Cocktails For Grown Folks: Make It A Double!

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By Ericka Beckwith & Robin Hunt

Sometimes one straight cocktail filled with the highest premium liquor just isn’t enough and for this version of Cocktails for Grown Folks so the Divas are going to pour a double shot for this one. Here’s the cocktail we desired this week, you make it a double if you want…

The Dirty Martini is a classic that is a simple and popular variation of the original Martini It is called dirty because of the olive juice which adds a more olive flavoring than the straight Martini with olives soaking in it. This cocktail can be easily ruined if too much olive juice is used, so go easy on it and you and your sweetie will have one of the best cocktails ever.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ericka Beckwith & Robin Hunt are an integral part of the writing team here at Blackloveandmarriage.com. They love good cocktails and great get-togethers (aka parties). They are moms, reality show junkies and together manage the blog Cocktails And Conversation along with their BlogTalk Radio show by the same name.

 

 

Should You Be Required By Law To Take Your Husband’s Last Name?

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By Mona Lisa Macalino

As an engaged woman, I was both surprised and appalled when I read an article on The Stir stating that 50% of Americans believe it should be legally required for a woman to take her husband’s last name. My first thought was: Who took this survey anyway, a bunch of people from Middle-of-Nowhere America (no offense, really) who’ve been completely cut off from the modern world? I mean, hello, this is the 21st century! What happened to women’s equality?

This opinion is surely rooted in tradition, just another way for the U.S. to use laws to protect what’s “right” or “normal.” Not taking your husband’s last name is widely considered taboo, like when children call their moms by their first names instead of “mom” (which I admittedly think is weird and a tad inappropriate, but nothing to make a law about).  CLICK HERE to read more.

Am I In A Healthy Relationship?

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By Margaret, Paul Ph.D.

Just as physical health is on a continuum, emotional health and relationship health are also on a continuum. And, like physical health, each person may have different criteria regarding what constitutes health. For example, some people say they are very healthy if they get a cold or flu a few times a year, while others’ health criteria is that they never get sick at all.

For some, a healthy relationship is two people who never fight or argue, or who take care of each other and basically agree on everything, or are very easy-going and give in to each other.

For others, a healthy relationship is a relationship filled with sexual passion, while others believe that a healthy relationship is when two people can talk things out in ways that reach resolution.

Rather than looking for an external definition of a healthy relationship, I suggest that you look inside and define for yourself what is very important to you in a relationship. While your relationship may have all the traditional characteristics of a healthy relationship, if it isn’t what you want, then it may not be a healthy relationship for you.

Glenn, in his early thirties, was ready to get married and start a family. He had been in a number of long-term relationships that had ended for various reasons. When he consulted with me, he had been in a relationship with Katherine for 3 years. She was pushing to get married and he was resisting, but not understanding why.

Glenn and Katherine had much in common. Both were intelligent, emotionally open people, and they both wanted children. They had similar spiritual beliefs, handled money in similar ways, and enjoyed the same activities. Their sex life was good. So what was in the way of Glenn wanting to marry Katherine?

“I don’t look forward to spending time with her. We don’t seem to click when it comes to talking. I love to delve deeply into feelings and ideas. I love sitting at the kitchen table and talking for hours without knowing how late it is. With Katherine, conversation is difficult. Everyone thinks she is so perfect for me, but I don’t feel “in love” and I think it’s because we don’t play off each other with our humor and we can’t get into in-depth conversations.”

Glenn had never before articulated how important this was to him in a relationship. Without this, the relationship was flat.

It was hard for Glenn to end the relationship with Katherine, because even though he wasn’t in love with her, he did love her and didn’t want to hurt her. But he knew he was not going to marry her.

A year after ending his relationship with Katherine, Glenn met Liz at a party. From the moment they started to talk, Glenn felt that, not only had he known Liz all his life, but that they could talk for hours. And talk for hours they did – and they still talk for hours after getting married and having children. Glenn says he is delighted with his healthy relationship!

So what does a healthy relationship mean to you?

A healthy relationship is one where: (you might want to mark the ones that for you constitute a healthy relationship)

* We can talk about anything without fear of the other’s anger or withdrawal.

* We support each other in doing what makes each of us happy.

* We each take responsibility for our own feelings and are able to share love, rather than expecting the other to fill us up with love.

* We laugh easily together and have a lot of fun with each other.

* We have similar interests and enjoy much companionship.

* We each contribute financially.

* We each contribute with household responsibilities and/or childcare.

* We find each other endlessly interesting and always look forward to spending time together talking and sharing ideas.

* We have deep trust, respect, and admiration for each other.

* We have a wonderful sex life.

* We are both very affectionate and love to hold, cuddle, and kiss.

* We share common spiritual values.

* We have the same religion.

* Other – add your own.

We each have the right to decide what is most important to us in a relationship. If you find that you are not in a healthy relationship, don’t despair! By doing your own Inner Bonding® work, there is a good possibility that you CAN heal your relationship.

Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is a best-selling author of 8 books, relationship expert, and co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding® process – featured on Oprah. Visit her at innerbonding.com.

 

Love… And Allow Yourself To Be Loved

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By Sole’

Do you feel all awkward when you think about romance?  Do your palms get sweaty…do you start to get a nervous twitch on the most conspicuous part of your body when you think about going outside the norm and romancing your partner?  Are you afraid of the intimacy that’s attached to romance?  Do you dare to be romantic and take the risk to experience a richer connection?  Being romantic involves finding out what your partner wants (not what they need!), and then finding a unique way to meet those wants. Pretty simple, huh?

Let’s get one thing cleared up first. Being romantic isn’t about some grand extravagant gesture like flying first class to Paris for a 2 week romantic blitz. Itís about the little things. Little things are simple things that you do for your loved one. Despite the fact that they are “little” they can mean a lot because it illustrates that you took time out of your busy life just to show them how much you care.

One thing that most people want, male and female, is to feel special and loved. It’s how you show them that you love them, where the challenge comes in. Some people feel loved when they are told repeatedly that they are loved. Others feel loved when they are touched frequently. And others see love in gestures and everyday kindnesses. Of course, there are others that may need all three of the above to really feel loved and secure but usually there is one need that dominates. You need to find out what your partner needs and then you can begin working out what method you will use to romance them.

Not sure what your loved one prefers? Do an experiment or three and see how they respond? You’ll very quickly work it out.

What can you do if your loved one wants to hear how much you love them? You need to tell them. But don’t just tell them and have it coming off like some kind of rote response to hello or goodbye or please pass the pepper. Think about different ways you can get your message across. You could:
. Post them a good old fashioned love letter
. Send a romantic email
. Text them a love message
. Place a love note somewhere it will be found easily, in their car or lunch bag or under their pillow or taped to the phone receiver or their computer
. For the kid in all of us! Use multi-colored, sidewalk chalk to draw a BIG heart in red and write “I love you” in the middle of the heart. Do this someplace prominent like your driveway so that when your partner comes home they will see it right away.
. Make a long list of the many reasons why you love your partner and have the list framed and present it to them.
. If you don’t live together, call your loved one just to say goodnight and recite a favorite love poem over the phone.
. Give your loved one a compliment, about how great they look or what their smile does to you
If your loved one needs regular physical contact to feel loved you can:
. Give them a massage on their back and feet at the end of a work week…it is always well received!
. Keep in physical contact as often as you can, for example, when watching TV together, eating dinner (it doesn’t just have to be hands, you can make sure your feet or legs are touching)
. Give them random hugs
. Put your arm around your loved one in public
. Hold hands as you walk side by side
. Cuddle up in your pj’s and watch a romantic movie together
. Make sure you kiss them when you get home and kiss before you leave

If your actions speak louder than words for your loved one then you’ll want to focus on gestures that express your feelings. You can try:
. While your partner showers, heat up his or her towel in the dryer.
. Have flowers delivered to partner at work.
. Surprise your partner by arriving home with their favorite drink, snack, or ice-cream.
. Arrange for an intimate lunch date with your partner. Then afterward, send a virtual card. Tell them how much you enjoyed lunch together.
. Call your partner in the middle of the day to discuss your romantic plans for that evening.
. Write your own love coupon offering an hour of your time as their personal love slave.
. Cook a favorite meal for your partner and then eat it, slowly, by candlelight.
. Pick a bouquet of wild flowers and present them with a kiss.
. Call spontaneously at their work to say ìI am thinking of you.

If they like all of the above then you can really go wild and mix it all up together. The only limit is your own imagination and the desire to make it happen.

The Positives Of Marriage Outweigh The Negatives

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By Ilex Bien-Aime

This message is for the fellas out there, we need to be careful when we speak to our non married friends about marriage. I was talking to a friend the other day about marriage when one of his friends over heard us. He said something that really made me think about the way married men portray marriage. Often times when we talk about the subject, we say negative things. Instead of truly focusing on the positives, we usually speak unflatteringly.

Often times married men make marriage seem as if it were the worst thing ever. Before I got married I can’t tell you how many times I heard guys call their wives things like the warden or the slave master. It seems as if many of us are saying that our wives are trying to control us or take away our fun. I used to think to myself, why am I going to get married because married men seem so miserable. In my opinion when we do this, we do a disservice to our single friends.

Don’t get me wrong, marriage is difficult. If you are expecting me to say that everyday is like sipping Piña Coladas and making love under the pale moonlight, you would be sadly mistaken. When I talk to my friends about marriage, I try to give them a more positive spin. I tell them that often times marriage is difficult because human beings are flawed. I can’t go around speaking negatively about my wife without seriously acknowledging my own issues. Let’s face it, we are selfish beings. When we get married, often times we think of ourselves as two individuals living together but not truly as one. We want to do what we want to do and go when we want to go without considering the other person.

I get mad at my wife sometimes and honestly I have negative thoughts but as I said before, human beings are selfish. My wife is truly my help meet and she has my best interest at heart. She may suggest to me that I don’t spend money on something, not because she is trying to control my spending or take away my fun, she does it because she can see things that I may not see or choose to ignore. I can be an impulsive shopper and I end up buying things that I don’t need or plain just don’t use. When I am fighting with my wife about these things, at that moment I am thinking that she is trying to control me but often times afterwards I realize that she is trying to consult me.

Honestly, I have no business speaking negatively about marriage and some of my friends don’t either. Marriage has been great to me. I have a beautiful wife who has my back and wants nothing but love and respect from me in return. I know that I have a friend and a partner who I can confide in and that feeling is comforting to me. Yes marriage is difficult and sure my wife is not perfect but I wouldn’t trade her for the world. So the next time someone asks me about marriage, I would tell them that it is work but the rewards outweigh the negatives!

My name is Ilex Bien-Aime and I live in Washington, DC with my lovely wife. I write as a man who has seen women mistreat themselves and who have allowed themselves to be mistreated. I write as a man who wants to give my future daughters a guideline on how to deal with men. Lastly I write what I write because my female friends are always asking my opinion about these situations. Connect with Ilex at Iamsayingit.blogspot.com or via email atilexbienaime@gmail.com.

Dealing With An Insecure Wife

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“My wife appears confident and assured to the outside world but is insecure within our relationship” writes this husband. What does one partner do when you know that your spouse has issues around how they truly see themselves and feel about themselves AND it’s taking a toll on the relationship? What if that spouse is unable to see what you see and to top it off  is very defensive when you try to bring things to her attention? Listen is as The Ma’at’s share their thoughts.

QUESTION: How do you handle the hang ups of your mate? Do you ignore them or insist that they confront them?

Happy Anniversary Baby

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19 Years Together….12 Years Married….4 beautiful children. We did it and we continue to do it all day every day.  Happy Anniversary Boo. I continue to fall more in love with you each and every single day. I love you baby.  I love the life that we’ve created.

Looking at you makes my heart smile….

feeling you and your flyyy ass style….

hearing you keeps me stuck in redial…

loving you makes it all worth while.

Happy Anniversary Queen, Wife, Boo, Wifey Pooh, My Baby’s Mama lol

Check out our kids reaction to the kissing part in this video……HILARIOUS!!!!!

5 Ways To Make Your Marriage Click

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By James Walsh

Novelty and gift stores still keep crystal decorations with ‘25’ embossed on them – and there are people whose marriages last even longer. They are not the results of forced marriages in early youth within strong cultural and religious barriers, nor are they the result of devoted worshippers who believe suffering a rotten marriage in silence is the best way to please God and make things easy on the last day. Some couples just manage to make their union click, even in this age of divorce, prenuptial agreements and vulgar court battles fought by greedy celebrities.

The greatest secret to a successful marriage is that it does not have a ready recipe book to be photocopied and distributed. A good marriage is always ‘customised’ to the teeth — the two people who are a part of it go out of their way to make things special for each other. All of us are different, so the only way to manage a marriage perfectly is to know your partner and yourself thoroughly and be willing to take things on as they come. Below are some properties that most of these happily-ever-after matches have – but once again – they are no magic formula.

The Importance of Respect

Why do you love your spouse? If you start thinking carefully, you will realize that the physical attributes play a great role in it all, and there is no reason why they should not. We are not talking of storks bringing in the babies here. But do you really respect him or her for what he or she is? Respect is a heavy word — it weighs more than love. You have to respect your partner’s opinions, his or her idea of personal space, and retain your own respect at the same time. Slavishly following every whim of your partner and then behaving like a spoilt child once this transient charm of saying yes to everything is over is not what makes a marriage.

There are too many people squabbling over money, career, child rearing, household duties and every possible angle of a conjugal life today. These petty disagreements are not going to occur if two people respect each other. It is difficult, and not blindly done, but those who can manage it have found the key to happiness.

The Meaning of Commitment

Do you walk around with your resignation letter in your pocket? Do you automatically look for loopholes while signing a contract? Do you like painting one day and want to take up pottery on the next? When a person is fickle-minded, it will show in every aspect of his or her actions. In marriage, commitment does not limit itself to being tied down to the marital bed. It may sound shocking, but there are couples who have actually had open affairs with other people and stayed undyingly true to each other. And there are chaste and prim creatures who surf pornography on the sly. Commitment is a contract between you two – you define the terms – and ensure you stick to them.

The Value of Freedom

Marriage and freedom, in popular imagination, are opposite terms. The moment you marry, you are supposed to be fettered to the other in ‘wedlock’. But love is all about setting free, not tying down. Couples who have led gloriously happy married lives have learnt how to be free within their marriage. This includes freedom of opinion, thought, action and emotion – up to a degree mutually agreed upon. We are not advocating a Bohemian lifestyle, but marrying does not mean enrolling into prison life either.

The Role of Communication

How do you voice your love? Some shout it from rooftops, some look around before whispering it into the ear. Communication is not just talking, but connecting in general. You can say volumes through touch, smile, nod, glance and silence. Do you understand each other? If you don’t, or if you find you have to spell out everything and yet make that extra effort to get yourself across, then maybe you should reconsider things.

Romance Never Dies

The day you stop your courtship is the day the fire dies in the hearth. Whether it’s a holiday to Europe or a weekend drive, a diamond ring or a quick kiss before going to work – every gesture counts – because these are the actions we remember most. This is no wishful talk, but a proven attribute of human nature.

James Walsh is a freelance writer and editor.

Black Women-Where We Stand

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This MSNBC clip examines black women and where we stand in the African American community. It is a well known and documented yet rarely spoken about fact that a disproportionate number of African American women tend to have higher education, income, and job status than African American men. This is not ok. Why is this so? There are many theories and rationales for why this paradigm exists in the black community….but our question is: How do we change this in our community?

My Marriage Ain’t Perfect…And That’s Ok.

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By Neysa Ellery Taylor

This isn’t real fancy today. There won’t be a lot of alliteration or word play. Today I am just going to throw it out there. So if you are putting me, my marriage, or my testimony on a pedestal and don’t want that vision to be cracked, then don’t read any further. But if you read what I write because I tell it all – the good, the bad, and the ugly – then keep reading. So you’ve been warned…Ready?

Fighting your way back from a breach of trust is hard work. Hard work everyday. My husband has asked for forgiveness and changed his behavior. I’ve forgiven him. And we are both committed to making our family work. But there are days when I am still very upset. Yep, I said it. VERY UPSET. That doesn’t mean that I don’t forgive. I do. But there is no magic wand that erases my memory. And since I have chosen to write about the experience, I have opened myself up to anonymous comments and emails. (It’s funny how everyone has courage on the Internet.. but I digress.) But the comment I get the most is “he could be cheating on you right now.” And you know what, you are right. He could be. Heck, I could be cheating right now. Matter of fact, your spouse/pastor/the Pope/and President Obama could be cheating too. But I can’t control any of those folks just like I can’t control my spouse. My spouse controls himself. I can pray for him and my marriage. But I can only control me. (But I digress again…)

So there are days when I am out of control. When I am upset, angry, and let’s be honest pissed off. On “good” insecure days, I recognize it and call my hubs. Normally I say some variation of this: “I need more from you today. I am not feeling too secure and need you to really just show out on the love meter today.” But there are those “bad” insecure days. On those days, I keep my mouth shut but my mind is working overtime. I take note of everything that my husband does or doesn’t do. I am a psychologist/private investigator/stalker. I notice every change in behavior, speech or stance. Hell, I even notice changes in breathing. And when I am tripping, I am acting really funky. Naw, I am acting stank. My emotional wall goes up and I am giving my hubs the side-eye. This is so not the best stance for a productive marriage, right? The good news is that after a few hours (ok, sometimes a day) of acting this way, my hubs confronts me about it. And after he answers a barrage of questions, I take a breather and go back to what I can control – me.

I pause, pray, and process. I pause to quiet my mind. I really tell myself to calm down and think about things logically. I then pray. I ask God to wrap me in the spirit of wisdom and discernment and to be a hedge around the spirit of fear. And I process. I ask myself to look at the situation. Is there something I should be concerned about or am I tripping? Am I just mad at him for xyz that has nothing to do with what happened before? Is there something that we need to address or do differently? By the time I finish the process, I am calm and peace has been restored in the home.

So that is how we get through. As long as we are both committed to doing the work and weathering the storms – real or imagined – we’ll make it. So maybe we aren’t pedestal worthy and that’s ok. I’m just trying to make it to the throne room.

Neysa Ellery Taylor is an integral part of the writing team here at Blackloveandmarriage.com. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee with her husband, Chris, and their 4 children – Asyen, Maya, Preston, and Patrick. An Emmy-Award winning journalist, she hopes to share her passion for marriage and God through her writing. You can read more of her work at Myriadthatisme.blogspot.com.