#rushleydatenight

A few different times in our marriage, Russ and I have decided we need to go on more regular date nights. Problem is, it never really sticks! Or even happens, I think. We just talk about it, go on like one date, and then fall off the wagon again. This is lameeee because both of us really value quality time, but we're pretty bad at it naturally. Like, we spend lots of time together, but making it quality is the hard part. So basically, we spend a lot of time watching Netflix and movies together, but I don't consider that very quality time. I like time where we can talk more and where we can plan things for each other.

So a few weeks ago, we had that same talk again, and we've been doing pretty dang good! Here's what we've been up to lately for date night :)


7.25.15
The weekend following this talk of ours just happened to be a weekend spent in Boise. Since we had never been to Freak Alley but had heard about it just about every time we go to Boise, we finally went. I didn't even realize what it was until we got there . . . I was thinking it was more . . . circus-y maybe? Haha I don't even know :) But it's just a bunch of street art, which was pretty cool :) Then we walked around a bit before grabbing burgers for dinner at Big Jud's and custard at Freddy's.

7.31.15
It was my turn to plan the date, and I knew that Russ had his final weigh-in for his DietBet coming up, so anything food-based was out of the question. I wanted to do something exercise-based, so I decided we'd hike the Y. Then, during Friday-day, my sister-in-law Mackenzi texted me asking if Russ and I wanted to go on a sunrise hike of the Y with them the next morning. I told her that we couldn't because we were having a garage sale that day, but how ironic because we were already planning to hike the Y that night! She responded telling me that was a bummer we couldn't go with them, but to have fun and "Leave us notes ;)" . . . which turned out to be the best idea EVER!

The Y is a series of switchbacks, so we wrote notes on fluorescent green card stock and left one at almost every switchback. It was really fun for me and Russ because we tried to think of witty things to write on every note, so we took turns writing the notes, and they said things like, "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step . . . or switchback!", "And we would walk a thousand miles, if we could just leave youuuuu some notes! Or maybe just 10 switchbacks :)" and "Life isn't measured by the number of breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away! Enjoy the breath-taking moments while you're taking lots of breaths ;)".  And we had 10 notes with witty little things like that :) My favorite was one was the last one, written by Russ: "You made it! To our last note . . . And almost to the end! Thanks for letting us join you on your journey of 10 switchbacks!" I just thought it was funny and cute, because it was on the 9th switchback and we didn't have enough notes to do one at the final switch, so we had to end our notes before the hike was over :)

I just can't even explain how much fun I thought this date was. I loved that we were doing something fun for our siblings, and I loved coming up with witty things together :) And it was so rewarding the next morning when Mance-Z (Mackenzi, Lance, & Zander) came to our garage sale following their hike and told us how much fun they had getting our notes. Mackenzi said that the notes helped her get through it, and they both said that people on the trail were all like "You guys are the note people?!" and "Oh, I thought it was like a proposal or something" which I thought was funny :) What I really thought was fun about it is that usually you do do stuff like that for your significant other when you want it to be romantic and sweet, but we were doing it for our siblings, so it wasn't romantic, but it did feel fun and exciting anyway :) I totally recommend doing something like this if you're looking for a good date idea :)

we did the hike at night, so got no pics of us, but mance-z sent us this pic the next morning :)

8.8.15
This was our one week so far where we didn't do super great. It was Russ's turn to plan, but the things he thought about planning got messed up by some other plans, so we ended up having a spur-of-the-moment lunch date in the park where we ate pizza and doughnuts (we wanted reward food after working in the yard for 3 hours!) and then that night we had another spur-of-the-moment date where we got treats from Rita's and watched a movie on Netflix. This may sound like a date-overload weekend, but it actually felt like no date at all because they weren't planned. I like spur of the moment things, but I also like feeling like something was planned for me, just like I like to plan things for Russ. So even though we did both of these things, and they were both fun, they felt more like hanging out than dates, because we both had a say in what happened. So since things went down this way, Russ agreed to plan the next week's date :) He's so nice to me :)

8.14.15
First off, Russ took me to a new restaurant. It's interesting how it being a new restaurant (new to us) made it feel so much more like a date! In fact, the new restaurant is by one of my very favorite restaurants, so we drove up there and parked and I wondered if we were going to go to the favorite restaurant, and honestly I was kind of sad if we were because I was thinking, "I just ate here a week ago!" So when we went into Lucy's New York Pizzeria instead, I just felt excited about the new-ness of it :) And not only that, but I have an awesome man because he got a "pay $10 for $20" groupon for the place! What a keeper :) So we ate our pizza, and then went to a favorite place for dessert (Farr's Fresh). We enjoyed talking to each other and being with each other :)

After that, lucky little Russ got off the hook a little: earlier in the week, my parents offered us their outdoor theater tickets to Crazy for You at the Scera Shell, so he didn't have to figure out an activity for us :) But we had an enjoyable activity (and free!) nonetheless :)

we got the "meaty" and the "margarita." we both preferred the margarita.

I was a little bummed because I spent time getting all dolled up for our date and I curled my hair, but before our date even started, my hair was pretty much all flat, except for that one curl in the front! See below picture for accurate depiction of my "curly" hair haha :)

So there you have our date nights lately :) I honestly feel like it is bringing us even closer together, and I'm loving every second of this new arrangement . . . I get to look forward to date night all week long! I'm so glad Russ is the guy I get to date for the rest of forever :)

Also, in case you were wondering, all of these dates have been free! (Well, aside from food, but we'd be eating anyway!) So you can definitely find fun and free things to do for dates with your honey :) And if you want to follow along, #rushleydatenight is the hashtag I use on Instagram for our dates :)