Date Night

Tonight I thought the stars would not align. Erin and Megan are with Grammy and Grampy for the night and I had hoped to leave Evan with a friend for an hour-ish so that Chris and I could go out on a date--which we haven't done in a looooonnnnnnggg time. But then Evan didn't take a nap and the friend we were going to leave him with had to go to her office holiday party. Originally she was going to take him with her (not a big deal), but with him having not really napped and getting back late, it just wasn't a good situation for him. No problem, I called our babysitter, thinking that it wasn't like she had to put him to bed or anything--no dice, she had basketball and wouldn't be back until 6:15 or so. Her mom offered to take him, but as her husband wasn't home, she was the one that would have to go get her older daughter from basketball and I didn't want Evan to have to ride in a car all the way down to Orrington because then he would have fallen asleep in the car and not gone to bed tonight (other moms understand this, right?). So we finally decided to see if we could impose on my brother-in-law and sister-in-law, which we really didn't want to do because they have already agreed to help us out this coming Tuesday when neither of us can be home for a few hours due to a different conflict. We call them up and they agree to take Evan for a few hours. He can play at their house, "no problem" (which, given the mess he left there, was a pretty amazing offer on their part!).

Babysitter solved, we are off to dinner. Except we didn't take into account the HUGE hockey game tonight--UM vs UNH. Never have I seen that long a line of traffic trying to get over the bridge to campus! So even though we were only a mile or so from town, getting there was a trick. And once there, finding a place to park was even more of a trick (I had to go through a deep snowbank!). As we walked into the restaurant, we were fairly certain that it wasn't going to happen and we prepared ourselves to head back home, call date night a total failure and move on with our lives because clearly there would be a two hour wait for a table.

That was when the stars began to align. We got a table immediately AND it was next to the heater so I could dry my cold, wet feet (remember the snowbank mentioned above?). We got a wonderful meal, had a $10 coupon, and even enjoyed some fried ice cream. We went back to get Evan and he was happy as a clam, having spent the evening spreading cushions all over the house and feeding the rubber duckies some dry rice. Things worked out just fine!

And us? We got two full hours of uninterrupted conversation! Tomorrow the kids will be back and the holiday season will continue in full swing. The house will need to be cleaned, laundry done, plans made, errands run...but it will be done with a smile because tonight I got to remember a little more about this wonderful guy I am spending my life with--and that makes all the difference. Ahhhhhhh...we should do this more often!