Valentine’s Day is not only a day to celebrate romantic love, but also friendship. Today is a day to let someone know how much they mean to you. No matter who you are celebrating with today, here is a list classic love day movies paired with creative activities to share with those who mean the most to you:

The Notebook

Activity: Write/Call Someone You Haven’t Talked to in a While (like Noah writes letters to Allie) 

If a 2000’s Nicholas Sparks book adaptation starring Rachel McAdams & Ryan Gosling doesn’t have you pressing play, the timeless love story plot may. Noah, a poetry-loving underprivileged, young man, is set up with Allie, a high-class socialite. The two fall in love and have a dream together. Unfortunately, due to differential social circumstances, Noah and Allie have to move on living separate lives. However, Noah doesn’t give up on love and writes Allie a letter everyday for a year. So, the perfect activity to pair with The Notebook is writing/calling someone you haven’t talked to in a while to let them know you’re thinking of them. 

Titanic

Activity: Create Artwork (like Jack draws and sketches) 

Surrounded around the most well known maritime sinking with both realistic and fictional aspects, Titanic is a 1990’s historical drama romance filled with a goal to survive life as well as love. Rose, the female protagonist, is stuck in an enclosed, privileged life. She meets Jack, a starving artist on the Titanic who won his ticket (he’s poor, so he otherwise could not afford it). Jack shows her how to live a fill life, and they decide to be together, despite her engagement and elevated social class. After the Titanic hits the iceberg, the two lovebirds (and viewers) question if they would risk their life for their soulmate. As Jack says, “You jump, I jump, right?” The perfect pair with Titanic is creating art, as Jack does. 

Casablanca

Activity: Play a Card Game and Listen to Jazz (like Rick’s Cafe)

Ingrid Bergman & Humphrey Bogart star in Casablanca, the 1940’s classic. To call yourself a romance movie genre fan, you must watch Casablanca.  Rick, played by Bergman, owns Rick’s Café. When his old love Ilsa, walks in,  Rick has to make the choice of helping his former lover and her fugitive husband escape the Nazis pursuing them. As you go through the drama and all the up-and-downs with Rick, feel as though you’re in this war time romantic drama by playing ‘As Time Goes By” while playing a card game. 

Grease

Activity: Have a Sing-Along (with this high school musical)

Grease is a well beloved 1970’s romantic musical comedy starring John Travolta & Olivia Newton-John. Danny and Sandy meet over the summer, later finding they go to the same high school. Danny is a part of the T-Birds, leather jackets wearing bad boys, while Sandy is picture of innocence. Sing along with these high school sweethearts as they navigate finding out who they really are with songs like “Grease Lighting” and “Summer Nights”.

Beauty & the Beast

Activity: Spend the Day Reading (like Belle) 

This 1990’s Disney princess classic teaches us to not judge a book by its cover. Belle is a young girl who loves to read, which makes others in her close-minded village mock her. Her father is taken in by the Beast, and she takes his place to save him. A curse had been placed on the Beast and all who live in his castle by an Enchantress due to his cruelty. The curse would only be broken if he learned to love. Share the love of romance books and the warmth of reading on this sometimes lonely day after watching ‘Beauty & the Beast’. 

While You Were Sleeping

Activity: Cook or Bake (like the Callaghan family)

This 1990’s Sandra Bullock & Peter Gallagher rom-com involves a ticket seller Lucy who has a crush on Peter. Peter is pushed onto the train tracks before Lucy saves him. A nurse accidentally tells Peter’s family Lucy and Peter are married, so Lucy pretends to be Peter’s wife while he is unconscious. Jack, Peter’s brother, is suspicious and spends time with Lucy, and they start to develop feelings for each other – plot twist! The Callaghan family had been so hospitable to Lucy while Peter was in a coma, so make some delicious food & dessert to warm your  heart similar to the way Jack’s family warms Lucy’s. 

Sweet Home Alabama 

Activity: Dress Up, Even if You’re Not Going Out (like Melanie – the fashion designer)

This 2000’s rom-com, starring Reese Witherspoon, Patrick Dempsey, & Josh Lucas, is truly a Southern romance love story. Melanie Carmichael, a rising fashion designer from Alabama, moves to NYC and gets engaged to the mayor’s son, Andrew. She goes back to her hometown to divorce her husband (her fiancé does not know about!), though the trip isn’t as short as she planned. Does Melanie choose the Southern hometown life with her “childhood husband” or marry the NYC mayor’s son who she always dreamt of? As Bobby Ray says, “You can take the girl out of the honky tonk, but you can’t take the honky tonk out of the girl.” Dress up for Valentine’s Day to pair with Melanie’s fashion designer career in Sweet Home Alabama. 

50 First Dates

Activity: Do Something Nice for Someone (Like Henry does for Lucy)

50 First Dates is a 2000’s Drew Barrymore & Adam Sandler rom-com taking place in Hawaii. Henry Roth meets Lucy in a diner one day, and hanging out with her, falls in love. It’s the next day at the diner where they meet and it seems like the day prior is reoccurring that Henry realizes something is wrong with Lucy – she has a form of amnesia that erases the day prior. Does Henry go back to his days of commitment issues or live everyday over for a woman he loves? Pair this funny and uplifting movie with doing something nice for someone as Henry does for Lucy ever day. 

Miss Congeniality

Activity: Treat Yourself  (like Gracie finally does)

Miss Congeniality is a 2000’s action comedy starring Sandra Bullock as FBI agent Gracie Hart, who lives and breathes for her job. When she gets assigned as an undercover FBI Agent to stop the Miss U.S.A. Beauty Pageant from being bombed, she is finally able to get in touch with her non-existent femininity. Does she choose femininity or being an FBI agent? Or can she choose both? While watching Miss Congeniality, treat yourself with some self care – a mani-pedi, bath, meditation – to celebrate how Gracie finds herself by the end of the movie.  

My Best Friend’s Wedding

Activity: Spend the Day with Friends (like BFFs Julianna and George)

My Best Friend’s Wedding stars Julia Roberts, Dermot Mulroney, Rupert Everett, & Cameron Diaz. Julianne Potter finds out her long time friend, Michael, is engaged to Kimberly. Julianne is invited to the wedding, and seeing Michael & Kimberly makes Julianna realize how much she has feelings for her friend. So, she decides to make Michael want to marry her instead. In order to do so, she enlists the help of her other BFF George. This complicated love triangle (square?) ends up showing the viewer the power of friendship. My Best Friend’s Wedding  wouldn’t be the same without Julianne’s best friend George as a support, so spend Valentine’s Day with your friends. 

You’ve Got Mail

Activity: Do Nostalgic Activities (like the children’s books in Kathleen’s book store)

Tom Hanks & Meg Ryan pair in 1990’s You’ve Got Mail, a cute rom-com about opposites chatting anonymously online regarding their business, life, and love. Unware to the characters, Kathleen and Joe, they are in competing businesses – Joe owns a giant bookstore while Kathleen owns a quaint bookshop struggling to survive.  Will their love conquer this conflict of interest? Pair You’ve Got Mail with nostalgia of childhood stories like those found in Kathleen’s shop. 

Sleepless in Seattle

Activity: Listen to the Radio (like the radio show Sam and Annie connect over)

Tom Hanks & Meg Ryan are one of the best rom-com pairs of the 1990s. Sleepless in Seattle finds a young boy, Jonah, has just lost his mom, struggling to help his dad, Sam, grieve.  Jonah has his dad call into a radio station in order to find help. Annie, engaged to Walter, is listening to the radio station in her car and begins to cry. She begins to realize her love with Walter isn’t the beautiful love Sam talks about when discussing his wife on the radio. Jonah believes Annie is for his father. Does Annie give into her dreams and find Sam or always wish what could have happened? A recently widowed man’s son calls a radio talk-show in an attempt to find his father a partner. Pair ‘Sleepless in Seattle’ by going old school and listening to the radio (or a podcast). “…a movie. That’s your problem. You don’t want to be in love, you want to be in love in a movie.” – Becky.