s/o date night- how often?

Jamiedoll01

Just curious to find out how often you gals do date night with DH/SO, as well as how often you have nights out with friends.  With both of us having odd work schedules that often include evenings and weekends, we have never had a real set standard on this stuff...but I'm really feeling like I'd like to try to make it a point to have some sort of standard on this stuff and am curious as to what others have going on.

ValAndRyan

A night during Christmastime, maybe in February and one definitely in July. That is actually going out of the house together. It's bad. That's when we have family in town that can watch the kids. We have a sitter but the cost of sitters is just too much plus the cost of whatever we do so we save the sitter for special occasions. We count sometimes watching tv together after the kids have gone to bed as date night too. We love watching Friends. Honestly, we don't mind. Our lives are hectic right now and we just take whatever moments we can. Our kids will be grown up (well, Logan now since Dan can watch himself) before we know it so we'll also have time in the future.

Jamiedoll01

You are ahead of us, Val!  I find myself in a similar predicament when it comes to having a night out- paying a sitter is $$$ and we already get help from family here and there to get through the work week, so I feel guilty asking them to pitch in yet again on the weekend.  Then, the guilt over how to spend time kicks in- I feel like DH and I so rarely have time home together, that we should spend it as a family with Aisling, so I feel guilty if I plan to go out with friends (it's all me with the guilt- DH is fine with me going out).  But, bottom line, I feel like I need to make it more of a priority to set aside time for DH and me and to be with my friends...I feel like this summer has gone by and all I've done is work and take Aisling to her swim lessons and music classes.  

kross605

Until recently we were keeping up with a once a week date night...most of the time it was not an exciting date, it was just catching up on our DVR at home or something equally mundane, but we made sure to sit next to each other on the couch and put our phones away and totally focus on enjoying the time together. We just started talking about how we have to get back into that though. We've always done it in fits and starts. But I think its well worth the effort.

JenD1018

What's date night?

Seriously, I can't even get him to remove the iphone from his hands at night.

I'm still waiting on my Mother's Day present which was supposed to be a date night out with him planning it all.

tracyd21

Since we are still kid-less, date night is relatively frequent.  But, we realized a few weeks ago that we have spent every free moment this summer working on the baby's room and we haven't really spent any time together.  We've been trying to plan once a week and so far, so good.  Though, this week's date night will consist of assembling a crib and probably arguing over who is not doing it right, haha. 

I see my girlfriends pretty frequently - maybe every 2 weeks or so we get together for girls' night and have pizza.  It's nice because we just go to someone's house (kids included) and chat around the kitchen table.  We also always do this on a weeknight instead of the weekend so it is usually much easier for everyone to get together.  Anytime we've done a weekend girls' night, we have to plan it months in advance to make sure everyone is available.

just_JRM

JenD1018:

What's date night?

This.

That being said, we do enjoy catching up on DVR'ed stuff after the baby goes to bed. Until I fall asleep anyway. 

jpfeifer

Just recently, dh and I agreed that we need to make sure we have a date night at least once every two weeks.  Yes, a sitter and whatever we decide to do will add up, but we both agreed to keep our sanity and a happy marriage, we need to allocate time to ourselves.  So far so good.

SJU1982

We dpn't have kids, but our work schedules are not in sync.  Sundays are our one day together, and we always grab a nice lunch, or check out a museum or festival, etc. 

It's still nice going out on actual Saturday night, so we try for a "nice" night every couple of months.

Jamiedoll01

I'm thinking of maybe proposing to DH that we go out one time a month to start, though that probably won't start until after this baby comes...really, maybe it will end up being a New Years Resolution..haha.  I don't care if it's fancy dinner or just walking around a park or even grocery shopping- I just feel like we should make more of a priority of time together.

Maybe as far as friends, I won't set anything in stone, because I have friends from a few different 'groups', but maybe every few weeks I'd like to do something with at least a friend- get a pedicure or grab lunch or sit in one of our yards and gossip...

 I guess I'm just feeling disconnected lately- not depressed or anything, just disconnected.  I feel like wacky work schedules and kids are taking over every moment of life...which I know is semi-normal right now, but I just don't want to lose sight of me as a person either (that probably sounds dramatic).