New Year's Resolutions for Families

Resolve to Spend Time With Your Family

by Carolyn Moir

New Year's resolutions can start feeling like bad deja vu. Every year you resolve to call your mother more often, or stop spending so much on shoes. The disappointment of unfulfilled resolutions is familiar to us all.

Yet this is the time of year in which we are supposed to be optimistic, enthusiastic, and ready to tackle all our old problems. So this year, try something a little different.

Instead of making resolutions about your own improvement, make resolutions as a family. And I don't mean resolutions to spend more time together or do more chores. Those are too vague. This year, why not resolve to learn something new together?

Say you have always wanted to learn more about baking. This year, take your daughter with you to a class, or just experiment together in the kitchen with recipes from the Internet.

Perhaps your son has been wanting to learn to play golf, but neither parent knows how. Again, take lessons together, or just go down to a golf range, ask questions, and figure it out.

Maybe you're curious about the recent popularity of knitting. See if your family would be up for it, and go down to a local yarn shop if they are. Many privately owned yarn shops give free classes to people who buy the yarn there, and most also have tables and other spaces for people to knit or crochet in a big group.

What if you and your spouse are so busy that you hardly ever see each other? Rather than saying, "Let's spend more time together", this year resolve to buy a bonsai tree from a local garden shop and learn to care for it together, and go to bonsai shows. Or buy some woodworking tools and try building a piece of furniture together.

Start collecting model trains as a family, each member picking out trains or scenery and placing them in the space together. Or take Ballroom dance lessons together. Or... you fill in the blank. What have you always wished you knew how to do? What hobby has always looked interesting to you?

Pick one out and see if anyone else in your family wants to learn it with you.

Learning a new skill together will mean spending more time with your children or spouse, as well as actually learning to do something you've always wanted to learn. You can achieve a feeling of success this January, when you make resolutions that are family-centered, and not self-centered.