"I've had a crush on my husband since the day I met him," the Live with Regis and Kelly star, 36, tells Redbook for its August issue.
She also says that when she first encountered Consuelos, who hosts the NBC reality show Age of Love and will star in an upcoming Oxygen TV movie, Husband for Hire, it was as if she'd been struck by a thunderbolt.
"I had a dream about him that night," she recalls. "The next day I went up to him, and although I didn't even know his name, I said, 'I had had a dream about you last night.'"
In the dream, which she revealed to him, they were already wed, were the parents of a small daughter and were flying to Rome.
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For his part, Consuelos, 36, tells the magazine that when he first met Ripa, "She pretty much fulfilled all of my requirements and then some."
Despite her happiness with the way things turned out – the couple's children are Michael, 10; Lola, 6; and Joaquin, 4 – Ripa admits, "We argue, but we know how to compromise." Neither ever wins his or her fight, she says, explaining, "It's not like one of us is living the other's lifestyle – we're living our lifestyle."
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