Valentine's Day Under $20

This year the Guy and I planned the perfect romantic weekend:

+ Museum Talk on Elizabeth Peyton’s new exhibit: “Live Forever” (which just moved from NY to Minneapolis) – FREE, $4 for parking, footed by me
+ A white tablecloth Valentine’s Evening at Whitecastle – $13.40, footed by the Guy Mmm slyders!
+ Dessert: coffee cake and a bottle of wine at home, while watching the NBA slam dunk competition and Garden State
+ Joint Donation to the Dana Farber in Lieu of gifts - $150, split evenly between us

Total Spending: $84/person - but mostly for a good cause! The rest was under $20, and completely memorable...

Date Night

So The Guy and I have decided to establish a weekday date night, so we make it a point of seeing each other and spending quality time together – not that watching the Daily Show together with our laptops isn’t quality. But hopefully this will be better QT. The guy took me out to a romantic restaurant for the first one. I have this week, and I’m going to take him to a free jazz show tonight at this club he’s been dying to go to. I’ve got to work up an arsenal of creative ideas though so I don’t end up defaulting to expensive dinners or boring movies.

Right now my list is:
4/1: Rush tickets to the Guthrie
4/17: standing in line for ice cream at Ben&Jerrys free cone day
4/30: making dinner at one of those prepare-your-own-meals kitchens
5/13: Game Night!
5/27: outdoor movie or a walk through a trail (hopefully warm enough by now!)

Any good ideas for cute, cheap dates? I blogged about it once before, but I’m running out!

Frugal Food + a Plea for Cheap Entertainment...

Forgot to add my little boast that to top the Guy's crepes yesterday, I managed a veritable feast this morning using the few hodge-podge ingredients in the pantry/fridge: Baked Apple Oatmeal, Homestyle Southern Cheese Grits and Breakfast Burritos with Corn Salsa. The oatmeal was an amazing weekend treat... one of those that looks gourmet when it isn't:

Mix:
2 packets instant Quaker oatmeal
1/2 apple chopped
few raisins/dried fruit if you've got them
1/3 cup brown sugar
titch of salt & cinnamon
1.5 cups milk

Bake at 350 for 30 min. Serve with applesauce, more milk, honey, whatever you've got...

Also, a plea: my mother and grandparents (emphysema, one bad knee + one worsening case of Alzheimer's) are coming into town next weekend for a visit. The easy answer would be to buy up theater tickets and book pricey restaurants galore, but that would definitely combat my plan to limit nonessentials. Any suggestions for entertaining Nana and PawPaw on the cheap?