- my iParenting
- quick clicks
- moms today articles
- moms today q&a
- message boards
- research baby names
- prepare a birth plan
- content channels
- ip channel rss feeds
- read birth stories
- read parenting stories
- recommended books
- e-newsletters
- safety recalls
- ip diaries
- ip store
- mom of the month
- dad of the month
- editor's letter
- letters to the editor
 |
- e-newsletters
- Sign up to receive our free weekly e-newsletters
- award-winning products
The iParenting Media Awards program helps parents find the best products for their families.
High Hopes
It's Never Too Late for Those New Year's Resolutions
Many weeks may have ticked on by in this New Year, but that doesn't mean it's too late to make resolutions or work on the ones you've already made. And resolutions and New Years mean different things to every family. See what it means to some members of the iParenting community!
By George Ayres, father of four girls from Austin, Texas
Every year when I was young, somewhere in those afterglow days between Christmas and New Year's Eve, my dad would ask my sister and me if we had thought of any resolutions for the year to come. "Not yet" was our usual response, but we knew he'd ask us again before too long. We always came up with about five resolutions each. It wasn't some parental order he was imposing on us, but I could tell the act of making New Year's resolutions was something meaningful to him.
I've always understood New Year's resolutions as something like a goal I assign myself to make life better in the year to come. It's a way I look inside myself and see what I would like to be – a way of planting or re-creating myself to grow in the New Year. Resolutions have always been about pushing myself and searching for improvement. By making resolutions, we reassess ourselves, see what's important to us and who we are and what we hope to become. It's what we should also hope for our children.
As I've grown older, making resolutions have become more important to me. It's the one time in our calendar year where we're given a chance to stop and take a close look at ourselves and evaluate how we're doing. As we move into new decades of our lives, it's our chance to make a new plan if things aren't on track like we want them to be. And with our children, it's our chance to teach them about setting some goals for themselves – become better readers, exercise more, learn the multiplication tables, enter the science fair.
