Family Dinner

Family dinners can be really hard. When kids are little sometimes one needs a diaper change and no food, another needs a potty break and food, another dawdles instead of eating. Then there the parents who need to eat, want to talk about their day, struggle to make sure that two are getting food and one isn't crying, etc...

Parts of that get a little easier as kids age. Then sports come in, then school, then extra curricular activities, etc... There's the phone call, the text message, the email on the phone. Then the kids get phones. And don't forget the TV or work schedules that don't fit with the time the kids need to eat.

Really the list could go on.

Today, I read about one lady's experience at a restaurant.

It got me started thinking...

When I was growing up, my mom insisted almost every night that the TV was off during supper. That's just what we did. That is something that we've done in our house as well. Because of the layout of our house, it would really be difficult to eat while watching the TV as we'd have to eat in the living room and not the dining room. I can't imagine how hard that would be. I'm glad though that I didn't grow up eating in front of the TV because I'm sure that if I thought that it was normal, it would be a harder habit to break.

I really like our family dinners. I get to find out what is going on in David's day and he gets to find out what is going on with us. We tell each other about meetings or playdates that are happening later in the day or about those things if we've already had them. The kids tell us stories about their day or about the cat that's walking through the neighbor's yard. Even the days that David misses a meal, we still follow the same pattern. It really is nice.

Sometimes I do feel like I tell the kids to wait to talk too much. It is hard for me to tell them to wait, but sometimes they interrupt a ton of times in a row while David and I are trying to talk.

All in all, our meal times are really nice and family like. It really helps me feel like our days are grounded when we get to catch up at these points in the day.

What are your meal times like?