When my husband and I first had our son in 2016, our closest family lived about 1,000 miles away. So, finding the time to get away was very few and far between. We had to get creative in finding alone time away from kids. Now that our son is almost five, it’s a tad easier to figure things out since there’s not a specific feeding schedule or the need for diapers.
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Stay at Home
No babysitter? No problem! Here are a few ideas in finding alone time with kids at home.
Fancy Dinner
My husband and I love trying local steakhouses. Our two favorites are Bob’s and Flemings. If you want to have the entire experience with appetizers, drinks, dinner, and dessert, you have to be prepared to drop a few hundred dollars. Instead of dropping a ton of money at a steakhouse, go to your local meat market — we like Hirsch’s and Local Yocal — and buy a couple of steaks for a mere fraction of the cost. Our second (and new) favorite meal to make at home is crab legs! It’s fairly easy and oh-so-delicious!
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Dessert Night
If you are not a baker, find a few local bakeries. Grab a few of your favorites, and enjoy the night rating your favorite desserts.
Movie Night
One of my husband’s and my favorite things to do is to take turns picking movies. If it’s your turn to pick the movie, come up with four or five movies. If you or your spouse hasn’t seen them, pull up the trailer. Get your stack together. We would put two movies head-to-head and flip a coin. If tails wins, you discard the movie you assigned to heads. Makes it a little more interesting.
Plan Your Future
About twice a year, we do a little executive retreat where we review the past six to 12 months, and plan the future. It’s a great time for us to talk about our personal goals, couple goals, our son, financial, one, five, and 10 years down the road. It’s nice for us to talk about our hopes and dreams and come up with a game plan on how to make them a reality!
Other At-Home Date Ideas
- Virtual paint night
- Couples massage
- Listen to a podcast
- At-home workout
- Wine or champagne tasting
Take Your Kid(s) with You
Hear me out! Finding alone time away from kids doesn’t just have to mean staying at home. Here’s a few ways where we take our son with us, but still enjoy time “alone” together.
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Indoor Play Place
Find an indoor play place where your kid can run wild, and you can spend time with your spouse. My husband and I personally love taking our son to Kid Mania. We bring cards so we can play uno or gin rummy. That way we can stay there for an hour or two, and are only occasionally interrupted by a panting child wanting some water before he goes back in.
Kid-Friendly Restaurants
Find a kid-friendly restaurant like Hat Creek Burger, where you can enjoy a dinner and your kid can play outside or at whatever play area they have available.
Gym with Childcare
We personally have a membership to the McKinney Apex Centre and love it. There are designated playroom hours Monday through Friday, shorter hours Saturday, and no playroom on Sunday. This allows my husband and me to get a gym session in while our son is at the playroom.
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Various Childcare Resources
Friend/Family Babysitter
This is our go to. Not just because we trust family way more than anyone else with our son, but also because every time we find a babysitter, something comes up with the babysitter. Our last one moved to Austin.
Double-Date and Share a Sitter
This way saves money but also allows you time with your spouse and your friends.
School Day Dates
This has always been a favorite of ours. We will plan a vacation day while our son is in school. It always feels like a “skip” day from when we were in high school, but it’s not!
Babysitting Swap
Once a month you babysit someone else’s kids, and they go on a date, then the next time they babysit for you.
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My hairdresser asked me if I loved my son more than my husband (it fit the context of our conversation), and I quickly said no. She was taken aback by that response, but it’s how I feel. My son will leave me at some point. He will go off into the world and build his own family, leaving my husband and I together. It has and always will be important for us to find alone time away from kids. Some times we just have to work harder to get that alone time than others.
How do you find alone time away from kids?
