Happy New Year!

I want to wish a Happy New Year to families everywhere. Let's make this a year to remember. I wish all of you more quality family time, less stress, and a healthy, happy 2007!

As a parent, educator, and writer, I designed my blog to provide fun family activities and tips with active families in mind. Here are a few New Year's resolutions that I intend to follow with my own family. Maybe you will find one or two that you might want to keep with your family.

1. Try to keep my family unplugged at least one night a week. That means after dinner and homework, we will entertain ourselves the old-fashioned way. We will pull out board games, cards, books, and magazines. We will unplug the tvs, computers, and video games for one night and enjoy each other's company. This rule will apply to the adults and the kids.

2. I will stay on top of my house and all of the many weekly chores that I tend to neglect when life gets busy. I have written a chore chart with one simple nightly chore for each member of the family such as taking out trash, dusting tables, etc. This way no one feels overwhelmed by having to tackle the entire house at once. There is nothing worse than coming home to a messy house on Friday afternoons after a stressful week of work/school.

3. I will resist the temptation to pick up fast food for my family. Normally I cook dinner at home, but sometimes I am tired and fast food seems like such an easy option. It's ok for a treat once in a while, but sometimes it gets out of hand. I will do a better job of including my kids in meal planning so that everyone will get one or two of their favorite meals each week.

4. Exercise is already a big part of our family life. Each member of my family, including the adults, has a favorite sport or activity. I will plan a weekly activity that we can all participate in together. We might walk the dog together, ride our bikes, or play golf. It doesn't matter what the activity is as long as we are doing it together.

5. Finally, my number one resolution for 2007 is that I will stop nagging everyone. I constantly find myself reminding children to clean their rooms, finish their homework, comb their hair, or any number of other activities. This will be a tough one, but I hope everyone will take more responsibility for themselves when I stop nagging them.

Hopefully you have found one or more ideas that you could use with your family this year. I will give you a mid-year progress report of how many resolutions I was able to keep. I hope you and your family have a Happy New Year!