Running dry on ideas for date night? Need a little Qwirkii fun with your honey, but lack a budget or time to come up with ideas? Well, I pulled together some suggestions to help inspire your date nights for the next year. I’m giving you 52 ideas for how to spend creative time together while spending little or no money to do it, so no more excuses – go and enjoy each other’s company!
Spending quality time together is what will keep your relationship happy and healthy. It’s time to tune-in to each other and tune-out the rest of the world, drop off the grid and do whatever it takes to keep the focus on just the two of you. If you have young children, it may not be practical to spend much – if any time away from them – for various reasons. However, it is important to still squeeze in some good couple-time with each other. In fact, you are modeling to them what a healthy relationship is, so it is essential that you set the right example so that they will pattern their relationships after yours. You can find ways to turn some ideas into indoor, “virtual” activities after the kids go to bed, keep them entertained in a different part of the room or house, or involve them.
For each idea, inject your personality into it. Look at the concept behind it and pull together what makes sense for where you live. Add a little “qwirkiiness” to the activity by playing dress-up. You don’t have to go full-on Cosplay but put together some fun outfits for each of you that lends a unique touch to the moment. If you’re a city-dweller, countri-fy some existing clothes, or go to a thrift shop and buy something that goes with the theme. Likewise, if you’re used to being laid-back, do the opposite. Just have fun with it.
SUMMER
- Build a campfire and toast marshmallows. Yes, this too can be done indoors. Be extra careful, but you can toast marshmallows on a gas stove or with a kitchen lighter. Microwave is a backup, but take care not to explode those marshmallows!
- Go swimming and play pool games together. If you don’t know how to swim, learn! This, too, can be your activity together.
- Give each other a manicure or pedicure. Extend this to hand and foot rubs. Sit on opposite ends of the couch and do it simultaneously while listening to music or watching a show.
- Go somewhere to watch people or animals. Children and animals are natural entertainers. Enjoy the wonders.
- Go to a free outdoor event, perhaps a concert.
- Lie on a blanket outside and watch the clouds or stars.
- Go on a picnic.
- Watch a fireworks display.
- Be creative and engage in sexual role-plays. Be anyone you’d like to be for the night who is also exciting for your partner.
- Sit by the water somewhere.
- Do a prolonged striptease for each other.
- Have a water balloon fight. Most dollar stores carry them. In the absence of balloons, make a game of who can soak the other with cups of water or up the ante with squirt toys. Some of the best fun you can have on a budget.
- Sit outside and read poetry to each other. If you’re not into classic romantic poetry, pick unusual ones. For example, if you’re into Edgar Allen Poe, read to each other at midnight and turn up fun chills.
FALL
- Go for a walk or drive together in “uncharted territories,” i.e., where neither of you normally venture.
- Go window shopping for cool stuff on each of your wish lists and click pics to add them to goal boards.
- Cook a romantic meal together. Pick a fun theme and decorate and dress up accordingly. Turn an ordinary spaghetti dinner into a spectacular night at a cute little Italian bistro.
- Reconnect with mutual friends you haven’t contacted in a long time. If they are far away, Skype with them. Reminisce about fun times together or bring them into your date night madness.
- Go through old photos together of pleasant times you’ve shared and plan a future date together to relive one of those times.
- Spend an evening just talking with each other. Talk about the things you have done, plans you have for the future, important people in your lives, or current events.
- Take a bubble bath together. If you’re not petite and have a standard tub, this may not be too practical, so you can take turns soaking in the tub while one bathes the other and washes the other’s hair. Do it dimmed lighting or in candlelight.
- Go to a free movie or museum. Check your local library or local government site for free events.
- Take a drive and find the potential in old houses and their properties.
- Create an imaginary story together and act it out.
- Take turns being each other’s genie in a bottle by fulfilling your partner’s every wish and fantasy.
- Play in the leaf pile. It didn’t become less fun as you got older.
- Find a fair or a festival to go to. Fall is a great time for harvest festivals and county fairs.
WINTER
- Attend a winter lights festival. If there isn’t one nearby, make your own. Buy some fairy or Christmas lights and string them up around a porch, if you have one, or in a room. Cuddle together and be mesmerized by them.
- Play cards—perhaps strip poker.
- Watch a movie together. Yet again, pick a random theme. Make popcorn or a healthy snack to munch on.
- Go outside and have a snowball fight. In the absence of snow, play “tag” with each other. Your neighbors will think you’re crazy, but they probably already do, so who cares?
- Get some finger paints and create your own body art with each other as your canvas.
- Have a slumber party with just the two of you. Get in your jammies and stay up until dawn, watching random shows you enjoyed as kids, drinking hot chocolate, and having an old-fashioned pillow fight.
- Go ice skating or learn it. If they have it in Dubai, there’s probably a skating rink near you, no matter where you live. If not, make some hot chocolate and watch the movie “Serendipity” together.
- Work out or exercise together. If you’re not already doing this as part of a healthy routine, start. If you have weight to gain or lose, make date night an opportunity to focus on it.
- Stage your own improvisation show. Find props around your home to inspire a funny scene. Hopefully, you are funny, but if you’re not, chances are that you will be just because of that (if you don’t understand my comment, your spouse will)
- Sing to each other. Karaoke night can be fun. Don’t be shy; pretend you’re a rockstar. Dress like one to fit the mood. Live out your rockstar fantasies together. Search online for free singing lessons even.
- Make a photo album or scrapbook of your memories together. If having photos printed is inconvenient, search for a way to do it online. Some of them can even be made into a physical scrapbook.
- Play a board game, like chess, Scrabble, or Cranium. Childhood games were fun then and can be fun again. It’s all in your attitude.
- Go to a library and hang out there together, reading for hours. If your kids are tagging along, check for storytelling times or other free children’s activities. You can hang out with your spouse next to the activity area and have your own fun.
SPRING
- Work on a remodeling project together. If you’re a renter, pick some easy projects you can make to add some flare to your home, like a decorated photo frame or repainting a thrift shop find.
- Plan and complete a small garden project together. If an outdoor project isn’t feasible, check online for cute container planting ideas. Substitute with silk plants and flowers if you lack time to maintain real ones.
- Do the spring cleaning together—room by room. When done, reward yourself by making love in the room you’ve cleaned.
- Put on old clothes, and mud wrestle after some drenching rain.
- Pack a lunch and go for a picnic at a local park. If it’s raining or there’s no place close to go, spread a towel on the floor, put on a nature show, and have your picnic in your living room.
- Play catch. If you’re not athletically inclined to things like frisbee or catching a baseball with a mitt, go to a dollar store and buy a cheap, large plastic ball to toss back and forth.
- Test drive the car(s) of your dreams. Ask someone to click pics of both of you sitting in it and add them to your goal board. If you have different dream cars, do each one on a different date if you can’t squeeze them both into the same date.
- Talk about what you wanted to be when you grew up (if you didn’t become it) and take turns doing an activity related to it. If you wanted to be an astronaut, go to a space museum.
- Dance together. Pick a style that seems fun and, if you’re not already familiar with it, learn it together through online or local classes. This is where dressing up can definitely add fun to it.
- Go on a hike and pretend to be on a safari. Make it a point to spot animals and unique plants. Crikey! Just look at the size of that squirrel! Some areas just aren’t chocked full of lions and tigers or bears, so your imagination will have to suffice.
- Take a free or inexpensive adult education class together. If you can’t find one locally, pick a topic and find a free lesson online.
- Check for mall or radio station promotional events. They often involve contests and giveaways, bring in special guests/hosts and activities.
- Go to a Holi Festival, the Indian Festival of Colors that signifies the victory of good over evil, the arrival of spring, and the end of winter. This is where you cover each other – and other participants – with brightly-colored powder. Very messy, but very fun.
These are just some inspirations to kickstart your own creativity. Take them and make them your own by adding dashes of your own personality.
Agree as a couple to try new things; if you find that you don’t like something once you’ve tried it, don’t ever do it again, but it will begin to free your minds and not get stuck in routine thought patterns.
It is important for you to find things to do as a couple that you can both enjoy. If you have vastly different interests, then agree to take turns and enjoy seeing each other indulging in those activities.
Keep your relationship fresh by doing things together regularly. Life distractions can put you – and your relationship – into ruts. Beat this by making your time together just as much of a priority as those other things in life. If you have children, remember that having happy parents is as equally important as time spent directly with them.
If you’re still single and are just reading this to daydream of the day when you can have a spouse do these fun activities together, you can modify the couple-activities into solo ones. You never know; you might just find your dream life-partner on one of your solo outings!
