Type A Parenting: Family Dinners are Sacred

We make an effort to eat dinner together every night. My husband is busy in the morning and leaves for work early, so we can't eat breakfast together. Dinner is our chance to reconnect all together. It's a tradition for us. I know that once the kids get older and have more activities that this will change but for now? We eat together with the TV off.

When I was growing up, and I'm embarrassed to even say it, my parents would eat dinner while watching the news on tv and us kids would eat by ourselves in the kitchen. I've never talked to my parents about this but I'm sure it's affected our relationship to this day. That is I think we might be closer if we'd eaten together.

So, with my son and I, I make sure that most of our dinners are spent together at the kitchen table although I must admit my laptop is also there and I do have it open sometimes. I must make a conscious effort that meals are for meals, not checking Twitter!

And, Mir, I'm constantly telling him to get his elbows off the table.

Jen at Semantically driven ( http://www.semanticallydriven.com/ ) and Safari suit ( http://www.safarisuit.com/ )

Thanks for this fantastic post about the importance of family dinner. Traditions like this really set the foundation for years to come, don't they?  Growing up, our family sat down to dinner almost every night.  Although I didn't value it then, I certainly value it now.  My sisters and my parents still love eating together and often have so many laughs over meals.  Unfortunately, we all live scattered around the world.  I've been trying to keep family dinners with our kids.  But I must say that it's hard now that our eldest is in school.  It's tempting to over schedule them with activities that often run into dinner time for younger siblings.

Although the family I grew up in had family dinners, we didn't often talk about thing that matter in each of our lives.  Instead we talked a lot about the food we were eating and gossiped a lot.  My hope is that with our kids dinner time can become a time were we take turns to share about our lives and practice that kind of healthy communication.  Since our kids are so young, we're still learning about taking turns to talk and sitting still at dinner.  Once in a while, we'll have a gem of a conversation.

We've also found that traveling together is a tradition that fosters great communication and team work.  It also gives us wonderful shared experiences that we draw upon when we are at the dinner table.  That's why we have been so passionate about building Trekaroo into a resource to help families travel together.

LiLing Pang

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When my kids were young and I was still living with their father, we had dinner.  When I became a separated parent and later a widow, we had dinner at the table.  Now in my second marriage with kids in distance cities, I sit down to dinner with my husband most nights.  As a busy professional, cooking dinner and sitting down to it are a way to separate work time from home time (even though I'll be back to work and avocation later in the night).

What I've found is that if you decide that eating dinner at the table is something that has value for you, you'll make time to do it.

In addition to crock pot meals, I used to cook several meals on Saturdays or Sundays that could just be reheated with a freshly prepared salad and I even wash my salad greens every other day.  Kudos to you for making this part of your family time.

http://blog.candelarisilva.com ( http://blog.candelarisilva.com/ )

Good and plenty!

The best tip I can give to those who are time-strapped (and really, aren't we all??) is this: Learn to love your crock pot.

This is where meal-planning really helps. Even when I worked out of the house, I found life completely unmanageable unless I usually knew what we were having for dinner that night. So either dinner went in the crock in the morning before we left (see A Year of Slow Cooking ( http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/ ) for inspiration and to learn just how versatile crock cooking can be), or I cooked stuff on the weekends that could easily be reheated during the week.

Sometimes even just planning to chop stuff up in the morning so that it can be taken from the fridge and dumped in the wok that evening can be a tremendous help. A little planning goes a long way! You can do it! :)

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Mir Kamin
(BlogHer contributing editor)

Personal: Woulda Coulda Shoulda ( http://wouldashoulda.com/ )

Having it all with less: Want Not ( http://wantnot.net/ )

I've got to say that this aspect of family life is a challenge for me, as you can tell from my post! I LOVE the idea of sitting around at the end of the day, and enjoying each other's company...But working all day, and getting my butt home and getting it done is taking it's toll! Need to seriously brush up on some 30 minute meals! :)  Last night I just couldn't come up with anything...So we had pancakes! :)

Stories around the table.  Talking about your day.  Leaning how a conversation should flow at the table.  It's things like these that are a highlight of my day.  They are what separates the mongoloids and savages from the less than classy later on in life.   There's so much to be said about table etiquette.  A very valuable and pertinent lesson. 

This is all about tradition/ritual, and only a teeny tiny bit about nutrition. Though I'd be lying if I said I wasn't hoping that that tiny bit will stick with them, too! :)

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Mir Kamin
(BlogHer contributing editor)

Personal: Woulda Coulda Shoulda ( http://wouldashoulda.com/ )

Having it all with less: Want Not ( http://wantnot.net/ )

I hope they do look back fondly. Or look back from therapy. Either way. ;)

It's true, the path I took to here has a lot to do with why this is an important issue for me. We could just as easily work on 90% of the issues we handle at the dinner table in another setting, it just works for us to incorporate it into the dinner ritual.

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Mir Kamin
(BlogHer contributing editor)

Personal: Woulda Coulda Shoulda ( http://wouldashoulda.com/ )

Having it all with less: Want Not ( http://wantnot.net/ )

Your family traditions are your own, and I'm glad to hear you don't associate it with how nutritious or healthy your kids are. 

Politics & News Contributing Editor
Queen of Spain ( http://queenofspainblog.com/ )

My mom worked outside the home and we commuted some distance, so looking back what amazes me is how often she managed this kind of thing on a smaller scale (because my father often worked odd hours or played softball so he wasn't there or we were all out together.) My grandparents were my after-school caregivers and we ended up there a lot, where meals were always family affairs.

My ex's mother was home all day and they did family table meals each night and he (sorry dude) had the most deplorable table manners of anyone I've ever met who came out of such a circumstance. It really does depend on the person and the details of each family situation.

I think it's nice that you do this with your family, especially having followed your story for a long time and knowing what it took to get there. As people and as families we focus on what matters to us and in this case the care you're taking is evident. I know they'll look back and appreciate (and do now, but it's our job when young to complain at least a little. ;))

Laurie

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