Archive for May, 2012

Committed: The Ties that Bond

with Angella Dykstra

I'm a mom of three, a professional accountant, and an amateur photographer and writer. I am not a marriage expert. But my husband and I take "Til death do us part" seriously, and here I'll be sharing how we keep our marriage strong while we both do that insane work-life juggle.

Check out my Work It, Mom! profile and my blog, Dutch Blitz.

Do you share the same views on guns?

Categories: marriage

5 Comments

SheepThree years ago, my husband and some of his buddies took a hunting course. Some of them had grown up in hunting families and some had not, including my husband. They thought it would be wise to take a course that taught them both hunting skills and gun safety. They all “graduated” with their gun licenses.

My husband has both a rifle and a cross bow, and both are kept under lock and key in his workshop. I know that’s the responsible thing to do, and that our children are completely safe. I’ve never given it much thought beyond that, though I know that some people are afraid of any type of firearm being anywhere near them.

As for me, do I want to get a gun license? I’ve never wanted to, even despite the event that happened this week. My dog was attacked by another dog when we were out on a public trail, and the owner could not control his dog. The dog was clamped so hard on my dog’s neck that it got to the point where I thought my dog might die.

I’ve since bought bear spray, and a neighbor suggested I run with a hand gun. I’ve chosen instead to drive into town and run in a more public area. I wouldn’t want to find myself in the position where I’d have to fire a gun at a dog (or a person). I think that guns are for hunting, and I have no desire to hunt (though I love that my husband does and fills our freezer with meat).

I know that gun ownership can be a testy subject for some couples. Do you share the same views on gun ownership, or do you agree to disagree?

Go on vacation to have better sex

Categories: sex, travel

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A reader sent me the link to this article: Jazz up your sex life - go on vacation

Specifically, 69 percent of men and 72 percent of women between 18 and 49 say sex on vacation is better than sex at home.

It makes sense to me. When you’re on vacation, you’re away from the usual routine of bills and laundry and chores work and all the things you do in a day to keep your life running. When you’re on vacation, your biggest worries are whether you’ve put on enough sunscreen and what you should pick to eat from the buffet.


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15 ways to stay married

Categories: communication, marriage, sex

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A friend sent me a link to this Huffington Post article titled “15 Ways To Stay Married For 15 years” because she thought I might want to use it for this column. She was right. The author has some really practical tips for those who want a marriage that lasts.


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Marriage tips

Categories: marriage

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When I tell people (who do not read BLAWGS) that I write a marriage/relationship column, I tend to count the seconds until that one eyebrow arches a little higher than the other one. It’s about three seconds, if you were wondering.

I don’t claim to be an expert (NO, NO, NO) and I tell them as such. I share issues that we’re working through and link to other posts and share my thoughts on them and ask people what they think on the topic du jour.

My husband and I are celebrating twelve years of marriage this coming Sunday, which I think deserves a huge WHAT THE HECK? And also, YEAH YOU DID.


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Who is the better parent?

Categories: Uncategorized, family, marriage

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The Internet has been aflame this week with incendiary posts. Time magazine’s cover photo got Twitter/Facebook/blogs all aflutter with their takes on if women were “Mom enough.” Yesterday’s post over at Babble about ‘Top 10 Things Mothers Do Better Than Fathers’ got all of the Dads’ panties (Do Dads wear panties?) in a knot.

It’s 2012, people. Two thousand and twelve, twenty-twelve, however you pronounce it.

There are people who are stuck in stereotypes from fifty years ago, and God bless them. I hope they are happy.


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Will you take the ‘7 days of sex’ challenge?

Categories: love, marriage, sex

6 Comments

In line with my last post about having a “healthy” sex life, I learned about the Lifetime show called 7 days of sex. I’ve written about previous ’seven days of sex’ and ‘30 days of sex’ challenges, but this is a new spin on it. This is a T.V. show that is chronicling real-life couples who are having sex for one week straight with the hope of saving their marriage.

30 days is a little bit over the top many and also for us (except for when we were wanting to be pregnant), but for those who are feeling disconnected and struggling, seven days straight is totally doable. (Heh.)

Would you, could you, take the ’seven days of sex’ challenge?

Do you have a healthy sex life?

Categories: love, marriage, sex

6 Comments

I don’t know what constitutes a “healthy” sex life, exactly, but I have to guess that it constitutes actually having sex. As I mentioned last week, my husband attended a conference in Atlanta. One of the sessions he attended was about marriage and there were some statistics that shocked him a little bit. There are people our age (mid-thirties) who are married and don’t have sex. Ever.


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Have you read 50 Shades Of Grey?

Categories: sex

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When I first started hearing about 50 Shades of Grey, my interest was piqued. People were reading it, and talking about how hot it was. I thought it might be a book (or series) to check out once I made it to the end of April, for “research purposes”, of course. (I’m an accountant by day; there is no free time in tax season for reading.)

As the weeks wore on, however, all I heard was how horrible the writing was. People who hopped on the bandwagon quickly jumped off of it, and then everyone’s been linking to the 50 Shades of Suck tumblr blog. There is also the issue of how the “heroine” is (abused, and) portrayed.


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Does your spouse blog?

Categories: communication

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My husband just got back from the Orange conference in Atlanta full of stories to tell and ideas that he wants to follow through on. One of those ideas is that he wants to start a blog. He even joined Twitter last week.

Prepare yourselves for the end times, people, because that is a sure sign that they are upon us.

One of the speakers wrote a book about social media and my husband read it on the plane ride home (WHO IS THIS MAN, AND WHAT DID HE DO WITH MY HUSBAND?), and he said that there are three types of people who use the Internet:


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