No matter if you are married, engaged, dating, just met. Never forget to Keep on Dating!! It’s vital for a good relationship. Being a wedding planner has exposed me to couples of all ages, from all walks of life and in all stages of life. I have seen really compatible and super awesome couples and I’ve seen ones that make me question whether their decision to marry is a good one. The highly successful couples are always the best communicators, really in tune with each other and are constantly taking the pulse on their relationship.
I really struggle with sharing feelings and being an open communicator. M does not however. He’s really amazing at it and pushes me out of my no-feelings comfort zone. So I was SUPER excited when Allison Carver, Owner of A Taste of Therapy asked us to try one of her monthly themed cooking date nights!! Cook In is the cutest little date night in a box! You get a kit with 2 aprons, printed recipe cards, a folder to store your recipes, a list of suggested movies to go with your cooking theme, a play list to download and listen to while you’re cooking together and MOST importantly… conversation starters.
Y’ALL!! When I opened our kit a few weeks ago and read the conversation starters I literally teared up… and then the fear set in. I was going to really have to talk about my feelings which if you know me personally is really a painful thing for me. So… I procrastinated…
We decided that we would do our date night on our weekend away to the Smoky Mountains. We already had reservations at the world’s cutest (and tiniest!) little cabin in Bryson City, NC. We love to cook together and do it almost every week but this would be different for us to have no little people around. We downloaded the playlist, picked our movie (we chose Under the Tuscan Sun (which is one of my favs)), and true to our personalities we got really silly really quickly. It de-escalated quickly and went from us pretending to stab each other with knives… to him spanking me with a frying pan. That is our personality as a couple though so you could say we were true to form!!
The date night takes a little planning on your part, but not much. We picked our date and I click-listed our groceries from Kroger. I didn’t even have to set foot in the store doing it this way AND it was surefire way to ensure I got every ingredient on my list. On the menu: Chicken Marsala with a yummy spritzer drink that you could easily make spiked if you need to loosen your lips a little before you get into the Q&A session. We were able to tailor the recipe to our tastes with ease. We omitted the pearl onions and added tarragon! Everything was delicious and this wasn’t a recipe that was in my repertoire but we loved it so we’ll be making this together again!!
Then… the part I was dreading. I definitely needed some wine for this. I poured us each a glass of Relax Riesling… which if you haven’t had it you should try it! One… the name couldn’t be more perfect! Two… it’s on the sweeter side so is perfect for sipping… especially after dinner. The instructions said to have a conversation at the table over dinner but the great thing about this kit is you can really make it work for you. We had a horribly small table to eat from in our cabin and one of our favorite things to do together in the evening is to lay in bed and snuggle so we opted to go through our conversation starters then instead. We muted the TV and got down to business. I totally chickened out on the first question which was “Where would you like to be in 5 years”.
He asked and I immediately said Well… Where would YOU like to be in 5 years. <FacePalm> He answered, then I did. And it was a little easier after that. We took turns answering the questions first and reading them out loud. Some were a breeze. Some… were really kind of difficult and thought provoking. I really had a hard time with the one that asked what personal sacrifice could I make right now to better our relationship. That one really made me think about what failings I have and how I could change myself to make our lives easier. I won’t tell you what I said but it was nice that M didn’t think that I needed to change much. We went through each question and I was really surprised to see how aligned we were on everything. Even our favorite date was the same! It made me feel good to see that we were on the same page with our relationship. It would be interesting in a couple years to see where we are at and go over the same cards again! I’m definitely going to keep them and we’ll try this date night again! I already can’t wait until the next Cook In kit arrives. Even though I was most nervous about the questions in the beginning… they are what I most look forward to getting more of! Those topics weren’t something that we would typically bring up in natural conversation but they were definitely things that I wanted answers to and the cards gave me the perfect excuse to ask them!!
Click Here to get your Cook In kit. Allison will be on Facebook live tonight and tomorrow at 8PM EST if you have any questions about her relationship kits!