What fun activities do you do with your FI or husband?

[chiapet]

Hi all, after 18 months of marriage, I noticed that hubby and I are running out of fun things to do on weekends. We usually go to the movies or have dinner together or take walks... but we seem to be staying home alot more nowadays, especially since it''s been so cold. I''d love to compile a list of activities (besides movies & dinners) that couples do together to have fun. Activities can be indoors or outdoors. Thanks everyone!

 

[hairgirl95]

Hey Chia--

My hubby and I kinda go through phases. We''ll spend time at home for a while, then be out running around every weekend. I agree the cold weather does make it less *fun* to be outside. We like to race pocket bikes around our neighborhood. We make it into a race, and whoever loses has to cook dinner!

We just built a house 1.5 years ago, so we do a lot of window shopping for landscaping ideas. Then we do them ourselves to save a TON of $$$. We try to catch a hockey game a few times a year, at least 2-3 college basketball and football games. On the really cold dreary days we pull out a deck of cards or monopoly. If all else fails, theres always a dog that needs a bath or a nap to be taken in the recliner!! We''ve been married 3 years in May, so I can relate that its kinda hard to be creative sometimes. Don''t be too hard on yourself for just chillin at home sometimes. I have seen first hand once kids come along (my sister has 3) that the "free time" is always chaos, and you will want those quiet filled nothing to do evenings to come back!! Hang in there--once spring hits you will probably be going 100 mph in all directions with so much stuff going on.

 

[KimberlyH]

Hiking
Traveling
Exploring our area (it amazes me how many fantastic places are just 30 minutes - 1 hour away from home)
Dinner (we try new restaurants fairly often)
Movies
Walks through our neighborhood
Theatre (we have season tickets to our local theatre and go to shows elsewhere as well)
Long drives
Open houses
Games (every once in a while I can get him to play Jenga with me)
Dinner w/ friends

 

[dani13]

Go to the gym and workout together
Go shopping
Take road trips
Movies
Out to dinner with friends (we socialize a lot)
Comedy clubs
Go to a lounge for drinks
Go to the beach in the summer
Travel
Skiing in the winter
Concerts (we're huge music fans)


We have a lot of similar interests and love to spend time together. MH is my best friend.

 

[chiapet]

All great activities! Thanks for the suggestions. I''ve been meaning to pick up some board games. We were hooked on Scrabble for awhile but then got too competitive

 

[chiapet]

Date: 3/2/2008 8:39:50 PM
Author: hairgirl95
Hey Chia--

My hubby and I kinda go through phases. We''ll spend time at home for a while, then be out running around every weekend. I agree the cold weather does make it less *fun* to be outside. We like to race pocket bikes around our neighborhood. We make it into a race, and whoever loses has to cook dinner!

We just built a house 1.5 years ago, so we do a lot of window shopping for landscaping ideas. Then we do them ourselves to save a TON of $$$. We try to catch a hockey game a few times a year, at least 2-3 college basketball and football games. On the really cold dreary days we pull out a deck of cards or monopoly. If all else fails, theres always a dog that needs a bath or a nap to be taken in the recliner!! We''ve been married 3 years in May, so I can relate that its kinda hard to be creative sometimes. Don''t be too hard on yourself for just chillin at home sometimes. I have seen first hand once kids come along (my sister has 3) that the ''free time'' is always chaos, and you will want those quiet filled nothing to do evenings to come back!! Hang in there--once spring hits you will probably be going 100 mph in all directions with so much stuff going on.

What are "pocket bikes"? It sounds really cute.

 

[Sparkster]

- museums
- zoos
- trivia nights
- karaoke (go on, let your hair down and make complete fools of yourselves!)
- comedy acts
- a picnic at a local winery
- hire a luxury car and go for a country drive
- go up in a hot air balloon
- camping
- indoor rock climbing
- take up a sport together (racket ball, tennis...)
- theme parks

 

[mimzy]

around the house FI and i like to....
- take turns picking out movies to watch
- read aloud to each other (we had like $160 to borders after christmas, so we''ve been busy with this!)
- cook
- play nerdy board games
- pick something we are both interested in and look it up together online
- watch marathons of tv shows on dvd

 

[elle_chris]

Do you or your husband ski?

When I first met my husband (7 years ago) he was an avid snowboarder (still is) i though knew nothing about snow other than how to build a snowman

I learned very fast that boarding was not for me but skiing is.
He learned with me and it was a ton of fun doing it with him and we now have a blast during the season.

Since it's the winter, if you guys don't ski/board maybe you can learn together. I promise it's a great time

and you feel like you've accomplished something at the end of the day.

 

[Haven]

We''re information junkies (and perhaps a couple of dillitentes, I''ll admit it) so we tend to become fixated on things and then we''ll spend a lot of time learning about them. First it was black holes, then organic living, and then I got him obsessed with diamonds. SO, we''ll watch movies, documentaries, read articles, go out and look at the stars--whatever it is that feeds our mini obsessions. It''s a lot of fun!

We also go to the movies all the time, debate politics, and talk about, well, everything!

 

[Fancy605]

My husband and I play trivia at least once a week. We usually win or at least place, so we earn free food too. We invite our friends along. Sometimes they come, sometimes no.

We and several of our friends really love play station karaoke, and we get together and play with our friends often.

We have different projects around the house we try to do that our fun. Right now we are collecting rocks to landscape our little scrap of yard with.

I know you said no movies, but we like to share old movies with each other that one of us loves and the other has never seen. We do that if we have time.

When we know we are going to be on the road a lot, we pick out an audio book and listen to it together in the car (and at night wherever it is we happen to be staying the night)

We love to take walks with our puppy.

We just moved not long ago, so it''s sometimes fun to explore the area.

I am ALWAYS up for shopping, and my husband is good at carrying bags

 

[Dreamer_D]

These are all great suggestions! I am going to make a list.

Like many of you, my DH and I are best friends and we spend a lot of time just hanging out together not doing anything in particular. We like to watch TV and make fun of the commercials (I know, that isn''t very cool, is it?? We think we are hilarious though). We eat out once a week and spend at least a couple nights with our closest friends who live down the street. We love walking our dogs or generally just admiring them and playing with them. We also really enjoy going to the gym together. We love watching movies and I just saw the "Top 100 Movies of All Time" countdown so now we are going to work our way through the list renting them. But like chiapet we sometimes get a little stymied for things to do, so I am totally going to use these suggestions!

Hairgirr, I also want to know what pocketbikes are??

 

[doxielover]

Hi chiapet
Some of the things my FI and like to do are:
-go to antique faires
-go to classic car shows/swap meets
-invite friends over to play Wii
-go to arcades
-we sometimes go rollerskating
-walk our dogs
-go to the shooting range
-we just went out with 2 other couples for bowling and laser tag and we had sooo much fun
-play miniature golf

hmmm, tha''s all I can think of for now

 

[brazen_irish_hussy]

Since it is winter, we have mostly gone hiking or sledding which is a lot of fun. We have a game of going hiking in new places every weekend.
We do go to the zoo and museums sometimes.
One of my favorites is to go swimming at really fun pools for kids with water slides and wave pools when it isn''t crowded.
Sometimes we go find some pretty old buildings to look at and take pictures of.

 

[zoebartlett]

My FI is more of a homebody than I am, so while I''d prefer to be out and about much of the weekend, he''d rather stay in. We compromise -- one day we''ll do something in the area and then the other day, usually Sundays, we watch movies, play games, etc. We''re comfortable doing our own thing too, so if I want to go shopping or visit friends, he can spend that time doing what he wants. It works for us -- having a balance.

Here are some of the things we like to do:

-- day trips: Boston, the beach, the mountains, other places

-- visit my parents (who live close by) or my FI''s parents/siblings

-- go to open houses

-- hang out with friends (most of them live an hour away or so)

-- take walks

 

[Skippy123]

My favorites are

going to the movies

eating out or in

hiking and biking or nice long walks

traveling w/hubby

and just hanging out w/friends in our backyard doing a barbecue.

 

[LitigatorChick]

Have a baby - then you will be praying for 10 minutes in the tub alone and it will be pure bliss!!!

 

[sumbride]

These are great ideas! I was looking for some too because our main hobby has been curtailed due to gas prices... we used to go on "Ta-Da days" (an invention my BFF and I came up with) where we would just drive around attempting to get lost to discover new things. We would go to odd museums we passed, look in new shops, find long country roads... it was great, and I miss it terribly, but, well, we''re trying to do our part in the whole petroleum thing by not using much. we''ve become homebodies and I think we''ve seen every documentary on tv, including the "What if we run out of oil" one that scared us and helped keep us at home.

 

[Independent Gal]

Our most favourite thing is going to the zoo together.

We also make a habit of reading the New Yorker together, and then arguing about it.

We sometimes read out loud to each other. Put the fire on, pour a glass of wine, and snuggle in for storytime.

We watch tv series on netflix dvd''s... and that''s all we watch. So it''s kind of a ritual. Right now we''re watching ''House MD'' but we also have enjoyed Battlestar Gallactica and some other bad sci-fi ... Oh and nature documentaries, lots of them.

We play in the snow. Whenever the snow is of the right consistency, we go out and make a snowman.

We go to sports events (baseball or hockey), or to our local pub to watch sports together.

We go out with friends a lot

We go to the library and read together

Good for you, Chia, for working on your marriage! We''re rooting for you!

 

[Elmorton]

Wow, DH and I had the same problem the other night - we went to an early dinner and then wanted to do something fun and couldn''t think of ANYTHING (and we''re also on a budget, which makes life difficult, too). We vetoed movies because he''d been out of town for nearly the whole week and we wanted to talk... Thanks for posting this, there have been so many good ideas!

Things we''ve been doing:
-Drive around and find neighborhoods where we''d want to live
-Go to openhouses on Sundays
-Go to the Y (we keep on saying we''ll start playing raquetball or swim, but we chicken out and end up in the cardio room
-LOTS of board games (the day that I dragged out Girl Talk and got DH to play will seriously go down in history for the hilarity that ensued)
-Read together
-Walks (but it keeps snowing rrrrrg)
-Museums
-"Future" shopping (window shopping for big ticket items that we can afford ohhh someday)
-Bowling
-Golf driving range (indoor)
-Semi-pro sports (hockey - in the summer, baseball)

Other things I can''t wait to do when the weather is warmer:
-Go outside and play catch
-BBQ competition (we each make a marinade and make kebobs)
-Badminton in the backyard
-Go to the botanical garden nearby
-Zoos, zoos, zoos
-Swimming!
-Music festivals, outdoor concerts
-Arts/crafts fairs (love those things)
-Driving to a smaller town nearby and shopping in little downtown shops
-Driving to towns nearby for the day to "sightsee" and shop
-Bike rides/bike trails
-Golfing

Another one - we used to live about 40 mins away from an Amish community, and now we live about the same distance from the Amana colonies - I don''t know where you are, but communities like these can be REALLY cool to spend time in -where we were, a few Amish families will let you spend a day with them - ending in a dinner at their home - for a pretty small fee ($40? - it goes to support the Amish museum/education) which I thought sounded like a totally amazing experience, but unfortunately we never signed up to do it. Anything similar (reservation, etc) could be something really interesting.

Also, near where I grew up, there was a horse stable on the edge of a state park and you could go on trail rides (it was about 10 yrs ago, but back then it was $12 for an hour). DH and I had been planning on doing that last summer, too.

 

[Independent Gal]

Ooooh! Playing catch! I was just having a daydream yesterday about playing catch with our future kids. I love playing catch.

 

[Elmorton]

I do too! When DH''s little bro and I were attending the same univ, DH and BIL would go play catch all the time and talk while I was at class or studying. Last sumer, DH realized he missed it, and got me a cute pink and black glove (even though he told me that getting an already worn-in glove on Ebay is much prefered). It''s so nice because you can just talk but you''re doing something - I finally understand the father-son catch references in movies. When we''ve been going to openhouses, we always check out to see if there is enough yard for catch

 

[tberube]

After over four years of being together, some of our favorite things to do together have not changed, nor have we even gotten bored of them. They generally consist of:

chatting about stuff over coffee
watching movies together (either at the theater or at home)
maul shopping
inviting friends over to the house
going out for dinner

We're simple people. Heh.

 

[chiapet]

I LOVE the support I''m getting from this group! And I have to say that some of you must have awesome FIs & husbands. My husband would never go to open houses or go shopping!

IndpendentGal: Thanks for keeping up with my problems

and giving me input. Yes, I am trying to make this marriage work, darn it!! BTW, I happened across one of your old posts about you getting a job in NY. Did that ever happen? You also mentioned something about visa. Where are you from?

Dreamer & Elmorton: It''s good to hear that other couples also run out of ideas sometimes and it''s not just ME. I''m perfectly happy staying at home and reading a book but that''s probably because I work 6 days a week and am exhausted on weekends. Hubby doesn''t work and gets antsy/bored.

Here''s a question for all your board game lovers: What board games are fun for adults? So far, we have Scrabble and Monopoly.

 

[chiapet]

Date: 3/3/2008 9:07:49 AM
Author: LitigatorChick
Have a baby - then you will be praying for 10 minutes in the tub alone and it will be pure bliss!!!

I work with kids and I hear the same comment from their mothers

 

[chiapet]

Date: 3/2/2008 9:44:02 PM
Author: mimzy
around the house FI and i like to....
- take turns picking out movies to watch
- read aloud to each other (we had like $160 to borders after christmas, so we''ve been busy with this!)
- cook
- play nerdy board games
- pick something we are both interested in and look it up together online
- watch marathons of tv shows on dvd

Mimzy, what kind of "nerdy board games"??? I want some nerdy board games too!

 

[zoebartlett]

The zoo! I want to go to the zoo! We don''t have one near us but I''d go all the time if I could. I could watch chimps all day long and not get bored.

We also take drives through neighborhoods and see where me might want to live some day when we buy a house. This isn''t so easy to do because we''d love to live on the seacoast again but we moved away from there when I got my "new" job three years ago.

I wish my FI was a reader. I loved hanging out at my parents'' house when I was growing up and we''d all be in the living room together (my parents, my sister, and I), each reading our own thing. It was very comforting. Now, with my FI, when I''m reading, he''s ALWAYS playing hockey on his XBox. It''s just not the same. I can''t get him to read though, no matter how hard I try.

We love watching certain series (what''s the plural, serieses?

), and now we''re in the middle of "Monarch of the Glen," a Scottish BBC TV show. It''s really good.

 

[firebirdgold]

Play the wii together.
Invite friends or family over to play the wii. (mario party rocks!)
Go on photography drives in the country.
Spend the weekend on the coast.
Go to a casino and see who can take the longest to lose $20.
Go to a vineyard.
explore
Go to a fair or expo.
walk along the river with doggy.
hike with doggy.
bike along the river.
start a fire in the woodstove and curl up and read together.
Go out to a cafe and work.
go to a concert.
have dinner with friends.
spend the day with family.

As soon as I stop limping, we''re going to take up raquet ball. (sp?)

 

[anchor31]

This winter isn''t easy for us because we don''t have the car (parking in Montreal streets during winter is crazy, so we stored it for the cold season) and I''m still in school so money is a bit tight, especially with the wedding coming. But we always manage to find things to do.

- Sometimes we can just chat for hours and hours and hours... Great way to spend an evening.
- We''re big movie geeks. Sunday night is our date night, and it''s usually a movie night. We rent one from the blockbuster around the corner or order from Illico.
- I''m big on arts and crafts, so I introduced him to that. We''re working on a gorgeous puzzle we''ll be able to glue together and hang up. Fun and decoration all in one!
- He''s a big gamer, so he introduced me to that. I don''t play much on my own (until he bought Mass Effect, man this game is addictive) but I love playing with him.
- If I don''t have too much studying to do (which doesn''t happen much these days), we can take an afternoon and cook together. Loads of fun!
- Walks. Long walks. Even if it''s cold. Love it.

 

[Elmorton]

Chiapet, here are some boardgames that we play:

-Trivial pursuit (we really like Book Edition, but it''s hard!)
-Cribbage - DH introduced me to it, and we''re totally hooked. We have a tally going of wins since we got married - I kicked his rear massively when we were on our honeymoon, so he''s still catching up
-Boggle
-Mancala
-Dominoes
-Jenga
-Checkers, chess
-Guess Who, Memory, Connect Four, Trouble, Sorry - all the good kid favorites

And the last one on my couple''s list - The Ungame. It''s a favorite of therapists and it''s not really a game. It''s a stack of cards with personal questions written on each card. Sometimes DH and I get out the Ungame just to talk and connect. I think I''ve seen it in regular retail stores before, but you can find it online for sure.

When friends are over, there''s a game called The Top 10 Game that is AWESOME - but I think it''s out of production. We found it on amazon.com. Our other one with friends is Catch Phrase - it''s a really really good ice breaker when people don''t know each other well. DH and I have been known to play Catch Phrase when it''s just the two of us, but it''s not really as fun