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Anyone who has spent a summer in the Pacific Northwest knows it arrives with a specific sort of relief. After months of gray skies and that particular kind of drizzle that makes you question your life choices (and your real estate decisions), the sun shows up in Portland like it’s been meaning to call. The heat is gentle, the light lingers until 9 pm, and suddenly the mountains are just there on the horizon again.
I make a summer bucket list every year for exactly this reason. Because summer in Portland is too good to sleepwalk through, and I have a bad habit of blinking and finding myself in September wondering where July went. This year, I’m paying attention, and these 30 ideas are how.
What do you actually want this summer to feel like? Not what you want to accomplish, not what looks impressive on a to-do list, but the feeling you’re reaching for. More ease? More adventure? What about more mornings where you’re not already behind before you’ve had coffee? Let that answer guide how you move through this list.
We’ve all felt it before: summer can slip through your fingers if you let it. One minute it’s Memorial Day weekend and you’re making plans; the next it’s Labor Day and you’re not entirely sure what happened in between. This list is an antidote to that—a collection of ideas designed to make summer feel lived in, intentional, and (drumroll) fun.
A few of these are adventures, and some are so small they barely count as plans. But every idea on this summer bucket list? 100% worth doing.
Summer eating is its own love language. These ideas are about slowing down and making the most of the season’s best ingredients. Ideally, with good company and something cold in your hand.
1. Visit your local farmers’ market. You have one rule: buy whatever looks best and figure out dinner from there.
2. Make a signature summer drink. These NA summer spritz options are my personal go-to.
3. Host a dinner party with a theme specific enough to become a story. Every dish from a country you’ve never visited. All pink foods (this is on my own summer bucket list). A menu built entirely around one ingredient. Commit to the bit.
4. Try the thing on the menu you’ve been curious about but always talked yourself out of. This is how I discovered that oysters are actually my favorite food.
5. Cook something entirely from scratch that you’ve always bought. A vinaigrette, a simple jam, a loaf of bread. (My only rule on the bread: just please don’t talk about it ad nauseam. Thank you!)
6. Eat at least one meal outside every week this summer. Not a picnic necessarily—just your regular dinner, on a blanket, on the porch… anywhere you can see the sky.
