go out on "date nights" with my spouse on a regular basis

I haven’t kept proper tabs on this goal lately, but we’ve continued to grab alone time whenever we can swing it (despite someone’s recent somewhat disparaging and uninformed comment to the contrary, although I bit my tongue at the time).

This summer we’ve had to be more creative, as the majority of our kiddo watchers have been out of town, and we’ve had moving madness as of late, but since my last entry we’ve managed to catch some great live shows, a few films, had some lovely meals alone, even pulled our first all nighter at a fancy hotel. I don’t sneeze at the obscure late night movies curled up on the couch, star gazing or sneaky kisses by our proposal tree either.

Friday we capped Markus’ week off (which was supposed to be utilized for a family camping trip but got sucked up by the straw of moving house instead) by using Isak’s pre-school hours for a delicious brunch in a little jukebox garnished café and wandering Main street hand in hand, poking about in whatever little shops struck our fancy. Casual. Wonderful.

I look forward to our family and friends’ return which will allow us more grown up time alone, but my real goal isn’t to ‘ditch the kid and go for dinner and a movie’, it’s to keep our connection polished, and I think we’re doing a fine job. Yup.

Tonight we’re going to a big holiday dinner/Xmas party for Markus’ work, the type of thing we’d usually love to go to but can’t make. Fortunately, Jojo offered to babysit for us, so we’re getting ready and heading downtown to the Pan Pacific Hotel for the festivities. It’ll be the first time I meet the people he works with too. Oooooh… where’s my red lipstick?

^{Post-party update here.}

Today we had a very nice “we’re flying by the seat of our pants so let’s enjoy the view” date. Rather last minute we decided to go to White Rock, dropped Isak off to go bird watching with Grandpa and Grandma, and departed in search of sustenance.

The cafe we’d initially wanted to try was closed, so we drove around until we found a place that looked good, settling on a restaurant by the water called the Sideshow. It was empty of people and full of local art, decent music, delicious food, and a killer view. We had big meals with a pint and watched the sun do interesting things over the water while we talked.

Afterward we went for a hike into the gorge, stopping on a nice little bench to stare at the sky and catch our (my) breath. This was a place he used to go when growing up, so he shared a lot of stories about the spot. We saw a bald eagle doing a loud dance in a treetop and caught the sun going down like an orange ball through the trees, striping them with golden orange light. By the time we got back to the car the sky was purply-blue with pink smudged clouds. Beautiful.

We even had a chance to shop a bit & check out a little gallery, finding some wonderful paintings of Vancouver and the surrounding areas that we loved (I’m going to search for a print of one showing a rainy downtown evening on Granville Street in the 50’s).

We picked up Isak, had a quick visit with my parents over ginger ale and mandarin oranges & headed home. A very nice and unexpected outing.

We’ve been trying to squeeze time for ourselves in. Sometimes it happens very late at night – putting a dvd on after Isak’s asleep (we’ve been doing that lately, with plans for tonight too) or both realizing we’re wide awake at 2am and talking or… whatever.

Norm’s been wanting to see Isak, so today we dropped him off where he had a fantastic time honing his painting skills, playing with vintage toys, posing for photos, and running around excitedly with a rat puppet on his hand. Knowing he’s having fun with her lets us relax and have fun too.

We went downtown and had some rainy day cafe food at a favorite old haunt of ours, hit the music store and picked up a new CD we’ve been waiting for, walked around noting all the city changes in the last 20 years, whatever we felt like. We’d planned on a movie, but were having a fine time without it and wandered around instead. Very nice.

A few hours later we picked up a happy boy & Norm begged us to go out more often, so we really, really should.

With all the recent chaos, one on one time (awake) has been rare, but last night Isak went to sleep shockingly early, so we picked a dvd, indulged in tea, truffles, and licorice (black for him, red for me) and watched the whole movie, uninterrupted. I also realized that Ellen Burstyn has been in 4 of the last movies we’ve seen, which is odd. Maybe I should put Requiem for a Dream on later – he hasn’t seen it and we could use something light hearted (jk).

Future shiny date night plans: my parents are back in town, and since little sir is completely off the mommy moo now, we can start moving towards our first overnight visit with grandma and grandpa. Sweetening this idea is a generous offer of a night at the Hyatt Regency (from a friend with an unused certificate) which would be strange, I think a room costs about half our monthly rent. Also, our friends on the island said they can wrangle us a cabin for a weekend get-away out there, which is terribly appealing.

Of course… all of these marvelous plans require me to GET WELL first, but with all the stress the last few weeks has bestowed upon us, it’s nice to think about.

Heading out with a couple of old friends to catch some old punk rock bands (DOA & the dayglos) may not sound romantic, but it was great. We whipped up a great Indian meal, our friends and sitter showed up, and we headed downtown.

The show was really fun and boisterous, and I particularly liked the brass ensemble that joined in at the end. I can’t believe it was their 30th anniversary show. Eek. Lots of long ago familiar faces in the crowd. And rum! The rum was good too.

We really cut loose – Sherry was sitting and said to come home whenever, usually we have to worry about time. We stayed until the end of the final encore and caught the last sky train back. When we got home, Isak had been asleep for hours (shocking!) so we had a nightcap and some ginger flecked chocolate with Sherry before she left, then kicked back and talked until the wee hours.

We must get out together more. More live shows would be good – even little ones.

Although we’ve done some fun family things lately, we haven’t had much “alone time”. All of our usual kid wranglers (which is a fairly small list to begin with) have been out of town. We did go to a fantastic Indian restaurant in White Rock last weekend, and last night Isak passed out early, so we ate gourmet pizza, watched the Motorcycle Diaries, and fantasized about traveling to far away places together someday.

Yesterday was Markus’ birthday, and a friend offered to babysit so we could go out for dinner. We ended up walking to one of our old favorite places for a meal only to find it had vanished, so we ended up at another tasty place, Memphis Blues, which serves Southern stlye BBQ.

We had delicious hot sandwiches and cold beer and just being able to sit there, relax, and not chase anyone was such a treat. We had the place nearly to ourselves, and they were playing great old blues at a decent level so we could talk.

After dinner we took a long walk (and caught a gorgeous sunset) in the deliciously mild summer night. We held hands, stars peeked out one by one, and when we eventually got home they’d had such a good time that Sherry said she’d be happy to come by for a few hours every other week so we can go out together more often.

This is a very generous offer – especially with my parents away for so long, we haven’t had many chances for grown-up outings. We’ll definitely have to take her up on this again.

It was so nice to be out together, I almost feel guilty about it. Almost.

Not only is it Mother’s Day, but it’s also our anniversary. My mom came over to watch Isak and we went out for a wonderful, casual, free afternoon. We had a tasty lunch at the pub down the street, stopped to buy a print and a book from a local artist, took the skytrain downtown and wandered around, had some hellish fun at a pinball arcade, stopped off for pints and conversation at the Railway Club, then headed home.

There was a wonderful balance of romance, ridiculous silliness, serious future planning, and overflowing mutual appreciation. A great, great time.

Lately our ‘dates’ have continued to consist mostly of revelling in our evening alone time talking, drinking tea, reading together, or renting a movie for people over 3 years old (recently Sweeney Todd & a History of Violence), but there are upcoming plans in place for more datelike dates.

We’ve had some truly great family outings & Sunday drives that tuckered Isak out and gave us quiet time to talk while he napped though…