staying put in Chicago (at least for the most part). On the whole, my day-to-day won’t look dramatically different just because it’s summer.
But I don’t want summer to come and go without seizing the opportunity to experience some of the things I love most about the season.
So, I’m repeating an activity I did last year and making a “summer fun list!”
The idea comes from author Laura Vanderkam. She suggests spending time thinking about the things you want to do that make summer feel like, well, summer. You compile a list of these things as way of remembering and encouraging yourself to actually do them over the next couple months. The hope is that when Labor Day Weekend rolls around, instead of thinking “where did the time go?,” you reflect on all your new summer memories.
For me, I want this year’s summer to be a time of a more relaxed routine, more connection, and lots of time outside. With this in mind, I compiled my summer fun list below and am sharing this morning in hopes it encourages you to make one for yourself. I hope reflecting on past summer memories and making a list for this year brightens your Monday today, like it did mine.
Summer 2022 Fun List:
- Make a summer reading list. I did this last year and it was really fun. A nice homage to the good ol’ summer reading list from school years. Last year I read “beach reads” and celeb memoirs exclusively during the summer months, and I still need to pick what I want to do this year. I might do books by a certain author or all from the same time period… or fun, fluffy beach reads again 😉
- Do a big adventure and small adventure weekly (+ write them down!). This idea also comes from Laura Vanderkam. She suggests planning adventures (subjectively big & small) to make days/weeks stand out from any other time. As she writes, “The point is to make something you’re already doing slightly more memorable, or to see how it might already be memorable as you think about it intentionally. When we decide that something is an official ‘little adventure’ we treat it more seriously. We put a little more thought into it, and as we think of it as an adventure, we notice more.” Summer feels like a perfect time to give this a test (a lot of things on this list could be big or small adventures)! And I’m planning to write them all down to have to reference at the end of the season.
- Intentionally change up my daily routine. For the first time in my professional life, I’ll have a “Summer Friday” schedule (office closes at 1 PM on Fridays) starting this week through Labor Day. I’m SO excited. How do I want to use this newfound time?!
- Listen to the live music in the park at least twice.
- Plan a progressive dinner party. I want to go for appetizers at one place, the main dish at another and finish somewhere delicious for dessert. Bonus points if one – or all – of the places are outside.
- Go to a Cubs game. And eat a hotdog. Quintessential summer activity.
- At least once a month, end my Sunday evening walk with ice cream. Let’s be honest, it will probably be more than once a month 🙂
- Walk 50,000 steps in one day. Have to offset the ice cream somehow.
- Road trip somewhere fun outside Chicago.
- Volunteer with three different organizations. I have two organizations on my radar, but want to find a third before summer is over.
What would you put on your summer fun list?
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