Author: Stacey

What can rest do for your marriage?

9 Effective Ways to Stop Stress from Hurting Your Marriage

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We’re living in a world where everything is instant, households require two working parents, and stress/anxiety are a quickly growing psychological struggle for the masses. It’s so easy to get caught up in the trials of daily life without realizing the lasting impact it may have on your health and relationships. I’ve admittedly been a busy bee for the past couple of months. My nose has been in the laptop or a phone for far too long and I haven’t been enjoying the small things. In the grips of working 70 hours a week in my day job, running a blog part time, serving at church, and domestic duties, I have been stressed and consumed with everything I need to do. So much so, that it affects my physical health and my attitude in relationships. My husband on the other hand is really good at rest. He can shut off the stress of to-do lists and immediately switch to having fun playing a video game or relaxing on the couch with me. All the while, …

30 ways to respect your husband

30 Ways to Respect and Honor Your Husband

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“Men are from Mars and women are from Venus” couldn’t be a truer cultural statement, especially when it comes to communication and meeting each others expectations. According to one of my favorite marriage books, Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs, men thrive in a marriage when they feel respected and women thrive when they feel loved. My husband and I have applied this theory to our own marriage and it’s helped us through the good, bad, and ugly. Here’s a list of practical ideas that you can apply to your relationship with your husband to help make your marriage flourish: Engage in conversation with him by being responsive with more than an “uh-huh” or “uh-uh”, open body language, and eye contact. Never threaten him with divorce. Take initiative and try to be the first to apologize, no matter how hard it is. Don’t nag, even if you think he’s ignoring you. Remind him often of how proud of him you are. Ask him what his pet peeves are and try your hardest not to …

Valentine's Day ideas: Re-create your very first date night

Valentine’s Day Ideas: Re-Create Your First Date

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Recreating your very first date night is the perfect date night for a special occasion, anniversary, or Valentine’s Day. Reminisce about funny memories, simpler times, memorable moments, and how far you’ve come over the years. Bring back those feelings of excitement – minus the awkwardness, uncertainty, and nervousness – and spend a night walking down memory lane together. Here are a few things to think about as you go about re-planning your first date night: What time of the day was it? Was it in the morning, afternoon, or night? Try to plan it around the same time. What were you wearing? How did you do your hair? Don’t do the ultimate tbt and bring back fashion that should remain in the past but do find something similar. Were you wearing a summer dress? Casual? Dressy? Where did you go? Plan ahead and make reservations. What did you do? Think back to every detail of that night and how you can replicate it. Were there flowers, chocolates, or other small gifts? What conversations did you …

DIY Valentine's Day ideas: Hide handwritten cards around the house

DIY Valentine’s Day Ideas: Hide Cards Around the House

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Hiding cards around the house is the perfect Valentine’s Day, and even Anniversary or birthday idea. It’s a great way to remind your partner how much you think of them, how thankful you are for them, and how much you love them. Forget the traditional Hallmark card and do something that will be a simple and sweet gesture for your special occasion. This is one of my favorite February 14th ideas my husband has done. It was thoughtful, creative, but not too over-the-top cheesy — my kind of Valentine’s Day. Here’s how to pull off this cute Valentine’s Day idea: Buy simple and small cards. You’ll want something that has a Valentine’s cover but are blank on the inside. Plan what you’ll write in the cards. Remember, you’ll be hiding quite a few around the house. You want to be careful of rambling and you want them all to be meaningful. Choosing a theme makes it easy. Here are examples of themes you can write about: Reasons why you’re thankful for your partner Reasons why …

DIY date night ideas: Time capsule with questions and free PDF templates

Time Capsule Date Night – With Free Downloadable Templates

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Time capsules are a fun community, school, or family activity. But they also make a really fun date night activity. Who doesn’t like dreaming and reminiscing together? It’s also a simple and easy idea that costs $5 or less to make, and can be made any time of the year. It’s fun to create together and even more fun to open at a later date.   What you’ll need 1 mason jar with lid (we recommend a wide rim so it’s easier to fit your hands inside) 2 pens 1 printed photo of the two of you from this year Front page of today’s newspaper Print the Date Night Time Capsule PDF template. It includes: “Don’t Open Until…” Label Goals and Predictions Guide This Year’s Events Guide 2 Letterheads   Instructions Download the Date Night Time Capsule PDF. Choose a date to open and write it on the label. Then tape the label inside the mason jar with the label facing out so you can read the date. This prevents any future weather or other wear …

7 fun New Years resolutions for marriage

7 Fun New Years Resolutions for Marriage

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Who said resolutions had to be painful? Here are seven easy (and did I mention fun?) marriage resolutions you and your boo can do now. Here’s to a year of building your marriage and having fun too! 1. Schedule a date night once a week Setting aside some time for a date every week will transform your marriage. That’s the whole reason why we’re doing this blog! Sit down with your honey and choose one night per week. Marking it on the calendar or choosing a specific day of the week really makes date night feel intentional and special. Need ideas? We have hundreds of them! 2. Find a hobby you can do together You married your best friend after all! Finding a hobby you can do together will bring the fun back into your marriage and build a stronger bond between the two of you. Find something you both like to do and be more intentional about doing it. If you or your spouse already have a hobby you individually enjoy doing, do it …

The Mall Gift Swap Challenge Date Night

The Mall Gift Swap Challenge Date Night

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Around the holidays, the mall may be for gift shopping but it can also provide the backdrop to an epic date night. Get into the spirit of the holidays with this traditional and fun group game of gift swapping that can be played as a couple too! The rules for the The Mall Gift Challenge Date Night are simple: The Rules Decide on a cash amount. Put the cash in an envelope. You CAN NOT spend over that amount. Head to the mall or a local shopping center with a variety of retail stores to choose from. Split up for 30 minutes and find the best gifts possible. Bonus round: Wrap your gift before meeting. Meet at the food court or nearby restaurant for dinner and exchange your gifts. Download the free PDF printable instructions We’ve played this Christmas gift giving game with friends quite a few times before we were dating. We had so many fun memories with this game that we decided to take a throwback holiday tradition and give it a try as …

How You Can Use Myers-Briggs to Better Your Marriage

How You Can Use Myers-Briggs to Better Your Marriage

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Have you ever taken the Myers-Brigs test before? If you haven’t, it’s time to understand you and your spouse a little better. I believe that if you can understand the cause of what makes people make the decisions they do, you can really understand how to thrive with in your relationship with them.  With this free worksheet, learn how to communicate, motivate, protect, and care for your spouse. Don’t know what the Myers-Briggs test is? In short, it’s a test to give you accurate results of your psychological indicator type (I’m an INFJ and Eric is an ESTJ). Remember that everyone is unique and with 16 categories, there may be a couple traits that might not be exactly you. But it does gives you a deep understanding of who you are and what motivates the decisions you make. This test is used by psychologists and counselors helping clients to understand their complex personality, and even large corporations helping their employees thrive in their work environment. I’m sure you’ve taken Facebook quizzes before, but this is …

Sundae Football Date Night - Over 60 Ice Cream Topping Ideas

The Ultimate Sundae Football Date Night with Over 60 Ice Cream Topping Ideas

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Sure the fall leaves are beautiful, the hot cider warms the soul and the apple cider donuts are deliciously delightful, but the best part of fall is football season! Football is a big deal in our house. Eric is from Washington so he’s a Seattle Seahawks fan and being from the golden state of California, I’m a 49er’s fan. We’re usually “that cute couple”. However, when a football game is on – especially when our teams are playing – we are (in the most loving way) a house divided. Some call it a rivalry, we call it flirting and team pride. So in celebration of fall and football season, we’ve come up with an awesome idea if you and your boo love football. Sweeten up your football date night with creative ice cream sundaes. It’s super simple and fun too! Choose any combination of the list of ice cream toppings below and enjoy with vanilla ice cream, your honey and football.  Remember to grab your toppings in your team’s colors and waffle cone bowls! Over …

Date night ideas with baby

Date Night Ideas with Baby

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We love supporting local businesses and bloggers. That’s why we’re excited to have Kristina Lough from the blog, “Loughs in Love” and local business, “Painted by the Shore“. You can find her beautiful hand painted totes, glasses and other goodies in shops across Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. We hope you enjoy her fun (and honest) perspective of motherhood and date nights. Make sure to leave her a comment if you’ve enjoyed her post!     About a year before baby, my husband Eric and I instituted Friday date nights. Each week we take turns planning something fun to do together. It doesn’t have to be fancy, just a chance to set aside everything else and enjoy time with one another. Cue baby Cooper. Our first date night after Coops was born consisted of Chinese food and bedtime for the both of us at 7:30pm. We were exhausted and actually getting that quality time back seemed seriously far fetched. Especially when the next couple of weeks passed with the same, take out food and early to …

Holiday donation ideas you can do together

Date Night with a Purpose: 5 Easy Holiday Donation Ideas You Can Do Together

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With the rush of the holidays, we tend to get wrapped up in our own agendas and needs that we forget about the needs of others that might not be in our circle of family and friends. Helping and giving to others feels great. Helping and giving to others as a couple is even better. My husband and I have had many great memories of volunteering together or doing something for community members in need. In fact, volunteering at church is how we met and it even led to our marriage. I fell in love with some Christmas cookies he baked for a production at our church and it was all downhill from there. We’ve put together some holiday specific activities to help members in need in your community that you and your spouse can do together, anytime and anywhere. All of these can be done within a couple of hours, are stress free and easy to do. Choose one (or more if you’d like!), download the available PDF’s and have fun getting generous together. …

Romantic scanvenger hunt date night

Romantic Scavenger Hunt Date Night

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I’m sure you’ve done tons of scavenger hunts in your day, collecting random items with a group of friends for a probably not-so-great prize. When doing a scavenger hunt for our own date night, a lot of the items on lists we found seemed random. What did light bulbs and an old newspapers have to do with date night any way? So as we do here at Tonight’s Better Together, we came up with our own fun, creative list that’s romantic and perfect for date night. Scavenger Hunt Instructions: Below is a list of items to find. You can find these items in your neighborhood, the mall, the grocery store and your own home. The sky’s the limit! You can also download the PDF for easy traveling and checking off your found items. It’s fun to come together and see what each of you has come up with and it’s also fun to go on the adventure together. That’s why some items on this list you will need to split up for and others you …

8 Ways to Prevent Long Commutes from Ruining Your Marriage

8 Ways to Prevent Long Commutes from Ruining Your Marriage

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Chances of divorce and infidelity can happen when one or both spouses are commuting long distances. Based on a 10 year study in Sweden,  couples that have commutes 45 minutes or more have an increased chance of divorce by 40%. Not only are there these statics, but there are an overwhelming amount of infographs on Pinterest and headlines on popular sites that read “Couples with Long Commutes are More Likely to Divorce ” and “The Rise of the Super Commuter and the Fall of the Marriage”. It’s enough to make any commuting couple, with a healthy or strained marriage, fear for their relationship. We’ve been in a celebration mood for the last couple months, partly because of my husband’s successful completion of his MBA and partially because he had a job as soon as the diploma was in hand. However, a reality has recently set in on the arrival of his dream job. He commutes an hour to work and an hour back home. Sometimes more depending on traffic. Plus business trips. Uh oh. More …

Cold Soba Noodle and Pork Salad

Summer Recipe: Cold Soba Noodle and Pork Salad

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It’s not quite officially summer here in Providence, Rhode Island, but it sure feels like it. We live in a cute little Victorian house with no AC so as the days have been getting more hot and humid, our meals keep getting colder and colder with more salads and fruits. It’s a little tough to think of a cold meal in conjunction with date night. When you think of dinner dates, you typically think of a beautiful steak or a fancy fish. But with the early summer we’ve had, being in a hot kitchen and eating a hot meal afterwards sounds awful! We decided to get a little creative on date night and came up with a delicious cold soba noodle and pork salad recipe that we absolutely loved. Yes, I know what your thinking. Noodles with salad? Cold noodles? Are you nuts? But I promise you, this is the best dang noodle bowl combination you’re going to want during the summer. And it’s great for date night because it’s more than just a salad. …

Tonight's Better Togehter Top Ten Posts

Our Top Ten 2016 Posts for Marriage Resources and Date Ideas

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The month of May marks our one year anniversary for our blog. We’ve made it! We’ve gotten through our first year and we’re reflecting on how amazing of a journey it’s been so far. We can’t believe how fast this year has flown by, how many incredible people who we’ve connected with, all of the adventures we’ve been on and the community that’s grown around this blog. In one year, we have an amazing community of 2,000 readers, we’ve written 57 posts, taken 5,208 photos and have spent countless hours planning, researching and learning. A very big thank you to all of our readers, commenters and new friends we met during this process. So in celebration of our one year blogiversary, here’s a round up of the top ten articles that became everyone’s favorite. If you’re not a weekly reader or if this is your first time here, this is a great way to get to know us. We invite you read and join the community. 1. 50 Questions to Really Get to Know Your Spouse …