time for two

My cousin, Ee Laine, recently wrote about how difficult it was to find 'couple time' for her and her husband, what with a two-year-old boy and another baby on the way.

I wanted to pick up on that, as 'couple time' is really something many of us struggle with in a relationship, whether we have children or not. The thing is, living together doesn't necessarily equate to time spent together, a fact that most couples living together can probably attest to.

In the past, I've found myself observing my relationship with The Husband, and lamenting to him whenever I feel like we're being more like roommates, than a couple sharing a life together. And it can be so easy to fall into that hole. There are days when The Husband comes home from work and he just doesn't feel like talking, and days when I have nothing much to say. And so we both end up sitting on the couch with our respective laptops - surfing, reading, catching up on emails, or watching the television for hours until it's time to go to bed, and we do the same thing again the next day, and the next.

I'm not saying there's something wrong with just being, but when that's all you do everyday, it is easy to lose the connection and closeness. And so I implemented a 'Date night', one night a week where we took turns planning 'dates', the way we would when we started going out. One week, I would take The Husband for a nice dinner somewhere, and the next week, he would organise a trip to the cinema, or perhaps to a wine bar we've never been to - as long as we did something new and different. It worked for awhile, although we usually ended up in bars and lounges, sharing a few glasses of wine as we talked about everything - our future, our home, our travel plans, or families. And we both had a lot of fun. It's important to reconnect, and a different environment often helps to inject that little bit of romance, and a sense of 'newness' into your lives as you do so.

But it is challenging and at times difficult to keep that up. We were trying to save money, which means spending more time at home instead of going out. In a small city like Auckland, it can also be difficult to find something new to do each week that doesn't break the bank. And so we inevitably slipped back into our routine of computers, TV and books at nights.

What we did learn after all that was to recognise how important it is to spend quality time together, not just time together. It is equally important to be flexible, and staying at home doesn't have to be boring. These days, The Husband and I cook together, we talk over our glasses of wine, we have movie nights in the comfort of our living room, complete with popcorn, and we always go to bed together each night. Every once in awhile, we do something different, and yes, we still go out on 'dates'.

It's easy to take a relationship for granted. But I'm always amaze that such a little effort can go a long way into strengthening the bond that's already there. Yesterday, The Husband and I drove out to the beach, shared a walk hand in hand, ducked into the beach cafe when it started to rain, and had a cup of coffee as we talked, and talked, and talked.

And I fell a little more in love with the man who already has my heart.