"Thirty, Flirty, & Thriving" My "30 by 30" Bucket List

Back when I was in my early 20s, I wrote out a bucket list of 30 things I wanted to do by the time I was 30. As with almost everything in my life, it MAY have been a tad overly ambitious 😝. I recently stumbled across this list and was pleasantly surprised by how much of it I’ve actually been able to accomplish – a whopping 70%! I thought it would be fun to document my 30 by 30 items and talk a stroll through memory lane for my birthday – so here goes. Disclaimer: Some of these aren’t “exact” – but close enough for me to feel like I accomplished what I wanted. Case in point – 10 miler instead of a marathon. My 22-year-old self had no idea what she was getting into putting a marathon on this list!

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1. Leave a waitress or waiter a $100 tip

Still outstanding. You’d think this would be one of the easiest ones, but for some reason I had completely forgotten about it.

2. Run a marathon

As mentioned – I didn’t run a “marathon” per se – but did train for and run all of the races in the triple crown of running, including the Papa Johns 10 miler. That was a huge accomplishment for me! I also learned that I never want to run more than 10 miles at once again 😩.

3. Become active in a volunteer organization

I spent several years in the Junior League and was able to find some awesome local organizations through that! While I’m still not as active in volunteering as I’d like to be, I do try to help out where I can.

4. Read 30 books to read before 30

Sad to say, this didn’t even come close to happening. For loving to read, it’s so hard to find the time!

5. Share a kiss on New Years with the person I love

Check – and now I get to share every New Years kiss with him!

6. Make somebody’s dream come true

This is a tough one to quantify, but I’ve confirmed with Felipe that I made his dreams come true 👌🏻.

7. Complete a 365-day project – whether it be a photo every day, a calendar entry every day, etc.

For 2 years in a row, I took a photo every day and made photo books out of them at the end of the year - It was a blast and really helped teach me that every day has something special if you know what to look for ❤️.

8. Participate in a flash mob

Why did I put this on my list? WHY? Didn’t happen. Won’t ever happen. I’m shy and awkward. Who would think this was a good idea?

9. Say “Yes” for an entire week

The movie "Yes Man" must have been the inspiration for this one. Realistically, I suppose I could try something like this and just see where it goes, but I’d never tell anyone until the week was over so I didn’t get any crazy requests.

10. Find a cause I’m passionate about and strongly support it

I’ve become passionate about several causes since writing this list, the “strongly supporting it” part is where it’s hard to keep up with the follow through. One thing I really am passionate about is minimalism and living intentionally. Felipe and I designed and built a tiny house to really pare down and live with exactly what we needed, enabling us to travel a ton, save for a future home, save for our future retirement – we can’t recommend this lifestyle highly enough for people who are in a place where it could work for a few years. It really helped us to maximize these young years where you’re starting to build your career, but have little life responsibility yet. Check out a post here on some things we’ve done to build our lifestyle!

11. Finish my Masters & Continue education (On my employers dime!)

I did finish my MBA, and even graduated with distinction! While I haven’t gone back for more official schooling since then, I did at least have my employer pay for my Rosetta Stone lessons… counts as education, right?

12. Pay off student loans completely

I hesitated including this in my post as I know it’s a really difficult thing for a lot of people and don’t want to come across as entitled or spoiled. I have been incredibly lucky to have a financially supportive family; my awesome Dad helped with my graduate loans and I had scholarships for a chunk of my undergrad. With some crazy strict budgeting and lots of frugality, we were able to pay my undergrad balance and start saving towards more fun things like tiny houses and travel!

13. Find a job I love and feel like I’m contributing to something

When I wrote this list, I was an intern with Schneider Electric. I since moved to a Business Analyst role, where I learned and grew so much – I was able to drive the creation of some really cool software and learned a ton about the software development process and software design in general. I’ve recently actually moved to a new job, where I’m an IT Project Manager and so far I’m loving it! It’s a very agile environment so I’m learning a ton and excited for the chance to grow in new ways.

14. Start an on the side business that I enjoy

A random coworker once told me that multiple income streams were the way to go in becoming successful. I didn’t even know this guy and was getting coffee in the break room at the time. That ended up being one of the most useful pieces of advice I’ve gotten! I’ve done all sorts of side hustles, the most notable being LuLaRoe. My mom, sister, and I started on as consultants pretty early on in that boom. We’ve had an awesome experience with it, and even have a little boutique shop of our own in my Mom’s garage! Our shop is another thing I’m really proud of, we took a concrete block garage and created a really gorgeous shopping space. Tiny house, boutique shop… side design projects are kind of my thing. Check out these posts on side hustles and capitalizing your income to read about all our extra money making schemes, with some tips on incorporating saving strategies into your own life!

15. Become fluent in another language

What is fluency really? While I definitely have learned a lot more Spanish, I still don’t consider myself even near fluent. I didn’t count this one as a check off the old bucket list as 1. I’m not fluent and 2. it’s still an outstanding goal of mine that I plan to reach one day 👌🏻.

16. Invent or create something

When I think back to when I wrote this list, it’s so crazy to think how much my

life has changed. I was still in grad school, hadn’t really started my career, was sub-leasing a room from a friend in the student apartments – I didn’t have a whole lot to show for myself besides a degree on paper. While we still don’t have a ton of material possessions (Minimalism, remember?), we’ve been able to accomplish so much and build a really wonderful life for ourselves <3. I’m annoyingly organized and love creating things – business plans, spreadsheets for everything, designs, websites, financial plans, you name it… All stuff I love to do in my spare time (#nerdalert). For a long time, those were fun things I did when I was bored but nothing ever came of them. Over the years I’ve been able to take a few of those plans and make them reality, which has been incredible! I feel like the most notable thing I created was the tiny house – I designed it from scratch using post it notes for drafting ideas and self-taught sketch up skills, and we built it with a lot of help from family, friends, and google. The summer we built that house is such an incredible memory for me, it was the last summer my surviving immediate family was together in Louisville and I’ll always look back on it so fondly. Huge shout out to everyone who helped us build our little home. Read more about the tiny house build process here.

17. Visit all 7 continents

This has sadly not been accomplished, but I came close! The two I haven’t hit are the two most difficult to visit, so procrastination and funds have kept me closer to home. Still a goal, though the more beaches I visit I’m starting to wonder if Antarctica is a realistic vacation spot :p. Anyone ever been there that wants to weigh in?

18. Visit the Harry Potter World theme park

We extended a holiday weekend by a day and let me tell you… this trip did not fall short of what I dreamed it would be. I think about going back all the time! It was a whirlwind weekend and is honestly one of my favorite memories to date. If you like Harry Potter, this is a must do. Heck, even if you don’t like Harry Potter, this is a must do. Is it too cheesy to say it was magical? 😂🧙‍♀️

19. Live / Work in a different country

I always wanted to live and work in a different country – I thought it would be a great way to experience a different culture for real, instead of quick vacations in and out. While I didn’t end up doing this, I do at least feel like I’ve accomplished some of the main purpose; I married into a Panamanian family and absolutely love visiting my husband’s home. So while I haven’t lived in another country, I’ve definitely experienced the Panamanian culture and we visit whenever we can – it’s much more like a second home than a vacation spot ❤️.

20. Do an extreme sport (Go Cage Diving, Ice climbing, rock climbing, or all!)

The most extreme I’ve gotten was rock climbing and zip-lining in Peru – We did a day trip to the Sacred Valley to “hike” up to these suspended pods for a lunch with a zip line down through the valley. When we arrived and were getting ready, Felipe and I ended up in the rock climbing section – I had apparently signed us up for the wrong one! I was about to tell the guide, but Felipe looked SO excited so I thought what the heck. I thought I might pass out when we were getting ready to start, but it wasn’t as terrifying as I feared and was actually a ton of fun – I’d even do it again!

21. Ride in a hot air balloon

I haven’t done this yet! I still think it would be really cool; it’s just so hard to find the opportunity.

22. Stand under a waterfall

I think my vision of this was like in a movie where there’s an awesome cave behind a waterfall and you stand in the stream of water. I still haven’t even seen a place like that, but Felipe and I DID swim under a waterfall in a cenote in Mexico and I say that counts 👌🏻.

23. Throw a dart at a (U.S.) map and go where it lands

I think this is also in the movie Yes Man! I must have watched that around the time I wrote this list. I still think this is such a cool idea, but I might be more likely to choose from a hat filled with cheap travel locations or something… I just can’t seem to justify an expensive trip to the middle of nowhere, but if it were a list of places Allegiant or Frontier go to from Louisville, that could work! Maybe for our next trip?

24. Go snorkeling

We’ve actually been snorkeling a few places now, and I learned that I love snorkeling! My two favorite experiences were snorkeling in Bocas del Toro, Panama and off some islands around Split, Croatia. I love the idea of scuba, but snorkeling is fun and you get to see beautiful things and seems MUCH less intimidating than Scuba. Maybe I’ll be brave one day and try scuba. 40 under 40 list?

25. Complete an adventure race

I actually checked this off the list recently, we did a 24-hour scavenger hunt around Louisville called “Questival” and it was SUCH a blast! It’s organized by Cotopaxi and you have to complete random tasks, checking off as many as you can of the list. We ended up winning the “Laugh” category and won tons of cool Cotopaxi gear – I was worried about the 24-hour thing making me exhausted, but we had the greatest time and I’d highly recommend doing it if they come to your city. Check out their site here to see if it’s coming to your city – Registration comes with a $40 Cotopaxi backpack, so it’s worth it just for that!

26. Build my Dream Home

This is… In progress. In case you don’t know, we’re in the process of building our next (permanent) home. Not tiny this time, but still very intentionally designed and it really sticks to the core necessities. We finalized the design and sent the first round of approvals to the city, so now we’re playing the waiting game until it’s approved and construction can officially begin. We absolutely love our future neighborhood and can’t wait to be in the new place – so much so that we already held my birthday party on the neighborhood dock 🎉🎂.

27. Get my PMP certification

Another in progress item. These things take time to study for! This is both a personal and professional goal that I really want to accomplish – I went through a pretty time-intensive few projects at work and this took a spot on the back burner, but it’s back in focus and a priority to pursue again now. Updates soon!

28. Cliff Dive

Well… I consider it cliff diving! We jumped off a cliff in Mexico. I was scared. Video proof exists.

29. Go hiking (Real hiking - not walks through hills in the park)

We visited my brother in Colorado a few years ago and did some awesome hikes while we were there! Some close to his home near Boulder, and an amazing trip to Crystal Lake (which was covered in snow), and the hanging lake (which was the opposite of covered in snow). Colorado weather 🤷🏻‍♀️.

30. Start a family

If you actually made it to the end of this post, you deserve to be one of the first to publicly know… we’re having a baby! Milo is pumped to finally be a ‘Big” brother, Toby is unsure about sharing our love but we reminded him how much he loves Milo and that this baby will soon be his best friend too. Felipe and I are beyond excited and can’t wait for the biggest craziest adventure of all to come 😍😍.

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With that bomb dropped, I’ll sign off. What a lucky and blessed life I’ve lived so far. Special thanks to Felipe, my family, and my friends for being everything to me and making every single day extraordinary ❤️. We can’t wait to meet you baby Mora!