A Family Vision for the New Year

New Year’s resolutions sound great on December 31st, but they often feel kind of gross by January 10th.

“Work out five days a week, “no more screens on weekdays, “we will ALL eat vegetables and never yell again.”

Those are cool goals.

And also… we live with children, schedules, germs, and actual human emotions.

This year, instead of a list of rigid resolutions, try something softer, more realistic, and honestly more powerful: a family vision for the new year—a few shared intentions about how you want your home to feel and what you want to do more of together.

Why Resolutions Don’t Really Work for Families

Traditional resolutions tend to be:

All-or-nothing (“we will always…”/“we will never…”).
Individual (Mom’s resolution, Dad’s resolution, kid’s resolution), not shared.
Detached from real life (they don’t care that one kid got the flu, the other has a science fair, and you’re on a deadline).

So when the first stomach bug hits, or someone has a meltdown in the grocery store, it’s easy to feel like you’ve “failed” your resolution and just…drop it.

A family vision is different. It’s not about perfection. It’s about direction: who are we becoming as a family this year, and how do we want life at home to feel?

What Is a “Family Vision” Anyway?

Think of a family vision as a shared compass, not a contract. It answers questions like:

How do we want life at home to feel most of the time?
What do we want to do more of together this year?
How do we want to treat each other (and ourselves) during the chaos?

A good family vision is:

Short: One sentence, or a handful of words.
Shared: Everyone gets some say, even the littles.
Flexible: You revisit and adjust it, not toss it in the first tough week.

Example: “This year, we want our family to feel more connected, calm, and playful, even when life is busy.”

From there, you build tiny habits and rituals that move you in that direction.

Step-by-Step: How to Create a Family Vision for the New Year

You don’t need a Pinterest-perfect family meeting. You just need 20–40 minutes, snacks, and a willingness to listen to each other.

1. Reflect on last year (gently)

Ask a few simple questions:

What felt really good about last year as a family?
What felt hard or draining?
What do we want to do more of this year?
What do we want to do less of?

Let kids answer in their own way (drawings, single words, “I liked when we…” stories). You can jot their answers on paper.

2. Choose a few “anchor words”

Together, pick 3–5 words that describe how you want family life to feel this year. Think:

Calm
Cozy
Adventurous
Connected
Kind
Curious
Silly
Brave

These become your intentions, not rules. Example: “We’re aiming for connected, kind, and playful this year.”

3. Brainstorm tiny actions that match the vision

This is where it becomes practical. For each word, ask: “What’s one small thing we could do more often that would help our home feel like this?” Examples:

Connected
- One device-free dinner a week.
- A 10-minute “family walk” after dinner on Sundays.
- 1:1 “kid date” each month with a parent (coffee, playground, bookshop).
Calm
- A five-minute “quiet time” after school, books, Legos, or just lying down.
- A “Friday reset” where everyone does a 5-minute tidy with music.
- A phrase you use when things get spicy: “Pause & breathe,” or “Let’s restart.”
Playful
- Monthly “Family Game Night.”
- A running list of silly things to do when everyone’s cranky (dance party, charades, flashlight tag).
- Family inside jokes board.

You don’t need 100. 2–3 small things are enough to start.

4. Make it visible

Kids (and tired parents) remember what they can see. Options:

A simple poster on the fridge with your 3–5 words and a few rituals under each.
A photo + text collage on your phone lock screen (“Connected • Kind • Playful”).
A bulletin board by the door with your words and post-its of ideas.

This isn’t a vision board for the internet. It’s a reminder for your real life.

5. Do kind, low-pressure check-ins

Instead of “How are we doing on our resolutions?” (which invites shame), try once a month:

“What’s working from our family vision?”
“What doesn’t fit our life right now?”
“Anything we want to swap out?”

Remember: the goal is not to stick to the plan; it’s to keep adjusting the plan to your real life.

Making It Fun for Kids (Without Overdoing It)

A few ways to make this feel more like a celebration than a meeting:

Vision board night (kid version): Grab old magazines, stickers, and markers. Ask kids to create a page of things they want more of this year: reading nooks, parks, swimming, cousins, or snacks. Then pull themes from what they draw.
Family “Word of the Year”: In addition to your 3–5 anchor words, pick one word as the family’s theme. Kids love this.
- Examples: “Adventure,” “Brave,” “Kindness,” “Rest,” “Joy.”
Intention Jar: Keep a jar with slips of paper, like:
- “Movie night on the floor”
- “Bake something from scratch”
- “Visit a new playground”
- “Family walk, everyone picks one song for the playlist”
  When you have a free afternoon, let a kid pull from the jar.

You’re basically adding micro-delights to your year, not more chores.

For Busy Parents: Let’s Be Realistic

A family vision is not:

A color-coded, laminated schedule you follow perfectly.
A plan to reinvent your entire life in one month.
Another stick to beat yourself up with when things get messy.

It is:

A way to remember what matters to you when you’re tired and overstimulated.
A filter for decisions (“Do we say yes to this thing?” “Does it match our vision?”).
A gentler, more human alternative to “I failed my resolutions again.”

Even if all that changes in your house is:

One intentional dinner a week
One small new ritual
Slightly more language around how you want to treat each other

…that’s movement. That’s enough.

Bringing It Back to You

At MomBrains, we love a good research-backed framework. We also know parents don’t need more to-dos; they need smarter, kinder ones.

A family vision for the New Year lets you:

Ditch the rigid resolutions
Get your kids involved in shaping family life
Build small rituals that make home feel a little more like the place you want to be in, not just the place you collapse at the end of the day

So grab a snack, call a “family huddle,” and ask: “How do we want our home to feel this year, and what’s one tiny thing we can do to help it feel that way?” That’s a new year you can grow into, not just grit through.