How Do You Say?

I recently read this post on A Blog About Love.  These people live in Brooklyn and I've met them.  They're very kind.

When I read the post I linked, it made me smile.  In my family growing up it was expected that we would tell each other every day that we loved each other. When Brent, my brother came home from his mission he really impressed me with his optimistic outlook and how sincerely complimentary he was of everyone he met.  It made a huge impression upon me and I tried really  hard to mirror that in a lot of ways.

My Great Grandparents M.

In fact, it is one of the many things that I love about my sweetheart, W. Especially when we were dating and newly married. It made me so happy every day to see his sparkly eyes and hear the great things he had to say about me and see how he could make anyone feel appreciated moments after meeting them.  How dearly I love him!!!

When I met W, I was taking this class at BYU where the professor told the class about expressing love and  he and his wife would squeeze one another's hands three times for the beautiful words "I love you." Then even when he and his wife were expecting children they started patting her tummy in sets of threes (and were shocked once when the set was returned--from inside).  It impressed me so much I wanted to use the same practice in my future family.

I've never had it returned to me from in-utero (but I did have some dancing when the hymns were played by R--while inside me).  But my kids all know what the set of three squeezes means (I love you!), but we've adjusted it to our family and we add one more for the subtly competitive word "more!" :)

We've also started using the one handed sign for "I love you!"  Which I like because sometimes the silent but happy "I love you!"  I thought this was great until at T's Thanksgiving party a  little girl's mother informed me that my son (age 4) had gracefully signed that he loved her daughter (in class) and then he gleefully told her what it meant.  Where is the handbook for this?!

Also, we say "I love you!" about 40 times a day, so there is no doubt that I love my dear ones.  In W's family they say, "I love you more than air."  And my mother says, "I love you profusely!"

We also have three songs we sing to each other that mean a lot to us! "Together, Wherever We Go!"  "I Love You a Bushel and a Peck" and "I'll Be Loving You, Always!"

How do you do it in  your family?