Mini Shopping Spree

Go shopping with your spouse, but don't go crazy! Designate $25 or less, and purchase a small item for yourself, like sunglasses, a scarf, a hat, or cheap jewelry. Then, model your new treasures in the photo both at the mall! Take some silly pictures together and just have fun being together!

Carwash!

Have fun on  a hot summer's day by washing the car! Turn a boring task into something enjoyable and give yourself the chance to cool off. Make the task fun by having a water fight or making soap bubble mustaches!

Go Antiquing

Pick a Saturday and go downtown to visit the shops and antique stores in your town/city. Be on the look out for an item that represents or reminds you of your spouse. If desired, put a cap on the amount you are willing to spend. Purchase the item and give it to your spouse. When you get home, place the item somewhere you'll see it often to remember the important role that you play in your relationship and how much you mean to your spouse.

Reading Time

Agree on a novel or short story and take turns reading it out loud to each other. If you are not the one that is currently reading, cuddle with your spouse and relax while you listen to his/her voice. Enjoy being together as you explore new worlds and experience new adventures!

Love Letters

Spend 30 minutes telling your spouse how you really feel about him/her. Sit across from each other with paper and pen, and write a love letter to your spouse that explains what you love about him/her, why you are attracted to the other person, and what made you fall in love. Then, sit closer together and read the letter you wrote out loud to your spouse. Hold hands while you read, and afterwards, put the letters in a safe place where you can always go back to read them.

Build a Birdhouse

To go Home Depot, Lowes, your local hardware store, or Michaels, and purchase some cheap wood, nails, and paint. Go home and build a birdhouse together. Hang it from a tree in your yard and put seed outside. Enjoy the beauties of nature and the birds that come to pay you a visit!

Money Management

Talk about some of your financial goals as a couple. Where do you want to live? What kind of car do you want to have someday? How much schooling do you want to obtain? Kids? Vacations? Comforts of living?

Write down some of your financial dreams and turn them into goals. Do you want to be debt-free? Do you want to invest in certain stocks? Is there a charity you want to give generously to? Make a plan of how you can reach these goals you have. Write it down and make it realistic enough that it can be achieved.

When you're done, go out for ice cream!

Take a Walk Down Memory Lane

Spend the evening looking at photo albums of your wedding or other special events. Watch family videos, or if you don't have those, talk to your spouse about some of the fondest memories you have of your life together. Tell each other why those memories are so special and how they define you as a couple.

Invent a New Recipe

Come up with a new recipe with your spouse. Go to the store and buy random ingredients, take them home, and make something with them! Even if it doesn't turn out to be something "gourmet", enjoy the chance to be carefree in the kitchen. Take a picture of your creation and enjoy! If the recipe ends up being tasty, write down how you made it on a card and keep it handy for future reference.

Have a Photoshoot

Venture out into the city, a forest, a park, or even your backyard, and have a photoshoot with your spouse. Take pictures of one another, do funny poses, and take pictures of things you see that make n impression on you. Don't worry about looking beautiful or handsome; come as you are and enjoy seeing your spouse through a new set of "eyes".

"I am Thankful For....."

Take an hour or two to talk with your spouse about what you are thankful for. You can do this over dinner, during a drive out in the country, or on a park bench. Tell each other how thankful you are to be married to one another, and how each of you has made an impact in the lives of one another. Talk about the blessings that you have noticed in your life and how you can both be more grateful going forward.

Disney Date

Who doesn't like watching a Disney classic? Set up a blanket outside in the backyard  and bring an extension cord and TV out with you. Watch some of your favorite Disney movies while cuddling in a blanket and enjoying a nice bowl of popcorn. Take turns choosing movies, and find out why your spouse likes/dislikes certain movies.

A Competitive Service Date

Serving your spouse is always a good idea. I would hope that we all know that the more we serve someone the closer and more love we will feel towards them. Although serving your spouse is important, it can at times be hard to distinguish the areas they really want you to serve them in. So why not use a fun date night to come up with ideas?

Choose your favorite game, it can be a card game, an athletic/active game, or even a video game that you can play together. Any sort of game that allows for one winner between the two of you. Once you have both agreed upon a game, you will now think of three wishes, or things you would like your spouse to do for you. Try to keep them service related, and stay away from anything of monetary value.

Now you can begin your game! With each round you will each wager one of your three wishes. Winner takes the spoils and will get their wish granted within the next week and the other will lose their wish. Continue the rounds until you have both wagered all three of your wishes.

Won't You Stay with Me?

Go out with your spouse to a nice, dine-in restaurant and enjoy a meal together. Focus on talking to one another and don't let phones, TVs, or waiters distract you. After you've finished the meal and dessert, stay and talk to one another until you're one of the last ones in the restaurant. Use your conversation to ask each other what's new in life, about each other's past, what's ahead in the future, or what vacation you would like to take together next. Stay as long as you can, and take advantage of your time together.

Quality Time

Learn about Quality Time, one of the 5 love languages defined by Gary Chapman. No, quality time does not mean sitting and watching TV together! It means giving your undivided attention to your spouse by carrying on a meaningful conversation, practicing good listening skills, and limiting distractions. You can spend quality time together while doing an activity as long as your relationship and couple interaction are more important than the activity itself. Read more about quality time here.

On this date, practice the love language of quality time as you enjoy a walk or a bike ride on a local path or trail. Spending quality time together, especially if it’s one of your primary love languages, will create a stronger sense of togetherness in your marriage and intensify your friendship. Make sure to turn your phones on silent to limit distractions!

Your spouse should be the focus on this date. Enjoy the conversation, respond to each other, hold hands, be a good listener, and validate your spouse’s feelings. Talk about how your week went and how you both are doing mentally, physically, and emotionally. 

Watch a video that introduces all 5 of the love languages here

Take the love language quiz at http://www.5lovelanguages.com/profile/

Architecture Tour

Explore the different kinds of architecture that surround your city or town. Take a walk with your spouse down Main Street or somewhere downtown where you can admire the old buildings that your city/town used to thrive on. Talk about what your dream home would look like if you could design it yourself (unless you  already live there!). Talk about what excites you about the future, and how you and your spouse can take on future challenges together.

Be Good Parents, Gross your Kids Out!

Sometimes the fun of a date is all about anticipation. Your kids need the security of knowing that their mom and dad love each other, because that means stability in their lives.

So, for not only your sake, but the sake of your kids, make the moments gearing up for the date an affectionate one. 

• kiss extra long! 
• Stare into each other's eyes.
• Turn up the radio and dance in the kitchen.
• Text each other throughout the day, sharing your anticipation for that night.
• Tell your kids how much you're looking forward to your date with your love.

They may pretend they don't like it, but it's exactly what they need to hear. They'll put it in the back of their mind because one day, they're going to want the same thing for their family.

A Little Encouragement Goes a Long Way

Interesting fact: 

Did you know that going to church together is correlated with increased marital satisfaction?

  THIS STUDY found that religiously homogamous marriages had greater frequency of worship

compared to religiously heterogamous marriages. Frequency of worship was associated

with increased time spent together, which in tum was correlated with increased

marital satisfaction.

Irregardless of your choice of religion, finding a way to connect on a spiritual level will bring you closer together. Here are some suggestions of ways to connect spiritually.

Take Me Away

Sometimes we need to get away from the stale fast food and stinky socks in our minivan for the night. Take a joy ride away from the reminders of life for a few hours. Renting a car for a day is a great option - totally unpractical, unpredictable, and FUN. Don't we all need that in our lives every now and then?

Before you go, make a cruisin' music playlist together. Hit up several different drive-thru restaurants (drink, appetizer, main, and dessert). Park in between each "course" eat slowly throughout the night. After the courses are finished, find a place to park, turn up the music, get out of the car, and dance.

The Selfless Date

Have you ever noticed that after doing something really nice for your spouse you feel really good? Ever spend time serving someone and then come home to realize that all your worries have been forgotten about? Research has it that it is not by chance or coincidence that this happens.

At the National Institute of Marriage a research article shows, as many other research articles have shown as well, that those who spend time serving are much happier than those who do not. These people have greater personal relationships with others, have higher self esteem, and most applicable to you and why you are here on this blog...they have higher marital satisfaction.

Since we all want to be happier and we all definitely want to have higher marital satisfaction then maybe it's about time we start planning our dates more selflessly!

So lets get started: get out a paper and pencil and think up your spouses favorite things, maybe favorite memories, favorite activities, favorite food, even favorite sexual setting and in the case that your a girl, his favorite lingerie. Keep yourself out of the brainstorm activity completely and try to only focus on your spouses loves, some might coincide with yours which is all the better but try to keep the activity as unbiased towards your interests as you can.

Once your brainstorm is complete and you feel like you have enough to work with, create a date out of the things you have written down. For example: if one of his/her favorite memory is your proposal then try and visit the place it happened, or a place similar and have his/her favorite dinner there while listening to their favorite music. If you took your brain storming activity seriously then the date possibilities will be endless and incredibly endearing.

Tip: Take a minute after the date is complete to write down how spending all your energy trying to create your spouse's favorite date made your feel. Being able to reflect back on the positive feelings this date will inevitably bring will ensure you want to create more and more selfless dates in the future. You might be surprised to find that you spouse starts doing the same for you as well!

... Willpower for a Happy Future

From the movie Frozen, the infatuation Anna and Prince Hans have for each other is adorable, catchy, and fun. We've all been through it, for it is the first step to finding love. 

This article compares and contrasts infatuation with true love. Infatuation is based solely around intense feelings:

"Infatuation is the state of being completely carried away by unreasoning passion or love; addictive love. Infatuation usually occurs at the beginning of relationship when sexual attraction is central."

As the years pass by, infatuation doesn't have the ability to last and the test of love steps in. It isn't a chemical response any more - it takes patience, kindness, respect, and trust.

All those attributes aren't easy! As we are very aware of, the one we love isn't perfect. It takes willpower and determination to act this way even when it's not easy.

Are you determined to grow old together and be happy? Where do you see yourself on your 50th wedding anniversary?

Date Night in a Box

Big Lots

biglots.com

This date is going to take some pre-planning. You never know what you'll find at Big Lots. Find some items that would make a great Date night in a Box. Put them in a package and open it together at home for some things you can do together. 

Click here for some ideas. But really, the sky is the limit!

A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes...

Step 1: Plan you dream vacation together. Map it out and pick out all the sights you want to see.  Dream big!

Step 2: Then, instead of getting depressed when reality sets in, take a "Fake-cation!"

Turns out your fingers make a good pair of legs. :)

How about a good kiss in front of the Eiffel tower? Give it a try!

Just remember, it's not about where, but who you are with. :)

A Skill You Won't Regret Learning

HERE are 17 Free Massage Courses. Study up and practice on each other!

Learn to Cook Something New

HERE is a list of the most popular cooking channels on YouTube. Learn how to cook something you've never made before.

Finding Alone Time

It's no easy feat to get alone time together. But it's worth it! Just remember...the kids will be happy if mommy and daddy are happy, and that means alone time together.

Need some ideas to finding a way to get alone time?

• Ask around your local church for youth that babysit. If you are worried about not paying enough, READ THIS ARTICLE about how one mom tries to be realistic with the cost. 
• If you're worried about seperation anxiety, it will get better the more you do it. I had babies that cried every time, but as soon as I got out the door, they were fine. Now they happily wave goodbye because it is so routine, they know I will be back soon.
• Offer swaps with family. My mother-in-law offered a "movie night with grandma." We'd drop all the cousins off at Grandma's house and then we'd all scramble off to dinner. It was a great way for the cousins to play together too!
• If you don't have family, find a couple you can take turns with.
• Adopt-a-grandma. Any sweet old ladies that could use some companionship?
• Home date. AKA #MommyDaddyTime. Sometimes when nothing else pans out, the kids know that upstairs is off limits and they watch a movie.
• Lunch date swap. Sometimes its easier to ask a friend to watch your kids during the day, and then you can meet up with your husband for a bit during lunch hour. We've had success with this as well.

Make a Love Time Capsule

HERE is a great idea - make a love time capsule. On the same day every year, go through it and add more things that have happened that year.

Things you could put in your love box:

• Write a letter to your spouse.
• Take some kissing selfies and print them off. 
• Write best of/worst of for the year. 
• Favorite song of the year
• Best moments of intimacy
• Happiest moment as a couple
• Proudest moment as a couple
• Biggest challenge you've overcome as a couple
• Your hopes for next year when you open the box

Start a Love Journal

Keep a love journal by your bed. Take turns every other night writing in it. It doesn't have to be fancy - it can just be a plain spiral notebook. But the point is, it keeps love on the mind. It forces you to find the good things in each other - the little things - every day. 

Emotional Intelligence

How intelligent are you? We give a lot of credit to those that are smart with money, school, or on the street. But what about emotional intelligence? Do you know how to deal with your feelings?

Emotional Intelligence is equally as important. This article teaches four attributes of emotional intelligence:

• Self-awareness – You recognize your own emotions and how they affect your thoughts and behavior, know your strengths and weaknesses, and have self-confidence.
• Self-management – You’re able to control impulsive feelings and behaviors, manage your emotions in healthy ways, take initiative, follow through on commitments, and adapt to changing circumstances.
• Social awareness – You can understand the emotions, needs, and concerns of other people, pick up on emotional cues, feel comfortable socially, and recognize the power dynamics in a group or organization.
• Relationship management – You know how to develop and maintain good relationships, communicate clearly, inspire and influence others, work well in a team, and manage conflict.

Spend the weekend with your spouse at a hotel and get way from the everyday life. While you're gone, take the Emotional Intelligence test on your date, and discuss together how you could improve your awareness of each other's feelings.