Dinner Time, Why I Make It A Habit to Eat Around the Table

Sitting around the dinner table tonight, my family becomes engaged in conversation about my 8-year-old’s return to school from Spring Break. Excitedly telling us about her day, she delves into a story about how the Lochness Monster is real because her teacher Googled it and found information about it.

 
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I explain laughingly that just because Google provides information about it, does not mean it is real.

She then proceeds to explain that she knows that the monster was at least real in the dinosaur times because she saw a picture of the dinosaur with the monster. My husband, hinting at the fact that there were not cameras during the time the dinosaurs roamed the Earth, attempts to explain that it was not possible for there to be a picture taken of the monster during that time.

To this, my daughter chimes in, “It was real! The picture wasn’t in color. It was all in tan since they didn’t have color back then!”.

My husband and I both erupted in laughter.

Stories like this are common around our dinner table of an evening. While it is chaotic at times, as long as my hardworking, third-shifter husband is home for dinner, I make it a point to bring my entire family to the table for dinner each night. Why mess with it? A couple of reasons actually.

Not only that, but my children also tune me out much of the time as they partake in their own activities. Video games, tablets, TV shows…9 times out of 10 they are in a zone and mom’s input is not interpreted when they have entered that zone, so I am ignored. They are only kids, right?

It Gives my children a voice

In today’s busy, busy world, I often find myself telling my children “Shhhh, just a second.” Often times, this happens more than I would like to admit. Phone conversations, adult conversations, TV shows, Facebook posts. Undoubtedly, I have put my child’s need for conversation off for all of these, though I am not always proud of it.

Around the dinner table, however, everything slows down and my children’s voices really come out. I make a point to ask about their day, and even my 3-year-old has now taken to coming up with something to share about his day.

It becomes this magic time when my daughter, who previously told us that her day was “good”, suddenly has all kinds of details about why her day was good, and what she did. And apparently, it is at this time she remembers that only black and white pictures existed when the dinosaurs were alive.

Time to wind down from electronics

It’s 2017. My three-year-old has a Kindle tablet and he, along with everyone else in my family for goodness sake, needs a 20-minute break from the glow of a screen at least once a day.

Not only that, but it is more than good for my kiddos to be able to see that their father and I can survive without our phones for the duration of dinner and beyond, as it seems sometimes that they have installed magnets in cellphones that target our eyes.

This break is very easily executed in my house during dinner, and it is to a point where it has become habit now for all of the electronics to be down during dinner. I am sure it will become a fight again when my oldest gets her first phone, but perhaps I am getting the tone set early enough that maybe I will be wrong.

Opportunity to learn more about my family

`Yes, I know, I live with them. What more is there to learn?

You would be shocked at what all you can learn about your kids, and even your significant other, when you slow down and take a minute to ask, and listen, about their day.

Who are their friends? What are their fears? What are there favorite things? Most of these things change on a weekly, if not daily basis for our children, and if we do not ask about them, most the time they will not feel that they are important enough to share.

Also, this is an opportunity for me to hear what my spouse has been up to. Currently, my husband is working 12 hour days at least 5 days a week. Between work, commute, and then that dreaded screen time, we would not talk as much as we probably could if it wasn’t for us sitting down to eat together.

Teaching my kiddos dinner etiquette

Everyone wants to be able to take their children into a restaurant and have them behave appropriately at the table through the meal, right? I know I do.

I found that when my husband and I began joining our children at the table, we began teaching them. Teaching them what was and was not appropriate at the dinner table. Things that we had never noticed them doing before became teachable moments.

From chewing with their mouths shut, to remaining seated when they are at the dinner table, my children began to correct the behaviors that made it terrible to take them into public to eat. Instead, we began receiving complements on our children’s behavior while we were at dinner, which was a welcome change, let me tell you!

Well, there you have it. While we do not receive a crazy, laugh until you cry, story every night my husband and I do notice that joining with the entire family around the table each night has brought about some positive changes.

Do you and your family sit at the table each night? What kind of stories come about at your dinner table?