Date Night Jay DIY

Happy Valentines Day! I realise that for a lot of people, Valentines Day is a bit of a cliche.  I've heard an endless amount of people moan about how you should treat your loved ones wonderfully every day, but for me and my better half it's an excuse to go for a nice meal and give each other some soppy presents, so we don't complain.  As we are both students money is a little tight, so I made an effort to think of a way to give him a nice present which wouldn't cost too much, and turned to Pinterest for some ideas.  There was a number of lovely homemade gifts, my favourite of which was the 'Date Jar'.  This is basically a jar full of possible activities to pick from on a night you fancy doing something nice as a couple.  I grabbed my pen, scissors and glue and got creative!

Firstly, I wrote a list of different activities I thought Rob and I would enjoy.  As we aren't exactly rolling in money, I kept them to things we can do around out hometown or for a small price.  Most of these ideas I found easily with a quick Google search, were things we like to do or things we have talked about doing.

I copied the date ideas onto individual pieces of pretty paper, and folded each of them in half to hide what they said.  I chose paper with a number of different designs in a cute pastel style which I had laying around, but you could use whatever paper you fancy.

I found an empty jar (it doesn't need to be expensive, mine used to hold Tesco Value honey!), washed it thoroughly and peeled off any labels.  I cut a pretty piece of paper to the appropriate size and decorated it, before gluing it to the jar.

I placed all of the date ideas into the jar, making sure none of the writing could be seen.  My jar contains about 50 pieces of paper, but you could include as many or as little as you would like.

I cut out a small heart from the same paper as the label to stick on the lid (covering the use-by date of the original contents), screwed the lid on and voila!  What I love about this is that we can save the dates we enjoys and re-add them to the jar, remove any activities we don't particularly like, and add any new ideas we have!  This is so easy and simple to make, and seeing as I only used things I had lying around the house, completely free!

I realise this post is a little late to give you an idea for your loved one this valentines day, but I couldn't post about it any sooner - my boyfriend reads my blog, and I didn't want to give away the surprise!  I have also bought Rob some tickets to see Lower Than Atlantis in a few months time which I'm hoping he'll love, and we're going for a meal in TGI Fridays tonight (if you haven't tried their Jack Daniels sauce you need to, trust me!).  However you're spending V-day this year, whether its a romantic night with your other half, a girly night in front of a good film, or curled up in bed with a good book I hope you had a lovely day.

Have you ever given a home-made gift? I'd love to try other things in the future, I'm really fancying giving hand made soap a try! Let me know your DIY gift ideas!