This weekend has restored my faith in my husband.
He stood up for me against his mother, father and sister when it would have been easy for him to bottle it and let things lie, given that we see them once a year at best. He told them in no uncertain terms that if he hears that they have said anything negative about me again, they would not be welcome under his roof. He also told them that he thinks I have been a fantastic hostess this week and have kept my thoughts to myself, despite them being lazy fuckers who have left the kitchen in a mess for me to clean up after a day at work, them having drunk my christmas and birthday present alcohol (3 bottles of 50 quid wine one day whilst I was at work - the only red I like), putting up with them asking me to book restaurants for specific times, changing their minds 3 times, being late to go everywhere so we've missed our taxis and I've had to drive, missing football matches I want to watch so she can watch Eastenders which she was recording at home anyway and then they still complain about me because... get this... the bedding hadn't been ironed when they arrived and I hadn't left them spare sets of towels or offered to wash the ones they'd been using. I was the one working all week - husband had 3 days off in the week with them plus weekends, but apparently its my job to make sure they have clean towels, not his.
This is nothing less than I'd expect of him, but reading the relationship boards I've started to appreciate the good things he does. From reading on here, it appears that standing up to his parents to support your wife is a rarity, or at least not just a given.
He's also taking me for a nice meal tonight to say thanks for putting up with them and not throttling them. And replacing my 
I love him a lot today.
He also knows me very well and looks after me when I need it, but also knows when not to try to look after me and let me deal with things on my own. A few weeks ago I ended up in hospital with gallstones. I was in agony for hours, but he knew to keep away and let me try to sleep, just making sure I had some water every so often. When we were both awake at 4am and I was still in agony and I said that if I was still in pain at 9am, then we'd go to the hospital as maybe it was something serious, he put the light on, got dressed, and dragged me there immediately because when I admit that maybe I might possibly need help at some stage, it means I really need help. I'm not good at wanting help when I feel ill so when I admitted that I might need it, he acted straight away. Same day, my kindle battery died. He gave me his to read. that meant that he was sitting there for 6 hours between my tests with nothing to do/read and me ignoring him as I was reading Harry Potter light nonsense as I was dosed up on tramadol , but I was comfortable so that was what mattered.
He's rubbish at keeping secrets and has tried to do nice surprise things for me, but bless him he gets far too excited and blabs. For our 5th wedding anniversary he said he'd book the restaurant and then just take me. He lasted 30 mins before he blabbed and told me he was taking me to a place I'd wanted to go since it opened. When he booked us a weekend away (I normally do the bookings) he lasted a little longer - the following day he admitted he'd booked us a villa with a private pool instead of a normal hotel room. He gets very excited when he does nice things for me, because he likes doing them so much. When he managed to get my mulberry kindle cover shipped from the UK at the very last minute and delivered on time for Christmas, it was hell for him to keep his mouth shut and made me open that first before the kindle it was to cover just so he could tell me about it.
Best of all, he still says he fancies me even though I'm 4 stone more than when we met.
Don't get me wrong, he can still be a cunt pain in the backside occasionally, but on the balance of it, he's a rather good egg. 