Winter-themed activities to celebrate the season and create sweet connections with your crush, BFF, or favorite family members.

With the changing of seasons, one must find joy between the dark clouds of winter, so it is important to spend time with loved ones by engaging in fun winter activities that make the season a bit brighter. Using my own expertise in the realm of dating, as well as that of the Axe Newspaper staff, I have compiled a list of winter date ideas to do with friends, partners, or just by yourself.

Ice Skating

Go to the local Rink Exchange and enjoy the wintry feeling of gliding across the slick ice with a friend who struggles to stay on their feet. When you both get too cold to feel your hands, head inside from the rink to get a cup of steaming hot cocoa or hot apple cider before returning to the ice to enjoy more fun time with loved ones.

Baking Decorations

Who doesn’t love a fun baking session, especially one that includes baked-good decoration? Make sugar or gingerbread cookies, or make and decorate a cake that encapsulates all the wonderfully snowy flavors of winter. If you feel extra motivated, create and decorate a gingerbread house together that displays your incredible creativity and ability to work together.

Watch a Hallmark Movie

Picture this: a (rich) journalist (from big city New York) has to write a story about a failing 

Christmas tree farm to “get to the heart” of journal readers. In this writing expedition, she becomes friends with the owner of the Christmas tree farm, a friendly, albeit stubborn, hunk. They fall in love, and before you know it, you’ve arrived at the very much expected happily-ever-after. Movies like these that take place in snowy wintry settings in tandem with busy big city streets are an absolute necessity for the winter holiday season, especially when you can curl up with a loved one on the couch. Because of these predictable endings, chatting during the movie is easy, and it can be fun to make fun of the characters’ shallow actions and the admittedly formulaic plots.

Build a Snowman

Though snow is a rarity during Eugene winters, especially with global warming, a chance to build a cute snowman is always worth the spent time. Team up and create the snowman of your dreams, giving it fun decorations, such as eyes of coal, a carrot nose, and a dripped out hat that screams “winter!” Feel the frigid snow on your ice-cold hands as you roll your big snowballs through the snow – the snowball effect that everyone talks about, but no one understands in Eugene (given our lack of snow). Or if you’re looking for a more thrilling activity, take on the local sledding hill, or drive up to your favorite ski location to enjoy the adventure of downhill skiing.

Holiday Light Drive

Drive out to the big-house neighborhoods with a loved one to check out the local backyard holiday decoration displays, and enjoy chatting about cozy topics while admiring those extreme light shows that come out year after year. Dream about those elaborate decorations that will likely never go up at your own house, and enjoy the cold winter air as you walk around those lights with your loved one.

Article by Basil Dracobly