A Parent's Valentine: Keeping Romance Alive

• Take a few moments (or hours) to bring the heat back to yourself. Concentrating on your own needs and body is really important.
• Feeling saggy, baggy, and flabby? Indulge yourself in the props you need—oysters and wine, lingerie, heels and lipstick, bubble baths and massage oil, chocolates, pedicures—whatever! Stop waiting for your lover to bring the props and, what's more, appreciate them even if he doesn't.
• Once you feel the glimmers of lust and love rise in you, only then should you begin to plan a romance revival in your equally tired partner.

Top 20 Romance Tips for New Parents

• Plan a sleep date. What could be more romantic than to sleep in your lover's arms? Remember when you were dating, when that's all you longed for? For those of us with a family bed, or a sleepless child, or both, the idea is bliss. (Planning a sleep date may entail hiring a babysitter to spend the night with your child, or bribing the grandparents to take on the task.)
• How about a hot bath for the two of you, complete with candles and bubbles? Wait until the baby is "down." Oh yeah, this isn't about sex (yet).
• Take the time to get romantic. No matter how tired you are, how positive you are that the very moment you sit down to a glass of candle-lit wine, the baby will start crying. Do it anyway. Shove the piles of clean, unfolded laundry off the couch, and settle down. If you end up making goo-goo eyes to each other over the prone form of a nursing child, so be it.
• Lower your expectations for romantic evenings. If you've got a new baby, it doesn't matter if you've managed to find a babysitter, you're still going to spend at least 80 percent of your time together talking about the little one's bodily functions (or, if you can elevate it beyond the diaper, his dimply smile).
• Take an undeclared break from complaining about your weight, cellulite, wrinkles, or whatever. When you're feeling old and worn out, dowdy and matronly, it's hard to understand how he can still find you gorgeous and succulent. Trust me, he can. (But it helps if you don't point out your flaws.)
• Make his favorite meal for him (not the one you think is good for him).