{"id":4011,"date":"2009-03-04T20:09:20","date_gmt":"2009-03-05T01:09:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thehappyhousewife.com\/?p=4011"},"modified":"2018-12-08T20:12:31","modified_gmt":"2018-12-09T01:12:31","slug":"date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/","title":{"rendered":"Date Nights at Home ~ Dinner for Two"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This topic is even more timely now that we just purchased our new (to us) van. We were able to get everything we wanted, but it did cost us a little more than we had planned. We paid cash, but now that our savings account is significantly smaller I want to build it up again as quick as possible. I think that spending quality time with your husband is essential, but I need to do it for a minimal cost!<\/p>\n<p>Our first date night at home was dinner for two. I planned for more but an unexpected stomach bug hit me over the weekend so dinner was all I felt up to by Sunday night.\u00a0 I wanted to make something special for dinner and try to recreate a restaurant atmosphere, minus the constant interruptions by a server.<\/p>\n<p>Here are some ways to make dinner for two special.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Use nicer plates, silverware, and napkins.<\/li>\n<li>Think presentation, if serving a salad ~ jazz it up by using a nice bowl, unusual greens, or splurge on crotons.<\/li>\n<li>Use <a target = \"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.pandora.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Pandora<\/a> to create a music play list for the evening.<\/li>\n<li>Light candles for the table.<\/li>\n<li>Create a menu that is simple enough, but different from the every day.<\/li>\n<li>If you are not a cook purchase a skillet meal at the grocery store or some other type of meal that doesn&#8217;t require much cooking skill.<\/li>\n<li>Put the kids to bed<\/li>\n<li>If you do the cooking have your hubby to the dishes, we have always done this at our house and it works well.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><strong>Our Dinner for 2<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li> Spring Mix Salad $1<\/li>\n<li> Crab dip $3 with French Bread $1<\/li>\n<li>Shrimp and Chicken Pasta w\/ Garlic Cream Sauce $6<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><em><strong>Similar dish at a restaurant <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Side Salad $2.50 each<\/li>\n<li>Crab dip appetizer w\/ bread $8<\/li>\n<li>Shrimp and Chicken Pasta $13 each<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><em><strong>Total cost for our at home dinner $11.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Total cost for similar meal at a restaurant $39 plus tip.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/\/i533.photobucket.com\/albums\/ee336\/anderbach\/blog\/DSCF1384.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"520\" height=\"347\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/\/i533.photobucket.com\/albums\/ee336\/anderbach\/blog\/DSCF1385.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"504\" height=\"336\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/\/i533.photobucket.com\/albums\/ee336\/anderbach\/blog\/DSCF1386.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"501\" height=\"334\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Now it&#8217;s time for you to link up with your <em><strong>Date Night at Home <\/strong><\/em>ideas. Please link to your actual post and not your blog homepage, and please link back to this post so others can participate.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-506\" src=\"\/\/www.thehappyhousewife.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/05\/hh_signature_green.jpg\" alt=\"hh_signature_green\" width=\"163\" height=\"20\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This topic is even more timely now that we just purchased our new (to us) van. We were able to get everything we wanted, but it did cost us a little more than we had planned. We paid cash, but now that our savings account is significantly smaller I want to build it up again [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wprm-recipe-roundup-name":"","wprm-recipe-roundup-description":"","_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[3358],"class_list":{"0":"post-4011","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-frugal-living","7":"tag-redo","8":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v15.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Date Nights at Home ~ Dinner for Two - The Happy Housewife\u2122 :: Frugal Living<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Date Nights at Home ~ Dinner for Two - The Happy Housewife\u2122 :: Frugal Living\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This topic is even more timely now that we just purchased our new (to us) van. We were able to get everything we wanted, but it did cost us a little more than we had planned. We paid cash, but now that our savings account is significantly smaller I want to build it up again [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Happy Housewife\u2122 :: Frugal Living\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheHappyHousewife\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-03-05T01:09:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2018-12-09T01:12:31+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"\/\/i533.photobucket.com\/albums\/ee336\/anderbach\/blog\/DSCF1384.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@tonihanderson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@tonihanderson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Toni Herrbach\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\">\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/\",\"name\":\"The Happy Housewife\\u2122 :: Frugal Living\",\"description\":\"Where Martha Meets Real Life\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/#primaryimage\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"\/\/i533.photobucket.com\/albums\/ee336\/anderbach\/blog\/DSCF1384.jpg\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/\",\"name\":\"Date Nights at Home ~ Dinner for Two - The Happy Housewife\\u2122 :: Frugal Living\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/#primaryimage\"},\"datePublished\":\"2009-03-05T01:09:20+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-12-09T01:12:31+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/#\/schema\/person\/4e0cc17af167f72194b9d40ffb066454\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/date-nights-at-home-dinner-for-two\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/#\/schema\/person\/4e0cc17af167f72194b9d40ffb066454\",\"name\":\"Toni Herrbach\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4011"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4011\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22425,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4011\/revisions\/22425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/frugal-living\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}