With Hunky Actor Boyfriend far away in the frozen north (sniff), my Christmas Eve will be all about friendship and fun (yay!). But knowing what I know about the magic of Christmas Eve, I'm betting there will be plenty of romance happening around the blogosphere.


The passion blog offers 5 Ways to Romance the Holidays:

It’s that time of year again: shopping, wrapping, Christmas parties, and relatives. It’s usually a very stressful time for most of us. We don’t have enough hours in the day to finish all of the work we have to do. The house needs to be decorated, the cookies need to be baked, and somehow, someway we need to remember that we have a family that needs to be tended to.

Don’t forget to turn to your partner for a little stress relief and relaxation. The Christmas season actually lends a helping hand in finding ways to be romantic, you just need to take the initiative. Here are my top 5 ways to find romance during the holidays.

Check out her list and make sure you haven't missed anything. Got kids? They've got to fall asleep sometime...

Over at My Bottom Smarts, Bonnie asks "What are you and your partner doing this holiday season to keep your love light shining brightly?"

I hope all MBS readers are enjoying a peaceful holiday season and staying nice and warm. It's a time when many people fall victim to stress and unrealistic expectations. It would be easy to suggest that one good spanking will wipe away all of that tension. But the solution is usually not quite so simple. The reality is that rushing around and worrying tends to sap our energy and leave us feeling anything but playful.

So how do we combat the winter blues? How can we regain our vigor, our enthusiasm, and our passion?

She recaps all the answers, and there's a focus on spanking. Lots of spanking.

OK, the spanking might wake up the kids, if you've got 'em. Can you spank quietly?

Julie blogs My husband buys the best gifts...

Eric is the most thoughtful, loving husband on the planet. He ran out today, to buy my Christmas gift….snuck back in the house and wrapped it..and hid it under the tree.  Then he came to find me. He said “there is a new gift under the tree”, and of course I replied “so”. This went on for a while before he said “why don’t you open it today”, and then he got the kids involved…they were all begging, so I did what I had to do….I opened it.

Check out her short and sweet post to find out what he got her.

Ariane's Christmas Romance came pre-Christmas Eve:

Saturday night, John and I got to do something we hardly ever do: go out just the two of us. John's brother and his wife Sonia were hosting their 9th annual Christmas party...

Sonia is truly a "martha stewart type" and I don't know how she pulls off the food and desserts at all of her parties. She served her famous lasagna. I still remember tasting it for the first time at their Christmas party in 1999, when they were living in Redondo Beach and John and I had only been dating a couple of months.

Ariane's post includes a nice picture of her and her husband at the party. Ah, romance!

I think it's important to remember that romance doesn't have to mean that you are alone with your partner. Certainly you can and should be romantic in front of your kids, friends, and family (maybe skip the spanking in that case, though).

You've been busy all month, and maybe today is the busiest of all. But if you can, take a romantic moment, even if it's right in the middle of all the hustle and bustle. Remember that romantic love is one of the many blessings of Christmas.

Contributing editor Liz Rizzo also blogs at Everyday Goddess.