• Relationships Take Work

    Words Happy Couples Say

    Have you ever seen a couple, and you just know that they’re happy together? I don’t mean that everything’s perfect — when does that ever happen? But, they got it goin’ on, you know? If you pay attention, as I do, you’ll hear it in the words happy couples say. Now, if you don’t consider your relationship to be happy or if you’re not in one, you might be tempted to skip this article. Sometimes, seeing a picture of that thing you want plays a role in you getting it. You can compare your current situation against a healthy target. And a good relationship can become extraordinary with a few tweaks. I…

  • Relationships Take Work

    Create The Relationship You Want

    Like most couples, my mom and dad established particular roles for themselves in our home, and they didn’t wander far from their lanes. Mom’s lane included furnishing the house. Dad didn’t know what new couch he’d be lounging on until the truck arrived. They like it this way. When we tie the knot, we take what we’ve learned into our marriage. Often we don’t realize that we can create what we want our relationship to be. So when I got married, and it came time to buy furniture, what do you think I did? I called Mom to arrange a shopping date. When I hung up the phone, my husband…

  • Relationships Take Work

    In the Middle

    I was listening to a great song this morning called “Here Again.” The first few lines say, “Can’t go back to the beginning. Can’t control what tomorrow will bring. But I know here in the middle. Is the place where You promise to be.” The song is about how God is always there for us. I believe that we are to emulate God, as best we can, in every way that we can. I started to think about how this applies to our romantic relationships. The beginning of our relationship is often referred to as The Honeymoon Phase when everything is easy. An endless stream of dates and late-night talks…

  • Relationships Take Work

    What Story Will You Tell?

    My husband Bobby recently reconnected with his childhood friend Kevin on social media. He read me a post written by Kevin about how he’s managing quarantine. Bobby knew I would be intrigued by it because I’m endlessly interested in relationships and how we navigate our way through them. That’s a fancy way perhaps of saying that I’m nosy about people’s personal business. In my defense, I do share some pretty personal business of my own in this blog so you get equal opportunity. I’ve been thinking a lot about this extraordinary situation we’re in and how we’ll tell the stories of it to our kids and their kids. We are…