photo credit: Izzard Today is my wife's birthday. I really wanted to treat Annabelle to a special day however we could not really afford going overboard with expensive gifts. I feel that I must invest in my marriage. Relationships need investment, and like all investments, the greater your investment in them the greater the dividend will be. For her birthday then I decided that I was going to surprise her with several "treats". Without further ado....... herewith follows the anthology of a pampering frugal romantic: 1. The day was started by serving-up breakfast in bed. Nothing too fancy but just preparing something for her was special in itself. This also included my making-up earlier and preparing the boys' breakfast and their lunches so that Annabelle would not have to rush and do it herself. We gave her a couple of birthday cards and sang "Happy Birthday", waking-up the baby in the process (my bad). 2. Halfway through the morning I called her to check-up on her..... and told her where she could find a secret letter that I had written to her and hidden. The letter just simply was a little "pause" to reflect on what she means to me. 3. We had originally planned to have lunch together at a fabulous but reasonably priced Moroccan restaurant that we both love, but circumstances conspired to make it impossible to eat out. No worries I had it the meal prepared to go and I went home for lunch and treated her to a nice meal. 4. I had some flowers delivered to her at home during the afternoon - my babe loves flowers. 5. When I went home (early!!!) I gave her another little surprise - I had researched all of the Billboard No. 1 best-selling songs of each year, for every year since she was born right up to last year, and had downloaded them and made a compilation of the "music of [her] life" 6. .....I think that is all that you need to know ;) The point is this: Make every effort to invest in your marriage - it is THE most important relationship that you have with another human being. I am being challenged to continue to do this, to continue to find creative ways to improve my relationship, improve my communication with her, my intimacy with her - well, I guess you get the picture. A great relationship does not just "happen" - it is made. In a society where you can rejoice simply when a marriage is surviving, I want to have a marriage that thrives, that is not just good but great - a marriage where we do not just tolerate each other, but celebrate each other.