Date Night: Two Children Later.

October 10, 2011

Date Night: Two Children Later.

Date night for Brent and I used to involve two hours of me trying on different dresses, curling my hair, then putting it up, then taking it down again. It involved three rounds of drinks, and four different stops to meet up with friends. Most of the time it was hours past midnight by the time we made it home.

Last Friday my dad and stepmom called and asked if we’d like a night out while they spent time with the children. We were excited for a few uninterrupted hours together (it was only our second date since Arlo was born) but it also got me thinking about just how much date night has changed since we became the parents of two children.

Observe:

5:30pm. Grandparents will be on their way soon, so I mentally choose an outfit in my closet. There is no leisurely getting ready time these days. Try on determined outfit and decide it works well enough. Resist the urge to change my pants, I’m already running out of time.

5:45pm. Yell in the living room for Brent to get ready. Try to straighten the messy top knot I’ve worn in my hair all day. No time for a shower. A swipe of eyeliner, a dab or deep pink lipgloss and I survey myself in the mirror.

6:00pm. Like clockwork, the grandparents arrive. I layout pajamas for the kids, run down the list of things to do before bed “eat. play.bath.down before 8pm”, kiss the babies, wish the parents luck and off we go.

6:15pm. Sitting in the front seat of the car. With all the excitement of a night out, we never decided where we wanted to eat. Oh well, just drive towards downtown and we’ll figure something out

6:45pm. Sitting at a little table outside our favorite Mexican place. They have a Mariachi band playing. We order margaritas and hold hands and enjoy the buzz of downtown life. We eat slowly and talk about our week, our plans for the fall, a new house, and something funny Everly did.

7:30pm. The Mariachi band surrounds our table and plays “Besa Me Mucho”. I steal a kiss from my husband after the band moves on. A second Margarita? I don’t know…. well, ok, it is our night out afterall!

7:45pm. Me: (pointing to the 2nd margarita that I have had exactly one sip of) “Will you drink this? I shouldn’t have ordered a second one - Arlo will probably be up by 4am”

8:10pm. Look at the clock and text my dad. “Did the kids go down ok?” He responds that all is well.

8:15pm. After dinner we head to a little coffee shop for something to warm us against the cool evening air. Brent has an Irish coffee, I have a hot cider. Then we head out on Fayetteville street to take in some of the activity happening around First Friday.

8:30pm Fire dancers and a drum circle! We stand next to one another, our shoulders touching and sip hot drinks while we enjoy the show. “This makes me feel like we are in San Francisco” says Brent. I smile and squeeze his hand. We clap and move along to the steady thump thump of the drum circle.

9:00pm. “Let’s take a rickshaw home!” Brent says to me. “But I’m completely sober. I can drive.” I say back. “Let’s do it anyway. I can ride my bike back and get the car in the morning”

9:15pm. Tucked in under his arm, we watch the city sweep past us. The rickshaw driver plays a rap song through the speakers that neither of us know. “Do you want me to change this to something else?” he asks. “No, it’s perfect” I say back. We challenge a group of bicyclists to a race at stop light. Of course they blow us away and we all laugh.

9:25pm. We push through our front door and greet the grandparents. We talk for a bit, get an update on evening’s activities and thank them so much for giving us the opportunity to go out. They leave and we kick off our shoes.

10:00pm. The house is quiet. We curl up on a corner of the couch and I think to myself that this would be the time we would just be getting started before we had children. I marvel at how efficiently we’ve managed to squeeze a night’s worth of fun into three hours. I am happy to know my children are both sleeping soundly in the next room.

As different as our nights out are from the days when we used to stay out late, I feel just as satisfied. The process has changed but the key elements are exactly the same - his hand holding tight to mine under the dinner table, a bounce in our step as we seek out an undetermined adventure, laughing together under the street lights.

And when Arlo woke at 3:15am, I could almost hear the ghosts of Brent and Melissa past rattling their keys in the door, kicking shoes off sore feet and feeling utterly exhausted from a night out on the town. I was happy to have been them at one point in my life, but looking down at that sleepy, nursing boy in my arms I know I wouldn’t trade places again for all the date nights in the world.

Love,

*All photos for this post were taken with my new Olympus PEN camera provided by Tumblr & Olympus for the #PENready project. No editing was done to these photographs, I just used the built-in photo filters on the camera. I’m pretty smitten with this tiny DSLR.