Couples bucket list: 50 things to do together
Fifty ideas in five groups of ten. Go through them separately, each mark your own yeses, then compare. Whatever you both picked is your list.
- Ideas: 50 ideas in five groups
- Range: From free to once-in-a-lifetime
- Account: No account needed
At home
Ten that need no tickets and no travel.
1. Cook a three-course dinner from one cookbook
Borrow the book from the library. One course each, and dessert together.
2. Watch a whole trilogy in one day
Plan the snacks, leave your phones in another room, and walk around the block between films.
3. Sleep in the living room
Drag the mattress out, open the curtains, and wake up somewhere slightly new.
4. Host dinner for four
Each of you invites one person. Three dishes at most, and one of them can be store-bought.
5. Assemble flat-pack furniture and stay friends
One reads the instructions, one holds the screwdriver. Swap at the halfway page.
6. Make a photo book of your first year
Thirty photos, fifteen chosen by each of you. A printed copy runs about $20.
7. Invent a holiday
Give it a date, a menu, and one tradition that makes no sense. Celebrate it again next year.
8. Grow something you can eat
Basil on a windowsill counts. The first harvest goes into a dinner you make together.
9. Each master one signature dish
The one you’ll be asked to bring to every gathering for the next twenty years.
10. Make pizza from scratch, dough included
Start the dough in the morning. Half the pie is yours, half is theirs.
In your own town
Ten for an ordinary weekend, no suitcase needed.
11. Eat at the place you always walk past
The one you’ve said “we should try that” about at least three times.
12. Visit a new neighborhood every month
Take transit there, eat one thing, walk one street end to end.
13. See a band neither of you has heard of
Choose by name alone from a small venue’s calendar.
14. Go to a midnight movie
Or a drive-in, if there’s one within an hour of you.
15. Become regulars somewhere
Same café, same day, until they start your order when you walk in.
16. Learn one dance well enough to use it
Four classes of swing or salsa before the next wedding on your calendar.
17. Watch the sunrise and the sunset on the same day
Pick a long summer day, or a short winter one if you’d like more sleep.
18. See something with an intermission
A play, a ballet, an opera. Balcony seats are fine.
19. Try a cuisine that’s new to both of you
Ask the server to order for the table.
20. Claim a bench
Find the best view in town, bring coffee, and call it yours from then on.
Trips and the outdoors
Ten that take a free day, a weekend, or a passport.
21. Take a trip with nothing booked past the first night
Decide the rest over breakfast each morning.
22. Sleep under the stars
A campsite, a rooftop, or a backyard. All of them count.
23. Swim somewhere that isn’t a pool
A lake, a river, or an ocean. Check the water temperature first.
24. See a national park in the off-season
Fewer people, lower prices, and a different landscape from the postcards.
25. Ride an overnight train
Book a sleeper if you can, and wake up in another state.
26. Visit each other’s hometowns
The one who grew up there leads the tour, embarrassing stops included.
27. Watch a meteor shower
The Perseids peak in mid-August and the Geminids in mid-December. Bring a blanket and get away from city lights.
28. Reach a summit, any size
A hill with a view qualifies. Eat lunch at the top.
29. Go where neither of you speaks the language
Learn twenty phrases on the way and use every one of them.
30. Spend a night in a hotel in your own city
Pack a bag anyway. Order breakfast.
Things to make and learn
Ten that leave you with a skill or an object.
31. Take a class where you make something you keep
Pottery, woodworking, or glass. Put the results where guests can see them.
32. Finish a 5K together
Running or walking. Eight weeks of training, and you cross the line side by side.
33. Film sixty seconds of an ordinary Saturday
One-second clips, edited on a phone. Do it again in a year.
34. Write down how you met, separately
One page each, with no conferring. Then trade pages.
35. Start a tradition on a random date
The first snowfall, the half-anniversary, the day the clocks change.
36. Learn to give a proper shoulder massage
A ten-minute tutorial each, then practice on each other.
37. Create a recipe that’s only yours
Adjust it until you’d both order it, then give it a name.
38. Read each other’s favorite book from age fifteen
No teasing until you’ve both finished.
39. Do something that scares one of you a little
A karaoke solo, a high dive, a roller coaster. The other one holds the jacket.
40. Learn a card game and keep a running score
Gin rummy works for two. Keep the tally on the fridge for a year.
Just the two of you
Ten small rituals. Most are free.
41. Recreate your first date
Same place if it’s still there, same order if you remember it.
42. Take a photo in the same spot every year
Same pose, same frame. Start this year.
43. Write each other a letter for a hard day
Seal it. The other one decides when to open it.
44. Have a yes day
One of you plans, the other says yes to everything within a budget you agree on. Swap next month.
45. Ask each other the 36 questions
The well-known set of questions that go from light to personal. Give it a whole evening.
46. Plan a surprise day
The only hint allowed is what to wear.
47. Make a five-year list
Five hopes each, written separately. Compare, then keep both pages in the same drawer.
48. Spend a full day apart on purpose
Meet for dinner and tell each other all of it.
49. Put your phones in a drawer for a weekend
From Friday at eight until Sunday at noon. Tell people in advance.
50. Dance somewhere with no dance floor
A parking lot, a kitchen, the cereal aisle. One full song.
Couples bucket list: common questions
- How do we make a couples bucket list we’ll both use?
- Go through the fifty separately and each write down the numbers you’d say yes to. Compare. The numbers on both lists are your bucket list; the rest are worth one conversation. Ten shared items is plenty to start with.
- What if our lists barely overlap?
- Then you’ve learned something useful for the price of ten minutes. Each of you picks one item from the other’s list to try once, and you add two ideas of your own that aren’t here.
- Do we need money for a bucket list?
- No. About twenty of these cost nothing, including sleeping in the living room, the same-day sunrise and sunset, writing down how you met, and the phones-in-a-drawer weekend.
- How is this different from the Just Between Us game?
- This page is a reading list you mark by hand. The game has its own cards with small wishes, and it does the comparing for you: each answers on a separate phone, and only shared yeses are shown.
Where to next
- Just Between Us: a wishes game for twoHow the wishes game works, and what the other player does and doesn’t see.
- Winter date ideas: 25 cozy plans for cold eveningsTwenty-five plans for cold evenings, outdoors and in.
- Indoor date ideas for rainy days and lazy weekendsTwenty-two plans for rainy days and slow weekends.
- Cheap date ideas: 30 plans under $20 (and many free)Thirty plans under $20, sorted by price.
- Long-distance date ideas: 20 ways to have a real date apartTwenty dates for when you’re in different cities.
- Date ideas for two: what should we do?Shorter plans for this week, with filters for time, place, and budget.