Don't Go to Bed Angry at Each Other

In respect to marriage,"It's not if you'll get hurt, it's when you'll get hurt." The loving relationship that comes from marriage makes the hurts worth it. It's going to happen; you're two imperfect people spending a lot of time together, coming from totally different backgrounds and families, having good and bad days; you're going to hurt each other. So, I love the advice:
"Don't go to bed angry at each other".
We heard this before we got married and we've tried to stick to it. It helps to be able to start the next day fresh. Even if you can't solve your problem the same day, at least you can agree to disagree, or agree to talk about it later, before going to bed.

image from furniture clipart

Traditions

When does your family open Christmas presents?

There are so many traditions surrounding Christmas. Which ones do you keep when you get married? I doubt it's possible for you and your spouse to have completely compatible traditions.

Recently Ryan and I read "Twelve Traps in Today's Marriage and how to avoid them" by Brent A Barlow. We weren't expecting much from this book; but it turns out it was actually really helpful. Dr. Barlow chose twelve common traps in marriage and what to do about them. One was "tradition". He specifically mentioned the problem he and his wife had with deciding when to open Christmas presents - Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. The tradition trap is when we insist that our marriage be exactly as our parents, friends, or relatives have it---or insisting that our marriage be as marriages of the past.

Solution: Examine your traditions. Decide which ones you want to keep, which ones you will discard, and which new ones you're going to make together. At least that's what works for us. We've done a lot of that over the years. There are plenty of traditions that we each had growing up, including some that we cherished, but that just don't work for our own family. Those traditions have to be let go of in a tender way.

Parents Celebrating 40 years of Marriage

On my parents 40th wedding anniversary, we took them back to the college dorms where they met. They could remember which numbers they lived in and everything. While we were outside taking pictures, a college student came out of the dorm where my dad had lived when they met. My parents described briefly that it was there 40th anniversary and which apartments the two of them had lived in when they met. The student was surprised because not only did he live in the apartment my dad had lived in, but his girlfriend also lived in the apartment my mom had lived in! That probably made some fun conversation for the student that night.

This photo is taken on my parents 40th wedding anniversary in front of the apartment where my dad lived when he met my mom.