..a relationship blueprint -- a work in progress

This past Sunday Mr. Spie and I celebrated our 12th wedding anniversary.

Mr. Spie and I 12 years ago. We were so young and carefree!

Mr. Spie and I now (plus 2 years. I don't like having my picutre taken.) We are so much older, ummm I mean wiser now!

This anniversary was a little different this year. This past summer, Mr. Spie's brother and his wife divorced. This has deeply affected Mr. Spie.

I would describe our relationship as "casual" -- not in commitment, but in attitude. I have no idea the date of our first date/kiss/engagement. Generally, we do not buy each other anniversary presents. A card and a kiss have always sufficed. We have always operated under the pretense that anniversary present money would be better spent on one of the kids activities/clothes/ home improvement projects... the list goes on and on. This philosphy also somewhat applies to Christmas as well. We do not go overboard on gifts for each other. The largest gift to one another comes from the "kids". Christmas is for others and not for ourselves.

Throughout the years and the many children, we have developed our own interests. We skillfully negotiate time so everyone can do their favorite things. We also support each other interests (I'll give kudos to Mr. Spie to being way more supportive of my interests than I of his. He has endured long training runs, purchased me road bikes, and bike trainers. He has watched several marathons in inclement weather with our children in tow.) Our joint interests, however, have suffered with the addition of the children. This added to the significant lack of alone time sprinkled with his brother's divorce has caused Mr. Spie alarm.

He is fearful that we are or will soon be drifting apart because our personal interests do not coincide, our shared interests have been shelved due to lack of time, and there is little to no alone time due to work, parenting, volunteering, and all the other "must dos".

I am not hearing the alarms (or they are not as loud for me). I feel that our foundation is still strong. He is my best friend. I tell him all of my secrets. I can show him the unpleasantness that is inside of me without fear and judgement. He is the first person I want to tell any news to -- good or bad. Our "inside jokes" still make me crack up and we are adding more and more each year.

After listening to Mr. Spie's fears and being a little shaken by the BIL's divorce, I will concede that in our marriage house there is some structural support that we need to work on. Our relationship reinforcement construction, thus far, has three steps.

1. We have arranged with one of our friends a babysitting co-op. We dump, er drop, our children off at their house so we can have a "date night". Then we reciprocate the next month. Athough, the only gives us "date night" 6 times a year, it is six times a year more than we are doing currently and it also eliminates one of the barriers to our going out -- the expense of a babysitter.

2. We are trying to find more shared interests. This has resulted in Mr. Spie agreeing to participate in an team adventure race with me in 2009. Although he is not excited about the run portions, he is excited about the bike. I am excited about having the experience with him. We also have found some other races that we might consider in the future. Mr. Spie is fired up about the Tour de Donut -- but who wouldn't be?

3. We are trying to make a conscious effort to do more things as a family --bike rides, walks, daytrips, going out to dinner. If often seems that we are going in a million different directions and we rarely do anything fun as a group (unless you count shopping for new appliances fun -- it wasn't fun for anyone last night!)

After we get these structural supports in and secured, checking that they will not shift or change, we undoubtedly will continue on our relationship reinforcement adding more strength to the relationship that we have already built.

I have to admit that I am interested as to what our building will look like in the years to come.