Family Day & Date Night

Monday is "Family Day" for the Callenders. We went a long time, out of necessity, with no real day off together - I worked on Adam's days off while he was home with the kids, and he worked on mine. Now that our situation has changed a bit, we've been very intentional in setting aside this one day every week. It's a day off for everybody that we hold almost sacred. I mean, whenever humanly possible we don't answer phones, we don't do work stuff - it's our Sabbath...That's not to say that we do something spectacular every Monday - in fact, it's often quite the opposite. It's often just a day to wear our pajamas around the house and be as lazy and comfortable as we can possibly make ourselves. I love that.

Occasionally, however, we do something special, like catch a movie together or go out to eat. Today we hit the beach. Being that we'd never really done that before (Yes, I know - what kind of parents go 6 years without taking their kid(s) to the beach? All I can say is that I have this thing about sand...) the kids were pretty stinkin' excited. We didn't head up that way until mid afternoon, so by the time we got there the worst of the heat from the "noonday" sun was over (it was still at least 90 degrees, but it was a dry heat...). The kids had a blast! They rolled in the sand, swam, rolled in the sand some more, ate some cookies, more swimming, more sand...We were only there about an hour and a half, but it was a great time, and lots of great memories were made. We'll be cleaning sand out of kids parts for the foreseeable future, but it was a great time.

Another great thing about Mondays is that it's DATE NIGHT! We alternate every other week with the McMullens - one week it's their turn, the next it's ours, and so on. There's nothing like having free (and exceptionally high quality!) childcare while you head out for some alone time with the love of your life. Tonight was our turn, so Adam and I got to dump the kids and run! ;) We went out to dinner (enjoying some fine service by a former cheerleader at Max & Erma's) and then checked out the new river walkway in Mishawaka. Let me take this brief moment to say that if you haven't been there to check it out - you need to go! We had a great time walking leisurely around the beautiful park, just talking and being together. It was awesome.

All this to say - you married people (with or without children) - if there were two things I would force couples to do to help their marriages, it would be those two things: Family Day and Date Night. They should be absolutely mandatory. Set aside a day every week that's strictly yours. Do something that makes it special - whether it's something fun outside the house or doing absolutely nothing. And find another couple (or more than one) that you can trade kids with. It'll help your marriage, and it'll help theirs. Do it. I mean it. Do it now.