The Best Date Night Ideas During Self Isolation and the Coronavirus

The coronavirus COVID19 crisis is impacting a lot of things — date night is a big one for some couples. Time to connect after lots of work and busy lives is essential to making relationships work. Here are a few date ideas during self-isolation to get the passion fire lit during these next few weeks.

During this outbreak, it’s important to remember to wash your hands with soap and water, isolate for 14 days to maintain public health when exposed to confirmed cases, if you develop symptoms, or after being in high-risk situations. Keep in mind that symptoms can look like many other issues — a cough or sneeze could be a sinus infection not Coronavirus, so do get tested whenever possible and remember to self isolate as much as you can.

Enjoy our fun date night ideas. Although we can’t incorporate public transit or people watching, these date ideas are pretty killer. These date nights won’t need cleaning and disinfectant and prepare for date idea that’ll blow your regular date nights out of the water.

A Few Isolation Date Night Ideas for those Inclined in the Kitchen

Create Coffee Syrups for during the week

With having to stay at home all of our favorite coffee shop options are just …not available. Why not make some of your favorite coffee shop syrups at home so that you can have a more normal week?

You can try your hand at mocha, honey-cinnamon, peppermint, vanilla, and lavender syrups by clicking this link.

Learn to cook a new dish together

Now’s the time to break out the Pinterest and attempt some of those more complicated meals we never have time for. Try a Coq au Vin, or to make a Tonkotsu broth.

Nothing is better than cooking together. Put each other to work, one person chopping veggies and the other prepping the meat. There are so many ways to team up and create incredible meals. Hone in on your culinary skills, and get adventurous. With more time on our hands as we stay at home, you have time to make those meals you LOVE but never have time to make.

Cook Dinner For Each Other — Pantry Surprise Style

So grab like 3 food items from the pantry, pick generously or go for gold, and hand them to your partner to make dinner with. Get silly with it and have some fun, clear out your pantry at the same time and minimize the need to head to the grocery store.

Make some serious ice cream.

Now, we all know ice cream is delicious. However, there are some super rad options that are really easy to make at home. Self-isolation can seriously suck, but a tub of lavender-earl grey ice cream could totally make it a TON better. What about

Break out your baking skills.

There are some incredible baking recipes that take some serious time. Now that we’re doing the whole social distancing thing, there’s more time in the day for things like baking. Why not team up together and try to bake a few pies or more complicated layered cakes. Or just bake a crap ton of flavored bread and deliver to a family member.

Date Ideas For the Couples who Love Harry Potter and World of Warcraft

Board Games

I KNOW you haven’t played any since when? You were a kid? Cool, neither have we. There’s like 230498234 board games out there now so no need to start a Monopoly war. Now there are things like Goat Lords and Teleparty.

Alternative Card Games

Grab a few cool card games off Amazon and have them shipped. Unlike Uno and the others, the few we’ve snagged up are pretty awesome and you’ve probably never played them before.

Sushi Go is a spin-off of go-fish. Order some takeout sushi too, and play while eating sushi during a living room floor picnic.

We all know Cards Against Humanity and Uno but what about That’s What She Said and Exploding Kittens. Who wouldn’t want to play a game around exploding kittens?

Snag a new puzzle online…

Let’s get a little tame with these home date ideas. You can do online puzzles or snag something rad off Amazon. Museum gift shops are also an amazing spot to find unique puzzles that will be a little more fun. Zazzle also has a few unique puzzle options.

Throw trivia nights.

If your regular date nights included trivia night, we’ve got you covered. Snag this book off Amazon and snuggle in for the night with a glass of wine (or kombucha), a snuggly blanket and your bae.

Read a book together.

Whether you grab the Bible or a super cool vintage book you found on a trip years ago, pull out a book and read together. It’s not something we often do, but reading out loud together is a blast. It’s something you could do each week until you finish the book (or your isolate for 14 days).

Movie Marathon in the living room…

Drag that mattress into your living room, load it up with your favorite blankets and fluffy pillows. Turn that living room into the comfiest, most perfect movie theater EVER. Snag some sweet homemade ice cream or a favorite pizza and settle in for a marathon of movies.

Get down like Tina Fey and Steve Carrell and load up your FAVORITE movies into that Netflix Queue and let it rip. Whether it’s a James Franco marathon, a High School Musical marathon, a Hary Potter marathon, or some more Wes Anderson stuff like Lobsters (it was SO good), throw on a few solid movies till you pass out on the mattress in the living room.

Around the house scavenger hunt during self-isolation

During the “workday” create a scavenger hunt for your partner and whoever wins get to choose what’s for dinner or what movie you get to watch first. Use things around the house or even plant a few quirkier and more unique items (we have some plastic dinosaur toys from my son that I can put around the house in less typical spots.

Date Ideas in Isolation for the more Artistic Couples

Pick up embroidery

Etsy is POPPING with embroidery kits. Snag a couple for you and your boo and crank that record player while you learn to embroider. Tactile crafts like embroidery can help with burnout and reduce stress — how perfect during a time like this. It’s also a great way to keep busy hands active during a Law and Order marathon or that Harry Potter marathon.

Create a painting together

Collaborative painting can be quite fun. Snag a large canvas, or two, off Amazon or Michaels.com, or a JoAnns store pick up and paint one of your favorite places together. Use old photos from your travels and paint one of your favorite locations for the living room wall.

For the homeowners: Paint a mural together as an accent wall

Go big with your painting skills after a few practices with canvases, and paint that accent wall in your bedroom or living room. Snag a few tutorials on Pinterest or grab some inspo and freehand something incredible. Teamwork makes the dream work right? Crank some awesome music and paint your heart out.

Snag a few ceramic painting kits online…

If you head to JoAnns, Michaels or Amazon you’ll find a few DIY ceramic painting kits. Snag a few and create some awesome dinnerware to use when you cook some coq au vin or bake some rad cakes.

Do some …body painting…

Why not just lay out some serious backdrops and paint one another in the living room? Draw those curtains shut and strip down to start painting each other. Get to know one another’s bodies and play with color together.

For the Handy, Craft Couples, a Few Date Ideas

Try your hand at Shibori Dying

Grab some of your old cotton bedsheets or snag a few online and hop onto Pinterest for a few Shibori tutorials. If the weather is great, head outside and play with some indigo and cotton. Create a new tapestry or bedsheets for your house together.

Create Picture Frames for some rad couples portraits

When this is all over you should DEFINITELY get some couples portraits done with your favorite photographer — in the meantime, create some bomb picture frames with some DIY tutorials on Pinterest. There are tons of ideas from using palettes, cement, and shells, or branches.

Make a Wall Hanging together

Grab some cool unique yarn off Webs Online Yarn Store. This large store has tons of options for non-traditional, more funky stuff as well as a few more normative yarn options. Head to your backyard or take a hike and snag a few branches that might work for hanging and snag a few tutorials off Pinterest. (Man, I love Pinterest). You can sand down the branches from the hiking trails and use those to hang your woven pieces from.

Teach each other a new craft

There are literally billions of crafts and it’d be so easy to pick a few more up with all our time now that you have to self-isolate for 14 days. You can snag a $50 sewing machine on Amazon and cotton fabric for $2-5/yard on JoAnn’s website in order to make a few masks for yourselves or others. You could also pick up quilting or make a few clothes while you’re at it.

Yarn spinning would be another easy, cheap hobby to pick up right now. Spindles often cost $15-20 on Etsy and you can snag a few pieces of roving. There are great tutorials on Pinterest and YouTube that can teach you how to spin your own yarn.

Knit each other a hat, or two.

If you’ve gotten spinning down why not try knitting your own hat too? Knitting can be an easy skill to pick up. Watch a few YouTube tutorials or snag a few Pinterest patterns to try yourself. There are also tons of Facebook groups that’ll lend a hand to new knitters.

Saucy Date Ideas to Keep Isolation Interesting

Our Favorite Date: Spa Night

I promise you got some stuff in your house to give yourself a bomb spa night. Grab some oil (can be any — olive oil, grapeseed oil, avocado oil, sunflower oil), some baking soda and some Himalayan salt. And candles of course…

So you’ll take about 4 Tbs of baking soda + 4 Tbs of Himalayan salt and combine them. Shake it up. You could add lavender flowers or rose hips if you have them. Lemon rinds are fun too!

As you get out and dry off, offer a massage with olive oil to your partner! You could do some face masks too or bath bombs if you have them. Amazon also has some options.

Try your hand (or feet) at dancing.

A quick search on YouTube will give you a few options to learn salsa dancing or just about any other type of dance. Get that passion burning with a little salsa or ballroom dancing. Clear that living room floor out and spend some of that new-found free time dancing your heart out.

Explore a Karma Sutra book…

Not exactly the most unique date idea, but definitely one of the hottest. You can snag a karma sutra book off Amazon and try out some new …things. Light the candles, set the music down low and light that passion together.

Make a chocolate-lava-cake together

Nothing says romance like splitting a chocolate-lava-cake. There are tons of recipes on Pinterest for both gluten-free and dairy-free options (if needed). Try some of our favorite chocolate-lava-cake recipes:

• Dairy-free, gluten-free chocolate lava cake
• Chocolate Earl Grey Cake with Lavender Ganache
• Peanut Butter and Chocolate Lava Cake

Get the bath bombs ready…

So go get y’all in that bathtub, lit up those candles and throw on some John Legend. Spend a few hours there just enjoying yourself, cause WHY THE HECK NOT.

Ideas for Date Night in Isolation for the More Adventurous Couples

Living Room Camping

Let’s just let our inner child out and camp in the living room. Screw it, why not — set up a fort in the living room, bring a lantern or two in and eat dinner by lantern light in a blanket fort. Changing up your environment like this is actually incredible for the soul, especially if you’re in a small house or apartment.

Take a tour through a museum

Tons of museums are offering virtual tours right now through some of the most coveted galleries and exhibits. Check out some of our favorites:

• National Gallery of Art
• Musee d’Orsay
• The Louvre
• British Museum

Propagate some plants

Give yourself some more of mother nature inside while you’re stuck…inside. If you have some plants that have been growing well, you can propagate some of those plants, into new plants, giving yourself more and more of an indoor jungle. Check out this sweet article to propagate your plants.

Bring nature HOME with some nature art

Combine nature and art! Use outside plant material to stamp or paint with. Add pieces into your artwork or grab some sun paper on Amazon and play with that. When you’re done with your collaborative artwork bring it inside to have more of the outside world inside your home.

Take a few Virtual Tours of some of your favorite places

Many State Parks are offering virtual tours, as are some national landmarks and world oddities. If the travel bug is eating you alive, this might help calm it a little while we’re on travel restrictions. Check out a few of our favorites below:

• Machu Picchu
• Kenai Fjords National Park
• Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park
• Carlsbad Canyons

Plan 3 new trips for 2021.

Keep taking some more virtual tours and figure out 3 new trips for 2021 you’d want to take. Plan them out start to finish and if you can, book them. Supporting some of our tourism industries by booking future trips can help sustain these vulnerable communities.

Date Ideas for Couples Who Dig Yoga

Try a Guided Meditation

If there’s anything we all sort of need right now it’s a little positive affirmation. Try a few guided meditations together that can support a healthy mindset and bring you together as a couple. Sometimes it’s not what you say to one another but what you do together that can create vulnerability.

Practice Yoga Together

So many yoga studios are offering online yoga options. Try a few different options (you should during the workday anyway if you’re working from home and spending so much time sitting). If you’re like most of America and the world, you’re spending a lot of time sitting. Try classes geared towards hip openers, which will stretch your pelvis and thighs.

Try your hand at singing bowls

You can usually snag a few singing bowls from websites like Etsy and Frontier. It’s a skill that doesn’t take a whole ton of effort but a lot of finesse. Light some sage, light a few candles and practice your singing bowls together to create synchronicity or melodies.

Have you ever done a tea ceremony before?

There are a few tutorials for hosting a tea ceremony. If the more formal options are just not your jam, snag a couple of loose leaf options and blend your own teas together.

Date Night Ideas for the Backyard

A Picnic in the Backyard

Grab your barbecue favorites and make a huge pot of mac and cheese and head to the backyard for the perfect picnic or go for indoor picnics. Throw some blankets on the group (put a tarp down first to protect them) and grab a few candles, and flowers. Have a bottle of wine and some slow-roasted pulled pork.

Create an Italian Cafe in the Backyard

Snag a nice table and chairs with a red and white checkered table cloth, those beautiful candles you’ve been saving for a special occasion and that homemade pasta and have an Italian date night in your backyard. Bake a loaf of bread beforehand, snag some sweet tunes on Pandora and have that perfectly enchanting date night.

Have a Backyard Movie Night

If you’re anything like us, you’ll grab your favorite Mark Whalberg or Shawn Levy movie for the backyard.

Turn it into dinner and a movie date by putting together your barbecue favorites. Or match the meal with your movie…

Prepare your greenhouse & get your seedlings going

Get that greenhouse going! Now is the time, especially if you’re one of the few who cannot work from home and now have all this time. Creating some more self-sustainability for yourself is so important.

Get some fresh air with mini golf

Set up the BEST mini golf set up in your back yard, twinkle lights and all. Snag some sweet sound effects off YouTube and let ‘r ripe!

Stargazing with a bottle of wine

Ever had an excuse to bring your mattress outside? Here’s a solid one. Drag that baby outside and cover in amazing, fluffy comforters on a clear night. Bring some of that incredible homemade pasta you made earlier and have dinner under the stars and try to find your favorite constellations in the sky.

We hope this gets you started on a few date options that work for y’all and can help keep your sanity during this time. If you need a little more of normalcy try out these favorite coffee shop recipes.