"I Love You" Video: An Innovative (and Inexpensive) Valentine's Day Gift

With Valentine's Day fast approaching, and the economy still not looking too good, the search for quality, but inexpensive, gifts is on. There is a simple solution that is not only cheap, but also highly personalized, and is sure to delight your significant other all year.

If you have a computer with a built in camera, or a regular digital camera, you can record a video message for your loved one and then burn it onto a CD. If you have a program for it, you can also give the CD a nice, pretty, label personalized for your honey. Use your imagination when recording your message - you can either improvise the whole thing or stick to a script. You can sing, recite poetry, talk about your first date, your next date, whatever you like. This way, even though you aren't physically able to see each other, they are still able to see your face and hear your voice whenever they like.

Since most CDs have about 700 MB of space, you don't even have to stop at one message. You can record several if you are so inclined. In the first one, you may want to just introduce the rest of the CD, and then go on to make a sort of video diary. You can record songs that are special to the two of you and then talk about the first time you heard it together, or when you danced to it at prom or your wedding. The only limit here really is your imagination, and how much thought and creativity you are willing to put into the project.

In addition to the video messages, you can also include pictures. That way, if your loved one is watching the CD on a DVD player or computer, everything becomes one big slideshow. You can put the pictures in chronological order if you choose to do a retrospective video diary. So if you talk about your first date, you may want to put a picture from that night after the video, and so on with other special occasions. You can even do a collage of scenes that are special to the two of you. Again, you have many options and it really is up to you how much or how little you want to do.

Another thing that you might want to include are any poems or songs you may have written for your sweetie. You should be able to burn documents onto the CD just as you would videos, music files and pictures. If they aren't able to view the documents in a DVD player, they can always put it into their computer and open them from the disk. Either way, they have everything in one place and have easy access to you, in a sense, when the two of you can't be together.

This gift is perfect for couples who are away at different colleges, or whose jobs take them away from home more often than they would like, but it is not limited to those in long distance relationships. Even if you and your loved one live together, it is still a nice gesture, as it is very personal and from the heart. And it is something that can last a very long time and in the future can serve as a reminder of how strong and beautiful your love is.