A Love To Last A Lifetime. How To Celebrate Valentine’s Day On A Budget: 5 romantic and sweet ways to celebrate with your loved one

I recently had the pleasure of capturing the sweetness of intergenerational love in a Valentine’s Day styled shoot at Promise Manor in Lynchburg, TN. I wanted to showcase the beauty and importance of love throughout your lifetime, highlighted by the gorgeous Pantone Color of the Year: Classic Blue. 

My models ranged from a couple who have been married for over 60 years to a pair of newlyweds and some sweet mother-daughter pairs. Our older couple taught us about how to celebrate love later in life, while our newlyweds explored how to celebrate Valentine’s Day on a budget. The moms and daughters showed us how to make Valentine’s Day meaningful outside of a romantic context. There are so many ways to celebrate love! (To check out the Mommy & Me Valentine’s Day Session, please click HERE and to check out the Nolen’s 60th-anniversary session click HERE). 

I shot using film and digital to capture the timeless, radiant, and joyful elements that define my photographs. In addition to artfully posing the models throughout the beautiful manor, I wanted to highlight their own personal love stories! This joyful styled shoot demonstrates the importance of celebrating Valentine’s Day with everyone you love!

The Promise Manor was a perfect location for this shoot. The historic home is owned by a sweet couple who fell in love, got married, and nurtured their dream of one day owning their own wedding venue. The Promise Manor is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and I love how the history of the home reflects the eternal nature of love.

This week, I wanted to highlight how you can celebrate Valentine’s Day with your loved one if you are a younger couple, a newlywed couple, or even a couple who may be needing to celebrate on a tighter budget!

Five romantic and sweet ways to celebrate Valentine’s Day with your loved one this year (and hopefully throughout the year) (BONUS: if you are a five love-languages person, I have tried to incorporate ideas from that perspective as well!)

1- Instead of simply buying flowers from the store: take a floral arrangement class together so that you can surprise her (or him) with gorgeous floral arrangements! (An Experience gift + Quality Time)

2-If you are on a tight budget, did you know you can check out movies from your local library? Go to the library, check out a couple of movies (at no cost) and snuggle on the couch and watch several of your favorite movies together! (Quality Time + Physical Closeness)

3- Invite another older couple over and enjoy learning from their own experiences and life story! There is a lot of wisdom in learning from an older generation, and not just leaning on your own perspective. (Quality Time)

4- Find a local organization where you can serve together, and hopefully make it a weekly (or monthly) habit of serving together (Service + Quality Time)

5-Go to the bakery where you purchased your wedding cake, and buy a smaller version of your wedding cake to share over coffee and/or tea together (maybe if you are anything like me, you didn’t get to enjoy your wedding cake on your actual wedding day, so treat yourself to something sweet!)

BONUS 6- Again if you are on a tighter budget as a newlywed couple, instead of buying cards at the store, perhaps write out notes for your loved one to let them know how much you admire and respect them. The power of a hand-written note goes a long way for many people (Personal story: I have been saving up my notes from my own husband for years and cannot wait to share them with my grandchildren to show them how much their grandfather means to me!) (Words of Affirmation)

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Meet Your Friendly Nashville Family Photographer

Dolly DeLong is a Nashville-based family & personal branding photographer, and also serves as a business systems educator to new creative entrepreneurs (which is a fancy way of saying, she enjoys teaching how to best lay a good foundation for automating your new business).  Dolly loves serving families, and business owners with her timeless, radiant photography.  She loves capturing the joy and emotion in both digital and film photos.

She also has a heart for serving the larger business community. Dolly shares her knowledge of tools like Pinterest, email marketing, automation processes, and time management with fellow creative business owners in an encouraging and supportive way through her T.A.S.K.* method (an example of this can be seen in her Pinterest Foundations Mini-Course), through helpful blog posts, and other resources. 

Dolly’s faith and love for her family motivate her to help other business owners find the joy and freedom she’s found in running a successful small business.

Whenever she has a spare moment, she enjoys watching TV (i.e. Survivor), eating way too many sweets, and listening to podcasts while running or walking. To work with Dolly DeLong Photography LLC, please email her at thedollydelong@gmail.com or fill out her contact form here.