Don't Stop Playing

One thing my husband is really good at balancing me out with is bringing reality to my spontaneous ideas. Where I have the ideas and then often talk myself out of them. He will answer with "why not?" This past week has been a perfect example of that. He has had some afternoons off which made space for more family time.

With our North Carolina weather turning more and more like spring and summer, I was ready to take off and GO somewhere anywhere. A drive, a hike, something. He graciously offered to drive to this town that we thought had a funny name on the map. We grabbed coffee from our favorite local place and then off we drove. Baby girl napping in the backseat, music playing and random conversations happening. The name of the town we were driving to is called Burgaw and while that isn't necessarily a funny name. I kept saying it like a chicken "Bur Bur Bur Bur...BurGAW!" (Sorry if you lived there) it really was a cute town my brain just liked playing the name. It was so simple, but there was so much release in just driving to drive. To adventure and not have a destination or goal in mind.

That same night we had come home, had dinner, did bedtime with our daughter and were settling in to spend some time together when I heard the sweet but sad cries of our daughter who needed Mama to come and nurse her again. So up the stairs I went and cuddled her on our bed and nursed her back to sleep but by then I was nap trapped. My husband came upstairs and we watched Bluey. Why you may ask? Because I relax watching that show I don't know why. But if you have seen Bluey we were watching the "Hammerbarn" episode where Bandit gets a pizza oven and both of us were like "pizza sounds good." Then we looked at each other. It was 9pm why would we???? So half an hour later my husband is racing to the door to beat the delivery driver to the doorbell and we were eating pizza and cinnamon rolls in bed while watching Bluey. Let me tell you it was the best time. We have talked about it all week. It felt rebellious in some ways to order pizza when we already had dinner, but it also had sleepover vibes.

Saturday night we once again had our daughter down for bedtime and were curling up on the couch to watch a movie when I said "Oh I ate all the cookies didn't I?" I often make cookie dough and then keep it in tupperware in the fridge to make a few cookies at a time. However, this night there was no cookie dough. "You want to make cookies?" my husband asked and you know what I did. So out came the kitchen aid and all the ingredients, plus the laughter of a husband and wife covering the clean kitchen in flour because how could one resist tossing flour back and forth.

So why do I share this? I share it because I think that it is easy to get caught up in the daily needs and there isn't anything wrong with that but we need play. That is one thing that becoming parents has taught my husband and I to do more. Our dates can't look like dinner out on the town as much anymore. BUT it can look like a fun drink and racing each other in Mario Kart after bedtime. We aren't doing getaways in this season, but we can still adventure and explore what is local to us. Sometimes it is just taking advantage of the moment. Whether it is a late night pizza order, a drive to a town with a funny name.

Finding times to play allow us to learn more about each other. We laugh, we great new inside jokes that get us through the tougher moments of everyday life. Can I tell you about the night we stayed up way too late mimicking the funny faces our daughter makes and laughing ourselves silly. We still make the face during hard parenting moments and it totally lifts the mood. So don't stop playing. Explore new things with your spouse, as a family, but don't get complacent with them just being another set of hands to help with the kids or the house. Remember that you can always date your spouse, the dates may just look a little different.

What are your favorite date ideas? Drop them in the comments I would love to hear them.