Yep, I take my kids on dates. Recently a close friend said to me, “I love how you do dates with your children! You guys are awesome parents.”
At first, I thought, well I'm just being a good parent. But maybe I AM being an awesome parent? With four children, it's not as though there's much extra of me or my husband to go around at the end of the day. We like to try to do special activities for each of the children—because even though there are four of them, they still all deserve and need their own one-on-one time with their parents.
Before our twins were born, we would take our son to do special “dates” so that he got some alone time with each parent and some time without the baby around. By the time our twins were born, we were still “dating” our children, but those dates became even more important. Not only was there a baby (again) to draw away our attention, but there were actually two babies taking the attention—and a helluva lot of our time and sanity.
Our children have grown to appreciate and look forward to our special dates. Lunch with my son at his favorite Japanese restaurant. Boy Scout camping weekend with dad. Brunch with my daughter. Shopping with one twin. Dinner with another twin. Anything that gets them that additional periodic special time with one parent or another. Sometimes it's as simple as taking one child with me to the grocery store, a real treat if you normally have to shop with 4 kids or with your 3 siblings. Other times it's a birthday weekend road trip to Boston to the American Girl Store and a Girl Scout overnight.
Every one is memorable and worthwhile. Besides, I get the most adorable dates.
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This is something I have recently become much more cognizent of. We used to be so much better about alone time with each of the kids but somehow with summer we got way out of our routine. I realized a couple of weeks ago that my daughter was in desperate need of some alone time with her daddy and now it’s our plan for them to have daddy daughter dates every weekend (even if it’s just going to the grocery store together). Found you through the Blog Hop!