The First Date.

Our daughter went out on her first real date last night. She was introduced to this guy by her friend, whose boyfriend is this guy’s best friend. Both boys go to the same private school and both girls go to the same public school, so we knew nothing about this guy other than the minimum details our daughter gave us. Last weekend the 4 met up for a double date and evidently “this guy” and our daughter hit it off right away because an hour after I picked her up from that double date, he CALLED her and asked her to go out on a real date with just him. Her dad was all like “WHAT?!? and I was all like “Awwwwe” but still a little nervous about it too. Our first born is dating now? Stop it!
She asked us if she could go out with him and we sluggishly agreed to it as long as we could meet him and his parents before they went out. We’re not sending our only daughter anywhere – ESPECIALLY ON A DATE – with someone, we haven’t met. When she went to bed that night her dad and I totally stalked his parents on Facebook to see if they were normal looking and not serial-killer-ish. It didn’t take long to find them on social media and ‘we’ learned pretty quickly that dad is a doctor and mom is a lawyer. Okay, so this kid’s parents are obviously really smart people. I’m over here like “I’m a mom who spends her spare time writing blogs about important issues like man buns and bee-holes” *OMG, get it together, you’re so embarrassing!* I’m sure his parents weren’t feeling as optimistic about the pairing after they did their Facebook background check on me (and you know they did.) I guess I have no choice but to dazzle them with all this charm and personality! 🙃

So last night was date night and as we were driving to drop her off at this boy’s house we were filling her up with dating do’s and don’ts. Ya know: don’t eat anything garlicky, do offer to pay for some of the date, make conversation with his parents etc. Our daughter who generally is a nervous wreck about anything new was surprisingly calm, cool and collected. None of it phased her in the slightest and I’m sure it was because she knew we’d like this guy. When we got to the front door her date greeted us by opening the door, shaking our hands and introducing himself. He was so sweet and as I looked him over, it was obvious how much effort he had made to make this first date special for both of them. I was internally giddy about our daughter’s good first date choice. He wore a sweater and JEANS, you guys. (My boys practically meltdown if I make them wear jeans) His hair was combed, he made conversation with us, he was polite….all the good things. We stood in the entryway and visited with him and his parents for a little bit and then we left and headed out on our own date.
As we were walking out the front door of their house, I said something like “take good care of our girl” and his mom was like “Oh he will! We’ve talked about this all week and he will take good care of her, I promise.” JACKPOT!
They had a really great date and when they arrived back at our house to drop her off they were both excited and couldn’t stop smiling. His mom picked them up from the movies in her pajamas and I was like #SoulSisters! *Too soon?* He was sweet and thoughtful and wouldn’t let our daughter pay for anything even though she offered. He even asked her if it was ok to hold her hand. ❤️ I don’t want to be all corny and sappy but this kid set the bar pretty high for any future daughter daters, and I’m happy about that. It’s refreshing to know some people are really raising gentleman and that my daughter was treated well and had a good first date experience. I can only hope that my boys will be the same way when they start dating because those are the kind of boys I want to raise; the gentleman kind.
I tried really hard to remember my first real date and was unsuccessful. I can tell you with certainty that if my first date was anything like my daughter’s was, I surely would have remembered it. Kudos to this guy for making such an effort and kudos to his parents for raising him well. Guys that make an effort and treat girls with respect are the lucky ones who snag a diamond in a world full of cubic zirconias. 🥇
T.