I remember it like it was yesterday. I pulled up to a backyard bonfire at the end of July, and the sun was already long gone. My palms were sweaty as I checked my hair and make-up one last time before I opened my car door and walked towards the sound of music and people laughing around the campfire. Before I knew it, there he was. My heart skipped a beat and time seemed to stand still for a moment. That was the beginning of our Adventure.
Almost every marriage starts with a similar story about that special memory of the moment they first met. The moments filled with butterflies and excitement of the unknown. The smiles and giggles of new love. Those are the beautiful memories of life, the true beginnings of new adventures.
Fast forward the years. Bottles, Babies, and Bedtime. The rush of bath time, feedings, diaper changes, schedules, appointments, and frantic calls to Poison Control because your son ate Vaseline out of a jar (wait... was that just me?) Your life is filled with an immense amount of love and beauty in child rearing but, somehow those carefree feelings and intimate moments seem a distant memory. Priorities become clear; keep the tiny humans alive and survive another day. You long for connection with your spouse, but it just isn't possible amidst the hustle and bustle. Things become stagnant and less vibrant.
All too often couples forget that BEFORE children there were two people who intentionally made a choice to commit to one another. That choice was made because they studied each other, learned likes and dislikes, made each other laugh, made memories together, and finally chose to embark on the greatest adventure out there: Parenthood.
But what if I told you our secret to getting unstuck? The trick is to recognize the patterns and be intentional, as a team, to reignite the spark. The truth of the matter is most couples accept the change and surrender to the idea that this is just how life is going to be from now on. But it doesn't have to be that way. In fact, it can't.
Traveling and Adventuring with your spouse is the fastest marriage revamp you've ever experienced. The trip doesn't have to be extravagant, in fact just a hike in the woods for a couple hours while the baby is napping with the sitter can do wonders. Anytime that you are able to give 100% attention and focus to your spouse while also learning and discovering something new is an opportunity for magical things to happen.
I remember our first cruise. We both had never taken a cruise by ourselves and even after hours and hours of research (we didn't have a Travel Agent.) we still had no idea what we would expect. Each new destination gave us a new memory. Each new experience we tried allowed us to learn a little bit more about each other's likes and dislikes.
We chose to invest our time and energy into each other to be able to keep our marriage alive and flourishing. We never have felt guilty or selfish for taking date nights, weekend trips, or even our weeklong trips each year because whether our children realize it or not, we need to have a strong healthy marriage for us and FOR THEM. For us to be the very best parents, we need to be the very best married couple and very best version of ourselves.
We invest in our marriage because when the child rearing days are long behind us, we want to be able to still reap what we sowed in all those years from when we first met to when we are old and gray rocking on the front porch.
"If Time is money, then it should be the greatest investment you make in your marriage."
xoxo, Living Adventures Family
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