Hey guys,

As far as I can tell, there's no "Edit" option if you are not the original author of a post. (Can anyone else confirm this...?) Perhaps the settings for this blog can be changed so that we CAN edit Alysia's post, but for now I'll just put my ideas here...

3) Snuggle as much as possible. Especially the kind of snuggling that leads to sex. ;-)
4) Remember to put your spouse first- even in little, subtle ways. One thing Nate and I do instinctively, that I really appreciate, is that when we're in a group of friends, if one of us gets interrupted or doesn't get a chance to say what we were going to say, the other one of us will bring the conversation back to pick up the missed comment... (do you guys know what I'm talking about?) I find this very encouraging and affirming; it dissipates any leftover feelings of junior high awkwardness in social settings.
5) Don't throw away things without permission. This includes old underwear. ("If there is at least one molecule of Boxers left, it still counts as underwear!!") This applies even when your spouse has a Packrat Problem (as does mine.) Learn to negotiate gently. Praise when progress is made. (Last year Nate cleaned out his closet and organized the remaining items... I was on Cloud 9... I probably took him out to dinner afterwards or something.)
6) Try, TRY to listen when your spouse is making The Confusing, Boring Words. After 6+ years of marriage, my husband STILL tries to bravely tell me about his Science Things, like proteins, and graphs, and... yeah, I lack the vocabulary to even talk about it. And when I am reading or watching TV or something it is REALLY hard for me to stop what I'm doing and listen to a couple of minutes of Science-Talk that is 100% uninteresting/un-understandable to me (in its own right), but because it is Important to the one I love, I Try. (Last night I launched into a long thing about how Nate needs to be Emotionally Supportive during labor and help me stay relaxed and calm and everything, and at some point he kind of glazed over and I said "Are you listening to me?!?" And he said "There were keywords that made me zone out... something about Emotions and Feelings..." And I said "Now you know how I feel when you talk about science!" And he said "Now you know how I feel when you don't listen to me!" So there you have it.)
7) Smooch a lot.
8) I just asked Nate, what is your advice about marriage? And he said, "Big sheets." ;-) He also said, "People are always surprising. The surprises just get more subtle."