spring at home: a rainy day bucket list
snuggling up with a book, spring baking, puzzling the day away, etc.
All day long, it has been dark and dreary outside. The rain has been falling in curtains, even indoors I can hear it rushing down the side of my house. We’re solidly in spring now. It’s mid-April, days are getting just a little warmer and rainy season is here. A few days ago, we had this spring’s very first rain shower and afterwards out popped the first rainbow I have seen this year. A true symbol of spring!
As I’m delighted by the rain’s arrival this spring, I thought it would be fun to share a bucket list of activities to do indoors when you are stuck inside on a rainy day. It seems like more often than not rainy days are busy working or otherwise occupied; but if you have any magically free days at home during this rainy time of year, make the most of it, won’t you?
One tiny note - if seasonal bucket lists bring you as much joy as they bring me, you might like reading my winter outside and winter inside bucket lists too. Now, on to rainy day rituals!
Snuggle up with a book.
Reading has to be the ultimate rainy day activity (and as I’ve shared before not just a rainy activity but also a sunny activity, a cold weather activity, and a literally anytime activity). Snuggle up under a blanket, open up a page turner and lose yourself in the world of a favorite author for a few hours.
Bake up something sweet.
I’m not a huge baker most of the time but when it is a little cold and dreary outside, nothing is more appealing than a warm and toasty oven and the delicious scent of baked goods. For everyday projects, my favorite thing to bake are cookies. Quick to put together and always tasty! A few of my tried and true recipes are Alison Roman’s shortbread chocolate chunk cookies from Dining In and the lemon poppyseed cookie in Melissa Coleman’s the Minimalist Kitchen. This year I have been enjoying baking from Sugarhouse Workshop’s seasonal zines as well.
Since cookies are more of an everyday baked item, I think rainy days are a lovely time to dig into a little bigger baking project, like breakfast pastries, a rhubarb galette, or even a cake. The incredible cinnamon rolls shown above come from Sarah Kieffer’s Baking for the Holidays which I have used the last several years for festive holiday baking. I find her recipes to be incredibly well written and easy to follw. If you’re interested in trying a more elaborate baking project outside your comfort zone, I would highly recommend trying something from one of Sarah’s cookbooks or blog.
Get organized.
After a few hours of unencumbered idleness, you might be itching for something productive to do. (Or maybe not! In that case, carry on with a relaxing day). A rainy day at home could be a pleasant time to tackle a small, satisfying organizing project. One project that is both painless and relatively quick is organizing your bathroom.
Take everything out of your bathroom storage/cabinet/closet and sort through it all to see what you use regularly.
Toss anything out of date or that won’t be used (and think how you can avoid buying or receiving other items like this in the future that will inevitably end up in the garbage).
Set aside anything that could be donated or passed on to a friend and make a plan to do so.
My favorite part! Choose a basket or another small container you already have on hand and fill it with any of those random toiletry items you have sitting around that you were planning to use “one day”. I’m thinking that bath bomb that your sister gave you, that foot soak that has been sitting in your cabinet for months (years?), and that face mask that you bought because it looked fun but never ended up using. Keep the basket in a place you see daily and prioritize actually using the items in it. See how quickly you can empty the basket and luxuriate in not only using some fun products but also the additional space left in your bathroom storage.
Before returning everything to it’s place, think through anything that would be better corralled or separated and get creative! Your bathroom is the perfect place to reuse old containers. Clean pasta sauce jars are ideal for storing cotton balls or q-tips. I like to use the sturdy boxes my phone and headphones came in to divide up my bathroom drawer and keep my deodorant, toothpaste, floss, and other items organized. Unused bins or baskets you already own could be the perfect thing to separate your first aid items from your extra toiletries. Rock what you’ve got!
Finally, put whatever you have left (that you will actually use) back away.
Ahh. Enjoy your reclaimed space.
If you’re bathroom isn’t in need of organizing, there are plenty of other bite-sized projects you could do. You could organize a drawer in your kitchen, do a quick pantry clean-out, or refresh your living room (15 minutes of tidying up, dusting and a quick sweep or vacuum). Whatever you choose, keep it manageable! Thirty minutes spent organizing on a day at home feels good; a day-long slog of deep cleaning your baseboards does not.
Make a big ol’ pot of soup.
Along with a baking project, a rainy day is the perfect time to cook up a little more labor/time intensive meal than usual. A big pot of soup or stew is my favorite slow cooking meal! Take your time chopping up veggies (I love listening to a book on tape while prepping) and get a pot going slowly on the stovetop. Something that gets better the longer it cooks is just perfect. My favorite vegetarian stew is Alison Roman’s delicious coconut-chickpea-turmeric recipe that heavily relies on canned items (so easy and no trip to the store in the rain!) and there are also countless delicious vegetable soups - dill and lemon, lentil soup, bok choy and udon, chickpea noodle. Choose your adventure!
Daydream about future travel.
If you have any upcoming trips, a rainy day is the perfect time to do some research (or daydreaming!) about it. Browse for places to stay, save restaurants you’d like to eat at or sites you’d like to see, and pick out any fun activities for the trip. I also love to find books set wherever I am travelling to and read those in the weeks leading up to the trip or even during the visit itself. It’s such a fun way to get excited for your travel and get to know the personality of the place you are visiting. Use your rainy day to comb book lists and local authors and save some travel-related reads to your to-be-read list.
Puzzle the day away.
Similar to reading, puzzling is something I would be happy to do 365 days a year. Spending a few hours sorting through pieces and slowly fitting them together is such a cozy way to fill a rainy day. Better yet, if you’re rained in with someone, you can rope them in to puzzling the day away alongside you. If puzzling isn’t your jam, card games are also a classic rainy day activity and an easy way to while away the hours on a day indoors.
And for an outdoor bonus: even if it is raining, just go for a walk.
Thank you for reading! If you’d like more nudges to live seasonally, please subscribe to seasonal things.
Disclosure: I am an affiliate of Bookshop.org and I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase of any of the books linked in this post.
I need to clean out my bathroom cabinet, and I love the idea of actually setting aside the items you were saving for a “special occasion” and just using them already!