23 Ways to Keep Your Romance Alive

23 Ways to Keep Your Romance Alive

Ban the quick kiss, share a sexy secret code ... and other itty-bitty ways to make him lovesick for you every day of the week.

In a perfect world, each moment of a relationship would be like that weak-kneed romantic scene inThe English Patient when Ralph Fiennes and Kristin Scott Thomas finally get together. So what keeps us from living that swoony, loopy-in-love life? Nothing more than getting stuck in the same day-in, day-out patterns and letting gushiness shift to the back burner. Okay, maybe that and the lack of a beautiful African desert background. Let Cosmo play mushy-moments director and push you to pack as much lovey-doveyness as possible into your daily duo. That means seizing every opportunity to sweeten up even the most seemingly unsentimental times together.

Here, easy but so-worth-it ways to jump-start both of your hearts.

1. Share a Secret Code. Pick a word that's likely to come up occasionally in conversation (heat, midnight, bedroom, whipped cream...) and agree that every time someone uses it, you have to touch — anything from a kiss to a lingering thigh stroke under the table. 
2. Transform Dinner into Dining. That midweek post-grind meal you devour together? Make it register off the mush-o-meter with some tiny adjustments to the atmosphere. "Pull out your nicest dishes and light a couple of candles, even if you're just having a mushroom pizza," suggests Gregory Godek, author of 1001 Ways to Be Romantic(Casablanca Press, 2000). "It's the mood, not the food, that sets a romantic scene. So stick a bouquet of daisies from the corner store in the center of the table, lower the lights, and turn up Enrique Iglesias or Bessie Smith. You could even conveniently forget the utensils so you have an excuse to feed each other." 
3. Get Swept Off Your Feet. Make up your own tango moves and groove with your guy for 15 minutes while you wait for dinner. Pop in the Marc Anthony CD, then press your pelvises together, entwine your legs, and twist and twirl around the living room. "Slow dancing is so intimate," says Godek. "The way you stand hip-to-hip, block out the world, and sway to each other's rhythms...now you're really cookin'." 
4. Outlaw Grunge-Wear. You and your guy are having a Blockbuster night. But wait, think twice before you change into your lounging-on-the-couch clothes... You know, oversize T-shirt, shabby sweater. That gear isn't exactly a recipe for a night of making googly eyes. Instead, slip into something a little more comfortable but a lot more cuddle-enticing. "A fitted T-shirt or a semisheer tank top, especially when worn without a bra, is a lot sexier than some too-big shirt you're swimming in," says fashion designer and Cosmo contributing editor Shoshanna Lonstein. "Pair it with your favorite perfectly worn-out blue jeans or khaki cutoffs for a casual but irresistible look." 
5. Dish with Him. Flash back to the '50s and get passionate over pots and pans. "Okay, it's totally old-fashioned and cornball, but I find doing dishes together incredibly romantic," says Janet, a 28-year-old chiropractor. "My dishwasher went on the blink one night, and my boyfriend offered to help clean up. We both rolled up our sleeves and got sudsy in the warm water. We talked about the places we'd love to travel to, the crazy things we'd like to try just once in our lives, and our hands kept touching — we just got completely lost in each other as we did this mindless activity. It was so sweet and oddly intimate that I haven't bothered to get the dishwasher fixed." 
6. Touch Tenderly in Front of the TV. When you're both chilling out in front of the tube, heat things up with some hands-on action. "Give each other mini foot massages while watching the evening news," suggests Laura Corn, author of 101 Nights of Grrreat Romance (Park Avenue Publishers, 1995). "Or lay your head in his lap and let him stroke your hair." For the ultimate drive-in date experience, invest in an extralong extension cord and watch TV outside on the deck or on lawn chairs on the front stoop underneath the stars. 
7. Flash Him. When no one's looking, give your guy a sneak peek in public. Granted, it's not exactly violins-in-the-background romantic, but it's certainly guaranteed to send his heart (and pulse) soaring. 
8. Send Him a Sweet Afternoon Treat. If you know your guy's facing a particularly grueling, sucky afternoon at the office, call up a local restaurant that delivers and send him an I'm-thinking-about-you lunch, suggests Ilene Rosenzweig, coauthor of Swell: A Girl's Guide to the Good Life (Warner Books, 1999). Let him know dessert's waiting at your place later. 
9. Play the Dating Game. Get out of the same old Saturday-night film-and-food groove. For your next date, come up with three out-of-the-ordinary evening ideas — perhaps a starlit ferry ride, a game of mini golf, dinner at a restaurant with a kind of food you've never tried, or even seen, before — and write them down on index cards, suggests David D. Coleman, coauthor of Date Smart! How to Stop Revolving and Start Evolving in Relationships (Prima Publishing, 1999). "Then, have your guy blindly choose one of the cards and embark on a mysterious, exotic adventure." 
10. Keep Him in the Dark. For the ultimate lights-out love nudge, fake a power outage. "Unplug the phone, computer, and TV, then turn off all the lights," instructs Godek. "With nothing else to distract you, you have no choice but to break out the candles and cling to each other as you tell scary ghost stories...or just plain cling to each other." 
11. Ban the Peck. Replace that chaste, no-effort lip graze with a 10-second smooch — and make every single kiss a bit of bliss. 
12. Map Out the Hot Spots in Your Neighbourhood. Make it your mission to fool around in every prime passion nook of your neighborhood — behind trees, on nearby park benches, under a lamppost. Every time you walk out your front door with your dream guy, hit one of these desire-designated areas until you have the whole area PDA'd. 

More at>> http://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/tips-moves/285737-4

SMACKS OF HAPPINESS: Couples who kiss frequently are 8 times less likely to have stress or depression

Stressed out? Kiss more...

6 Surprising Stress Fixes. Simple, Field-Tested Strategies You Can Use Right Now

You know what stress looks like: The sun rises; so do you. Your child suddenly remembers that he needs cupcakes for the school party. The dog's gotten sick in the living room. Your spouse leaves for work in a
huff after a pre-breakfast tiff over finances. You leave for work without a report that's due today. You double back, grab it from the kitchen counter, trip over an Everest of laundry -- must we go on?

You know what stress feels like: Your pulse quickens, your lungs squeeze shut, your ears ring, and you wonder if this is the time your head actually explodes. Sensing anxiety overload, your brain orders up a chemical surge that makes your blood vessels narrow, heart race, blood pressure rise, and muscles tighten. Your body is mobilizing to deal with threat.

Good plan, nature! But you weren't meant to stay on red alert forever. Prolonged stress leads to health problems. High levels of the stress hormone cortisol are associated with heart disease and cancer; stress
has also been linked to gastrointestinal problems, eczema, asthma, and depression.

And you probably already know what's involved in long-term, big-commitment stress reduction: physical changes (exercising, eating right, getting plenty of sleep); organizational changes (planning ahead, divvying up chores equitably); attitude changes (letting go of what you can't control, for starters); and relationship changes (finding ways to talk through, directly and respectfully, the problems that are the sources of anxiety). All of these transformations are definitely worth the effort.

But here's what you may not know: Recent studies have suggested six new stress reducers -- research-tested, rather surprising, and relatively simple. You can ease these strategies into your life right now.


*Strategy 1:* Smooch spontaneously
"When I come home from a hard day at work and kiss my husband, the bad
stuff doesn't seem to matter anymore," says Cheryl Kennedy Henderson,
47, an accountant in Knoxville, TN. Science says she's on to something.
A recent study of 2,000 couples showed that those who kiss only during
lovemaking are eight times more likely to report suffering from stress
and depression than those who frequently kiss on the spur of the moment.
Study leader Laura Berman, Ph.D., an assistant clinical professor of
psychiatry and ob-gyn at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of
Medicine, explains why: "Kissing relieves stress by creating a sense of
connectedness, which releases endorphins, the chemicals that counteract
stress and depression."


*Strategy 2:* Take the cuddle cure
More good news from the annals of affection: Researchers at the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill recently found that holding
hands and hugging can measurably reduce stress. Fifty couples were asked
to hold hands for 10 minutes, then hug for 20 seconds. A second group of
85 people rested quietly, not touching their significant others.
Researchers then asked people in both groups to talk about a past event
that left them angry or anxious. Those who hadn't cuddled before
revisiting the past exhibited signs of elevated heart rate and blood
pressure. But couples who had hugged and held hands weren't nearly as
ruffled. "The gentle pressure of a hug can stimulate nerve endings under
the skin that send calming messages to the brain and slow the release of
cortisol," explains Tiffany Field, Ph.D., director of the University of
Miami Medical School's Touch Research Institute. And if your honey isn't
on hand? Field says other studies have found that a hug from a friend or
a professional massage can also help banish tension.


*Strategy 3:* Lash out less
You may have already concluded what a series of studies has confirmed:
When married couples argue, men are more likely than women to withdraw
-- and this frustrates their wives. The studies also revealed something
not as obvious. The way a woman deals with frustration during hostile
arguments can measurably affect her stress load, and thus her physical
health. Women who responded to their husbands with verbal hostility
showed elevated stress-hormone levels during arguments and for hours
afterward. Their mates didn't show these physical signs of stress, says
Janice Kiecolt-Glaser, Ph.D., professor of psychiatry at Ohio State
University College of Medicine and a member of the research team.
Prolonged surges of stress hormones can damage the immune system, she
notes. (One serious physical consequence of a hostile fighting style was
discovered last year by researchers at the University of Utah, who found
that wives who lashed out at their husbands during disagreements had
twice as much coronary artery calcification, a sign of heart disease, as
wives who stayed calm. Hostile husbands weren't affected.) "Conflict
isn't necessarily bad," says Kiecolt-Glaser. "It's the /way/ couples
disagree that affects health." Her advice: Concentrate on the issue at
hand and forget about getting even; drop the sarcasm and name-calling.
"Generally it's best to try to keep the emotional temperature as low as
possible," she says. "The more heated the words or tone of voice, the
harder it is for husbands and wives to hear each other. If necessary,
take a deep breath and respectfully end the conversation, promising to
talk about the situation later, when you're calmer."


*Strategy 4:* Put the kettle on
Tea is the most popular beverage in the world (after water); even
coffee-worshipping Americans guzzle more than 2 billion gallons of tea a
year. Part of the appeal may be its tension-taming powers. In a recent
study, scientists at University College London noted that people who
drank black tea four times a day for six weeks had lower levels of
cortisol after a stressful task than those who drank a caffeinated fruit
beverage. Research also shows that a substance in green tea leaves,
L-Theanine, may shift brain wave activity from the beta waves that
accompany anxiety to the alpha waves associated with relaxation. Maxine
Friedman, 43, of New York City, the mother of 7-year-old twin girls,
builds tea breaks into her busiest days. She finds the ritual as calming
as the beverage. "I start relaxing even before I start to drink -- at
the sound of the kettle, the feel of the cup in my hand," she says.


*Strategy 5:* Loosen your electronic leash
Thanks to high-tech gadgets, your kids can reach you 24/7. Knowing where
they are and what they're up to? Priceless. But there's a hidden cost. A
two-year study of 1,367 working men and women in New York State,
two-thirds of them parents, found that all were overburdened by a
blurring of the divide between the workplace and home. But while both
men and women reported bringing job-related worries home with them, only
women felt stress because of home worries spilling over into the
workplace. Researchers speculate that cell phones and pagers are
responsible for this blurring of boundaries. "When your kids have a
crisis or a relative gets sick, it's usually the women, not the men, who
get the call at work," says Noelle Chesley, a professor of sociology at
the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and the study's author. She
suggests you take turns with your spouse being "on call" for minor
emergencies, and make sure the sitter and the school have his number as
well as yours. You may have to retrain the kids, too.


*Strategy 6:* Reflect on what you value
When your frazzle level is so high you feel yourself spiraling out of
control, a quick way to re-center is to remind yourself of what's most
important in your life. Researchers at the University of California, Los
Angeles, asked 85 people to complete a questionnaire ranking their
values from what matters most to what matters least. Then the group was
divided. Half the people were asked to talk about their top-ranked
values; the other half discussed what mattered least to them. Afterward,
everyone took part in a stress-inducing task (giving a five-minute
speech in front of a heckling audience, then counting backward from
2,083 by 13s). People who'd reflected on their most cherished values had
a lower stress response than those who'd discussed matters that didn't
mean much. "Affirming your values changes the way you appraise a
situation," says David Creswell, Ph.D., the study's lead author and a
research scientist at UCLA. "In this case, the stressful event became
less of a threat and more of a challenge." He suggests one way to put
the research findings to work: In a stressful situation, think about
people important to you, and how you've been a good mate, mother,
daughter, sister, or friend. "Affirmations of close relationships are
powerful sources to draw on," Creswell says.