Meeting someone you have corresponded with for so long can be very nerve wracking, even if you’ve done it countless times before. You may wonder: Will I meet up to their expectations? Will we connect the way we do over the phone? Or will we connect the way we did when we first exchanged numbers? You might feel like there’s so much that can go wrong!
This article aims to provide calming date ideas that will help you and your loved one make every visit together one that you won’t be quick to forget!
Create a “Bucket List” Together
Write a bucket list of all the things you would both like to do the next time you are together. Include places to visit, activities to try, foods to eat, things to smell and sights to see. You can create a bucket list to complete on a single visit, or you can create one that you will both complete over a series of visits. Make one of the final goals on your bucket list “Finally being together.”
Create a “Story Scrapbook”
Go to a public place like a mall, a café, a supermarket or anyplace you’d like and take photos of people. Try to catch people who look strange, or stand out to you both in some way.
Develop or upload the photos and come up with stories for each person in the photos you took. Write them out into a notebook and pin the photos on the pages with the corresponding story. Not only is this a fun activity, but now you both have a keepsake from one of your first visits.
First Date Documentary
Pull out your camera or video camera and create a documentary about your first visit together. This is a day you truly want to remember. Compile your photos into a beautiful slideshow, accompanied by short video clips of you and your loved one together.
You can even include special voice messages you’ve both left at the end of the documentary for one another, perhaps even in secret. Share it with the world, or create two copies and share them with each other. You’ll thank yourself later when you’re able to hit the play button and re-live it all again.
Play Tourists or Tour Guide
Pretend to be tourists and travel around to all the key points in the city you are in. If your loved one is visiting you, be their tour guide for the day. Take them around to all the best places to eat, the best museums and the best attractions. Or you can give them a tour of your life by simply taking them around to all of your personal favorite places.
Buy something to remember
Go shopping together and pick out something that will remind you of each other and of your first visit. Perhaps matching necklaces, pajamas or shirts. Maybe you both love to write and buying matching memory notebooks will be a great way for you to remember the trip together.
Try getting caricatures of one another, or have your faces painted onto a pillow case or shirt. If nothing else, stuffed animals are always a safe option. These are things you can wear, keep and hold when you’re apart to help you both feel connected.
The “Memory Book”
Create a book of memories that you can both swap when the trip is over. In a notebook, record your thoughts, feelings and favorite moments of the visit at the end of every day you are together. Add photos, drawings, cards, trinkets –whatever you like and whatever you think your loved one will enjoy when they read the book later. Keep them secret until the last day and swap them just before you part.
Try Different Locations
If you and your loved one are the types who love to keep busy, keep your first visit fast paced and full of adventure by visiting as many different locations as you can. Not only will both never get bored, you’ll always have something fun to do and say to one another.
Here are a few suggested locations you might like to visit. Discuss which you’d like to visit together, or toss them in a hat and pick at random. Try to visit as many as you can in a single day, or over the course of an entire visit.
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A trip to the Zoo, Amusement Park or Carnival, Stand-up comedy club
Karaoke singing, A live performance or concert, The Beach
A trip to the old Arcade, Nature Walk, Opera or a musical show
An aquarium, Cooking Class, Historical Site
Sledding/Skiing, Fishing, A School Play
An Educational Lecture, Horseback Riding, Visit a Farm
Factory Tour, Farmers’ market, Book Store
Sports Game, Cooking Class, A Car Show
Visit a Museum, Movie Theatre, Soup Kitchen
A Castle, A Convention, Open House Tour
Rock Climbing (Indoor or out), Bowling Alley, Botanical Garden
An Auction house, Planetarium, The Circus
The Park, Restaurant, A Garage Sale
A Vineyard, Indoor Sports, Ice Skating Rink
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Be a Humanitarian
Do something productive and good natured by volunteering somewhere. Try helping out at a soup kitchen; visit a nursing home or an animal shelter. Donate a few things to a shelter or thrift shop together. Donate books to a school or library. Plant a tree or help out with a public community garden. These activities a very wholesome way to see your loved one in a new and positive light.
Be Early and Late
Wake up and get out early enough to watch the sunrise together and stay out late to watch the sunset together. Have a full, long and beautiful day together.
The Treasure Hunt
If your loved one is visiting you, prepare a short (or long if you prefer) Treasure hunt for the two of you to complete when you’re together. Try leaving clues in interesting and different locations like inside library books, under café tables and inside stuffed animals.
Use words on signs, or places in portraits to make clue finding even more adventurous. Accompany them as they try to complete the hunt and follow the clues, giving hints as needed. Leave a small gift, note, date plan, location or activity at the end of your hunt.
Leave Notes Everywhere
For every location you visit, leave small notes everywhere you go. They can be sweet, silly, annoying or weird and unusual. Leave them in the most inconspicuous places you can think of, or leave them out in the open. If you leave them out in the open, sit back and see how long it takes someone to notice and how they react. Document this escapade in photo form.
Take a class
Taking a class together is a great way to share quality time while learning something new.
Take a Train or Bus Ride
Pack a lunch, grab your loved one and pick a train or bus ride to anywhere. It will be like having a moving picnic. This is especially great if neither you nor your other half have ridden a bus or train before.
Share a Story
Visit a coffee shop, a café, a book store, a park a restaurant, library or any place that fits. Bring two notebooks and takes a few minutes to write out 3 favorite memories from your life or childhood. After you’ve both finished, swap notebooks and read the stories aloud to one another over a light meal, drink or snack. This is a great way to get to know each other better.
Run Errands Together
Take a trip to the grocery store and pick out a few things to cook or make together. Or simply go shopping together! This is a cool way to see what interests your loved one might have that you didn’t yet know about.
Have an ABC Day
Plan a day on your visit where each activity you do will correspond to each letter of the alphabet. A for apple picking, B or Basketball game, C for Candy shop, etc.
