14 Super Fun (and Thrifty) Ways to Say I Love You

Valentine’s Day is the hol­i­day of love. Well, at least accord­ing to Hall­mark. The stores are sat­u­rated in pink and red, the cal­en­dar has that pesky lit­tle fine print next to the four­teenth day of Feb­ru­ary, and the pres­sure is huge to com­mem­o­rate the big day with your sweet­heart. That often means roses, choco­late, a din­ner out…zzzzzz…oh, sorry, I drifted off there for a sec­ond. Valentine’s Day may be one of those oblig­a­tory hol­i­days, but it’s never a bad thing to show some­one how much you care, and it needn’t be bor­ing. Your honey deserves more than ho-hum! And the fun ideas that fol­low won’t break the bank, either.

1) Fill your sweetheart’s car or office or closet with bal­loons. Lots and lots of balloons.

2) Some­where between a mas­sage and a tickle is what I like to call “back skat­ing.” It’s like hav­ing your fin­gers ice skate across the back of your part­ner. Take turns draw­ing sim­ple pic­tures or spelling out words and see if they can guess the message.

3) Write a love mes­sage in soap on the bath­room mir­ror. Dry erase mark­ers also work beau­ti­fully (and wipe off eas­ily) on glass. Don’t for­get about adding lots of hearts. Or a funny mustache.

4) Get a box of those cheap kid­die valen­tines and hide them every­where: in the car, under the pil­low, in the lunch bag. Or make one grand ges­ture by fil­ing the sink or a briefcase!

5) Make break­fast in bed. But make it fun! Fash­ion a face out of the fried eggs and bacon. Or make heart-shaped pan­cakes, topped with sprin­kles or candy hearts. (And don’t for­get to use the good china.)

6) If you’re in the car together, kiss at every stop­light, or any­time you see a red sports car.

7) Slow dance to “your song” in the liv­ing room. Clothes are optional

8 ) Meet your honey for lunch with Happy Meals in hand.

9) If you live in a colder cli­mate, write a love note in the snow. You could use snow­balls, your foot­prints, or a spray bot­tle filled with col­ored water. Hooray for food coloring!

10) Replace the Chee­rios with candy con­ver­sa­tion hearts.

11) Get your sweet­heart a gift inspired by their favorite child­hood toy. It could be a t-shirt, cuf­flinks, a poster, or the toy itself, pur­chased on ebay.

12) Get a roll of cookie dough, but instead of bak­ing a dozen cook­ies, use it to make one BIG one!

13) Rent and watch a clas­sic love story from child­hood. Some­thing like Princess Bride, Beauty and the Beast, Lady & The Tramp, or one of my favorites, Karate Kid 2. (Fun trivia: Glory of Love by Peter Cetera was the first song Kim and I danced to as hus­band and wife.)

14) Make a pizza together — includ­ing the dough! (There’s some­thing roman­tic about being cov­ered in flour.) Arrange pep­per­oni in the shape of a heart and have a pic­nic in your liv­ing room.

What is your favorite FUN and THRIFTY way to say “I love you?”

by Jason Kotecki

Jason Kotecki is an artist, author, and pro­fes­sional speaker. Jason and his wife Kim (a for­mer kinder­garten teacher) make it their mis­sion in life to fight Adul­ti­tis and help peo­ple use strate­gies from child­hood to design lives with less stress and more fun. Stop by www.KimandJason.com for more tips for escap­ing adulthood.

Jason Kotecki

View all posts by Jason Kotecki