It is all too easy to think of items to complain about when it comes to your spouse. The pile of clothes on the floor instead of in the closet, the bathrooms that seem to be waiting for the cleaning fairy to appear, the vacuum that sits lonely in the corner waiting for a chance to dance around the room.

(These are my flaws, for the record. My husband has his own but we’ll save that for another day.)

I thought it might be fun to reflect on the characteristics your spouse has that are endearing. Not “they great things they do” or “how great they treat you” but the personality characteristics that make you grin from the inside out because they’re just so darn cute. You know, like when he’ll sit and have a tea party with our daughter, complete with a tiara on his head.

The trait that never fails to crack me up is how my husband will mix up words and their meanings. Don’t get me wrong, he’s one of the smartest guys I know, but his spelling isn’t the greatest (”Hey Honey? How do you spell (Fill in the blank)?” Or the time we were arguing over the pronunciation of a word and he told me that he was going to look up the prophetic (phonetic) spelling. Or the time he told me that he wanted his pasta cooked del monte (al dente).

This weekend served up another example that gave me no end of delight.

Him: “What’s the name of that character on Sesame Street? He looks like Grover, but he’s red? Emo?”

Me: “ELMO?”

(Emo’s World would be a great addition to Sesame Street, no? A character complete with dark eye makeup and an angsty iTunes playlist, who storms off to his room to write in his black journal. Ha!)

How about you? What do you find endearing about your spouse?