In his book, Fun Loving You, Ted Cunningham writes about how married couples should aim to have a daily getaway, a weekly getaway (date night), and an annual getaway.
- The daily getaway is quality time spent in and around your home.
- A weekly getaway is spent away from your home but in town (otherwise known as a date!). (If you have kids, this can also happen at home after you put them to bed. You can have a creative weekly getaway in your own home).
- The annual getaway is quality time spent out of town.
Cunningham writes how prioritizing and planning all three transform a marriage. I highly recommend this book, and in fact, will give away a copy to a lucky prize winner! See below for details.
What is an Annual Getaway?
Kristen and I did our last annual getaway together as a couple a few weeks ago. We went to Boston for four days and had an amazing time. My mother-in-law came to town to watch our boys, and we had a blast celebrating the fact that I turned in the first draft of the manuscript for my book.
In 2015, I shared four reasons why you and your spouse need to get away. Today I share four more reasons why I’m glad we got away (and why you should as well).
1. To explore other parts of the country and world.
We have grown to love our hometown of Dallas, but I gain a great appreciation for God’s creativity and vastness when I get outside of Dallas. I see these things they call hills, mountains, and oceans. Dallas is FLAT and not pretty. The people are amazing; the scenery is not. Getting outside of Dallas allows us to appreciate a different part of the country and different aspects of His creation.
2. To get some extended time together to talk and catch up.
Sometimes life back home is one to-do-list conversation after another. Kristen tells me about all the kid’s activities. I tell her about all that happened at work. We then tell each other about all the things we need to do and places we need to go. We make sure we know who’s dropping off which kid when and where. And we make sure we don’t leave any kids behind. We’ve done it one time before. Don’t judge me.
When we get extended time away, we get to talk about hopes and dreams. We take long walks and hold hands and talk about everything and also talk about nothing. It’s awesome.
3. We do things we wouldn’t normally do back home. 
In Boston, we ate donuts and drank coffee out together at real places (i.e., not at IHOP – yuck). We walked the Freedom Trail from early morning until late evening. I think we walked 12.5 miles that day!
Last year we went away to San Diego. One day we rented bikes and cruised around Coronado Island together. We biked, parked our bikes, sat on a bench and read for 30 minutes. We’re easy to please, and there is something so sweet about enjoying simple pleasures like biking, hiking, and reading together.
4. We’re reminded this isn’t real life, and a marriage isn’t built on one annual getaway together.
For four days we leave our responsibilities behind. We leave behind our jobs, bills, and house chores. At the same time, we leave some of life’s greatest gifts behind. Our kids were at our home (with my incredible mother-in-law), our jobs which provide still go on, and we leave behind friends and our home we love. We realize real life doesn’t consist of sleeping in, eating out, and biking and hiking all day every day. Realizing this makes me do two things:
- Thank God for the gifts in our lives and for the time away.
- Remind me that we have to work hard every day in our marriage and parenting so that we can enjoy extended time away together. If we didn’t do the hard work at home, we would never have the money to get away or the relationship to build upon while away.
Now you have eight reasons to get away with your spouse on an annual basis (Click here to read Part One). It’s time to get super practical for a minute:
- When can you and your spouse get away?
- Where do you want to go?
- If you have kids, who can watch your kids?
- Need some suggestions? Leave a comment below or make some suggestions!
Your Turn:
- What is your favorite place you’ve been for an annual getaway? Leave a comment below, and let us know where you love to go and why. I’ll pick a prize winner of the book Fun Loving You from out of the comments/suggestions on Facebook, Instagram, and below.
- Check out this post by my friends at Fierce Marriage. In this post, Ryan & Selena share 7 Reasons Why ‘Getting Away’ is Good For Your Marriage.
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Laura
My husband and I are planning on combining our first anniversary with a business trip (for his own company), as he only has a few vacation days left (for his “regular” job). We are certainly looking forward to it.
Scott Kedersha
Awesome! I love when we get to do that. Any idea where you’re going?
Kelly Alvey
Greg and I have a hard time getting away for several reasons, money, family not in town/available to watch the kids, and kids who have challenges which make it difficult to entrust them to others. However our 20th anniversary is coming up in January and we are planning on going camping (we love to camp) this time it’s going to be in a vintage camper! Looking forward to “roughing it” together and rejuvenating our relationship!
Scott Kedersha
That sounds awesome, Kelly! Congrats on 20 years!!
Brittany Smith
We love the mountains and enjoy getting outdoors. We try to get to Colorado every year to hike, ride bikes, and just enjoy the beautiful creation; we also spend some time to set goals and talk about our marriage. Southwest can have great deals to Denver if you keep checking the website. This year we did glacier national park in Montana and absolutely loved it. We stayed in the lodge in the middle of the park with no services so we played games, read, and worked puzzles next to a fire at night (it’s amazing how no service areas can really draw you together).
Scott Kedersha
Yes to this: it’s amazing how no service areas can really draw you together! Montana sounds great.
Tyka
Our favorite vacation spot is Hood River, Oregon. We were there in June and the sun rose at 5am and didn’t go down until after 9. We rented some e-bikes and went up to a trail that overlooked the entire town, took a wind surfing lesson, visited a winery and other local eats, checked out some waterfalls and went snow boarding. We highly recommend it to everyone
Scott Kedersha
Great suggestion! Sounds awesome, Tyka! So beautiful out there.
Jamie Weaver
Scott – We are one week away from heading to NYC for our annual getaway. NYC at Christmas time is a lot of fun and we are on year 5 of this tradition. We have a hotel that we love staying and we enjoy researching and reaching out to friends for all our meal suggestions, as that can be part of the fun of anticipation. We typically see a show on Broadway and three out of four days we work out in the morning at Barry’s Bootcamp(not in Houston yet). Laura and I feel this trip is the most meaningful trip we do alone each year and always look forward to it…like yours, my mother in law does a great job keeping our daughter. Thankful for your blog – Jamie
Scott Kedersha
That’s a ton of fun, Jamie – what a great place to go every year. That sounds like a winner of an annual tradition.
Angela
Great post & reminder Kedersha! Chris and I were actually just “gifted” a night away at a new fancy hotel all the way in BRYAN, TX ? We’ll go on our anniversary. We need to do this more often. You’re right. It’s important and takes planning. But worth it!
Scott Kedersha
So worth it! Glad you guys get a night so far away! Sometimes it doesn’t matter if it’s 15 minutes or 15 hours. Us boy parents need that space, right?
Scott Kedersha
By the way, I just picked the winner and you’re the lucky one! I’ll send you an email.
Angela
My husband and I have only been married a little over a year, but we’ve started a tradition of going to Austin in the fall for a weekend. We catch a UT game and do a little brunching ? Last year we ate dinner on a rooftop restaurant and people watched 6th street on Halloween. This year we had our 6-week old daughter with us, but hoping next year to leave her behind ?
Scott Kedersha
Awesome, Angela! Thanks for sharing. Sounds like a great tradition you have going. Congrats on your new baby.
Brian Wang
My wife and I were blessed to sit under Ted Cunningham’s teaching for sometime when we lived in Branson and got to see this lived out by many couples. There was a 52in15 challenge to try to date your wife once a week (52 times) in 2015. If you documented your dates and got at least 45 in, you were entered into a drawing for a Free Cruise! We won the drawing and got a phenomenal getaway when our first born was 1! With a lot of transition in the past 6 months including a newborn we are looking for our next annual abandon in a few months. Wherever we are we love to explore and find a coffee shop to read and and great places to eat. Our next trip will be to a coastal town on the east coast. Don’t know when we are doing it, but thats our goal!
Scott Kedersha
Love it, Brian! I’ve heard of that challenge – definitely want to pick your brain on that and hear more about it!
Scott Kedersha
Congrats to Angela (the first Angela listed above) for being the book winner of Fun Loving You by Ted Cunningham!
10 Ways to Increase Intimacy in Your Marriage
[…] Here are eight reasons why you need to get away with your spouse on an annual basis (Part 1 and Part 2). […]