Category: romance

Love Language

Posted on by Katie Ganshert

When the hubbers and I got married, the very first book we read together was The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman.

Great stuff. Seriously. Great, great stuff.

Even now, seven and a half years later, when either one of us is feeling unloved or unappreciated, we will say to each other, “My love tank is feeling empty.” And we know what’s up. We know how to fill it. 

Basically, there are five popular ways people express love. And often, how we express love is also how we receive it.

The five languages are:

  • Acts of service
  • Gift-giving
  • Words of affirmation
  • Quality time
  • Physical touch
So let’s say Joe and Sally are married. Joe’s primary love language is gift-giving. Sally’s is acts of service. Sally wants to show Joe how much she loves him, so she cleans the house and cooks him dinner. Joe wants to show Sally how much she loves him, so he buys her a Vita-Mix. Joe and Sally both appreciate the gesture, but they don’t necessarily feel the love because they aren’t speaking the same language.
 
Joe keeps buying Sally gifts. Sally keeps finding ways to do things for Joe. But the wires are crossed. And eventually, Joe and Sally’s love tanks are running on fumes. Both are trying to express their love, but they’re doing it in a way the other doesn’t understand.
 
Hence, the importance of knowing not just our own love language, but the special people in our lives too.
 
For me, I’m totally a Words of Affirmation and Acts of Service gal. Ryan can tell me I’m wonderful and do the dishes, and my love tank shoots through the roof. Ryan, however, is very much a quality time guy. So if I’m not carving out time to spend with him, then his love tank will start to feel pretty empty.
 
It’s a great book. An excellent Christmas gift for married couples. 
 
Let’s Talk: What’s your love language? What about your significant other’s? What about your parents or your children?
 

Affection

Posted on by Katie Ganshert

I’m an affectionate mom. My son has grown up with a mother who gives him too many hugs and too many kisses and too many cuddles and too many pinches. I can’t help it.

Have you seen little-boy underwear? I think it might be the cutest thing in the world. So when he’s walking up the steps in front of me with Mater on his tiny hiney, I really have no control over my pinches. 

Not to worry. He laughs and giggles and races up the stairs. 

And I promise I won’t continue when the little boy underwear turns into boxer briefs. I’m determined to give my child as few complexes as possible.

Anyway, I’m digressing.

This post is about affection.

It’s about how I grew up in a very affectionate home, where hugs and kisses were never lacking. It’s about how much I love to lavish that same affection on my wild-child of a son. And how precious our cuddle times are before bedtime, when he whispers, “I love you, Mommy” into my ear. And how sad I get when I think that someday, he won’t want to cuddle anymore. And how this last thought makes me want to treasure every single cuddle he gives me between now and then.

Let’s Talk: Did you grow up in an affectionate home? Are you an affectionate person? If your kids are older, at what point did they stop wanting to cuddle?  

Love at First Sight

Posted on by Katie Ganshert

What say you?

Does it exist or does it not?

I say no. It doesn’t.

And I might get absolutely slaughtered by the comment I’m about to make. Like, totally clobbered. So imagine me saying this from behind my couch.

But for me, love at first sight didn’t even exist with my child. Unlike the movies you see in Hollywood, I was not a teary-eyed mother overcome with emotion and love for my wee little babe. I was more like, “Thank you Lord that this kid is out of me and holy crow, he looks like my brother.”

I was enamored by my little one. And excited for what was to come. But I don’t think I fell in love with him the first time I saw his squishy, Elmer Fudd nose. He still felt like such a stranger.

It was over the course of sleepless nights and bare-skinned cuddles and his little fist wrapping around my finger and first smiles and all the other million things a mother experiences in that first month of motherhood that made me fall in love with my son.

So I’ll ask it again.

Let’s Talk: What say you? Does love at first sight exist?

*photo by Maxybonremovetweetmeme