A night in Paris

A couple people have asked me how my “French” date went.  I’m not usually one to advertise the details of my relationship and I rarely kiss and tell but I decided to document this date and share some of the details.  If you don’t know Brandon and I well, this is our 20^th year together and 15^th year of marriage.  We celebrate our 15^th wedding anniversary in Sept.  Our relationship has always been kind of an oddity.  We get along really well, too well if you ask some people.  If you are not someone blessed to know my husband, I’m sorry.  He is one of the kindest, most patient, charitable people I know.  I still remember the talk President Hinckley gave a few years back about he and Marjory.  At least I know we are not the only spouses that have ever lived on this earth that don’t fight.   I posted more about that here.  And that post is actually the last time I posted much about our relationship.  We have had our share of life troubles. Brandon was sick for 4 years, we have had financial difficulties, we‘ve had a still born baby and several miscarriages. Through it all we’ve just gotten closer and relationship has become stronger. Honestly, happiness feels like such a hollow word next to what it's like with Brandon.   

I think effort plays a huge roll in successful marriages, probably the biggest roll. But honestly it doesn’t feel like we put that much effort into our marriage. It is so second nature it just happens. We both are constantly putting each other first. I don’t think either of us thinks about ourselves anymore and because of this the other person is happy and gets everything they ever wanted and more. With us it has always just happened like this.  We started doing stuff like the French date we had this weekend regularly about last summer. It seemed that marriages all around us were falling apart.  Currently I know of 8 people with either a rocky marriage or currently going through a divorce.  Although our marriage has always been very strong and we have always been very happy and in love I decided I wanted to affair proof/"fireproof" our marriage.  Plus, we've always had fun dating each other. 

 I was sitting in my kids' swimming lesson one day and thought I should do something really fun for him. So we spent the day buying up all his favorite candy bars and I took them to the florist and they made them into a candy bouquet. I wrote a flirty ;) note to go with it and delivered it to his work for a fun surprise when he got back from his FedEx route. He was teased by the guys and ubber surprised but it totally made his day. In fact that day about 3 bad things had happened that I didn't know about. For the first time he had a student fail a check ride with the FAA examiner. He had been 100% with all his students for 3 years and this reflects negatively on him as a flight instructor. He had a major issue at FedEx. And the biggest blow was someone who he thought was his close friend told him they didn't want anything to do with him anymore. Basically this person had been doing some things they shouldn't and Brandon found out and although Brandon had not done anything this person decided to take out a lot on him because they were upset about their own actions and being found out. He was pretty beaten down that day and my one act turned things around. It brings tears to my eyes because I didn't know how badly he was hurting that day. After that I started doing a fun surprise tied to a date or time spent with him once a month. We spend a lot more time together than that, but at least once a month I decided to make a pretty serious effort with surprises, etc. A couple of months ago I found a great website with lots of ideas for wives. romaticmarriages.com. I use some of their ideas with twists of my own. I think it's as much fun for me as it is for him!

Romantic Marriages was started by 4 women who saw a need in their own lives and wanted to help others.   Everything on the site is in tune with LDS standards.  They’ve done a lot of research and their site is based on a couple of things, novelty and the 4 A’s.

"First creating new experiences with your spouse actually activates your brain’s reward system.  This floods your brain with Dopamine norepinephrine, the feel good chemicals.  We need to find ways to introduce novelty into a long term relationship because just spending time together doesn’t do it.  You have to do something different.  Those old brain circuits can feel new again just like they did during early romantic love just by being a little innovative." 

Second, men need what the wives at Romantic Marriage call the 4 A’s:

Appreciation

1. Regular expressions of gratitude for your husband
2.  Recognizing and voicing your man’s qualities
3.  Verbally valuing him.

 Attention

1.  Giving serious consideration to your man’s opinions and preferences
2.  Notice and show interest in all that is HIM; his hobbies, his interests, his goals.
3.  Being nurturing when he shows his vulnerable side.

 Admiration

1.  Share with him the positive ways in which you regard him.
2.  Share with others (his boss, your children, others) his positive qualities.
3.  Brag about and flirt with him in the presence of others.

 “Physical” Affection

1.  Initiate physical contact and intimacy
2.  Initiate physical contact and intimacy
3. Initiate physical contact and intimacy

You’re wondering, Steph what did you do for your date?

So I decided since I couldn’t take him to Paris I would bring Paris to him!  To start the week off right, on Monday I took him his invitation for the date.  I added some extra touches like spraying it with my perfume and sealing it with a kiss.  I stopped at the florist and bought a long stemmed rose.  I put it on his car at work for a surprise.  The invite went something like this:

A date in Paris for Two

So our romance can renew.

We’ll see the sites.

Enjoy French bites

Then French kisses

I’ll be sharing Avec vous!

He still has the card and envelope in the car because it makes his whole car smell like me.  J

Each day during the week I left him little surprises in places he would find them at work.  For a couple days I printed French postcards online and even made the place for the little French postage paid stamp.  I wrote things to him in French like what a great father he is.  He had fun trying to translate his messages.

I toyed around with cooking French food and having a quiet candlelight dinner at home but that wouldn’t be able to take place until after the kids were in bed.  So dinner after 9pm.  Boo.  Plus the kids would wonder what I was cooking and I would have to share some of our good special food with them.  Apparently I am a mean mommy because we prepared them a dinner of fish sticks, fries and a vegetable and Brandon and I went to town.  Thanks to my friend Moncia, we went to The Crepery in Logan.  It is this adorable little crepe and coffee shop inside a 100+ year old house in downtown Logan.  It is also an art gallery.  We sat at a little bistro table and enjoyed crepes.  My crepe had fresh arugula, chicken and artichoke hearts.  Brandon’s had sun dried tomatoes and pesto and cheese.  We shared a yummy dessert crepe with strawberries, cheesecake filling and chocolate! 

On our way home Brandon stopped and got me movie popcorn from the theater with extra butter.  He KNOWS how much I LOVE movie popcorn!!!!

We got the kids in bed and watched a newer movie -  Midnight in Paris.  It was meh... But it really showed the sites in Paris.  What a romantic place!

To finish the evening, since I couldn’t take him to see the Eiffel  Tower in real life we built our own tower using a Jenga game and played a little game of Jenga with a grown-up twist.  ;)

The total cost for this date including my surprise popcorn was $33.48.  A good investment in our relationship if you ask me!  It was a great night I can't wait to start planning my next date!