Okay you guys, this one has been on my heart for a long time and I've rewritten it about four times, so I'm just going to say it.
Belle Bucket isn't new. I've been making bucket lists since 2016. It started on Etsy with custom printable bucket lists, the kind you fill in with your family and stick on the fridge, and for years that's what it was. A cute little side thing. And then somewhere in the last couple of years it stopped feeling like a side thing and started feeling like the thing I was supposed to be doing, and I couldn't shake it.
So I rebuilt the whole thing. New site, new products, new everything. And I want to tell you why, because the why is the whole point.
What a bucket list really is
I used to think a bucket list was a travel list. Big trips and big dreams and someday.
I don't think that anymore. A bucket list is a LIFE list. It's the trip, yes, but it's also the pumpkin patch you keep meaning to go to and never do. It's learning mahjong with your friends at 40 because you always wanted to. It's the bread you said you'd bake, the state you said you'd see, the Saturday you said you'd spend with your kid and then didn't because the laundry was there.
Living intentionally, to me, just means deciding on purpose what your life is going to have in it and then going and doing it. You write it down and then you check it off and you stop waiting for someday.
We were not the family that traveled. Then we stopped waiting. That's the story of the O'Neal mobile (read it here) and 47 states and every guide on this site. Nobody handed it to us. We wrote it on a list and went.
So that's what Belle Bucket is now. The custom bucket lists, the family road trip guides, the roadschool curriculum, the points education, the hobbies, all of it. A space to help you live your bucket list. Every part of your life you keep saying you'll get to.
How Jesus got me here
I can't tell this story without Him, so I'm not going to try.
If you've read my Consider the Lilies post (read it here), you know about the twenty year old girl in the bed who couldn't get up. That was me. I wasn't walking with Christ and I didn't have one single idea how to get out. And through the atonement of Jesus Christ my heart was changed. I am such a different person than I once was. I was truly changed through Christ, and I have fought so hard for the person I'm working, through Him, to become.
I say that because the girl in the bed didn't have a bucket list. She didn't think she got to want things. And the woman writing this has a van full of kids and a list on the fridge and a business built around the idea that your life is yours to live on purpose. I didn't do that. That's what He did with me.
And He's the one who kept putting this on my heart. Every time I tried to set Belle Bucket down and be reasonable, it came back. Every trip we took, every time the kids learned something on the road that no classroom would've given them, every mom who messaged me asking how we do it, it was like He was saying, this. Do this. So I prayed about it a lot and I finally said okay. I'm all in. Here it is.
Some of you don't believe what I believe and I love you and you are so welcome here. But I'm done leaving this part out. Buckle up, because I have a LOT to share.
What you'll find here
Custom bucket lists you fill in yourself, by season and by moment, starting with the fall bucket lists (bellebucket.com/fall). Real road trip guides from trips we took, with the mess left in (bellebucket.com/guides). A roadschool curriculum for families who learn on the road. The Points Room, where I teach you how we fly and stay for free (bellebucket.com/points). The master list of every single thing we use in the van (bellebucket.com/road-trip-essentials). And a journal, this journal, where I get to write about all of it. Including Dolly Parton. Including the bear.
How you can support this (if you want to)
A few people have asked, so I'll just be honest about it.
Belle Bucket is a small family business. It's me, at a kitchen table, after bedtime. So this is what helps.
Buying a list or a guide obviously helps, and I try to make every one worth way more than it costs.
The affiliate links help too. When I link something on Amazon, like the Jackery or the Yoto, and you buy through my link, Amazon sends me a small commission. It costs you nothing extra. I only ever link things we own and use, and I will never link something just to link it. If you're going to buy it anyway, buying it through the links in my van list is the easiest way to support us, and it adds up more than you'd think.
Sharing helps. Sending a post to a friend who needs it, saving a pin, tagging @bellebucket when you spot the van. That's how a tiny brand grows without a marketing budget.
And the email list helps most of all, because it's the one thing nobody can take away from me. Every drop, every guide, every freebie goes there first, and you get the free National Parks bucket list the second you join.
If all you ever do here is read and feel a little braver about writing your own list, then this is working.
Thank you for being here. Now go write something down and go do it.
xo, Amy
