"Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it." – Mary Oliver

The 50 Lists

As part of my 101 list I wanted to do a 50 lists project. I’d done a list project on my previous blog and I love the combination of structure and freedom the list format provides. So many topics can be covered by a list but the effort of writing them is fairly low. Looking back on some of the lists I’ve written over the years provides an interesting snap shot into my life. I recently completed my 50 lists project. Here they all are in one place:

  1. My Favourite Ways to Eat Leftovers
  2. Highlights from our Trip Away
  3. Foods I Ate Christmas Day
  4. 100 Things That Made My Year – 2023
  5. Things I Have No Intention of Ever Doing
  6. Things I Want to Learn
  7. Places I’ve Lived
  8. Multiday Walks That Are On My Radar
  9. Some More Pet Peeves
  10. Five Simple Household Items That Make Life Better
  11. Decisions I Need to Make
  12. Soups on Regular Rotation
  13. Some More Things To Do If I Make It Back To Paris
  14. Return to Running Program
  15. All My NaBloPoMo Posts
  16. 100 Things That Made My Year – 2024
  17. Sports I’ve Done
  18. Good Things Friday – January 2025
  19. What I Did On A Mid-Week Day For Myself
  20. US National Parks (And Historic Parks) We Visited
  21. Good Things Friday – February 2025
  22. Good Things Friday – March 2025
  23. Strengths Of The Australian Democratic System
  24. Good Things Friday – May 2025
  25. Neighbourhood A-Z
  26. Good Things Friday June 2025
  27. Good Things Friday July 2025
  28. What We Did This Week On The Central NSW Coast
  29. Some Things I’ve Been Reading
  30. Another Peevish List
  31. Good Things Friday August 2025
  32. Five Year Travel Wish List
  33. Places I Need To Declutter And Organise
  34. Good things Friday, September 2025
  35. Habits on my Tracking Spreadsheet
  36. Good Things Friday, October 2025
  37. Five Podcasts I Listen To
  38. Five More Things About Me
  39. Books I Have on Loan From the Library
  40. Wildflowers we saw while in the Grampians
  41. Travel MVPs … Or Five pieces I love to pack
  42. What I ate last week
  43. Summer Veggies in my Wicking Bed
  44. 10 Recent Purchases
  45. Today’s Shopping List
  46. Good Things Friday – November 2026
  47. All My NaBloPoMo Posts for 2025
  48. What I Ate on Christmas Day
  49. A Few Adventurous Things I Have Done

Obviously I will keep making lists even though this project is done and I will keep posting some of the here. Do you use lists to document your life?


Comments

17 responses to “The 50 Lists”

  1. Good job! You’re really doing that 101 list!

    There are lists everywhere in my life. Last night before bed I wrote a list of things I needed to do before I left the house this morning. If it’s not written down, it’s not going to get done! For my blog’s 20th anniversary, I had twenty bloggers write lists on my blog. LOL. I am realizing now that that was a big ask for them!

    1. Lists may be the one thing that helps people keep their handwriting skills.

  2. This is so great. I read the post about all the houses you’ve lived in and I loved it. I wasn’t sure whether to comment there or here, so I popped back over here. I live very close to where I was born. When I was very young, we moved out of state a few times due to my dad being transferred for his job at International Harvester, where he was an accountant/controller. The moves were all only a few hours away from our extended family in Chicago. First chance my dad got to transfer back to the Chicago office, he took it. I was devastated, as a 5 year old – I loved our neighborhood and our family friends felt more like family than friends. Once back in Illinois, I lived in the same house for 8 years. Then we lived in a northern suburbs of Chicago near Wisconsin while I was in high school and college. A few years after I graduated from college, my folks moved out of state for my dad’s job. I lived in a condo that I’d bought by then – very near where I live now. Then we lived in our first house for 9 years and we’ve lived in our current house for almost 18 years.

    1. I think there is a time limit on the comments section, so commenting here makes sense. Interesting that you moved a fair bit during your childhood but have basically stayed put as an adult.

  3. I LOVE lists. Especially when there are very specific things I write down that I know need to be done. Nebulous lists can feel frustrating to me (things that I could do, but am not sure/don’t want to do). But writing down a list of chores to power through and cross them off systematically brings me so much joy!

    1. I love a Someday list, I mean most of the things I’ll probably never get to, or I don’t want to do in a few months time. IT is a good place holder sometimes when something interests me but I don’t have time, aren’t sure whether I want to devote the time.

  4. Scrolling through the titles alone already gives me a snapshot of your life, Melissa!

    Food, travel, running, reading, faith, everyday habits, small annoyances (the peevish list!), big joys, it is all there. I like how the Good Things Friday lists keep popping up.

    I use lists a lot as well, from shopping to training to my “List of 100 dreams”. It’s so easy to forget good ideas otherwise – and they are nice little time capsules.

    1. I love the time-capsule aspect of the lists you mention. Especially the want to do/need to do variety that shows what was on yuor mind at a given moment.

  5. I love me a good list, but doing 50? Okay, so I’ve probably done more than that in my entire life but still, maybe I need to start this on the blog as a fun exercise on a Monday say.

    1. You should give the that series a go. It is a fairly quick and versatile format.

  6. Hooo boy! So much to catch up on for me! Can’t wait to dig in.
    I make lists on a smaller scale (grocery, work things, some reminders for adulting). But other than that, no big lists. Well, my 2026 intentions list is kind of big. Interestingly, when I have a task (register the kids for summer camp), I write it on the calendar instead…
    Oh actually I have a”list” of sorts of places I want to visit- it’s a total mess.

    1. I have lots of those types of lists too. Things to see and places to do, but way more than I could possibly ever do and I keep adding to it.

  7. I see a lot of fun lists on this list! I am also a chronic list maker. I could definitely come up with fifty and probably more like 350 over the years since I started my blog. Of course, don’t even get me started on lists I have on my phone and in various other places. I think that two of my favorite things are lists of lists and bags of bags! 🙂

    1. Haha, I have bags of bags too.

  8. Lists are my sanity.
    And that is way I shamelessly copied this prompt.
    However you are much smarter in declaring all sorts of blogposts as lists. I probably should be a bit easier on myself.

    1. Yes, you can actually make lots of blog topics into lists.

  9. I live for list. This is a great list of lists! 🙂