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Tana Marie's Monthly Romance Column and Love Tip Newsletter

By Tana Marie

KEEPING PASSION ALIVE

• Are you interested in captivating & mesmerizing your lover?
• Do you want to continue having those butterflies in your stomach and a lifelong love affair with your mate?

If so, the secret that assures your relationship remains strong, continues to grow and provides all the love and passion you can handle is actually a very simple technique – SHOW APPRECIATION!

Real, heartfelt appreciation is one of the most overlooked and underused relationship enhancing tools. Showing appreciation to your lover is essential, allot of fun and gives you amazing returns on your emotional investment! So now let’s have some fun and talk about specific things that you can do to keep those home fires burning and kick your relationship up a notch, or 10!

SHOWING APPRECIATION
Some of most common ways to show your appreciation is:
• Buying cards
• Buying gifts, mementos and other collectibles
• Giving or sending flowers
• Verbally complementing your partner

The gift is more important this month than almost any other time of the year. Valentine’s Day + THE GIFT = How Much You Love Your Partner. Regardless of how much you wish it wasn’t the case, unfortunately in our society, it’s VERY true! We have been “conditioned” to equate the Valentine’s Day Gift Ritual as “THE Ultimate Test” of your love and devotion. Fight it as you might, you have years of tradition, advertisers, and Fairy Tales all working against you. So give-in and do something wonderful for your lover.

The following are all wonderful ways to show your appreciation, but I want you to get really creative - and remember the simple act of showing that you care does not necessarily have to take a lot of time or cost a lot of money.

• GREETING CARDS - instead of going down to the local stationery store, what about creating your own the greeting card, either the old fashioned way, by hand, or by using one of the new software programs available on the market today? Don’t worry about doing it perfectly, the fact that you did it yourself will give you 10 brownie points right off the bat. Another tip, instead of just handing it your partner, send it via Express Mail or put it on their pillow so they find it when they’re getting into bed.

• LOVE NOTES - this is a bit of a variation on greeting cards, but they will be equally appreciated. You can get as creative as you want with these, or simply write; I love you with all my heart. The trick to love notes is you want to leave them somewhere for your partner to find. I’ve had many clients use love notes very effectively over the years, and these were some of the creative ways in which they used them.
• One woman would pack her husband’s lunch and tuck a little love note in the bag.
• Another woman would slip little love notes into her husband’s suit pockets for him to find when he was away on business trips.
• Still another would use sticky notes and put scintillating little suggestions in her boyfriend’s DayTimer for him to find.
Now men can do this also, as a matter of fact I’ve gotten some great suggestions from some of my male clients, for instance;
• One man used to leave little cards and notes in his wife’s car for her to find when she got out of work at night.
• Another gentleman told me he felt his relationship has lasted as long as it has because he’s constantly leaving little Notes for his wife letting her know how special she is to him.

BUYING & GIVING GIFTS - think of a creative way to give them to your partner, or have them find it somewhere. The key to gift giving is to pay attention! If your wife or girlfriend remarks that she loves Precious Moments figurines - don’t go out and buy her a set of steak knives for her birthday. If he’s a die-hard football fan, buy him tickets for his favorite team, organize a tailgate party, or simply get him the teams sweat shirt or starter jacket - just make sure these items are for the team that he’s into. Again, great gift giving is simply a matter of paying attention to the likes and dislikes of your partner.

The gift doesn't have to be expensive, but it does need to show that you've put a lot of time and care into selecting it. If you've decided to give a traditional favorite, like flowers or chocolates, try and do something unique with them. For example, have 12 single roses delivered separately, or try creative chocolate ideas, like a trail of Hershey’s Kisses from the front door to the bedroom, or a treasure hunt where your date has to “work for the gift” by following clues to the gift’s location.
• I also mentioned giving it to them in a creative way - how about slipping those 49er Season Tickets into his jacket pocket, or under his dinner napkin during a romantic dinner?
• Ahhh FLOWERS! The universal symbol of love and caring. Men, any woman who says she doesn’t like to receive flowers is lying. Women, when was the last time you gave flowers to your man? Most men I’ve talked to over the years love to receive flowers, for many of them, it was the first time in their life they ever had.
Want some creative ideas regarding giving flowers?
• How about waiting for your mate at the front door holding a long stemmed red rose and wearing nothing but a smile?
• Buy a bouquet of field flowers and lay them along the path leading to your front door or from your front door to a significant area in your house.
• How about scattering rose petals on your bed, or floating them in a warm bath?
• Now nobody is going to reject flowers that are professionally delivered, but when giving flowers, think of a way to do it a little more creatively if you can. I realize giving flowers can get very expensive if you go to the florist all the time, that’s why buying a bouquet at our wonderful farmer’s market or at the grocery store is a good bet if you going to do this more often. Please remember, giving flowers for no special occasion oftentimes means more than when it is expected.

CREATE A MEMORY
• How About Lighting an Entire Room With Candles? Your mate comes home from a long day at work to this magical, romantic environment that you have created with candles, scented room spray, soft music and a bottle of wine or other beverage-you’ll take their breath away.
• What About Setting the Stage in the Bathroom? Lead your partner into a warm bathroom lit with candles, where a fragrant bubble bath awaits. Get undressed, climb in and enjoy the bubble bath together.
• Food Can Be One Of The Greatest Aphrodisiacs - How about preparing a meal entirely of finger foods and the only stipulation is that you have to feed each other, without utensils, using only your hands. Another way to do this is to go to great Moroccan restaurant and when your meal comes, you cannot feed yourself; once again you can only feed one another. If you’ve never done this, I have to tell you, it’s one of the most sensual things you can do with your clothes on.
• Create A Time Capsule Or Love Scrapbook - there are some wonderful pre made time capsule kits that you can purchase and work on together. How about creating a scrapbook of your favorite pictures coupled with ticket stubs, cocktail napkins, matchbook covers, personal mementos or anything else that is special to the two of you. Too often I seen one person in a couple take responsibility for putting together the photo albums or scrapbooks, but you’ll see how much fun a project like this can be when you share the memories and do it together.
• How About A Treasure Hunt? Depending on the amount of time you have to set this up, and how long you would like it to go-this can be confined to the House, or go out into the community. Your partner finds the first clue either at the front door, or once they enter the house - this explains the rules, and tells them that by following the clues and instructions, they will be handsomely rewarded. This first note will also direct them to the next destination, where further instructions will send them to the subsequent destinations. If you want to be real clever, make the instructions cryptic, so it takes some imagination to decipher the clues. The final destination, if you’re keeping it inside the house, could be you waiting for them in the bedroom, or in a bubble bath, or any other romantic setting you can think of. If you’ve sent them on a treasure hunt out into the community, the final destination could be your favorite romantic restaurant where your awaiting their arrival, or a lovely hotel or bed and breakfast where the concierge has a key waiting, and you’re already in the room.
• Go To A Drive-In Movie - bring along a takeout meal or pack a picnic yourself to surprise them with.
• Kidnap Them - first make the necessary arrangements at their place of employment, walk-in unannounced, blindfold them and take them away for an afternoon of delight, a picnic on the beach, their favorite daytime sporting event, or anything else you know they would love.
• How About Daytime Phone Sex? Call your partner at the office or on their cell-phone and tell them how much you love them. Describe, in Detail, what you’re going to do that night when they get home-be creative and outrageous! A little hint here - just make sure they’re not on their speakerphone!
• Run Away - arrange for a baby sitter if you need to, and meet them at the front door with a packed suitcase and announce that the 2 of you are running away from home, or going on a quest. A variation that can be interesting is one where you don’t preplan what you’re going to do or where you’re going to stay - just figure it out as you go along and see were you end up.
• Balloons - balloons are great and typically one of the most overlooked surprises for anyone over the age of six. Send a huge balloon bouquet to work with a card that says; “just because.” Fill their car full of balloons, or have a friend do it, and watch their face light up when they return to their car.

Love and appreciation – flip sides of the same coin – lavish both on your lover and you definitely will walk into the sunset together!