It’s no secret that we are living the frugal life. And any extra money we can carve out tends to go to road trips and other vacations. So when a holiday rolls around, we’re always scrambling to come up with an affordable way to celebrate. One of the best cheap date nights we ever had was our Budget Valentine’s Day.
Requirements: Fun activity, fancy dinner, AND presents for under $20.00
The Plan
Fun Activity – Thrifting for Love
We hit up the local Deseret Industries (any thrift store would work – the cheaper, the better). We each had a budget of $5 to find a present(s) for the other person. We had half an hour to walk around and look at everything. We each had a cart with a blanket so that we could cover up our awesome finds in the event that we ran into one another (intentionally or otherwise). Hiding the gifts was just as much fun as finding them.
This was what I got for him. He has always wanted a little fountain for our bedroom because he likes the sound.
Fancy Dinner – Make It Yourself
Yes, we actually made our own dinner for Valentine’s Day, and it was really good. I will warn you that the pictures make it look terrible. We had the lights out for romance, and the pictures were taken with a terrible camera. Also, I didn’t really know how to cook steaks at the time. I promise I’m better now. Still, it’s a pretty cute set-up, huh? And, the entire meal only cost us $10 – most of which was spent on the steaks and sparkling grape juice.
Alternatively, if you don’t want to cook, you could order Applebee’s Carside To-Go. They have a 2 for $20 menu that allows you to get two dinners (yes, they have a small steak dinner on there) and an appetizer for $20 plus tax. That would still bring the total for this date under $35 which is a great deal… AND you don’t have to cook OR do the dishes.
The Presents – Wrapped with Love
Obviously, we already had our presents from the thrift store. For the record, he got me a beautiful frame, yummy-smelling bath salts to ease my chronic pain, and a cute little figurine. After dinner, we went to separate rooms and wrapped them using free newspapers from on campus. As you can see, I got a little creative in my wrapping… Don’t judge my terrible puns.
This may be cheesy (American Cheese is circled), but you make me warm when I’m (Chili is circled).
Will you be my (honeydew is circled) – Dew?
The Results
We managed to have a wonderful evening without getting caught up in everyone else’s madness all for under $20.
