Word from Dad

New Year’s Revolutions

“Dad, what’s a revolution?” Ian had been quietly playing with some toys, so the question came out of the blue.

“A number of things. A violent overthrow of an existing government, a regular circuit around something or even spinning in place. Why do you ask?”

“I heard something on TV about the new year and how people usually make revolutions. Should I make one?”

I smiled at him. “Oh, you mean, ‘resolutions.’ A resolution is something different. It’s a promise that people make to themselves.”

“Yeah, that’s it. Why are they talking about resolutions on the news?”

I sipped my coffee. “It’s just a custom. At the start of a new year, some people make a promise to improve themselves some way or another.”

“Should I make some?”

“Well, now, that’s the question, isn’t it? If you keep them, you can be proud. If not, you’ll consider yourself a failure. What would you prefer?”

“I’d like to make one, but you’ll have to help me keep it.”

“Seems reasonable.”

“OK, I make a resolution to eat my dessert after every meal. You’ll have to help by making sure we always have some.”

“Nice try, but that’s not the way it works. Resolutions are things you’re supposed to do to make yourself a better person.”

“What should I have said?”

“Something like you’d be nice to your brother, or you’d obey Mom and me without complaining or clean your room, all on your own.”

“That doesn’t sound fun.”

“Pleasure is not the point. The whole idea is to improve.”

“I think dessert every night would improve me.”

I gave him a long, steady stare, and he returned to his toys. It’s just as well he doesn’t make any. I certainly don’t plan to make dessert every night for the next year.

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SETTING REALISTIC RESOLUTIONS

“E verything changes NOW!” bark those ambitious New Year’s resolutions. Your mind snaps to attention but then shifts into foggy overwhelm as it considers the drastic changes you’ll have to implement immediately, and then your eyes glaze over. Sound familiar? After so many years of feeling the pressure to come up with some great thing to change, I’m not a huge fan. Instead, I like to think of the goals I want to achieve in the new year. We parents have things we want to do for our family and with our family. We also want to be good role models for our kids and teach them good habits and life skills. How do we go about doing this? First, we have to start implementing these habits in our own lives. Kids naturally watch what we do and take it as an example of what they should do themselves.

Let’s start with expectations. We can’t keep ourselves on track and keep moving forward if we don’t know what our expectations for our own yearly goals are. As we have well learned by now, life changes and throws curveballs at us. This means our goals will most likely have to shift around at some point to fit where our lives are going. I used to be so strict with myself that if something didn’t go perfectly in line with how it started and how I imagined it, I was done. New goal! I’ve learned that in order to make something happen, I have to adjust and pivot to deal with whatever comes at me. I’m sure lots of people can relate with being your own worst critic and being overly hard on yourself. Well, I’ve also learned to expect something will happen to throw me off, but I also expect to roll with the changes and learn to fit my goal into wherever I am at that moment. I give myself grace and a little pat on the back for not giving up. After all, I still want to make those things happen, even if things look a little different in the end.

Parents, what goals do you have for yourselves for the year? Even if we do manage our kids, there are still things we want to do personally. Having and sharing goals also shows our kids we are more than just a mom or dad. We are our own people, too. These goals don’t have to be lofty and large undertakings. They might be as simple as finally finishing a photo album or redoing a part of the house. Even small goals require lots of tedious steps and some time to accomplish. Come up with the small, manageable steps to get those projects done and start to take action. Action is key.

Sit down as a family and talk about what everyone wants to make happen over the year. If your kids are old enough to provide input, I suggest letting them do that. We humans tend to feel more valued and want to participate more when we have input into decision making. In my personal experience, we also take more responsibility.

Kids start wanting independence at an early age. Coaching them about goals is a great way to let them start gaining that independence. From an early age, teach them how to set goals and

how to achieve them by breaking them down into manageable steps. Let them tell you what they want to do—you might even find out things about them you didn’t know! Teaching kids to do this will also teach them how to take life in small steps they can accomplish rather than attacking a momentous task in one impossible try.

The last—very important—part? Follow-through. Goals are great, but unless we follow up with action, they are just ideas. Here is my list of tips for following through. Be realistic about your goals. It’s exciting to have lofty goals, but if they are too big, you might get overwhelmed instead of chipping away at the small things. Don’t pick things you won’t do. Some things sound great to do, but if you’re honest with yourself, you know you won’t do it. Leave those for a different time.

Plan as much as possible. When you come up with activities to move toward a goal, put them in the schedule. Often, we have a great idea and then dismiss it and move on. Take two minutes to block time out and make it happen. Find activities that are fun. Goal setting and achieving seems like a boring thing. Find a way to make it fun for you and your family. Mix some fun into the activities that are helping you achieve your goal. Find friends who want to do it with you.

Add something to your life instead of getting rid

of it. I always thought of a resolution as something I’m going to take away so I could fix a part of my life or make it better. Someone once mentioned adding something. I thought that was a good spin!

If you are tired of being part of the group for which, come February, resolutions have fallen off your radar because of life’s happening, shift the way you think. I used to glaze over when someone asked me what my New Year’s resolution was. I always felt like the goals I set were not big enough or were too insignificant to qualify for a New Year’s resolution. The good news is we get to decide what the right resolutions and goals are for us. And big or small, they should be things that excite us to get out of bed or add satisfaction to the end of our day.

Goal setting doesn’t have to be for planning nerds. It’s for anyone who wants to be proud of what she accomplished throughout the year. It’s for those who are sick of looking back and saying, “I have no idea what happened to this year or what I did, but I was busy.” Don’t be another New Year’s resolution statistic. Come up with some goals with your family that work for all of you and have some fun with it.

Lauren Dreher lives in Stilwell with her husband and two toddlers.

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This summer I found carpooling to be a godsend. Our daughter was involved in so many different camps and activities that transportation was tricky. Carpooling with a fellow mother made life so much easier on me, and it saved us both a ton of gas money!

Store Pickups I tend to have so many random items I need to grab from the store throughout the week. I like to order items online and select drive-up as the pickup option. Then when I have time, I do all of my order pickups at once. This turns a day of running multiple errands into one 15- to 20-minute errand. Family Movie Night Don’t feel like cooking tonight? That’s okay! Just declare it Family Movie Night. To kids there’s nothing better than pizza for dinner, a movie and some popcorn. To parents, Family Movie Night means no cooking, no dishes to clean up and some nice quiet time to relax.

Set Out Clothes the Night Before Before bed, help your kids pick out what they’re going to wear tomorrow. In the morning, all they have to do is put on their clothes and they’re good to go. Your morning will go much more smoothly without the battle of what to wear to school.

Save Our Sanity

Life can be hectic, and sometimes it’s okay to take a shortcut for sanity’s sake. We parents tend to put pressure on ourselves to make everything perfect and Pinterest-worthy. Don’t let the stress of parenting make you question your sanity. Try out these quick and easy tips to simplify the parenting life and make it more enjoyable.

Freezer Meals With after school activities, sports, jobs and more, our schedule makes it difficult to have time for a home-cooked meal. To prepare for this, I cook double batches of our favorite meals and freeze a batch in the months leading up to our busy time. This takes no additional cooking time and gradually builds up to a nice freezer stash. These freezer meals make for quick and easy weeknight meals. You can also freeze individual servings of breakfast burritos and sandwiches that can be heated up in the microwave and eaten on the go. Clean During Other Tasks Do you find yourself with a little bit of downtime waiting for certain tasks to conclude? I suggest pairing your chores if you can. For example, while your kids are playing in the bath, kill two birds with one stone and clean the bathroom at the same time. While your dinner is in the oven, empty the dishwasher.

Store-Bought Instead of Homemade One of my favorite hacks is buying items from the store instead of making them myself. They can be just as tasty as homemade without all the effort to create them. For my daughter’s birthday party this year I bought an already prepared charcuterie tray and placed it on my board. Everyone complimented it and couldn’t believe it when I admitted it was from Sam’s Club. I also provide cookies for the football team my husband coaches. The kids have no idea the cookies are baked from premade cookie dough. Use Baskets Our children tend to leave their belongings all over the common areas of the house, and asking them multiple times to clean up their stuff can be exhausting. A great hack is to have a basket on the stairs for each child. When you see their stuff out, just throw it in their bin. When they head up to their room, it’s their job to empty their basket and put things away where they belong.

Virtual Gift Cards Finding time to shop and wrap gifts can be difficult. Sending virtual gift cards has become my go-to for gift giving. It’s so easy to email a Starbucks Gift Card to my friends and coworkers on their birthdays, and it saves me so much time. Most stores and even local boutiques offer this service now. Another option is sending cash through Venmo. My teenage nephew always wants money, so in his birthday cards, I write, “Check your Venmo.” He loves it, and I love not having to search for and wrap the perfect gift!

Grocery Delivery One of my least favorite errands is grocery shopping, especially with kids in tow. My oldest is constantly throwing items we don’t need into the cart, and my youngest refuses to sit in the shopping cart for longer than five minutes, which leads to our chasing her through the store. Grocery delivery has freed up so much time for our family and saved my sanity on multiple occasions. Most local grocery stores offer this service for a small fee. Another perk to ordering your groceries online is you are able to stick to your budget much more easily because you aren’t tempted by extra items you might see while walking the store aisles. Take Time for Yourself One of the best ways to save your sanity as a parent is to schedule time for yourself. Think about what helps you find peace and calm in your life. It could be as simple as taking a walk every day, spending 15 minutes reading or unwinding with a bubble bath before bed. Those moments make all the difference in your mental health and parenting.

Regan Lyons is a girl mom and freelance writer. She lives with her husband, Cale, and daughters Atley, 8, and Ensley, 2, in St. Joseph, MO.