Parents, how often do you go out?

My wife works evening. Once a week, she will go out with friends after work for a little bit. Once a week, I set aside a night to hang out with my friends. Together, we get to go out about once a month without our son.

About once a year we get to go out together. :grumble:

Maybe 1-2 times a year

Girl who will be 4 in April, Boy just turned 1

We are shooting for bi-weekly this year. In the past three years it has been more like 2 times total. Our three year old has cystic fibrosis and requires some extra things that not a lot of sitters are comfortable with. We have moved closer to grandma so we have been able to go out much more often this year.

It's probably some parents that wish they had child care complaining that you go out too much.

After getting a comment insinuating that we go out too much I am wondering ...

In general how often do you go out without the kids (anything recreational counts)

Do you And youe s.o. Go together or seperate?

How many kids and ages?

After having opposite schedules for a year, hubs and I now go out together one night a week leaving our 2 yr old with grandma for about 3 hours. I dont feel its excessive. We dont drink a lot hit clubs etc.

who is complaining? if it's grandma? then yes you are going out too much.

if it's not grandma then who are they to judge?

I go out about twice a week. But I have a large family and a large circle of friends who all enjoy spending time with Jbean.

More often than not I get told 'Mom, you go out and do something, XXX is coming over and we're gonna do stuff. "

so yes...twice a week.

edited to add: Jbean is 10.

Kids grown up and left home but we still don`t go out it is just too expensive, and we have to sub the kids all the time to help with their rent..so it just never stops even when they `grow up n leave home` lol

I'm 28, my husband is 29, and our son is 2. My husband has pool every Tuesday and goes out some weekends with this friends, but I just stay home those nights. We go out together probably once or twice a month and leave our son with his grandparents. We'd probably go out more often, but I don't like to pick him up after his bed time so we usually do over-nights or entire weekends with the grands and I would feel guilty asking too often. Plus, honestly, I don't want too much time to myself because the more time I have to be free the less I enjoy being tied down - I definitely wasn't ready to have a kid when I did. Don't get me wrong, I love my son more than anything and he is amazing, but I miss being me.

We share custody with my ex husband. So we only have them every other week.

On the weeks we don't have them we will usually go out one night on the weekend and one night during the week.
I also may have a GNO while we don't have them.
We're social people, and our schedule kind of lets us be.

We don't go anywhere without them when we have them, it would be a waste of our precious time with them.

I think this generally depends on the availability of relatives to watch the kid(s). People use babysitters, but in my experience, people don't leave babies with babysitters; they leave older children. For a baby, you need a grandma.
My wife and I had no family close. So we hardly ever went out.
Finally, just before the birth of our second son, we decided to take an evening/night just the two of us. It would have been the first time in 18 months we would have been without the oldest. My mom lived two-and-a-half hours away. So, I drove my son down there and I drove back. My mom agreed (begged really) to keep my son for three days! Yippee! Three whole days of R and R before we suddenly had two children.
Unfortunately, we got one evening. As we took a leisurely stroll to get breakfast in an actual restaurant that first morning, my wife's water broke. Two weeks early. She gave birth to my second son about noon.
We hardly ever went out without the kids after that, and we never spent a night without them, until about three years later. I had a business trip to Seattle. I convinced my wife to meet me there over the weekend, and my sister (who also lived about two hours away) agreed to come stay at our house and watch the kids.
Well, the wife flew up to Seattle on Friday night and, about three o'clock that morning, my sister called in a panic. My oldest son had a terrible cough and was whooping, and she did not know what to do.
By the way, my sister had already raised three kids of her own. But, since she was looking after someone else's kid, she panicked.
We told her to take him to the emergency room, and, as it turned out, he just had the croup. So, as soon as she got him outside in the cool air, the coughing and whooping stopped.
Of course, we didn't know that. So we could not get back to sleep. We did not hear back from my sister until about 9 in the morning. I was already at work.
Then, my wife went out for a run, and got lost in the strange town. Her run lasted about three hours. She was so tired that, when we went out to dinner that night, the first time we had gone to someplace really nice in five years, she fell asleep before the soup came, forehead straight down in between the silverware.
I let her sleep, and ate alone.

There is definitely a difference between going out and leaving kids with a sitter vs Grandma. I think it is good for them to spend time with grandma and good for your relationship, too. Unfortunately my mom didn't live close, so when my kids were young, we never went out without them. If one of us had to go for a work function or something, the other would stay at home with the kids. Not good for your marriage, trust me.

Before she started school maybe once every 3 months, now that she is in school once every 2 - 3 weeks.

Not enough. Honestly, I wish we could do it once a week. That's not excessive at all. We just went out last week for a date night ( dinner and comedy club) 200 dollars later, not including babysitting fees. Last time was November!! We just don't have family close to where we live to babysit and to go out as often as we wish, or can spend 200 every-time. Kids are almost 2 and almost 4. This is a very busy time... but its very important for a couple to have time for themselves so that they never forget why they got together in the first place. ""Good for you" key to a strong lasting relationship/ marriage !

Rarely, maybe once a month. Three kids and no local family means it's very expensive to do so.

We solve this problem by inviting people over at night and letting the kids sleep over. Much cheaper for everyone around.

OUT? what is out?? haha work and tesco is as much as my social life gets these days