I really enjoyed writing about the importance of date nights a few months ago and really enjoy getting out with my wife and having quality time. But a lot of the time we are guilty of doing the same things, whereas when I was dating her in South Africa, I was always planning something new.

So with a desire to be more spontaneous I found a list on a blog called thoughtcatalog.com to give some inspiration. I hope you enjoy it as I did and it inspires you too to do some new things together!

1. Make a fire outside. This is free and hands down, the best date ever.

2. Cheer on an amateur sports team in your city. It’s just as fun as supporting a Real Team but tickets are dirt cheap. My city’s non-pro baseball team has a few dates during the summer where tickets are $5.

3. Bowling is always a fun night out, and if you go during the week you can find somewhere to do it super cheap.

4. Lots of cities are getting cheap and easy bikes you can rent around town and return at any number of vending locations. This is a great way to see your neighborhood differently.

5. Go to a park where you can feed the ducks.

6. Play a Monopoly game through until someone wins. Play music (not TV) in the background. You’ll have fun conversations and learn a lot about your partner’s business sense while doing it.

7. Go to a flea market or hit some thrift stores. You don’t have to buy anything, it’s fun to look around at antiques and nostalgic products.

8. If you do find things at the flea market/thrift store, you can fix them up together.

9. Hike anywhere nearby with a great view.

10. Look up the events calendar of your local paper, there’s tons of free events like art shows, block parties, and festivals that you can go to together.

11. My go-to cheap date is to grab some food from my apartment and walk to the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden and walk around/hang out on the grass. This works with a community garden or a regular park as well.

12. Take a community education class together.

13. Learn how to cook and spend time together making nice dinners and eating them over candlelight.

14. Go to the beach.

15. Volunteer at the Humane Society together and play with dogs that need extra love.

16. When the fair comes to town, why not go alone together with out the kids and ride the big wheel.

17. On the first windy day of spring go buy the $4 kids kites from the grocery store and fly them in the park.

18. If you live somewhere without light pollution, sit outside and try to identify as many constellations as you can. There’s some handy apps for this, or you can just try from memory and be creative.

19. Find a coffeehouse that has live music and go there for a night. Even if you have two drinks each coffee is inexpensive and you’ll have paid less than $10 each for a whole night’s activity.

20. The gold standard of a cheap date: mini golf. It’s a fun outdoor activity that takes awhile to complete and forces you to have conversation while giving you something to talk about the entire time. If either of you is actually into golf, the driving range can be just as fun, but slightly more athletic.

21. In the summer, get some ice cream and go for a walk through a fun neighborhood.

22. Ice skating. Outdoor rinks in the winter are so romantic and beautiful. There’s a weird amount of privacy despite being around other people, so you can have good conversations without being forced into it.

23. Find out the free or reduced-price days to go to your local planetarium or museum.

24. Learn to play pool if you don’t already know how. You can go to any bar and spend the whole night for very little money. You can get competitive and play each other or make friends by playing as a team against other couples.

25. If you don’t like coffee, try a juice press shop.

26. If you’re an extroverted couple: karaoke. If you’re not: watching other people karaoke.

27. Go to http://www.pickyourown.com and search for the area you live in. You’ll get a list of local farms where you can pick your own produce. Spend the day filling a bucket up with strawberries and then go home and make strawberry shortcake and/or jam.

28. Most communities have some form of “movies in the park” going on in the summer months. It’s usually a free activity where they play movies in a local park on a giant screen.

29. If either of you is interested in photography, spend the day walking around a nearby town or city, trading the camera back and forth and see who comes out with the best shots.

30. Make and bottle a batch of salsa together. Figure out who likes it spicy and who likes it with corn added. Come up with a name for it.

31. Go to a nature center on a day when they are doing some kind of guided tour. It can be interesting to learn the names of your local trees and plants that you’ve seen forever but known nothing about.

32. Buy the ingredients for you to both make variations of the same dish and have a cooking competition.

33. Buy two lottery tickets. Get a laptop out and dream up a bucket list of places you’ll visit and things you’ll do when you win.

34. Go to bingo night somewhere. You’ll make tons of weird friends. Bingo people are a lot feistier and more interesting than you’d imagine.

35. Google how to give a great massage and take turns perfecting your techniques.

36. Go through each others phones or computers and share pictures of memorable trips or events from your life. Tell stories about what is important to you.

37. Take up tennis — It can be free after you both have racquets and you get to spend time outside together.

38. Google how to give a great massage and take turns perfecting your techniques.

39. Indulge in a seasonal activity: pumpkin carving, making hot chocolate from scratch, grilling outside, etc.

40. Wait for a night that has nice weather and go somewhere where you can see the city lights/skyline and just chill out. This could be from a scenic overlook in your car or just heading up to the roof of your apartment building.

The list appeared at http://thoughtcatalog.com/christine-stockton/2014/04/50-fun-cheap-dates-that-arent-netflix/ by Chrissy Stockton