Family Shirts with a Mission

The new year is well under way, but I am still struggling to remember to write 2024 on things. Usually somewhere around September I start to get it right. 😜

A new year often means new year’s resolutions. Do you personally make any? Are you still sticking with them or did they end with January?? One thing we always try to do as a family is to use the new year as an opportunity to evaluate our family’s goals and mission. We take a few days and go somewhere nearby where the kids can swim indoors (so they can burn some energy!) and we can reflect on the year. Sometimes it’s a hotel with an indoor pool, but the last couple of years it’s been Great Wolf Lodge. We really love going there, and the kids are at the perfect age for it. It has enough big rides to keep the older kids entertained and enough kiddie areas to keep Joel busy, as well as things in between. And this year the timing worked out great because we went right as a cold front came through, so instead of being stuck inside going stir-crazy at home, we were swimming and playing!

We read the book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families by Stephen R. Covey several years ago, and he spoke of the importance and impact of a family mission statement. We try to use this time each year to particularly highlight our own family mission statement, as well as look back on the last year and see what worked well and what could be done better. It’s so easy to get so busy with the day-to-day that we lose track of our goals and neglect our kids’ input. Intentionally taking this time each year has been helpful for getting feedback from the kids and keeping us all on the same page. 

One of my favorite things that we also do during this time (which was another recommendation from Stephen Covey’s book) is distribute family shirts. I am a big fan of t-shirts personally because they are such a tangible way of creating a sense of belonging. I have about ten billion A&M shirts, and which is more important – that I identify with a massive university or my own family? Each year I put something on the shirts that we want our family to believe/strive for/identify with. This year’s shirt (as well as a previous one) has the phrase “Soli Deo gloria,” on the front, Latin for “Glory to God alone,” and our last name on the back. We want our family to be one that loves God and loves each other, so these are an encouragement for both. The kids wear the shirts all time, and I hope that each time they do they are reminded of the purpose and unity of our family.

If you haven’t read the book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families, I highly recommend it. I need to reread it as it has been quite some time since I read it, and it is full of so many good ideas. I think it has been helpful for our family and hope it will be for yours as well! 

Happy 2024!! I hope this will be a year of growth and progress for each of you! I’d love to hear if you have any goals for you or your family this year!

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