Tag: couple

How Do I Make My Marriage Better?

3 Tips to a Thriving Marriage

Throughout the month of May (and today!) we’re going to be delving into how to make your marriage better. Doesn’t every married person want just a little bit better marriage? Maybe making your marriage better means a complete 180 degree turn for you. Maybe that simply means a few new tricks and tips that you pick up to keep it strong. Each week (5 total weeks) there will be 3 tips each week. That’s 15 tips and tricks for those of us less skilled in math. And if I do say so myself: they’re pretty good tips whether you’ve been married 80 years of 8 days. 

#1. NO PUBLIC SHAMING!

Remember the last time you were out with friends or just randomly at the grocery store and a couple starts fighting and bickering. It is literally the most uncomfortable thing in the entire world. Where do you look, what do you do, do you just walk away? It’s so weird! Matt is really good at only saying positive, nice things about me in public. He praises my intelligence and resourcefulness. It takes effort and it takes practice. It’s really easy to point out flaws and bring up old things, but do that on your own time. Your brain believes what you tell it. If you tell it (by telling all your friends) how great your spouse is, it will believe it. You don’t need to lie or embellish the truth, but make it a point to only say positive things!

#2. CHOOSE YOUR FIGHTS

Could I be anymore cliche? I know, I know. If you didn’t get this advice at your bridal shower, are you really married? It’s taken us 5 years, but I feel like we’re finally getting the hang of this. If it’s not important in 5 years, it shouldn’t be important in this moment. Do the socks on the floor require a 30 minute argument where you both storm off and don’t speak for 3 days or maybe a sticky note saying how much you love them and how much you appreciate it socks going in the laundry basket. You catch more flies with honey than vinegar

#3. TOUCH A LOT

My second top love language is physical touch. Contrary to what many believe, physical touch does not mean sex 24/7. I feel most loved when #myforeverpagel is using words of affirmation. I feel next most loved when he is holding my hand, when he has his hand on my leg while driving, when he puts his arm around me when we’re sitting beside each other. Y’all I’m all about that touch. There’s a lot of really interesting science behind how touch affects all of us mentally. We need and crave touch in our lives.

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Date Night Ideas

When was the last time you and your forever went on a date night? Do you have a set schedule or just whenever it works? My Forever and I normally go with the whenever approach. We started doing a monthly date night that was planned by the other. (So you’re planning a date night every other month). Ideally, you would have a set schedule that the first Friday or second Saturday is your set date night. That doesn’t work in our lifestyle. We go when it rains, when we have to go on a parts run or when we can combine it with an event we’re already out for. I wish we could do the first Friday approach, but it just doesn’t work. So much of what we do is based on getting it done at just the right time so when it must be done, it must be done. With that said, we do a lot of in home date nights.

What should date night look like? However you and your significant other want it to look like! That’s the amazing part of planning every other one-you get to choose. We don’t have kids and we’re our own bosses so we have a lot more freedom than most. Don’t let your kids be your excuse not to go. I hear so often, “we can’t go on dates because we don’t have babysitting money”. Your marriage is much too important to let that be the case. Get creative! Find somebody in your kids’ classes or your church that will swap babysitting-you babysit for them and them for you so you both can go out!

Dates do not have to be expensive. Seriously, our best date nights have been free or very inexpensive. Dates do not have to be dinner and a movie/show. Once you have the kids out of the house, cook dinner with your spouse. Use the fancy dishes! Light a candle. Snuggle on the couch. Go walk, holding hands. Seriously Google has 5 million and one date night options that are virtually free or very inexpensive!

Ideally, Matt and I have date night once/week. To many, our dates aren’t dates. That’s the beautiful part-we don’t care what others think of our dates and you shouldn’t either. Checking cattle with My Forever is a real treat for me and I LOVE when we get to. Normally, we split and conquer with the cattle checking and when I simply get to ride around with him, it’s pure joy for me. I’ll call that a date night anytime. My marriage is my number one priority in my life. I want to wake up in 50,60,70 plus years and be ecstatic that I woke up next to My Forever. It takes work! I can’t coast and assume it will all work out. Just like anything we care about, it needs constant improvement.

Schedule date nights if you can. If not, make them happen when you can (at least once/month!) Don’t let the person you loved enough to give them the rest of your life, end up a roommate.

Fun Facts about Team Pagel

  1. We started dating then we broke up. My Forever never quit “pursuing” me, but I wouldn’t ever say we were dating. So we were “officially unofficially not committed to not dating”. That’s what I would say. Anyway, he proposed the day we celebrated my Grandma’s 100th birthday. I didn’t have plans to go with him so I was in my party dress with no other clothes. I borrowed clothes and we went to go check cows or that’s what I thought! He proposed on a road we travel often now. We were engaged for 5 months. I wanted an outside October wedding. Yes, right in the middle of harvest! We decided on my Grandma’s hayfield, no matter how off the beaten path it may be. So I spent 5 months planning, while he played the supportive, ‘whatever you want dear’ role. When we got down to the wire, there were chances of rain. It was decided that we couldn’t set up the outdoor part the day before due to the chance of rain. (We had little square bales for people to sit on and they can’t get rained on or they are ruined). I was in charge of decorating the reception hall how I wanted it and he was going to set up in the hayfield the morning of the wedding. I didn’t see how he set up anything until I walked down the aisle of hay bales. There were so many small things he did! To this day, the comments we receive are 100% about how beautiful the ceremony was and how everything looked so amazing in the hayfield, not the 5 months of planning for the reception hall. This is life with him. He plans so little, but most everything comes out so perfect. It was all him and anybody he recruited to help him that morning (I’m still not sure who all helped). I always say we can’t ever get divorced because I had the wedding that exceeded my dreams and I have the most amazing mother-in-law a girl could ask for.
  2. More wedding fun facts. Our DJ backed out on us 2 weeks before the wedding. Our minister backed out 1 week. We had virtually no pre-marriage counseling. My wedding dress cost less than my wedding band (not engagement ring, just wedding band). My wedding band costs less than Matt’s. (His was less than $250 to give you a reference). Big spenders over here. I wear my wedding band (not engagement ring-it’s much bigger and more dangerous on the farm) everyday to remind myself that I do in fact love the man that is yelling at me. My Forever picked out the engagement ring by himself. We didn’t talk about what I wanted beforehand. We didn’t talk about getting engaged really. I mean we weren’t even dating so why talk marriage? Quite frankly, I didn’t care what the ring looked like. Matt picked out the ring that he liked and made him think forever with me was a good idea. I love it. We picked out our wedding bands together after getting engaged. The wedding band is now not circular due to catching it in a gate and having Matt use his pliers to get circulation back in my finger. The ring has a story to tell and isn’t perfect, just like us and our marriage. I think about that every time I see it.
  3. I call Matt, My Forever because it’s a great reminder when we’re fighting that we’re in this for forever and will get through whatever it is that we’re going through. The main reason is because he ended his vows (we wrote our own vows-and his were amazing and definitely made me cry) with…Together, Forever. It was the best!
  4. My Forever rarely yells or raises his voice. He will let you know how disappointed he is simply by shaking his head and walking away. He won’t have a full on screaming fight with me, he will simply walk away. He rarely says anything he regrets because he thinks about what he’s going to say first. When he does, he apologizes.
  5. I hate white socks. My Forever will only use a towel once, then it has to be washed. We have more “old” or everyday clothes than we have nice clothes. After almost 5 years of marriage, we still haven’t figured out a laundry organizational system (it literally still causes fights!).
  6. We can keep hundreds of acres of crops alive and thriving, but can’t keep house plants or a garden alive. The two peace lillies I have are exceptions to that rule, but they tell you when to water them, so it’s basically cheating. And honestly, I’m pretty sure I killed one of those this winter.
  7. Everybody that meets us will say Matt never talks. He’s a listener through and through. He can remember and repeat everything that is said. When it’s just the two of us, he never stops talking so its hard for me to remember when I thought he was quiet.
  8. We hate mowing our yard. Enter the chickens that do a lot of that work for us so we don’t have to mow nearly so often. Plus, we don’t have insects.
  9. We work together daily and haven’t killed each other yet. Yet is the key word. Kidding! In all honesty, we love our life and what we’re doing and there is no one I would rather be doing it with.

What are a couple fun facts about you? Let us know in the comments!