Intentionality: A Fresh Start for Families in 2026—Happy New Year!
🕊️ Mindful Inspiration: Family-first isn’t about doing more, it’s about being present, in the now, with what matters most, each other. There are no do-overs.
Welcome back to the Refreshing the Joy of Parenting newsletter, and Happy New Year! 📰🎆
We’re so happy to be back and to welcome you back! We hope you’re well rested and that last month brought you some cheer. 😌
With the holiday season now behind us, a fresh, new year lies ahead.
Resolutions are set, and their respective routines ensue.
And whatever the noise happening in the world, stifling your steps or bringing forth fear… ignore it.
Be present in today—with God, your children, family, friends, and, of course, yourself.
What’s Down Below:
🧭 Navigating Parenting: A Fresh Start Begins at Home
🌱 Planting Character to Last a Lifetime: Where Did The Time Go?
🧠 Nurturing Young Minds: No More Phones During Family Time
🍽️ Dinnertime is Familytime: Italian-American Turkey Sausage
👩🏽🍳 Cooking with the Kids: Ms. Gloria’s Oh, So Yummy Peanut Butter Cookies
💆🏽♀️ Self-Care & Wellness: Resolutions, Behaviors & Grace
📌 Resources: North-Texas Community Event Calendars
🧭 Navigating Parenting
A Fresh Start Begins at Home
The start of a new year is more than a change on the calendar. It’s a fresh start to begin at home with a meaningful call to be present, purposeful, and for possibility.
It invites families to pause, breathe, and embrace the small, powerful moments that shape young hearts: a shared laugh at the breakfast table, a quiet bedtime story, a word of encouragement spoken from the heart. These simple acts become the foundation of confidence, security, and love.
Last year, 2025, offered lessons, challenges, and opportunities for growth. Each moment, especially the difficult ones, reminded us that life is a gift, a present meant to be opened fully with gratitude and intention. It provided us a chance to slow down, value family time, nourish our bodies, nurture our children, extend love more freely, and be problem-solvers.
In 2026, let us release the pressure to be perfect and instead focus on progress, connection, and meaning. Let us choose presence over busyness, kindness over criticism, and joy over distraction.
When families grow together with intention and heart, children flourish in ways that last a lifetime.
This year, may every day be an opportunity to create memories, build strong character, and celebrate the love that makes a house a home.
The gift of presence is priceless—and it is ours to give.
A fresh start begins at home.
Ms. Gloria, The Parenting Mom
🌱 Planting Character to Last a Lifetime
Where Did The Time Go?
As parents, we don’t just watch our children grow—we watch time fly by. One year quietly turns into five, then ten, and before we realize it, decades have passed. Days once felt long, but what happened to the years? They moved faster than we ever expected. What we once cradled in our arms or held a small hand, now stands before us with their own lives, responsibilities, and choices.
Life has a way of pulling everyone in different directions. Work, expectations, routines, and distractions can slowly take priority if we allow them to. Without intention, we begin to rush through moments instead of living inside them. We assume there will be more time—more conversations, more chances, more tomorrows.
These are the conversations I now have with my adult children. I tell them to pay attention. To value their time and guard their sound mind from life’s distractions. Pay attention and do not squander their good years. Don’t rush past this season trying to get to the next one. Don’t give your energy to things that won’t matter when you look back.
Time is precious, and it is spent whether we are mindful or not. What I know for sure is this: missed moments don’t come back.
Forgotten opportunities don’t wait for us to be ready.
And life does not offer do-overs.
The love you don’t express, the words you don’t say, the time you don’t make, those are the things that linger later.
That’s why presence matters more than perfection. Being fully present—listening without distraction, showing up without rushing, loving without conditions—creates the moments that last a lifetime and more. Time is always ticking; before we know it, seasons have passed, and opportunities have become memories.
Never take life or family for granted. Be present enough to truly see one another. This moment, this conversation, this season, is all we are promised. Don’t get stuck in the busyness of “right now” or the belief that you can make it up later.
The clock keeps moving forward, and time never slows down.
Now another year has passed.
Today in 2026, let’s be here, love deeply, and pay attention. Because one day, these moments will be the memories you hold onto most.
Your family is a gift, a present, so be present.
No regrets or missed opportunities. Show up, be on time.
Ms. Gloria, The Parenting Mom
🧠 Nurturing Young Minds
New Year, New Intentions: No More Phones During Family Time
That’s right, you read the header—no more phones during family time—and that includes you, too, Mom, Dad (and Grandparents 😉).
Oh, and this applies to iPads too, for you iPad families out there…
We’re well into this technological age, and we’re all, for the most part, well-informed on the negative impact these smartphones are having on both ourselves and children.
We wonder why society has changed, what’s wrong with people, why things feel off, rushed, overwhelming… why everyone is, and everything feels… disconnected…
It’s that dang phone.
And for all of us! Not just young people.
Somewhere along these years, perhaps during COVID particularly, we all got online, and as a result, offline, in the real and tangible.
Big tech profits while we, with each and every instance we pop open our phones for a doom scroll, lose a bit of ourselves, our lives, and our loved ones in return. And it’s to no fault of our own—big tech is fully aware of our wiring, and their products are intentionally designed to keep us hooked and absorbed in consumption, to our detriment and their benefit.
And while we’re not advocating throwing away our smartphones (though I, for one, intend to get a regular-degular flip phone once my iPhone quits on me), at the very least, we can set intentions and follow through on them regarding our smartphone use.
So, 2026’s intention—no phones during family time.
Whether it’s the morning ride to daycare or school, the drive after, dinnertime, playtime, before bed, on the way to church or after, or simply any time you’re present with your family, no phones!
How do you get this to stick? Be the model yourself. And keep at it.
When your children are grown, and you’re in your senior years, you’ll thank your younger self for setting and following through with this intention. Not only is this paramount for your child’s development (cognitive function, general communication, self-expression, identity, literacy, and motor skills), but these are moments, days, months, and years you’ll never get back. Ever.
Set your intention. Follow-through. And when you fall, get back up and try again.
And again.
♥️
🍽️ Dinnertime is Familytime
Family dinner isn’t just a meal; it’s a designated time to connect as a family through conversation, good eats, and memories in the making. Kids and teens alike thrive with family time and dinnertime—bonds grow, brains develop, and everyone leaves the table feeling loved and valued. 🥰
This extends to you, too, Mom and Dad. 💞
Dinner is also the perfect opportunity to bring your kids into your cooking routine, not only to equip them with the life skills they’ll eventually need once they leave the nest, but also to give them an appreciation (recognize the fullness) of your daily efforts, keeping them loved, fed, and looked after.
So, what’s for dinner? 😋
Italian-American Turkey Sausage (Great For Any Pasta Dish!)
I enjoy pasta on “lazy days”, but not every pasta recipe is made the same (add that pasta water into your tomato sauce, always).
And while I’m not preparing my own pasta from scratch—if you have the free time, you definitely should—someday, I will (hm, maybe it’ll be this year?).
Nonetheless, if you love a good homemade pasta dish, give my Italian-American turkey sausage mash-up recipe a go!
I drew from a few recipes I found online and by chatting with my mom while cooking up the dish.
Ingredients:
1.3 Ibs 93% lean ground turkey
1 clove garlic, crushed (or several if you’re a garlic fan)
1/2 tsp sweet paprika (regular paprika is just fine if you don’t have any)
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes, more or less to taste
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/8 tsp dried thyme
1/8 tsp dried oregano leaves
1/8 tsp dried marjoram leaves (or Italian seasoning if you can’t find marjoram leaves)
1/4 tsp dried fennel (or a tad more, but not too, too much… I do enjoy fennel)
2 tsp brown sugar (the brown sugar really brings it together)
Instructions:
Place the turkey meat in a bowl and break it down with a fork.
Add spices, seasonings, and sugar.
Cover and let sit.
Place a skillet on the stove, add oil, and set to medium-high.
Once warm, add the meat to the stove and cook until brown.
Pour in tomato sauce once complete and continue cooking until ready.
Notes on pasta:
Prepare your pasta first—bring water to a boil, add the pasta, and save a cup of the pasta water before straining. Add butter to your pasta while it’s set aside.
While your pasta is boiling, prepare the tomato sauce and add the turkey sausage. Season further (if you’re using pre-made tomato sauce, add pepper, Italian seasoning, thyme, oregano, etc. to taste). Pour in ½ cup of pasta water into the tomato sauce and plate.
If you like veggies in your pasta, cook them in a skillet before cooking the turkey. Not all the way, as they’ll continue cooking with the meat, but just enough so they’re no longer firm (or, if you’re using frozen veggies, cook with the skillet uncovered until no water remains).
I hope you enjoy!
👩🏽🍳 Cooking with the Kids
Ms. Gloria’s Oh, So Yummy Peanut Butter Cookies 😋
Bakes 3½ dozen cookies.
Ingredients:
1 cup sugar
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
½ cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1 cup peanut butter
2 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
Instructions:
Heat oven to 375°F.
In a large bowl, cream sugar, brown sugar, and margarine.
Blend in peanut butter, milk, vanilla, and egg.
Stir in flour, baking soda, and salt.
Shape dough into 1-inch balls.
Place 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets; flatten balls in a crisscross pattern with a fork dipped in sugar.
Bake at 375°F. for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown.
Variation (peanut blossoms):
Shape the dough into 1-inch balls, then roll in sugar.
Bake as directed above.
Immediately top each cookie with a milk chocolate candy kiss, pressing down firmly so the cookie cracks around the edge.
💆🏽♀️ Self-Care & Wellness
A Refresh for the New Year: Resolutions, Behaviors & Grace
I’ve never been one for big overhauls at the New Year. Early on, as a teen, I put two and two together: my goals and resolutions never seem to “stick” unless I address my habits, and the routines and behaviors that shape them. The feasible.
And while I’m not yet a parent, and we need not a new year to begin, ‘tis the season for reflection and resolution, simply ensues.
This year, the behaviors I’m addressing are to slow down, set that nagging feeling aside, and learn to find solace in stillness with the goal (or resolution) of being more present.
Truthfully, TV has always been my doom scroll, and I’d like to put an end to it, especially with this being my 30th year of all years.
It’ll take time to untangle myself from this habit. It’ll require intentionality—moment-by-moment intentionality through taking an active role in addressing my behaviors in real time… and a whole lot of grace as I stumble and fall on the first few tries, but behavior change comes through intention—setting out a new routine to ultimately bring forth the new, intended habit.
What’s this routine look like?
It’ll begin to take form during the stumble and falls, those moment-by-moment self-dialogues, and quiet reflections… It’s all a part of the process. Hence, the point of grace; this is how we learn (so, do not be anxious), with time, reflection, and continuous intention, it’ll come together.
♥️
📌 Resources
North-Texas Community Event Calendars
Plano (scroll down a hair)
Flower Mound (see the left-hand panel & center page for specific events)
Justin (see the left-hand panel and click each event for details)
If we’re missing your city (North Texas-specific), let us know in the comments below, and we’ll add it to the next edition! Also, we have no affiliation with any organizations; we’re just sharing community resources.
More Goodness Coming Soon 💗
That’s it for today’s edition! Thank you for taking the time to read our newsletter; we greatly appreciate it, and, as always, we hope you found it insightful and inspiring.
🎗️ And remember, while we’re forever parents, parenting is seasonal, and above all, foundational. We want to lay a firm foundation of love, confidence, and self-respect in our little ones.
Words matter. So, uplift your children, speak life to them — and especially to yourself — and life (and love) will flow. ♾️
We only get one opportunity; this is your now!
Sending hugs & smiles,
Ms. Gloria, The Parenting Mom & her daughter, Naja! 🫶🏽
Creating lasting family traditions & turning everyday moments into joyful memories.
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P.S. Parents, teachers, community leaders, and everyone in between, this is a MOVEMENT! Together, we’re building a community to refresh the joy of parenting, and your help is appreciated.
Share this newsletter with family, friends, co-workers, neighbors, acquaintances… everyone!
Let’s make—and be—the difference! 🤗
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📍 To learn more about refreshing the joy of parenting: Character Avenue.
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