Are you ready for a fun date idea that is just the right mix of romantic, silly, adventurous, and yet chill?

I dare say this is it.

Did I mention it fits any budget?!

I thought of doing a photo challenge date night a year or two ago, but never got around to it. When we finally decided to try it out, I Googled to see what had already been done, but couldn’t find much and definitely nothing quite like I envisioned.

So we decided to put one together that anyone can use!

#SelfieScavengerDate

This date doesn’t really require any advance planning other than having the list of prompts handy. (Save it to your phone below or pin for future reference.)

Why is this photo scavenger list better than others?

Sure, you can find all sorts of photo scavenger hunt prompts across the web, but none of them are well-optimized for a date. When you’re on a date you want to have fun, get to know each other better, not be rushed, and probably not have to interact with others too much. These prompts are focused on facilitating just that 🙂

A few tips:

• First look over all the prompts to plot out your date itinerary as it makes the most sense. We would have easily been able to do everything in the mall where we were (we were on foot, as you’ll see if you watch the video), but you could also drive to several different locations or even park downtown and walk around.
• This is a date you could easily stretch out all day, but could also do in a couple hours if you order it right. Be creative in doubling up the prompts if you’re short on time.
• If you can, take your time to enjoy each activity – it’s really just a simple structure to make a normal date a little more interesting.
• If you’re using your phone camera, use the back one so the pictures will be nice enough to print out for a scrapbook or maybe even your wall, if you happen to capture something you especially like. (We didn’t, and I wish we had.)
• Use Pixlr or PicMonkey for quick and easy touch-ups and ready-made filters to make your pictures look their best.

Here’s a little glimpse into our date, and then in no particular order, our photos for each of them.

1. try something new – food or activity

We were so hungry and everything in the food court was pretty American, so we ended up getting Popeye’s, which we’d technically never eaten that either of us could recall. We had every intention of trying something very different, but ended up not having time.

2. your date gets to pick something for you to try on

We wandered into these stores for practical purposes – I was looking for shoes for a wedding. I had thought we’d run across funny masks or something, but these were still different from our norm 🙂

3. pose with a mannequin

David pointed out how ironic the sign above his head was, and he picked this one out for me to pose with… You could obviously get a lot more fun and creative than we did.

4. spell something meaningful with individual letters – your last name if you’re married, first names/nicknames, anniversary date, etc.

You probably want to make sure to decide at the beginning of the date what you’re going to spell out so you have time to spot letters you like. We got some extras so we’d have a few to pick from. If you especially enjoy photography and have the time, you could also find objects that look like letters and make them all black and white like I’m sure you’ve probably seen.

5. unexpected prop integration – with furniture in a store or in a cart or with a statue or something else silly-fun

These happened very organically and were the first pictures we took other than letter pictures. I was actually a little worried that someone would notice us since it was right out front, and they wouldn’t let us into the mall, haha. The funniest thing was that David put this cone on his head before I was ready with the camera, so he was just standing there for a bit, LOL!

6. inside joke or something that represents your relationship somehow

Since we weren’t familiar with the mall, we weren’t sure what we were going to be able to find to represent us, but then inspiration struck when we saw these rocking chairs. We’re all about finding a way to chill pretty much anywhere we are in our travels and in life, with a pinch of quirky for good measure 🙂

7. eat something lady and the tramp style

The funny thing is that I love churros, but I wasn’t even in the mood to eat something sweet. We were running out of light, so this was kind of a last resort shot.

We totally took the next 2 pictures at the end of our date night, but were reminded of just how very crappy the front-facing camera on a phone is, particularly with bad lighting. So we re-took both of these next 2 in daylight with a real camera.

8. buy something for your date – on sale/clearance or under $5

You can buy whatever you want for your date, as long as it’s in your budget, we just want to keep things inexpensive for the rest of us 😉

9. wild card:

We were thinking to make this a “secret task” that you have to text in or something to get, but decided to make it easier and just let you pick one 🙂

• search #datenight or #love pose or #SelfieScavengerDate or some such to find a couple pose/scene to copy, just beware of stupid pics showing up sometimes
• integrate a favorite movie quote or scene
• chalk pose – use chalk to draw a speech bubble or some props on sidewalk/pavement and put yourselves in the picture
• find a coin with a significant date – birth year, first kiss, first date, wedding, etc. you can turn it into jewelry later or something else fun
• one line drawing game – the first person starts with one mark and you keep taking turns making one line, without consulting each other what it is, until you can’t think of anything else to add. Congrats, you’ve just made some memorable art.

As you can see, we picked a #datenight to copy. I’m sure these highschoolers had no faint idea 30-somethings would be hi-jacking their idea. Be careful what you put online, kids, LOL!

10. kissing – extra points for creativity with/in front of something interesting

I know it looks like we’re not in love, but you can’t see that out of the frame I have my hands on his waist at least. We were actually trying not to completely cover up the mall statue. Thank goodness for David’s monkey arms, as we like to call them.

This date was SO much fun and we would LOVE to know if you try it out!

Use #selfiescavengerdate if you post anything to your social media, or message us if you want 🙂