Think of it the other way around.

Love the most when least deserved.
Give the most when you receive the least.
Do the work when others are resting.
Whisper when they are yelling.
Use your voice when they are too weak to speak.
Go faster when they slow down.
Help to slow things down when things are going too fast.

Be the Ying to the Yang.

I did this probably the first 5 years of my marriage.
Fearing he doesn’t really love me, because his love is different than mine.

Fill your week with love. Remember, that you will need to love yourself first before you can fully love someone else.

My sweetheart and I in 2002.

I am not a big fan of Valentine’s Day. There, I said it. While I love the idea of celebrating love for each others and remembering the people we love the most, I don’t think I need a day in a calendar for it.

Even though I am not a big fan of Valentine’s Day, it is a great time to remind ourselves not only to show our appreciation to each others on this one special day, but every day. I have been married for 13 years this summer, and every single day I feel that I am more in love with my husband. I have to say though, it hasn’t always been this way. We’ve had our fair share of difficulties, like I think everyone does in their marriage. I don’t think happy marriage comes easily, and “just is”, I think it needs a lot of work. And with work I mean watering the plant and helping the love grow, and it’s fun work. I don’t think it just happens, even though I can testify that I believe in the love at the first sight, and I still love him, years after the first sight. But to keep it going – you do need to work for it, and be committed to it, and it takes much more than getting the Valentine’s Day right.

I think Valentine’s Day brings many people pressure to make their Valentine’s Day special, and with that always comes (high) expectations, and sometimes those expectations are not met; whether it’s yours or your spouse’s. And trust me – the way how he handles Valentine’s Day doesn’t equal to how much he loves you.

I almost think my “gift” to my husband is that I don’t require a romantic Valentine’s Day – that means no stress of getting the perfect gift, no pressure to get it right, because most of the time he can’t read my mind what I really want anyways. Nothing ruined my Valentine’s Day more than knowing that only reason he bought me a Hallmark card and flowers because his mom had asked him to do so.

See, I just don’t want a gift, I want the perfect gift. And I don’t want to tell what I want (making it difficult to please me), I want it to come from the heart. But with that I have pretty precise expectations (that he should pretty much be able to read my mind) because we are soul mates. Ideally, he should do exactly what I want and when I want, because that happens when it’s true love, when we are soul mates and it all comes from the heart.
Yeah, right.

See why I much rather just skip it entirely? Because my expectations of a perfect Valentine’s Day are unrealistic and to avoid disappointments I rather celebrate our love in many many other ways.

So my crazy theory is that I much rather not ask my husband to try to read my mind what I want for a Romantic Surprise On A Special Day, because most likely he would not be able to reach my expectations. And then he is able to read my mind or surprise me in a romantic way on a regular Monday and when he does – it is better than anything else; it is a genuine surprise, genuine love, and no expectations to be met, and that’s why it’s perfect. Plus, I get helluva more “Valentine’s Days” this way than once a year. Because yes, my Romantic Expectations are still pretty high even though I don’t celebrate the Feb 14th. That’s just because I believe that we should work on our marriage and our relationship every day, not just on special days. To me having many surprise Valentine’s Days and celebrating our love just because is living life to the fullest. Oh, and by the way – I am perfectly fine getting the heart shaped box of chocolate a week late after it has been purchased on sale…

Whether your Valentine’s Day was perfect or less perfect, remember to continue the romance in your relationship every day. If Valentine’s Day is your thing, I salute you for mastering the day of romance, but I ask you to treat a regular day every now and then just like it was Valentine’s Day and see how much fun celebrating love is “just because”.

I was sitting here reading Jerri Ann’s entry post this evening. She is talking about her husband and her story reminded me a little of my own husband. Originally I was going to enter this contest too. I thought it was so sweet when I hear that Katja had sponsored Amanda. Then I thought it was amazing when she asked who else needed sponsored. She is going out of her way, spending her own money, to help other women. Asking nothing in return, just out of the kindness of her heart. That is unheard of these days! It’s sad, but it’s true. Hardly anyone does something just because they care anymore. It seems everybody forgot that 4 letter word… LOVE. How can anyone live their life to the fullest without love?

I thought of a million things I could say on how I live life to the fullest. I thought about all the people I could ask to vote for me. I thought about how nice it would be to win. Then I snapped back into reality. I cannot afford the plane or any other costs, so I wouldn’t be able to use the ticket. Honestly I couldn’t afford it right now if it was $40. Jerri Ann’s story reminded me of that, but not in a bad way.

My husband and I had just had a conversation about this. He was urging me to go ahead and enter and share how we live life to the fullest. He said I should tell the story about how every time life seems low or every time we are down I remind him, “It’s okay, because we have each other. Our love for each other and Elijah (our son) is all that matters.”

It’s true, we live life to the fullest by filling it with love for each other. The little things don’t matter, the money doesn’t matter, the material things don’t matter. WE are what matter. The love for each other is what matters.

I explained to him that it would do me no good to enter because I couldn’t afford the rest of the trip. I could see it in his eyes that he understood, but he WISHED for that second we did have the money so I could go.  I hugged him and told him it’s okay I will go to a conference eventually, taking care of our family is more important.

My husband loves me so much that he got upset we can’t afford for me to go to BlissDom. That act of love means more to me than ANY conference ever would. I am not sharing this story to enter the contest, I am sharing this because I wanted to remind each of you how powerful and fulfilling love is. Whether you are going to Blissdom or not, live life to the fullest now by sharing and treasuring love.

“Love has no desire but to fulfill itself. To melt and be like a running brook that sings it’s melody to the night. To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving.” ~Kahlil Gibran

Written by Erin Pyle. Erin Pyle is a writer, graphic designer and mother. She enjoys spending time loving her family and playing with her toddler son, social media, organizing and being creative. To find out more about Erin, the other places she writes, and how else she lives life to the fullest, connect with her on her parenting site, www.pyleoflove.com , and on twitter @erinjeany.

This post is part of Blissdom Conference ticket giveaway.

Exactly 11 years ago at this moment I was walking down the aisle standing in the front of a judge in Enterprise, Alabama, getting ready to say “I do”.

There is one picture of our wedding day in the anniversary post I wrote two years ago, but can you believe that last year, on my 10th wedding anniversary my blog post was titled “I Think I’ll Live”? And there was no hint of irony there… My biggest celebration of that day was that I was able to speak & walk five steps & brush my teeth myself, and had hope that I will see my 11th wedding anniversary.

We didn’t really care that we didn’t have a big wedding (I still don’t have any regrets). My family & friends were in Finland, Matt’s in Texas, and having a wedding in either of those places would have left one of us feeling out of place and not knowing anyone. We were getting married to spend the rest of our lives together, I didn’t care for anything else. While I understand the feeling of wanting to shout it down from the rooftops when you are so ultimately in love with someone, but love had hit me so suddenly and getting married felt really intimate and independent decision to me.

Of course there were the factors that my parents hadn’t even met Matt, my friends thought I was crazy, and many of them thought I was “wasting my life” by moving to the other side of the world. While my friends back in Europe thought my decision of getting married to an American soldier was the craziest thing I had ever done, to me it was the decision that felt the most right than any other decision I had ever done in my life. I still think that way.

We got married on a lunch break. The court house was not open during the weekends, and Matt was in the military flight school, unable to even get a whole day off. My mom had made me a dress, but my parents weren’t even there for the 5 minute ceremony, Matt’s family had driven in from Texas the day before. Our witnesses were Matt’s classmates, dressed in army uniforms and green flight suits. My mother-in-law-to-be bought me flowers, which I hadn’t even thought of getting, and we forgot to even get a wedding cake, but got one the night before from grocery story (and of all places I think it was Walmart, if I can remember correctly!). Only things I had really thought of getting to celebrate the day were new lingerie and a bottle of champagne!

So since I don’t have a picture story of our wedding, I figured I will share some other pictures from the past. This is the first 6 years of our marriage….

Of course, since we have lived the skimbaco lifestyle before I even made up the word, this photo collage isn’t even close to describe our life.. like how we moved to Germany after being married for a year, but I went to Finland to have our first baby, while Matt was deployed in Kosovo. Or how we had another baby in Germany, moved to the US when she was two months old, lived in Alabama again, took girls to DisneyWorld. Magically I was pregnant again.. and we bought our first house in New York, lived a while at Virginia Beach, sold the house in New York, Matt got out of army, flew TV news helicopter in Cleveland, Ohio… and we built our dream house in Nashville, Tennessee, but moved to be ski bums, pro moms and rescue helicopter pilots at the Rocky Mountains. Last year travelled 2 months, now we live outside New York City…

And I feel that this is just the beginning. Only thing that has changed since the day we got married is that I don’t care for the lingerie anymore. Today I just want champagne.

Oh, and one more thing. I really love you Matt.