3/20/17

6:30 Dinner

We have never had a dinner time. But recently, after a long season of chaos surrounding when to eat, I set a dinner time, 6:30.

The issue at the center of all this is that my husband does not arrive home for the evening at the same time every day.

And so it goes...the children get hungry early, but I want to wait on daddy. So most of the time I feed the kids, and I wait (starving, hangry) until my husband gets home...unless I decide to go ahead and eat (alone) after the kids. This is depressing!

And it was happening more often than not.


On a whim, I declared a dinner time. And now, for almost 3 weeks, we have sat down to eat at 6:30.

Laurie likes to set the table, we light candles, turn on music, plate the food, say a blessing. I sit down with the kids, phone off, eating when normal people eat. There are still evenings when daddy is not home at 6:30, but having the time gives him a goal to work toward.

And now the kids are so funny, telling him, "Daddy, you missed dinner." Like it's a grand event! 



This dilemma is representative of many household "problems" that I continue to let happen. It does not even occur to me to take action and seek a solution or improvement.

It was such a win, and it's got me thinking - what else can I fix?
....

Dinner time has been especially helpful with the time change, too. It feels too early and light outside to eat, but it's time. And it's important that we get on with dinner, so we can get on with bed time because we still have 2 full months of school!

.....

Do you have a dinner time?
Do you eat as a family every night?

5 comments:

  1. Yes! We eat together at 6:00 every night. If my husband is running a few minutes late we wait, but 99% of the time we are sitting down right at 6. It gives him a goal to get home and it gives me a goal to get dinner on the table.

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  2. I love this. We battle this very same thing, because both my husband and I work outside of the home, it's always chaotic to get dinner. However, we both are home by 4:30 to 5 everyday so having a time like 6:30 is definitely doable. Thanks again for the motivation!

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  3. How lovely! We eat dinner together at 5:30 every night. It simplifies my life SO MUCH to have a set time and not have to think - I usually start making dinner at 4:30, know how much snack to give the kids in the afternoon, get out to the door to any evening activities, etc. etc. My husband does not have a set end to his workday, so I like having this time established. Also, he travels for work, so we do eat by ourselves sometimes, too. My kids are very attached to dinner together and the lit candle! We hold hands and sing a prayer to start. There was even a time when we read a Bible story together at the end of dinner.

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  4. We eat at 6 every night - sadly Tom isn't home most nights to eat with us because #collegeministry - but it helps me to know what I need to do in advance to get to the home-stretch {dinner, bath, bed - usually do all of those on my own} --- sometimes we eat dinner at 5:45 if everyone is being super cranky - but it helps to have some anchors at night.

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  5. It's just me and my 4-year-old son. I really like this post and how rituals create meaning. We don't have a set meal time by any means, but I like that we eat together at our kitchen table many nights. It's nice to turn off the tv and set the phone aside to talk about our days. I ask him what was the best thing and worst thing about his day. On Sunday, he had such a good day that he said, "I didn't have a worst part today!"

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