Do you, or would you have a regular 'date night' with your partner?

[katykuns]

Genuinely interested if people do, and what they actually do...

Does it become a bit of a chore having one every week/month? Is it a crappy American fad?

I suppose I 'dated' my partner a lot... and we still have 'dates' but we never actually saw it like that. Now we have a newborn, the idea of escaping for a date would be quite a nice prospect in the not so distant future :P

No!

Yuk!!

I wouldn't call it a 'date night' but DH and I go out every Wednesday night without DD (she is only 4mths old, we put her to bed before we go out and we are only out for 2.5 hours, so far, for 6 weeks now she hasn't woken up whilst we have been out).

I really value this time, I enjoy being 'Gatorade' and not just feeling like 'Gatorade DD's mummy'.

I always think it's a nice idea but we never manage to put it into practice. I think we're just too lazy to organise ourselves enough to do it!

I think it's a good idea at least once a month if you can afford it. Just a meal or a trip to the cinema to spend time together is important and stops you getting dragged down by everyday stuff.

Gatorade, we look forward to this colicky stage to be over and then we will be able to go to do things alone and not have it involve massive organisational skills just to leave the house :P

The phrase 'date night' sets my teeth on edge.

No.

We go out together every 6 weeks or so, or just when ever we can get babysitter - usually for dinner and a few bevvies. It isn't a date, as we are married and have been for 12 years.

We go out for a short while after work most Friday evenings, and also on Saturdays.

If DH ever tried to refer to it as a 'date night' I would probably divorce him.

We generally don't go out together much as the cost of a babysitter on top of whatever we go out to do ends up making it rather an expensive luxury. Once dd1 is old enough to be left to babysit dd2 then we might go out more often but we're not really that bothered.

People get into ruts habits, and IMO it is better to get into the habit of "going out together" than into the habit of "not going out together."

Same with some other habits.

I reckon it's Pair Bonding and you need it.

Before DH became a complete tosspot we did - was nice to go out once a month and nice getting ready etc - took it in turns to organise and worked really well.

Btw my description of DH may seem harsh but that was whole other thread.

Oh and phrase 'date night' makes me cringe too - it was just one night a month (9th) which we'd make an effort to spend out together.

I've never called it a 'date night', to me dating is something you might do before getting married, not 10 years in! But if the opportunity arises for us to go out for food/drink/cinema/anything, even a walk together in the middle of the day, we take it. I like having time just the two of us. It's not that often though, but a heck of a lot more than many people posting in Relationships who often say they don't go out at all just the two of them, I think it's really important and worth prioritising.

The phrase date night makes me cringe a bit too but I have so far failed to come up with a better one.

DH and I decided a couple of years ago that we needed to put a bit more effort into our relationship to prevent it being swallowed up by the demands of having young DCs (they were 4, 2 and 3m at the time). So we did the date night thing for a while - not necessarily getting a babysitter and going out (although sometimes we did), but having one night a week when we cooked a meal together and talked to each other rather than collapsing in front of the TV / computer. Now we are less sleep deprived and our marriage is back to full strength we don't feel the need to have a special date night any more, but I agree with piglet that once you are in the habit of something, that habit will last. So now we almost always eat at the kitchen table rather than in front of the TV, and in general tend to spend more time interacting with each other in the evenings. I think date nights were good for getting us into this habit.

When ours were small we'd always get them to bed on a Saturday night and either get a takeaway or OH would cook us a meal. It was just one night a week when we didn't focus on them, just on ourselves.

We try to still have one night at the weekend when we go out by ourselves. Mind, ours are so much older that quite often we're the only ones home at the weekend now. :)

We normally have two nights a week to ourselves while my DC are at their dad's, so in terms of spending time alone together we have a huge advantage. DC don't go to bed til at least 9.30 so it's not like they are fast asleep by 7.30 and we still have time to ourselves! We tend to eat out one night and stay in the other night.

We also go away for the weekend about four times a year, not necessarily miles away, we stay in the UK. We find though that we spend more quality time together when there are no chores to do!

No. It's rare that we are in together though