Advent Day 10: Don't Forget Your Spouse

In many ways, Christmas is a holiday geared for children. I was always surprised how every year the Christmas season became less magical, less spectacular, and less thrilling. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy Christmas. But a lot of the festivities, i.e. opening presents, decorating gingerbread, acting out the nativity, and so on so forth, are more for kids.For the last two years, Lauren and I have been able to enjoy the holiday season together as a couple. We would open our presents, go on dates, watch Elf and other Christmas movies together and decorate our place as much as we could with the resources we had. Christmas has been great. But it has been missing some of the excitement that only children can bring to Christmas.This upcoming Christmas will be the first year we are celebrating Christmas with a child. Even though he will only be five and a half months, there is already a different kind of excitement. This change got me thinking.As parents, Lauren and I want to do everything we can for Kyler to make his life fun, exciting, and meaningful. So at Christmas time, a lot of our time from here on out will be spent making Christmas memorable for our children. This is a good thing, but an easy trap I can see Lauren and I falling into is pouring all of our time into our children at Christmas and in turn neglecting each other.So, tonight we are having our friends come stay at our house while our baby sleeps, and we are going to have a Christmas night on the town. No kids, just us two. Going on a Christmas date was a tradition we had with each other before Kyler was born, and we plan on continuing it.Our children are incredible blessings, but if we're not careful they can easily distract Lauren and I from each other, especially at Christmas time. In recognizing this, Lauren and I are trying to be intentional about not forgetting about each other in the midst of our efforts to make Christmas exciting for Kyler.We are committed to this because we believe one of the greatest gifts we can give Kyler, or any of our other future kids, is a happy and strong marriage. So this Christmas season, especially if you have kids, do whatever it takes to spend some time with just your spouse. Make it a regular Christmas tradition, and give your kids the gift of a loving marriage.And if you're not married, Christmas is a great time to work on changing that...