A Date

I am really excited that my husband and I am going on a real date tonight!

This is a real treat. Since we have 7 kids at home, getting away typically means either I am home with the kids, or he is home with the kids. It's just the easiest way to maintain a little bit of "me" time in the midst of so much "them" time.

The last time we were out without children in tow, we were sitting in the hospital waiting room all day, focusing on his fathers heart surgery. That was not my idea of a date. And I am sure his father would have rather we were out on the town instead of waiting to hear the surgeons recap of the day's events. (thankfully, the surgery was successful, and he's still on the road to recovery.)

I have learned that getting out a night or two in a weeks time makes me a much better mom, and more prepared to deal with the usual 24/7 of parenting. Mike's job gets him out daily, and he has a few service opportunities that he enjoys being involved in, so that has really been a fairly good solution to parenting a large family.

But tonight we get "us" time. It's a rare treat. We tell our sitters we don't mind paying them well for staying, and we try to make it worth their while. Our biggest problem with that is, simply, it's hard to find sitters who can handle 7 kids at one time. Hard, because it's really too much responsibility for even the best teenage sitter, and hard, also, because we have a young teen in our home that resents having a sitter.

And night times can be stressful here. Between medications for behaviour wearing off near dinner time, and nighttime medications not kicking in until bedtime, there are a few difficult hours in there that even we, who are much more accustomed to the issues, shudder at. It's that 5 to 7 night time "meltdown" phase around here.

So, my niece, a mother of three and familiar with our kids, has accepted the challenge tonight. I started praying this week for a sitter, and although she may not realize she is a direct answer to our prayers, she is allowing us some breathing time and couple time that we couldn't have without her. It's a huge blessing, to which we are very grateful.

I will have the meal ready for them when she gets here, (spaghetti usually works best!) and they will have their pajama's ready to jump into. They can watch a movie, eat popcorn in the livingroom, or read books in their comfy places. But when I walk out the door tonight to spend time with the most important person in the world to me, I can leave with the assurance the kids will be well cared for, safe, and perfectly fine in my absence. What a gift to us!

I think the night out for us includes a nice dinner somewhere, then landing for several hours after that at our local booksellers for some quiet reflection and reading time. We usually enjoy a late night coffee, and if we don't eat too much at dinner, a nice dessert to go with it. Usually we get so relaxed that we have been known to doze in an armchair with our feet up, a good book in our laps, side by side as people mill around us. It's a great feeling to know I will be with my best friend, reconnecting again, without any interuptions of little voices, sticky hands or minor squabbles.

It's funny, but after a couple hours together, both of us are ready to get back at it all again. We come home refreshed, and ready for the next round.

Here's to Date Night. Here's to Us!! Here's to a wonderful sitter! Here's to the promise of a great night out!