Sunday, June 27, 2021

When A Night Out Is Our Life Now

 

Dessert from Black Cat 


For the first time in a long time (a year, maybe?), Mom and Dad had a night all to ourselves. We did....a whole lot of nothing. Maybe it's because our kids are older now, so we can leave them for a while when we need to. The novelty of being able to go wherever and whenever we need to has worn off. When we first left the minis home by themselves to run an errand, it was like we were breaking a rule. It was freeing. Now it's life.

Not that we didn't enjoy a quiet house or a dinner in a restaurant (because that's always nice), but we were definitely "those people" that younger me would have been ashamed by! Here we are in our late thirties, with a night away from the minis and we ran errands, fixed the dryer, did the laundry, and watched a few episodes of Mad Men. I feel accomplished and so disappointed in our boring selves at the same time.

With the minis getting older, I'm noticing a lot of these subtle changes in our lives. This is another one, but I can't say this one is bittersweet. This change happened right under our noses and we only realized it this morning as we were on our way to pick them up from grandparents. There was once a time when I would eagerly leave the house without the kids at the end of the day because all they wanted was to be with me, touching me, needing me. Occasionally a mini jumps at the chance for errand running, but they're no longer attached to me all hours of the day.

While our beer was nice and cold, and we didn't have to rush our leisurely dinner, a night out without kids is now a normal thing for us. I honestly didn't think we'd ever see that day when the minis were toddlers! I had looked forward to this time and thought of all the wonderful, cool things we would do. Never did I imagine the most exciting thing we would do on a night out is fix our dryer.

I'm always amazed at how small our bill seems when we dine with the minis!