Dan and I have been dating a lot lately. It’s like being back in high school but I go out with the same guy every time and at the end of the night, he watches me brush my teeth and put on my muumuu. If he’s lucky, I also brush my teeth before the date and don’t put on the muumuu until after.
Dinner and/or a movie has been working well for us for months but we’re read to branch out and I’d love your suggestions. What are some fun date activities you enjoy with your shmoop?
I’ll give a couple.
Go to an arcade and play like you were little kids. Chuck E Cheese would even work for this. Sometimes it’s fun to go to places you normally take your kids but without them. You can actually enjoy yourself instead of following them around taking pictures and watching them have fun. That can be good too but sometimes it’s fun to enjoy yourself without worrying about who that weird creepy adult guy is crawling around in the tunnel maze with your 3-year-old.
Spend some time at a bookstore, browsing new sections and reading together. Dan and I had to stop reading a particular book last time we did this because we were laughing so hard we were worried we’d get kicked out and Dan was embarrassed by his own laughing man-tears.
Go kayaking in the Puget Sound… or other substandard body of water closer to where you live. We’ve done this once and it was a blast. Hopefully when the kids are older we’ll have the time and money to do this more often.
Okay, now you go. Tell me what we should do for our next night (or day) out.
Bowling is always fun. My husband would love it if we went golfing on a date. He promises that I wouldn’t even have to golf — I could just sit in the cart sipping Diet Coke.
I need to make this happen, too, so thanx for the nudge! You’ve already mentioned three of my favorites, then your first commenter added the bowling and golf that can be such fun sans kids. What about puttputt? Would that be easier on you at the moment, or are you trying to avoid physical, standing things? Have fun – I’m loving your Tuesdays, btw, and can’t wait to see some other suggestions 🙂
Dating?! That sounds vaguely familiar……
We’re getting all our dating in now before the mini-milk-sucker arrives.
We don’t get out much. You have to pay babysitters appalling amounts of money these days, so it’s usually not worth doing some substandard activity and then paying the 14-year-old more than I make to watch a kid for an entire day.
But we do have a lot of at-home date nights. Joining Netflix was the best idea we’ve had all year. We also bought a couple of cool recipe books – one for appetizers and one of recipes for non-alcoholic mixed drinks – so we put the kids to bed, fix ourselves some yummy treats, and watch movies. Works for us and costs significantly less than actually going somewhere.
We go mini-golfing and to the temple. Well, actually, we haven’t been on a date since mid-February, and before that was around Christmas to a work party? Babysitters are scarce up here.
Back when we were trying to use up all our engagement gift-card “swag,” we developed a date-night scavenger hunt, of sorts. We’d select one of our gift cards and then make a list of a bunch of things we needed from that store. When we got to the store we’d wander around, checking different things out (“Who in the world would buy that?”) and finding the things on our list. The goal was to get as many of the things on our list using only the amount of money that was on our gift card (quite often, this also helped us weed out things we didn’t really need or want). But really, the fun part was getting to walk around the store holding hands, laughing and garnering stares from other customers. Even though we’ve long since used up our stash of “marriage loot,” if we ever get a random gift-card for a present, we’ll often use it as the catalyst for a fun date night 🙂
Go ride a carousel.
Bake cookies and go and phantom friends (meaning leave a plate of cookies on their doorstep, ring the bell and run-maybe you should wait until after the baby for that one, although you could drive the getaway car and let Dan do the running).
Go to a play or concert at a local high school or college.
I third the mini-golf or bowling recommendations.
Go to a park with a camera and tri-pod and take silly couple pictures together.
Go shopping and pick out outfits for each other to try on that might not be something the other person would normally wear.
Go to a sporting event and snuggle up and stare longingly at each other to annoy the die hard fans around you.
Live music. If this were Boston I’d suggest Club Passim (not a dancing kind of club, a veggie/vegan pizza and live folk/jazz/etc music kind of club). Dunno what Seattle has but it surely has something.
High school or college sport matches (hockey, lacrosse, etc)
Our local churches have choral concerts every so often (not just around holidays, and outside of the regular services). Those are beautiful to listen to. Community choruses, musical ensembles, and plays are all great options.
oh – but you left out the best part of date night – a babysitting co-op! you need to explain that one! The husband and i never went out on a regular basis before this! It’s great – maybe that is because the kids are all great and easy to watch on our night!
I want to hear about a babysitting co-op because babysitters are scarce around these parts.
However when we do make it out I love to see plays and my husband always says it was worth it after the fact. We also like to go biking or hiking together. We try to find activities where we can have a conversation that is not interrupted every few minutes by “Mom, I have a question?” because that is a treat unto itself.
We made a deal with another couple in our church. We watch their kid on a Friday night once a month and they watch ours once a month. Also our college group has chosen to give all the parents a date night in our church once a month. We just go to the church building sign in the kiddos and we get to go do whatever for 3 hours! Another fun idea is to get some water color paints and paper, go to a park and both of you paint a picture. Then you get to make fun of each others paintings. Or you could get some side walk chalk and have fun that way too.
Frisbee golf. Cheap. Fun. All the makins of the perfect date 🙂
We don’t have any kiddles yet, but my favorite thing to do in college with Chris would be to walk to a Ben & Jerry’s for some ice cream, and then just walk around the park area. Sometimes there was a man playing a violin there, so it was pretty romantic.
We would sit on a bench, and even though not much goes on at our house, it is nice to just be outside and away from the usual tedium.
Picnics are nice too. Especially when you make the food together.
If we have a LOT of time (like, 3 whole hours!) we make a list of all our “favorites.” Sometimes we do fast food and sometimes regular restaurants. With fast food, for example: favorite burger: Wendys, favorite fries: McDonalds, favorite dessert: KFC apple pie. Then we go to all of them and just order those things! In regular restaurants, we do appetizer at one, dessert at another (too expensive and too much food to do the main dish too!) I think the best part is the getting to talk to each other, and just do something we would never do with kids because it is too much trouble. Even if it isn’t the most exciting activity, just being something out of the ordinary makes it fun!
I love day dates – grabbing lunch and going to a museum together, picnics (especially now that it’s getting warm!), exploring new places, etc. – things that let you just spend time together. You should check out springpad’s date night planner – it’s a great way to plan and organize the perfect date (day or night!) and I think you’d really like it!
Community theatre!! Check around for community theatres in your area- a great way to see a show for less money than live theatre will cost on a Broadway tour or done by pros, the talent is usually still great, and you support your local art scene!
My hubby took me ice skating for Valentines Day, something I loved to do in High School, but hadn’t been in many years.
Came over from Dandelion Mama – hi! DH and I love our bikes. We have a bike trail near our house that we like to ride on together. It’s nice that we don’t have to pull kids in the trailer or ride SLOW so they can keep up. 🙂
Also, we enjoy local theater performances although we don’t go nearly as often as we’d like.