2018 Family Resolutions

I’ve tried to keep personal resolutions before and decided to change my mindset on this and make it a family project this year.  At my house, it takes the whole family, working together, to keep things going.  We made 2 resolutions for the family this year.  

Goal 1 is “Let go and Let God.”

I’ve found myself being drawn to verses and prayer about giving it to God, and letting the little stuff go.  There is always this calm that you get after you’ve given over your stresses, and we decided our kids needed to understand the awesomeness of this.  Our kids need to understand the greatness of God through the power of prayer.   In the scheme of things our stress points this year have been nothing more than normal life: juggling raising kids that are good God loving people, making sure they have food eat, clean clothes to wear, and getting them to whatever activity. 

We also thought this would be a great way to help teach the kids about health stress relief.  Kids have more and more pressure on them coming from all different directions and don’t always know how to deal with it all.  We can begin by acknowledging, out loud, what the stresses are and begin to deal with these through talking and prayers.  

2 Corinthians 12:7-10 from the Message really hit home for me.  No matter what gets us down, we are strong because He is with us always.  

^7-10 Because of the extravagance of those revelations, and so I wouldn’t get a big head, I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations. Satan’s angel did his best to get me down; what he in fact did was push me to my knees. No danger then of walking around high and mighty! At first I didn’t think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and then he told me,

Once I heard that, I was glad to let it happen. I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ’s strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become.

Goal 2 will be staying organized. 

I love coming home to a clean house, that I walk into, and then actually use without having to clean something first.  I always find myself reading organization tips on Pinterest, and yet my house is an obvious organizational Pinterest fail.  During all of my organizational pinning, the one rule that stuck with me was the 1-touch rule.  Meaning, put it away right then so you only have to touch it once.  Putting it away might mean mail goes in the mail spot to deal with when you deal with mail, but at least it’s not sitting in the middle of the dinning room table.  Totally makes sense.  This is a fabulous teaching point for the kids as well.  It would be a complete parent fail to allow the kids to get to adulthood looking for my husband and I to be there behind them putting all their junk away.  

I’m very aware that the stress level goes up when the house is in complete disarray, but maybe my resolution picks are God telling me this it the year we’ll get it together.  And FYI my prayers might sometimes consist of begging me to chill and breath before I talk to my kids about the fact that the house is in complete disarray.  2018 is the year for the Wolfpack to put our stuff where it’s supposed to go, chill, talk about our feelings, and tell God more about what’s up with us.