Best Friends

I love being married to my best friend. Are you married to your best friend? Because people are always changing, learning new things, and in different phases of life it is easy to lose that friendship and just be living two lives side by side--especially with the busyness of children and their activities, work, bills, pets, house upkeep, other friends, and the list continues.

My husband and I are intentional about staying best friends--here are some of the things that we do:

• We find things in common that we like to do, and we make time to do those things together.
• We stay interested and engaged in each other's work lives. So if my husband is reading a book or going to a conference, I try to join him. He stays engaged at home with me and the children and loves it when I send him updates throughout the day of things that are happening.
• We talk about deeper things than the weather and not just about our children, though we do talk about them a lot! For instance, we might discuss politics or our Bible reading for the day.
• We learn new things together like a game or a new hobby.  Recently we've started geocaching which is a fun whole family activity. Now we are on the hunt for a new board game.
• We give each other space to have our own individual hobbies.
• We pray together.
• Sometimes, we read a book together--and I do mean we read it out loud together! It's been awhile since we've done that one but it was a great experience that we will repeat.
• We have date nights and actually get out of the house without children.
• We laugh together.

What are some things that you do to intentionally stay best friends with your spouse?