We’ve just reached a special time in our children’s lives. At ages five and almost four, we are well past the nappies, potty training and weaning stages. We don’t need buggies or a huge changing bag when we go out and it’s wonderful!
(I realise that if you’re still knee deep in carrot puree and nappies, you probably hate me for saying that. But hang on in there, it will all be worth it in the end. I promise. 🙂 )
Even better, the children are old enough to sit still and concentrate for just a little while now, which is why we decided to have our first ever family movie night this weekend.
Our five-year old made tickets for each of the family members:
We ordered a delivery from Pizza Hut, which was fantastic for me because I DIDN’T HAVE TO COOK!!!! I bought ice cream and popcorn…
 …and I was pretty pleased to find actual cinema style popcorn. Naturally, I also  got in a few drinks for the grown ups.
The film of choice was Finding Nemo. We picked it because both kids are currently fans of Octonauts and Julia Donaldson’s book Tiddler The Story Telling Fish, so we stuck with the fishy theme. And as it was released well before our kids arrived, me and Mr L hadn’t seen it before, so it would be a film premiere for all of us. If you’ve got young kids you’ll know that you have to watch each film about a thousand times, so we bought Finding Nemo on Blu-Ray for the occasion.
So we had our pizza and ice cream and took our seats on the sofa to watch the film.
Young kids can’t sit still for a whole film, so we had to have some popcorn in the interval…
…served in little cups cinema-style.
We haven’t had a Blu-Ray player for long and I was really impressed at how fantastic the film looked in this format. Like the best kiddie films it had funny moments specially for the adults and both parents really enjoyed it.
Best of all we had some proper family time with the whole family together and me snuggled up with my little ones on the sofa. Lovely!
My tip for a good night in is to make a special occasion of it and take the opportunity to spend some quality time together. We’re all so busy now that sometimes it’s worth booking a night in the diary and doing something together.
This post is an entry into MoneySupermarket’s Big Night In competition. Moneysupermarket reckon staying in is the new going out because “everything from handbags to gladrags via cocktails, tips and taxis seems to be getting more expensive – meaning a night out on the town can blow a big hole in your bank balance.” Even though nights on the town are few and far between for us these days, going out with the family is not cheap either! (MoneySupermarket contributed £50 to our Big Night In.)