Marriage takes work. Everybody knows that. A loving, healthy marriage doesn’t come easy. A husband and wife both have to be intentional about showing love to one another. You have to be willing to serve one another. The best marriages include spouses who both have a desire to make the other person feel special, important, respected, and loved. So what are some ways to show love?
Depending on each person’s love language, different acts can have more meaning to certain people. Some spouses really appreciate when the other person helps with chores. Others just want to spend some quality time together. Everyone is different. It’s important to learn ways to show love to your specific spouse and work to make them feel loved through the acts they most appreciate. Although, there’s nothing wrong with doing a little of everything!
I’ve compiled a list of 50 different ways to show love to your spouse. I encourage you try some of the ones you’ve never done before.
50 Ways to Show Love
1. If your spouse takes their lunch to work, make it for them the night before or in the morning before they leave. It’s one less thing they have to worry about before heading out the door. Since I work from home, I can spend a lot longer in bed than my husband can. One morning I decided not to stay in bed and I got up and packed my husband a lunch. I could tell he really appreciated it.
2. Bring home a special treat for you spouse, especially if you know they’ve had a bad day. One time, my husband knew I wasn’t having a very good day and didn’t feel good. He brought me a milkshake when he came home from work. It was such a sweet thought – literally.
3. Make the bed. For some people this won’t mean a thing, but for others it can make a world of difference. Walking into your bedroom to see a clean, made-up bed can improve someone’s mood and show them you took the time because you care.
4. Do a chore they don’t like. My husband knows I hate washing dishes by hand. He always offers to wash anything that can’t go in the dishwasher. I love it!
5. Hold their hand in the car or when walking somewhere. Such a simple thing can mean so much. I love when my husband holds my hand in public – it’s like he’s proud to say, “She’s mine.”
6. Plan a date night. Make reservations at a nice restaurant, choose a movie to go see or get tickets to an event.
7. Put your phone down. During dinner or especially anytime your spouse is telling you something, put your phone down and really listen. Phones can be such a distraction these days, and I love it when I know my husband is really listening and paying attention to what I have to say.
8. When grocery shopping, buy your spouse something special. This can be the littlest item. My husband loves it when I buy snacks or drinks he really likes that weren’t on the list. It’s my way of saying, “I was thinking about you even while shopping today.”
9. Send them a card in the mail. I know you live with them and you could just hand it to them, but isn’t it exciting when you receive something in the mail that isn’t junk or a bill? Buy or make a card, write a special message and send it off in the mail. This can be even more special for the person who gets the mail everyday.
10. Put the toothpaste on their toothbrush. This might sound weird, but one day I put the toothpaste on my hubby’s toothbrush right before he came into the bathroom to get ready for bed. The next time I did it, he said, “I love when you do that!”
11. When going from the kitchen to the living room, ask your spouse if they need a snack or drink and bring it to them.
12. When your spouse is in the shower, make sure they have a clean towel within arm’s reach for when they get out. You can even put the towel in the dryer and bring it to them all warm and cozy — especially great for cold, winter mornings!
13. Tell them you love them. Easy.
14. If you spouse needs to read a book or lesson for school but doesn’t like reading, read it out loud to them. You can even throw in some questions here and there to keep their focus and help them better retain the information.
15. Pray for them. I’ve said before, it’s the best thing you can do for your spouse.
16. Go to bed when they do. Since I don’t have to wake up as early as my husband, I also don’t have to go to bed as early as him. However, I like going to bed at the same time as my husband. It gives us a chance to cuddle, play and talk before falling asleep. We also take the time to pray together every night.
17. Thank them. It’s so important to show your spouse appreciation and the easiest way to do that is just to say thank you. Tell them thank you for anything and everything they do that you appreciate.
18. Make them some coupons. They don’t have to be pretty or cute, just write down some things you’d be willing to do on separate pieces of paper. Give them the coupons to use whenever they want. My husband once gave me a coupon that said it could be used an unlimited amount of times. Guess what it was for? Making me a milkshake! 🙂
19. Apologize. When you’ve messed up, own up to it and apologize. Do not become defensive. Try to understand how you made your spouse feel.
20. Forgive. When your spouse has sincerely apologized, forgive them so you both can move on. This can be one of the hardest ways to show love, but boy, is it meaningful and necessary in a healthy marriage.
21. Put your arm around them or put your hand on their knee. Whenever we are just sitting together watching TV, we always try to be touching some way. A simple hand on the other person’s knee can show love.
22. Forehead kisses. They are the sweetest.
23. Tell them how proud you are of them. My husband has told me one of the ways he feels most loved is when I tell him how proud I am of him. I tell him how good he is at his job, how great of a leader he is and how hard working he is. I understand how much it means because I love when he tells me how good I am at my job.
24. Give a massage. I love when my husband gives me a back or shoulder rub. It is so relaxing. You can even go all out by lighting candles, playing soft music and using lotion or massage oil.
25. Wash their car. One time my husband took my car to a car wash. He washed the outside, which it really needed. But he also cleaned out the inside and even vacuumed the floors. I loved it!
26. Have supper ready when they get home. If possible based on your schedules, make your spouse supper one night. I love when my husband makes supper because I get really tired of doing it sometimes.
27. If your spouse hasn’t fixed supper yet and you can tell they don’t really want to, offer to order pizza or get take out instead. It could be such a relief to them.
28. Leave notes for them. Leave them sweet notes for them to find at home, in their car, in their lunchbox or briefcase or purse!
29. Pick up around the house. This is a huge way my husband can show me love. I love having a clean house and it means so much when he takes the time to pick up his things or helps me in cleaning.
30. If your spouse is the one who spends most of the day with the children, offer to spend time with the kids or take the kids out so your spouse can have some alone time.
31. “Do you know what red lights are good for?” I asked my husband one day while we sat at a red stop light. The answer was kisses! Lay a big wet one on your spouse during a red light.
32. Make them a playlist. It can be a playlist full of love songs that have special meaning to you two, or just songs you know your spouse loves. Give it to them to play on their way to and from work.
33. Make them breakfast. It doesn’t even have to be a big elaborate meal, even just making the coffee in the morning can show love to your spouse.
34. Take random photos of them throughout the day, without them knowing, and then send them to them saying how beautiful/handsome they are.
35. Dance together. When you’re cooking or cleaning together in the kitchen, just start dancing — with or without music!
36. Make them laugh. My husband will make a complete fool out of himself just to make me smile. And I absolutely love it.
37. Tickle fights. What a way to be playful and get each other to laugh.
38. Cook together. I love when my husband and I are both in the kitchen cooking together or helping each other. I also really enjoy it when I’m the one doing the cooking and my husband sits at the counter and talks to me.
39. Let them try your food. My husband is so great about this! He always asks if I want to try some of his meal when we are out at a restaurant. It gives me the chance to try so many foods I wouldn’t normally order. I just recently tried swordfish and it became my new favorite fish! My husband ended up sharing almost half of his fish with me.
40. Scrape the ice off their car. In the winter months, you can help your spouse by scraping the ice and/or snow off their car. You can even start it for them so it can start getting warm inside before they leave for work.
41. Greet your spouse at the door with a hug and kiss when they get home from work.
42. Spend some time doing their hobbies or interests with them.
43. My husband loves to have lemon in his ice water, so whenever we go to restaurants I always ask for a lemon in my water too just so I can give him mine. It’s the little things.
44. Play with their hair. I love it when my husband plays with my hair — it feels so good!
45. Warm them up. My husband always lets me warm up my freezing feet with his warm body.
46. If they have this available on their phone, set up reminders for them throughout the day. It doesn’t just have to be actual things they need reminded of like doctor’s appointments, but you can also use it to remind them that you love them, that they are hot, or that you can’t wait for them to get home.
47. Talk positively or brag about your spouse in public — with friends or family.
48. Remind your spouse of little reasons why you love them by making an “I love you because…” frame.
49. How about that three-letter word that starts with “S” — oh yeah, you know what I’m talking about. There are lots of ways to show love in the intimacy department!
50. Treat them to something special. Give them a gift certificate to get a pedicure just because or surprise them with a deep sea fishing trip — whatever would be special and relaxing to them.
Did you learn some new ways to show love?
Can you think of other ways to show love to your spouse? What things have you done to show love or what things has your spouse done that has most made you feel loved? Share all your favorite ways to show love in the comments!
Check out my other marriage posts here for other ways to show love and follow my Pinterest board Marriage: Loving My Hubby.
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This is such a great list! I’m saving this to use as a resource 🙂 Because Chase and I started our relationship when he was deployed, we had to be creative in “being there” for each other. My favorite was writing letters every day. I thought that might go away once he was home, but he still surprises me with love letters when I’m least expecting them. My favorite.
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Oh I loooove letters! When Travis was gone for a month for LDAC while we were dating, I wrote him a letter every day. I enjoyed it. We still have all the letters we wrote back and forth. I think it will be so neat for our children and grandchildren to read someday. 🙂
This does not work for everone. I did all these things though hot are time together. Some of them where the things that pushed her away and I didn’t even know.
Jim, I’m so sorry to hear that. It’s true, we can do all sorts of things, pray our hearts out, and show love like no one else, and it really ends up being the choice of the other person on whether they stay. I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you.