I’m sure you’ve had quite a few friends or relatives tell you how incredibly important it is to date your spouse. Well, it is! It’s super important. It’s important for your relationship, your connection, and maybe even your sanity.
The bummer? It isn’t always doable.
Between crazy work schedules, finances, trying to find reliable babysitters, and every other excuse under the sun, it can be almost a chore to try and carve out that special time with your person. We end up feeling guilty when date nights don’t pan out or are so few and far between. It can be overwhelming and frustrating.
The truth is by the end of a very long and chaotic day, I’m done. We both are. When bedtime finally rolls around, we’re both ready to crawl under our blankets and hibernate. I’m a stay-at-home mom, my husband works restaurant hours, so we’re exhausted on multiple levels. Working on different shifts almost and looking forward to vegging out. So try as we might, that “us” time is usually put on the back burner.
Then it hit me! (Not the car or anything, but a car IS involved!)
Let’s work with what we have and find something that suits our lifestyle. Cue the driveway date night!
We pick one evening out of the week. It’s usually completely random. We have dinner with the kids, we do our normal evening routine with them, and then we put them to bed. My oldest is 12 and my youngest is 5 so they aren’t babies by any means. But we tuck them in, tell our oldest where we’ll be, and we head out to the car.
Yeah, you read that right.
We bundle up, grab our most favorite snacks and drinks, and we hide away in the car. We don’t actually go anywhere. It stays in the driveway, sometimes it’s even parked in the garage. We turn on a podcast or some show we’ve been waiting to watch with the other and we hang out. No interruptions. No major money spent. But all the quality time we could ask for. The kids can come right down to us if there’s an emergency, which hasn’t happened yet. We’re close enough to know they’re okay but far enough away to feel like it really is just the two of us again.
It may not seem like much but it means the world to us.
We’ve really been enjoying our newfound alone time. We aren’t out there for long. The length of most shows or podcasts is anywhere between 30 minutes to an hour-long. But it’s time we truly cherish.
Have you ever done this or something similar? I would so encourage you to try it out. Order take out if you’re feeling fancy and enjoy the time you get with your significant other. I know we will have so many moments together when the kids get older but I want to be with him now, too.
Will you try a driveway date night with your significant other? Let us know some creative ways you spend time with your partner.
