Lately, I’ve been using my free time to research places to eat, areas to explore, and walls to take a good Instagram in front of. As it turns out, this feels way more productive than scrolling through Instagram and Twitter … plus, it also helps make me feel even more excited for the nice weather.

There are so many things I want to do! And they’re more or less ~accessible~ because they’re in my city/state! They’re located in New York, just like me. Bucket lists are cool, but “to explore” lists are even greater, especially when you can make them realistic and reachable.

Here’s how to make a list of places and things to explore and do in your city … and here’s a peek into my list of things to do in New York for some inspo!

Finding things to do

This might not be as easy for those who aren’t in or near a major city, but here are some strategies I use.

Read local magazines or publications

First of all, your town and nearby towns’ newspapers are a great place to start. It’s worth skimming them to see what’s recently been voted the top brunch spot or what new art exhibit is opening up in the next town over.

TimeOut New York is great for reading about upcoming events and festivals or new restaurants worth trying. A lot of cities around the US have their own version of TimeOut, so it’s definitely worth looking into that.

Trust the Locals is another website I recently discovered. Although it’s definitely directed for travelers (it’s so useful!) it’s also handy if you find locals who are from your city or nearby areas! I don’t think the site’s been updated in a while, but digging through the archives is so fun and it’s provided me with travel inspo and ideas for a few new places I want to visit in NYC.

Read More: The Guide to Having Fun in NYC When You’re Broke

Follow people who work and live in your area on Instagram

Bloggers are especially great people to follow if you’re trying to find aesthetically pleasing photo spots and delicious places to eat.

Whenever local bloggers or people who live in your area post stunning Instagrams or tasty looking food, check the location or place they’ve got tagged on the post! I’ve found that this is such a great way to find new places to add to my Google Maps pins and my “To Explore” list.

Watch vlogs about people who live in or are traveling to your city

YouTube can be a pretty handy (and entertaining) resource. Just do some searching! I usually do this when planning a trip, but you can do this with your own hometown or local cities.

Some terms to try searching: “A Day in My Life: New York,” or “Staten Island travel vlog” or “Weekend trip to Poughkeepsie” or “Trip to Brooklyn in the winter.” Switch up those keywords! You’d be surprised at how many videos you might be able to find.

Read up on Google reviews, Yelp reviews, and TripAdvisor reviews

This is my guilty pleasure when I’m bored and trying to find things to do in my city and any potential cities to visit in my lifetime (Seattle, Washington, and Austin, Texas, are my new favorites to dig into!)

Search broad categories or search for something as simple as “things to do” or “best brunch” and see what you find!

Check Facebook events

This is a great way to find fairs, festivals, and nightlife events. You can see what friends in your area are going to or interested in or you can try doing your own little searches like “Brooklyn flea markets” or “Staten Island food festival.”

Organizing the list

There are so many ways you can do this! If you’ve been reading my blog (or you know me IRL), you probably know I love any excuse to make a ~ spreadsheet ~ with Google Sheets. This is one of those perfect excuses.

Here are a few different ways to sort your lists whether you want to combine all of these strategies or just choose a few.

Make a Google Sheet (or Doc)

This is especially great if you want to make a list with friends or a significant other because you can share the list and everyone can add new things to the list!

Plus, Google Sheets is the bomb for organizing things into different categories and it’s easily searchable. You can also access the list on your phone (with the Google Sheets app) or on your desktop from anywhere. I swear I’m not sponsored by Google Sheets, I just love them so dearly.

Divide it by season

This is especially handy for those who live in areas where the seasonal weather can actually impact your plans.

For example, you might want to save your ice cream crawl for summer and you might only be able to go apple picking in the fall. If your list is mostly restaurants and eateries you may want to just make some seasonal notes/use a certain color or key for things that can only be done in a certain season instead of using this to sort your entire list.

Make a section for things to do annually or “tried and true” events and places

This is handy if there’s already a bunch of things you’ve done that you want to try to do or visit every year. For example, if you went to an awesome haunted house or an annual beach cookout, you’d add those to the list almost as a reminder to keep an eye out for them each year

Include details and make categories 

It can be handy to include details for each place/event like the price (or if the event offers Groupons on the reg), the location, a mini description, etc. Some categories you might want to include are restaurants, one-time-only events, shopping-focused events, or food-focused events.

You may also want to make a category for more “out of reach” events that might be a bit more expensive or require a lot more planning, like something that you may need to drive a few hours to get to or something that’ll require putting aside a chunk of change.

Make note of things that are close together

Being able to batch things is awesome! If an event you want to go to is right near a museum and dessert shop on your list, consider tackling them all in one day! Make notes of where things are on your list.

Make your list into a calendar

If you’re someone who oftentimes has ideas and makes vague plans, this might help you actually stick to a schedule and do things. When you find events, pop them on your calendar! If there’s a place you want to visit, assign it a day you’re going to go. This is such a cool way to scatter fun things throughout your year, and it can be updated constantly or mapped out in advance.

Plus, if you make your calendar on Google Sheets, you can share it with others and they can note if they want to come with ya on any of these ventures. God, I love Google Sheets (sponsor me, please). You can also just straight-up make a new calendar on Google Calendar and call it your “Fun Stuff” schedule.

My NY list of things to do and place to explore

As soon as I publish this post, you can bet I’ll be organizing this into a color-coded spreadsheet. For now, I’m going to give you a taste of some of the things on my list. Keep in mind that this doesn’t include a lot of restaurants/dessert shops because I have so many that it’d probably entail an entire post.

Read More: Unique Things to do in NYC

Outdoor events to go to when the weather is nice: