July 5, 2009

Date Night

It has been a very long time since Nick and I had a date night together. We get to go out together, but it usually involves going to a wedding, party, or some other event where we are not alone. Last night, we decided to ask Grandma and Grandpa to babysit so that we could have a good old-fashioned date night. We did dinner and a movie and had five wonderful hours all to ourselves.

The night was so relaxing and nice, but I couldn't help but feel a little guilty about spending money. These days, I always feel selfish when I spend money on things for us. I feel as if I am taking something away from Charlie. As I laid in bed last night with a case of spender's remorse, I realized that the money was well spent for our entire family. Nick and I need time to focus on just us. We will be better partners and therefore better parents to Charlie.

I know there are many more cost effective alternatives to what we did last night, but it has been so long, that we just went with "The Usual" date night. I would love to get more ideas for date nights from some of you...if you have any. I really think that we need to start designating at least one night a month to just us, but I don't want to spend an arm and a leg each time.

Dinner Out - $68.00
Movie Tickets - $21.00
Popcorn and Drinks - $15.00
Coffee - $5.00
Alone time with Nick - Priceless

5 comments:

Vicki said...

Date nights are a must! I'll stay on the look out for good ideas:)

Jennifer Groves said...

Hi there, I check in every now and then and you're little man is super adorable! As for date nights on the cheap, we've done stay-at-home dates with a bottle of Trader Joe's, pizza, and playing cards or boardgames...no tv allowed!

Bowling is actually really fun too! We're losers and have our own shoes and then we look for coupons and it's a super cheap date night out!

Take care!

Anonymous said...

Here are a few date on a budget ideas I ran across the other day.

http://ideas.thenest.com/love-and-sex-advice/anniversaries-dating-ideas/Articles/cheap-date-ideas.aspx

The Shaw Family said...

Thanks for the great ideas, friends!!!

Amber said...

The mower is compliments of Grandma, but she got it at Toy r us for 16.99, not bad for a big toy. I love the bowling idea. I was going to recommend a night at home too, but she had that idea as well, the thing you should do is have Charlie spend the night at grandmas, you could go out for breakfast - way cheaper then pick him up.