When and where did the expression "bucket list" (for things to be done) come from? To the best of my memory it is quite new.
A list of things to do before you kick the bucket. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bucket list May as well add things to do before you buy the farm. http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-buy1.htm
You should watch the movie: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bucket_List before you ....give up the ghost....meet your maker....bite the bullet....bite the big one....bite the dust...etc.
Dictionary.com says that the colloquialism arose sometime between 2005 and 2010. As El Es said, it comes from the idiom, "kick the bucket," meaning "die." Dictionary.com offers this (somewhat hypothetical) origin for "kick the bucket." Kick the bucket, "to die" (first appearance 1785), is perhaps from unrelated Old French buquet, "balance," a beam from which slaughtered animals were hung; perhaps reinforced by the notion of suicide by hanging after standing on an upturned bucket.
I have the impression that it refers to things to do, without a reference to "before dying". I guess that's a recent evolution.