Date Nights

Hubby and I went on date night last night. We just went for a walk then supposedly to McDonalds for a hot chocolate before we had to go fetch eldest from somewhere. The queue in McDonalds was moving so slow that after waiting 15 minutes and still only being half way through we decided to nip to the nearby supermarket and grab a drink and a snack and go sit and wait for our eldest.

I realised something though as we were walking at the start of the evening. For a long time I have been allowing, no expecting hubby to take all the responsibility for date nights. OK, I was tired, I have sleep apnoea but that is now treated with a CPAP machine, and there really is no excuse for not making the effort any more.

There was a time when the boys were little and we could NOT afford to eat out that I used to make a real effort for date night, decorating (mostly with paper stuff I could make myself) and cooking along a theme. Our budget is probably just as tight right now as it was back then, so why not do that now?

So that's the plan. I'm not necessarily going to organise and plan every week, but I am going to start this week. My first major project is to make a curtain to cover the archway between our kitchen and dining room, so that we can make the dining room a separate space. Hopefully I have some fabric in my stash that is big enough to do that job and I won't have to wait until I can buy some fabric, but we'll see when I get to dig into my stash after I've finished writing this post.

This week I'll be cooking Chinese and these are the plans:

DECORATIONS
Red tablecloth,
Black place mats and coasters,
Shorter candle display in middle of dining table, and another candle display on the other table. (Using candles I already have),
Red paper lanterns (easy to make at home, but I will need to get red paper I'm sure there's none in my stash),
Possibly some red cord tassels if I can work them into the decorating design and pick any up really cheaply.

MUSIC
Somewhere we have a cd of Chinese worship music and I am pretty sure hubby ripped it to the hard drive of the computer that is in the dining room so if I can't find the CD we should still be able to use it.

FOOD
Starter - I will buy some mini spring rolls and other Chinese snacks
Main Course - Crispy Duck Breasts, garlic pak choi and Bejing rice
Dessert - crushed ginger nut cookies, topped with sliced strawberries, a scoop of good quality vanilla ice cream and then a grating of dark chocolate. Served with fortune cookies.

I'm not sure whether to try and make the fortune cookies or to go buy some as we do have a Chinese supermarket close enough to get to easily. If I make them I can insert my own "fortunes", but will I have time to get all that done? hmmmmmm.
I already have a bottle of sparkling wine in the fridge that we have been saving for a special occasion, so we can serve that with the meal.

So, are you having a date night this week?
What are your plans?