In Episode 47 of the Babies & Business Podcast, Avram and Rachel Gonzales delve into the transformative power of consistent date nights in building and maintaining strong relationships. Using the engaging metaphor of tending to a relationship like a garden, they explore how regular, intentional time together can prevent the “weeds” of neglect and disconnection from taking over. In a heartfelt discussion, the couple shares personal anecdotes, revealing the challenges and triumphs of balancing business responsibilities with family life and romance. Listeners will gain practical insights into how to prioritize their relationships amidst the chaos of entrepreneurship and parenting. Tune in to discover strategies for revitalizing your connection and keeping your relationship flourishing. Join the conversation and share your favorite date night experiences with the Babies & Business community!

 

Mentions & Resources

Mike Schlichte

E16 – Attracting Super Sick Deals with Mike Schlichte

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Episode Transcription

Below you will find a transcript of this entire podcast episode. Enjoy!

Avram Gonzales: Hey friends, we’re excited to be back for another episode of the Babies in Business Podcast.

Rachel Gonzales: Very excited to be here, partly because I am not wearing a baby while we’re recording. This is a huge monumental step for us.

Avram Gonzales: Rachel’s always having to try to like talk around the baby or like contain her breath and breathing so she’s not just all up in your ears on the podcast.

There’s a lot of audio stuff we’ve been figuring out with that.

Rachel Gonzales: And this is the second time we’re recording this because when we did record it It was

Avram Gonzales: the whole thing was

Rachel Gonzales: on my clothes wrong because I had the baby on me and I had a blanket and I was rubbing up against the blanket the whole time, so, redo, take number two.

Avram Gonzales: Yeah. You know, at least it’s not like a three hour recording.

Um, I have a buddy of mine, Adrian, he posted the other day that he did like a two and a half hour training that he didn’t realize the microphone was muted the whole

time. It had to do it. Can you imagine that

Rachel Gonzales: Oh, Oh, that would take my soul.

Avram Gonzales: Just soul crushing, right?

So, anyway, we’re back for round two and we’re excited to talk about strengthening the relationship you have with your partner today because we’ve just been through the equivalent of one month of consistent scheduled date nights.

And it’s been amazing.

Rachel Gonzales: been It’s been so good

Avram Gonzales: And it is the inspiration for today’s podcast because date night happened to be the mechanism that we’ve been enjoying to strengthen our relationship with each other but in talking about it we realized there’s a lot of things that went into this That are important aspects of building a relationship, and we wanted to riff on those, take you on this little journey discussion that we had, that we thought was worthwhile in the pursuit of building your relationship with your partner.

You know,

having date night for the last month straight, and comparing it to not having something consistent before,

Rachel Gonzales: It’s incredible.

For the first while with new baby with August in our family, it kind of felt like we were high fiving in the hall because I was so tired a lot. You know, you were with Lincoln and I needed to go take a nap when August wasn’t that napping. I was napping and there was very little time with each other.

You know, we get to the end of the day and we’ve put the babies down. We look over at each other and we just look like puddles melting into the couch because we just have no energy left and especially not for each other. It’s like, you know, what do you do in those times? So having that dedicated time this last month has been so incredible.

Avram Gonzales: it’s like,

how long could we really go?

having some time with each other before things just sort of start to degrade. I don’t know what that timeline looks like, but I know that other couples have felt that.

We’ve, we’ve spoken before on the podcast about benign neglect. We’ll talk about it a little bit more today, but it’s basically the drifting apart you have with people simply because you weren’t in contact. And even if you’re living under the same roof, The high fiving in the hallway is not really enough to keep a marriage together

over the long term.

Um, we thought about this really great metaphor, uh, you know, we haven’t been in our garden in a couple years because of babies, but previous to that, we certainly loved growing some herbs and some, and trying some other things out. And we thought a metaphor for all of this is, is a garden and that a garden, if left untended, will just grow.

And then you said something really brilliant about fruits and vegetables with a

garden.

Rachel Gonzales: I have never known a garden that just randomly sprouted a cucumber or a tomato. You have to plant those things. I have often seen weeds randomly sprout up everywhere, all over. growing up we had a garden, a big garden, and, uh, I remember having to weed the garden. Oh my gosh, what a tedious task, but it was that or milk the cow.

I chose weeding. That was great. So, yeah, so a garden, if you’re not planting the seeds, you’re not actually going to get the rewards, that fruit that you would desire. You’re going to get weeds. And in a relationship, what is that? What could that be? Could that be, um, less patient with each other, maybe frustration?

It could be you’re not growing close together. Your, maybe your goals drift apart, things like that. You know, those are some of the things that could be, for me, weeds in our relationship.

Avram Gonzales: Mm hmm. Yeah, and if you’re not visiting the garden on a regular basis, you don’t see what’s popping up. You’ll miss some things, right? We watched some movie the other day where this guy Um, he just couldn’t believe that his wife had left him and uh, Morgan Freeman was the other actor in the movie He’s like Bro, there had to be signs that you

Rachel Gonzales: I was sitting there when it happened.

Avram Gonzales: right? We’ll

look that movie up maybe

throw in the show notes because that was a really good movie.

I think we’ll visit again

Rachel Gonzales: Right, about relationships. It was so wonderful to watch.

Avram Gon
zales: So keeping that metaphor in mind, you know We

realize that you can either proactively and positively add to your relationship or not.

Rachel Gonzales: Right.

Avram Gonzales: And if you don’t do it, you end up with those weeds and maybe a random assortment of flowers if you’re really, really lucky.

Rachel Gonzales: Yeah. I mean, yeah, there’s, you just, A couple of years ago, we talked about intentionality being the one word that we had throughout the year about how we kind of, went about work, life, family, relationships, all those things, and with a relationship, I I chose you to be my, my partner for life.

And if I am frustrated with you at times or, whatever those feelings might be, I ask myself, is this going to get me closer to you or is it going to make me feel further away from you? am I going to feel good about this or is it going to make me feel kind of icky? Am I going to, be upset, but also just choosing you in those moments.

in every moment. So I love date night because it’s kind of having it all set up. There were a lot of different things that we had to do to get to the point of having a date night, but I’ve loved having the time with you this last month. Um, Because we just haven’t had the time to sometimes even finish a sentence.

Avram Gonzales: Oh, dude. One of the most aggravating things for me is that we’re trying to have a conversation and then, you know, Lincoln’s running over and he, you know, he wants attention and he wants to tell us what’s going on,

Rachel Gonzales: And he’s so he’s so excited.

Avram Gonzales: but like you literally can’t finish sentences sometimes.

It’s like, it’s just all about him.

Rachel Gonzales: Exactly. And it’s all, a lot around like transitions. If I’ve left the house and I’m coming back or whatever that is. Those conversations that we try to have. And then we just kind of abandon them. We don’t finish them because we just don’t have the time or we forget to get back to them.

So, Date Night has been really awesome.

It has taken us a bit of time to get to that point. And in comparison, it’s really neat to see, you know, what it was like not having date night and now having date night. but for those of you listening that are parents and you have your own business, you also feel the pain of what we’re going to talk about now is that it’s not always super easy and you feel like you’re spinning the plates of your relationships.

You have work, you have family, you have your relationships, you have your kids, all these different things. But

Avram Gonzales: you have to keep spinning them.

Rachel Gonzales: Yeah.

Avram Gonzales: You, you cannot leave your relationship, even if it’s the most, you know, like for us, like our relationship is the strongest part of what we have going on.

Rachel Gonzales: Yeah.

Avram Gonzales: Everything else sometimes feels like it can be a bit chaotic and go through those seasons, but like we always come back to the relationship. So that plate, you cannot leave it. alone for too long.

Rachel Gonzales: Right.

Avram Gonzales: And so we play this dance, this in and out. We have some great friends, Mike and Danielle Schlichte. We actually had Mike on the podcast about a year ago.

Uh, his episode, I think it’s episode 16. We’ll throw it in the show notes. How to, how to attract super sick deals. It’s really a great podcast about manifestation. And I think you guys will dig the forward thinking aspect of Michael on that podcast and there’s a lot of references to his partner Danielle and what they they put together Anyway, that’s an episode for the show notes, but Mike and Danielle when we first made friends with them I remember asking hey, do you guys want to do this or do that?

And this is before we had Lincoln right and if it was a Tuesday night Mike would always say sorry that’s our date night, but we could choose a different night and they defended that time vigorously.

Rachel Gonzales: Right. It was non-negotiable

Avram Gonzales: It was non negotiable.

That’s the word

Rachel Gonzales: They were not, going to sacrifice or change their plans for something else

Avram Gonzales: And it’s because they recognize what we are finally coming around to which is you don’t always get the time. And a week can go by very quickly without that time.

Rachel Gonzales: Oh yeah,

Avram Gonzales: You know, and just having that carved out ahead, you always know that it’s there. You never book other things on top of it. And for us right now, it’s Fridays.

We can get babysitting on Fridays. And our minds are ready and prepared for that time when it comes around.

Rachel Gonzales: Yeah. And sometimes, I mean, for me, I’ve looked forward to it. It feels like a reprieve,

you know,

just going out, doing something with you, having August along cause he’s breastfeeding, but it’s really awesome to see, Just the simple weekly check ins have been very, um, motivational, but also just energy giving.

I feel like I’m recharged at those times where, um, Gosh, it’s amazing when we can finish conversation, finish a whole sentence and not be interrupted. So that’s really, really awesome. you know, for us though, like you mentioned, we had to, we had a couple of things that we had to plan ahead in order to actually make this happen.

And some of these were roadblocks for us before that’s why it’s not happened sooner.

Avram Gonzales: I mean, and at times, and we’ll talk about this, it’s almost felt like, well, is it really worth all this effort?

Rachel Gonzales: Yes, I’ve absolutely felt myself ask that question. There was like two weeks ago that we made it out later to our date, still worked.

We had scheduled an oil change that day. It went long. We were like an hour ish into our date night time already. And I think we kind of looked at each other and were like, Yeah, plans aren’t going to happen. And so we chose ease and connection as opposed to getting the, keeping those plans. We chose to go somewhere else here on the, on our side of town, that kind of stuff.

So we, we pivoted a little bit, but talking about some of the things that we do and had to plan in order to get to the point of having a weekly date night. You know, we had to book time ahead with our babysitter, make sure that she had time and that we could have some regularity. So we schedule like a month out and make sure that that month we know which days we will have.

If we’re going to skip a day, maybe she’s got something going on. We know about that a month ahead. So that’s really nice for planning. We can plan it with friends if we want to do a double date or we could plan other specific things.

Avram Gonzales: a roadblock in that was, um, trust.

Yes.

Finding somebody that we really liked. So that was like a whole thing that we

navigated And figured out

Rachel Gonzales: Well, and the person that does our babysitting is our nanny. So we already had someone that we really trusted with Lincoln. And then the next thing, you know, making sure that you choose where you’re going to go. Make sure that you have a plan. That should not be the thing you’re talking about on your way out the door.

Because for us, we have a limited amount of time and if we wait or we delay, then we’re probably not going to be able to do much of anything.

Avram Gonzales: Well, let’s be honest, if there’s a particular activ
ity that we’re getting into, you know, sometimes those plans need to be made well ahead of time in order for you to enjoy that.

it sucks when you show up and, like, all the spots are booked or, you know, there’s no table ready for you. There’s a lot that can go wrong if you don’t have it picked out ahead.

Rachel Gonzales: Yeah. And you know, if we’re, because we are on a time crunch, we got to get back so we can relieve our babysitter and we’ve got a baby to put to bed.

So there are things that we also have to consider. also just the budget, you know, making sure that we have the money to go out, making sure that we have the money to pay a babysitter, it takes, it’s a financial investment. But it’s really well worth it to make sure that we have time with each other.

Avram Gonzales: Well we just kept coming back around to, if we don’t do it, then what? Right. And so looking at, you guys know, listening to this, we’re really into budgeting and money and making our money go as far as possible. And looking at the fact that we would be hiring somebody to watch our child for like three hours.

Plus going out, having a decent meal somewhere and maybe an activity. You

know, we’re talking about a hundred something dollars just to go out.

Rachel Gonzales: Right.

Avram Gonzales: And when you have a household budget, you know, that’s, you know, six thousand, eight thousand, you know, whatever amount, five hundred dollars is a big chunk of that.

Rachel Gonzales: It’s a big percentage.

Avram Gonzales: That’s a big percentage. So initially it was money. I mean, I know when we first had Lincoln,

And this is only like two and a half years ago. We did not have the money to go out and do a date night like we are now, every single week.

Rachel Gonzales: Absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah. But you know, um,

Avram Gonzales: It became a necessity, like the same way that we’ve seen the gym and talked about

that. Like that’s, that’s, what’s transformed for me in the last month of consistency with it. Cause before we were not consistent

Avram Gonzales: um, then I’m like, yeah, like we, we can’t go back from this. This isn’t just a luxury. It’s a necessity for us.

Rachel Gonzales: Well, I think also kind of going back to that, um, the gardening metaphor, if you don’t actually prep the ground for the seeds, it’s not going to really grow really good or really well if you don’t water it, if you don’t tend it.

And with a relationship, you know, you have to actually carve out that time in your schedule if it is hectic. You have to carve out the money for that time for you to go out and have a good time with your spouse. You have to actually do some prep work like you do for a garden.

 If you don’t, you’re going to get the weeds.

Plain and simple. So, deciding what are those non negotiables for you. What are those seeds you want to plant? In your relationship, in your business, with your children. What are those things? Um, and being really specific about it. Making sure that you plan. Plan ahead.

Avram Gonzales: Yeah. One of the things that we realized in all of this was that even if your love language isn’t quality time, you absolutely need the time.

Rachel Gonzales: Yes.

Avram Gonzales: I think when you’re a business owner and you’re raising babies, time is the thing that’s super scarce.

Rachel Gonzales: Right.

Avram Gonzales: So when you do have it, in a way, it feels more important.

Um, to me it’s felt more valuable.

less of it, right? The time that we do have, like when we go and we take this three hours for a date night, it is like the most magical three hours of my entire week because it’s just so different than the content and the quality of the rest of the week of like what we get to spend together.

And it really doesn’t take much for us to feel really filled back up again.

Rachel Gonzales: Absolutely. Well, I just think, you know, you and I really love playing board games and we have really beautiful board games. The artwork is beautiful. We actually have them displayed in our office. So we have this desk and there’s two shelves above where we sit with our desk.

And then the, the games sit up there. So we get to look at some of our most favorite games. But guess what we don’t get to do with those games

Avram Gonzales: We never get to play them.

Rachel Gonzales: We have taken them out like, Two or three times, and it was a massive failure. Really cute pieces. I’m thinking of this one game, it has animal characters, everdale, it has this 3D tree that you set up, it has this board, and then you have the pebbles, and the berries, and the twigs, and the rocks, and the, and the resin, and, and cards.

Avram Gonzales: And Lincoln, Want to touch everything,

Rachel Gonzales: He wanted to touch everything! So, we have not been able to take it out. We have not been able to take out most of the games that we like. So, one of the things that I love most is It goes back to when you and I first met. My mom had just passed and, you had asked me to go out on a date and we went to Slice and Dice.

And for those of you that don’t know that, that place, there are two locations. There’s one on the east side and one on the west side.

Avram Gonzales: here in Albuquerque.

Rachel Gonzales: Yep, here in Albuquerque. And we went to the west side location, it was there very first. We sat, we had some pizza, we played a board game. We actually hate the board game, funny enough, that we played.

But, we had a great time, and so, often times that’s what we do on our date night, is we’ll go and play a game, and what’s, what’s really special about it is We can finish the game, we can take out any of the, any of the games that have those pieces and we can finish conversations. You know, there’s so many different things that take us back to the beginning of our relationship and why we chose each other.

And those times are just really special.

So for those of you that haven’t made time for date night, please hear this, please hear this. If you plan and you prepare, And it’s important enough to you, you will make time, you will carve out the money, you will do all these things to make it something that’s happening.

But if you’re doing it, kudos to you.

Avram Gonzales: Listen, when you’re thinking about it and you haven’t moved, it feels like it’s not worth it.

But once you go out and you have that time, you realize really quickly, man. You should really do a lot more of this, and that’s what we are urging you to do here. So whether it’s date night or something else, you have to find a way to spend that quality time with your spouse so that you can build your relationship.

Because the opposite will happen. If you don’t tend to it, eventually it will start to degrade and you won’t even notice. That’s the scary part. You won’t even notice. And, uh, that’s the purpose and the point of sharing with you what we have today So, we would love to hear from you, our community. We’re going to post this up on social media.

You can comment on the episode announcement, wherever you find us, Facebook, Instagram, and so forth. Or, you can look out for the post that’s coming later this week. Uh, the question I want to ask you is, What is your favorite activity that you’ve done for date night? So it c
ould be anything, like is there a memorable thing that you and your spouse went and did?

It could be simple, it could be extravagant. We’d love to hear all of it. We also might be looking for some recommendations for ourselves in this, so, you know, help us out, answer the question, engage with us online. You can find us on all the major social media platforms @BabiesandBizPod. you can reach out to us via email, hello@BabiesandBiz.com. And make sure to go out and check the episode show notes. We always mention the resources and things that we talked about during the episode. People, books, other things. Um, you can always find that by going to BabiesandBiz. com forward slash the number of this episode. I don’t know which one we’re recording right now So i’m not going to give you false information on accident.

So check out the show notes. We’d love to hear from you guys anything else like to add before we wrap Rachel?

Rachel Gonzales: It’s worth it. If you have a spouse and you have a business and you have children, you will not be sad making time.

Avram Gonzales: Agreed.

Well, that’s all for now. Thanks so much for listening into the Babies and Business podcast.

We’ll catch you on the next one

Rachel Gonzales: Bye for now.