Category Archives: Communication

Couple Checkup by Prepare & Enrich

We have been marriage mentors for several years. One of the resources we often use to help us understand a couple, and for them to understand themselves, is an assessment by Prepare & Enrich. The assessment has been developed from … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Marriage | Leave a comment

Old Behavior Patterns and Starting Over

One of Sharon’s and my struggles after our separation was that even though we had learned a lot of new communication and conflict resolution skills and adopted more positive attitudes towards each other during our separation – both of which … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Marriage | Tagged | Leave a comment

Life Hack: Finances

One area of marriage that tends to have a lot of conflict is finances, however there are some simple things that can be done to at least prevent some of the conflict. Years into our marriage we went to a … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Marriage, Random | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Life Hack: Sharing a Calendar

We teach quite a few tools about how to resolve conflict, but most of the time it is easier to just minimize conflict. Having a shared calendar is one way to minimize conflict over schedules. We’ve learned over the years … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Marriage, Separation | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Encompass Connection Center Online

We participated in an online group presentation about anger sponsored by Encompass Connection Center. Our portion was teaching and modeling the PAIRS Emotional Jug. Lots of good teaching about the physiology of anger by Abby Glaser and other ideas about … Continue reading

Posted in Communication | Tagged | Leave a comment

Weekly Devotions

In this time of uncertainty this is just one thing we do that keeps us focused on God and connected with each other. So, we’re running an older post from 2011 to explain our weekly devotions. Enjoy. Our Weekly Devotions … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Marriage | Tagged | 1 Comment

Life Hack: Farm Financial Document

One simple thing I have done for my wife and kids is to sit down and write a document about many things stored in my head about our big picture finances and running our farm. I’m glad I have finally … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Marriage, Random | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Inspiring Couples To Use What They’re Taught

One of the hardest things for us about helping crisis couples, or even one person of the crisis couple, is inspiring them to use and practice what they are taught. Sharon and I can teach many communication and conflict resolution skills and … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Divorce, Marriage | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Using Facebook Positively In Marriage and Life

One way Sharon and I use Facebook to build our marriage is to share what we have learned from various friends and family members, especially if we do not both have the same person as a friend. For instance, there … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Random | Tagged | Leave a comment

Jay and Laura Laffoon

Jay and Laura Laffoon are marriage and relationship edu-tainers. They teach about those topics by using humor. We first saw them at an AMFM Conference years ago. If you ever get to see them in person with their Ultimate Date Night you … Continue reading

Posted in Communication, Marriage, Separation | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment