Romance: Making Special Time

~Originally Posted 2/2006~

My hope here is that by my sharing some of the things I have come up with lately to make sure hubby and I have special time together, that you will be inspired and come up with your own ideas. Obviously, all our situations are different and my ideas may not work for your situation. Try to use my ideas as a springboard to help you come up with your own. You have to decide what will work best for your situation. The most important thing is to try something! It doesn't have to be for Valentines Day, but that might be fun if you didn't think you could do something special for your honey that day!

Let me start by sharing the things that make it difficult for my husband and I to get out for a date or have special time together lately. The biggest obstacle is the nursing baby. She just turned 3 months old and is not much fun to take to a restaurant or a movie, etc. She prefers to eat, be up for about an hour and then sleep till the next feeding. She does not, however, like to be in the car or her carseat for that matter. Another obstacle is my husbands work schedule. He works a condensed work week. That means he works 3 days one week and 4 days the next, but the days he works are 13+ hour days. In the mornings he leaves before I get up and he gets home pretty close to the time I am going to bed at night. On the days he is home we tend to be just a tad busy with raising and schooling our ten children who are still at home, working on the house, fixing whatever has broken while he was working the previous week, etc. Sometimes it seems like whole weeks sneak by without us getting anytime alone together. The other big obstacle are the ten children at home. We hardly ever get to talk to just one another. There is always someone asking us something, or interrupting us. You get the picture.

I decided that I would have to MAKE special time happen. If I/we didn’t plan it, it just wouldn’t happen! But, what could I do here at home to make a special, romantic interlude for my hard working hubby and I? Here are the things I have come up with and tried so far:

1.A bubble bath at night:
This is one I could do on a day hubby worked. I decided ahead of time I was going to do this so I got a little nap so I wouldn’t be so tired when he got home. He gets home after the youngest children are asleep, so when hubby got home I got him his dinner, gave the older kids their bedtime instructions, and then grabbed hubby and towed him upstairs to our room for the bath. Candles and low lights made it a really relaxing time, where he could soak his aching muscles from a hard days work and we could just sit and talk without being interrupted.


2.Picnic date in our bedroom: This works well for us because our room is really big and the baby’s room in in one half of our walk-in closet. I sent hubby out to pick up a nice dinner from a local steak place (so we didn’t have to cook), while I got the kids dinner made and set up our picnic area. I put comforters and pillows on the floor, put my laptop on a box so we could watch a movie while we ate, brought up the good china and glassware and lit lots of candles around the room. After hubby got back we told the older boys they were in charge (get dinner and bedtime done with the younger kids) and were not to disturb us unless there was an emergency. So, we ate our yummy steaks by candlelight while watching a movie together. When the baby woke up to eat I just brought her to the “picnic” and nursed her, played with her and put her back to bed for the night. It was very relaxing!

3.Weekend “Away” but at home: I had planned to surprise hubby by arranging for our children to spend Friday and Saturday nights at our friends house (wonderful friends!). Hubby would have to work Saturday ( he works every Sat.), but would have Sunday off, so we could have some time together Friday night, have breakfast together Sat. and he could also stop by for lunch with me on Saturday. Then we would have Sat. night through Sunday afternoon all to ourselves! (well, baby would be with us). About two weeks before the secretly planned weekend, my husband gets asked to work a Wed. for co-worker and the co-worker would work hubby’s Sat. shift. Wow! Hubby then said we should see about having our friends watch the kids so we could have a weekend alone! Great minds think alike! LOL! I had to share my secret, which was kind of a bummer, but he was very happy to know I had been working on it and told me to keep that idea for another time. We stayed at home instead of a hotel, which saved us money, got to sleep in our own bed, in our new beautiful bedroom and baby got to sleep in her own bed. Hubby got take-out food for a few of our meals so I wouldn’t have to cook too much, too!

The most important ingredient in these ideas is PLANNING AHEAD OF TIME. Gone are the days of being spontaneous. At least for the season we are in right now. It takes just a little effort to pre-plan a romantic interlude. Remember that these are just ideas. You may have to adjust them or come up with your own idea. I would list a few more ideas, but hubby reads this blog and I don’t want to give away any of my secret plans! LOL!

Please share any of your own ideas you have done for dates at home. The more ideas the better!