Family Dinners

One of my New Year's resolutions this year was to focus on family dinners. In theory, it's a time for us to be together, enjoy homemade food, and talk about the day's happenings. With a 3 year old and a 4 month old, dinner time doesn't last that long but I hope our dinners will be something that my kids look forward to and remember as good times when they get older.

Family dinners are IMPORTANT!

Here are some stats and interesting articles on the positive affects of family dinners:

FOX NEWS posted this article.

http://www.foxnews.com/imag/Food/8+Reasons+to+Make+Time+for+Family+Dinner

TIME Magazine posted this article.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1200760,00.html

WebMD Feature (with links to further reading and suggestions for organizing family dinners)

http://children.webmd.com/guide/family-dinners-are-important

ON THE MENU

This is what we're having next week:

Sunday: Spaghetti, green salad, french bread

Monday: Moroccan Chicken and vegetables (crock pot), rice, fruit salad

Tuesday: Thai Peanut Noodles, sliced pineapple

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: Super Easy French Dip Sandwiches (crock pot), strawberries, baked potato fries

Friday: Pizza and green salad

If you'd like the recipes to any of these meals, send me a comment. I'd be happy to post a recipe. Most of the meals I make are simple and don't require a lot of prep time. They even taste pretty good too. :)

Each week we'll have at least one "leftovers" night and Saturdays are up in the air because we're usually out and about running errands, like grocery shopping for next week's dinners, or playing. We'll usually make something like quesadillas or waffles or whatever we have on hand.

DELIGHTFUL DINING Fork, Knife, Spoon, Crayons

Here's this week's idea of what we're going to do during one of our family dinners to make it fun:

Cover the table with plain paper or use large construction paper for place mats. At each place setting, line up some crayons. There are no rules for this activity. Just eat and draw. You can ask questions about what your kids (or your spouse) are drawing. Make it a positive experience.

If you'd like to find out more about HOW your child's day went, ask him or her to draw their best part of the day and their worst part of the day. (Hopefully they don't draw a picture of them drawing on the table cloth as their "worst" part of the day.) Ask them about how each situation made them feel?

This activity was awesome for my 3 year old. It seemed like she forgot she was eating broccoli because she was focused on drawing her rainbows and trees. I will do this again...maybe with squash.

TABLE TOPICS

To get the conversation rolling, choose a question or two to talk about.

What is your favorite game to play?

If you could have three wishes, what would they be?

What is your favorite time of the day? Why?