Because I want this to remain a mummy blog, and not morph into a beauty blog, I shall refrain from giving you the contact details of the salon I frequent for manicures. I will only reveal that it is run by the seven-year-old next door and she charges by the fingernail.
In a marriage, it’s the little things that keep the romance alive. Tiny, thoughtful gestures that show your beloved that they matter. Things like taking pride in your appearance. Not letting yourself go. Because it really isn’t that hard, even with the busy lives we all lead, with toddlers and babies and businesses and buying houses and selling flats, to put a bit of effort into making yourself presentable for your spouse. While obviously you can’t and needn’t go to the same effort every day of the week that you went to for your wedding day, you do want him to remember you’re still that lovely girl he married.
That’s why this morning, when I finally disengaged my snuffly, miserable baby from my bosom, to which he had been attaching and reattaching every thirty seconds all night long, which was as long as he could suck before his blocked nose caused him to run out of air, I took some care to peel the dried smears of baby snot from my breast before I appeared at the breakfast table. (Eventually I remembered to tuck that breast back into my very sexy maternity bra too. I am nothing if not a fastidious dresser.)
It’s also important to try not to let your children overwhelm your conversation. It’s all too easy to find yourself sitting at dinner with your partner, filling awkward silences with vaguely amusing anecdotes of what your little cherub said or did that day. Cast your gaze further afield and talk about the wider world. That’s why last night my husband and I, after cheerfully and, let’s be honest, somewhat smugly realising that in two and a half years of parenting there has been no gastro in our house, enjoyed a rousing debate about whether it would be better for the stomach flu to hit our family in the next five weeks, before we leave the house with all moppable wooden floors but only one toilet, or after, when we will be living in a house with two toilets but wall-to-wall carpet in all rooms except the kitchen and bathrooms.
How to you keep that special spark in your relationship?
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