Successful families have a plan to do routinely
what most families do once in a while.
Fall is traditionally a time of new beginnings and plans in the life of a family with school aged kids. There is excitement or dread about starting a new grade or even a new school. “Back to school shopping” for clothes and school supplies used to be a big thing. Remember the hype? The fun? There was the promise of at least some sense of a schedule, a routine, a plan.
Routines can be good for our kids, and our homes, too. They create “knowns” each day that kids-and moms can even relax into. For most parents, when kids attended onsite school, there were defined schedules they could depend on. But for many families, this fall and COVID precautions have caused school to be at home AGAIN, and the schedule keeper is the parents. And not so many are excited for fall now.
I want to help moms think about how they can make the plans for this fall look different, meaningful, and purposeful. I am not suggesting routine for routine’s sake, but for a way to reach goals, work together, and help each of your kids choose to succeed on a daily basis.
When my 4 kids were young, ages 10, 7, 5, and 3, I came up with daily plans that were personalized for each of them. They were based on some key bedrock family goals that my husband and I had decided on – targets that we wanted our kids to aim at and hit “bulls-eyes”- before and after they left home.
We wanted to make the most of the time we had with our kids. We also wanted them to be equipped to take life on and be really great people in whatever careers, vocations, and relationships they found.
It is a great exercise to determine what your family goals are. You learn a lot about yourself, and what you value, as well as what you’d like to pass on to the young lives that are entrusted to you. If you had 5 parents list some of their family goals, you would probably see similarities, but then you would see differences-and that would be okay, because there are different goals that can lead to success. But if you don’t intentionally name them, it is probable that you will miss working at them or attaining them.
Our family goals were: (in no particular order):
Learning a good work ethic
Being physically fit
Developing an appreciation of music
Developing our faith
Become lifelong learners
Serving others
When we wrote these goals down, it gave us a road map, and some definite directions to travel as we parented.
AS we created our plan that we called the All Done Day plan, we used each of those goals or targets to help us select tasks for their daily routine that would be meaningful for them. Just like all parents, we had hopes and dreams for our kids. These plans were designed to equip them and teach them things that we knew would help them succeed-now and in the future.
What comes to your mind when you think of what one of YOUR family goals/targets would be? Please share one in the comments!
Part 3 is going to help you to understand why the All Done Day plan is not just a chore chart, and Part 4 is going to tell you what the “secret sauce” to make this work will be.
If you need to know more now, go ahead and get my book below!
