Laura's Strengthening Marriage Blog

Few things are more enticing than chocolate—especially around Valentine’s Day. But the sweetness fades and the residual calories remain. Give your sweetheart something different this year. What’s better than chocolate you ask? How about something from the heart.

A friend recently asked me to write “a prescription” for her husband to provide more of a certain loving behavior to help her stop eating chocolate so much. I promptly wrote out the prescription on a napkin and handed it to her with a smile. The husband later told me he was happy to oblige. I started calling him her chocolate substitute!

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Anti-Mormon Bias

I was disappointed to see the end of Mitt Romney’s campaign for the Republican nomination as president of the United States of America. I personally believed that he would have made a most excellent president, especially at this time of economic insecurity, continual threats of terrorism and anti-American hatred, declining moral and family values, and out-of-control illegal immigration.

I was even more dismayed trying to understand how a man of his caliber, character, values and integrity could not handily overcome the competition for the nomination. I should have clued in when hoards of conservative voters overlooked Romney and cast their vote for Mike Huckabee in state after southern state, especially when Huckabee has been liberal on raising taxes and illegal immigration.

The pieces started to come together for me as I began to see and hear of those who would finally admit to and write about the anti-Mormon bias that had quietly been there all along. I could have never imagined. Read the rest of this entry »

Keeping the passion alive in your marriage is closely connected to keeping the passion alive in your own life. Ryan found himself drawn to the adrenaline-like energy of an old friend, because that passion and aliveness was missing within his own soul. If he is not careful he will mistake the attraction for something other than a yearning to come alive within himself.

Nourishing our own aliveness is the best source of keeping the passion alive in our lives, and in our sexual relationship with our spouse. Energy is contagious and has the power to deaden or enliven those around us.

How enlivening it is to come home each day as an ever-growing person. How enticing to come home to a spouse who is new and different every single day. I often marvel at how much I learn and change while my husband is away at work. I wonder how he will ever catch up on my newness and the mysteries that lie within me, or how I will catch up on his. It’s a good thing we have forever to discover each other’s mysteries! Read the rest of this entry »