Love sometimes looks like this; like a first vacation without kids where we both end up with the flu.

In my head, I'd dreamed of beach walks and sleeping in, dinner out and eating brunch. But sometimes love looks like bringing cold wash rags to your wife when she is sick and waking up in Florida wearing a sweater.

I'd hoped for rest and relaxation, a chance to reconnect. But sometimes love looks like being there at 2am to change sweaty sheets when fevers break.

For weeks I had been looking forward to dates and uninterrupted conversation. But sometimes love looks like making plain pancakes in your Airbnb because it is all your husband can stomach.

Instead of the local food and winery tours, sometimes love looks like Ritz crackers and Gatorade.

We had been talking about live music and late night laughing, but sometimes love looks like making hot tea for stuffy noses and chest aching coughs at all hours.

Friends, it is rare when things go as planned in our little lives.

Does that happen to you? Are you able to just see plans through and it all happens how you anticipate?

Not here. Nope. Almost never.

But here is what matters--beyond the coughing and the nausea, the fever and the chills, the congestion and the aching, there was always love.

It might never work out how we imagined it, but when love is there, memories are made and that is where the magic is, mamas.

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