The Love Dare - Day 6

I wasn't quite sure what this day meant exactly:

6 - Patience

Choose today to react to tough circumstances in your marriage in loving ways instead of with irritation. Begin by making a list below of areas where you need to add margin to your schedule. Then list any wrong motivations that you need to release from your life.

Sometimes, especially when things are hectic with the kids, I lose my cool. Or I think about having some free time to myself. But I don't think that's what I really want. I want to be with my children and with my husband, because I love them, and who cares about the other stuff? It's sort of like the laundry that's sitting on our couch, waiting to be folded and put away...yes, it needs to be done, but it's more important to have a fun day with the kids. Laundry can wait.

William's First Movie

Danny and I took William to see his first movie a few weeks ago. We went to see "Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaur." We did not see the 3D version (I thought it would be too much for him all at once). Oma and Opa watched Violet for us, and we got some popcorn and brought in some drinks. When we first walked in, the previews were already playing, and William said that it was dark. I was worried he wouldn't want to stay, but as soon as we sat down, his eyes never came unglued from the screen. :-) He sat on Danny's lap for half of the movie, and my lap for the other half. He loved it. I thought it was a great movie...the characters were cute, the dinosaurs were a little bit scary (but not too scary), and the story was entertaining, even for adults. Too bad he's too young to see Harry Potter (now THAT'S a movie I want to see!).

The Love Dare - Days 4 & 5

Day 4 of the dare I unfortunately have to pass on; I can't really contact Danny at work unless it's an emergency. But here it is in case you were wondering:

4 - Thoughtfulness

Contact your spouse sometime during the business of the day. Have no agenda other than asking how he or she is doing and if there is anything you could do for them.

So today, instead, I went on to day 5:

5 - Politeness

Ask your spouse to tell you three things that cause him or her to be uncomfortable or irritated with you. You must do so without attacking them or justifying your behavior. This is from their perspective only.

I asked Danny this; I think he thought there was some kind of catch. He wanted to know how I arrived at the number 3 ("why not 5 or 6?"). He also wanted me to tell him 3 things about him. Because I am supposed to be doing this dare in secret, I had to try to come up with a reason why I was asking ("just because"), and also had to get out of telling him 3 things about him, because I felt like that wouldn't be fair.

So, his 3 things were, in order: 1) When I am vague about things with him 2) When I don't tell him everything that is going on with me or with the kids 3) That I have an account on meetup.com.

The whole purpose of the exercise was not to get defensive, but just to listen to what he said. I am not going to defend myself on here, as I don't think that would be fair to what I was supposed to be doing either. I will say, though, that I got a meetup.com account about a month ago, in order to meet other moms and their kids. I have not met anyone, nor gone to any meet-ups. Because it was one of the 3 things he mentioned, as of 5 minutes ago, I logged on and deleted my account. I feel better having done this, because if it really did bother him that much, it wasn't worth it to me.

Outcome: I'm glad he was honest with me, and I didn't end up having to give up the dare. :-) It is sort of strange, but I felt proud of our relationship that the 3 things that bothered him about me were such small things (I don't mean I am belittling how he felt; I actually mean that these are easy things to fix; for example, he didn't say, "We fight too much," or "We don't spend any time together." :-)

The Love Dare - Day 3

Okay, I will be honest: I had to skip yesterday. I didn't start off the day being very nice. We went to the beach, and I was unnecessarily grouchy and negative. I knew right away my Day 3 wasn't going to work, so I decided to put it off for a day.

3 - Selflessness

Whatever you put your time, energy, and money into will become more important to you. It’s hard to care for something you are not investing in. Along with restraining from negative comments, buy your spouse something that says, “I was thinking of you today.”

Today, the kids and I spent the day at my grandparents' house. I bought a half-baked Lou Malnati's pizza (I don't know if I could live anywhere else besides Chicago, for all the great pizza) while we were out there, to surprise Danny with when we got home. He was very hungry, and very surprised. :-) We also got to watch the newest episode of 'True Blood' after the kids were in bed.

Outcome: Pizza was a success!

The Love Dare - Day 2

2 - Kindness

In addition to saying nothing negative to your spouse again today, do at least one unexpected gesture as an act of kindness.

I successfully refrained from making any negative remarks toward Danny (well, I only saw him for a couple hours today after he got home from work, lol). For my act of kindness, I went down to the kitchen after the kids fell asleep and baked some brownies. Three nights a week, Danny is on the computer playing Warcraft, so he was already in the other room. I took them fresh from the oven and immediately topped them with ice cream and hot fudge. He was really happy about it, as he stopped at the keyboard/microphone for a second. :-)

Outcome: I am really liking this dare, being in a better mood really makes everything that much nicer.

The Love Dare - Day 1

I got the idea to do The Love Dare from Valerie on diaperswappers.com; she sent me her own version. I found out about this by accidentally seeing the movie 'Fireproof'. I didn't particularly like some of the acting (Kirk Cameron was fine, some of the others were a bit iffy), but I did like the story and the whole idea of a love dare and keeping a journal about it. The Love Dare is basically a 40-day (mine is less with Valerie's edited version) journey of different tasks to complete each day, in order to perform acts of love for your spouse.


So here it is, my day 1:

1 - Patience - The first part of this dare is fairly simple. Although love is communicated in a number of ways, our words often reflect the condition of our heart. For the next day, resolve to demonstrate patience and to say nothing negative.

When Danny got home from work today, I felt like I didn't have to try too hard to be pleasant and patient. Before dinner, though, we went on a family walk/bike ride. I figured we would just go around the block, but Danny wanted to go to the park (which is far), and we ended up zig-zagging every which way. Normally I would have mentioned right away that I didn't think it was a good idea going so far, but I kept quiet. He should be able to make the call sometimes too, lol.

To me, this dare also meant not complaining. As well as being patient, I did not complain today, and even if something was difficult, I tried to change my focus to something else to ease my mind.

Outcome: A-okay

Sleeping Beauties

I'm sorry, but I just had to share this picture! These are my kids while they are asleep at night (we co-sleep). William likes to touch my face, and when they are asleep for the night, I will usually sit in a chair in our bedroom, using the computer or reading. Very often, William will touch Violet's face like this in his sleep, or hold her hand. It's very cute.

Everyone that sees this picture seems sort of surprised, "Are they really sleeping?" I know my family is probably wondering why we are co-sleeping, but it's cuteness like this that makes me glad that we do.

Wearing underwear...a little bit sad!

William is 2-1/2 now, and has been wearing underwear for 4 days straight now. I have to say, I am very proud of him and love seeing his successes, but I am a bit sad that his days of wearing diapers are over. Violet is still in diapers, and although I have to wash diapers half as often now, it makes me a little bit sad every time I go in to change her and grab a diaper.

Am I crazy or what?