How To Do Family Meal Time???

[Melsy]

Hi all,

I shall be quick!      Ds is 16 months.  We used to always do his dinner, bath, bottle bedtime routine etc then once he was down for the night worry about eating ourselves later. 

Well since he is at daycare now, I notice he eats less well than some of the other children so have decided this year that from now on all three of us (as often as possible!) will eat dinner together as a family!  I want him to see us eating and see us eating non pureed stuff so I am hoping this will help!

Any success or words of wisdom you have would be greatly appreciated.  For the most part it goes ok but then he wants out of his highchair and wants to eat the stuff off our plate (which is EXACTLY the same as his  :roll: ) but wants to eat it whilst moving around the living room, not whilst sitting still!  Should I just try a booster type chair and see if that improves things???  Can anyone tell me what their family meal times is like???

TIA,

Mel.

[SophieB]

I'm just impressed you can bear to eat early enought to have your LO watch. LOL.

[ktmum]

Best thing to do I have found is all sit together at the table with our DD in a chair ( we have one of those travel ones with a tray at the front)
At the moment shes being funny with food but i just put a little bit on a plate for her and top it up if needs be. I try and make it so she eats similar food to us so she has a bit off my plate too.
Then afterwards i get the hoover our and clean up the mess!!! LOL
We find it easy to eat at the same time as her now as Dh has to go back to work at 6 anyway. I normally leave my pudding til after DD is in bed :wink: ( cos its mine all mine  :lol: )
HTH

[Sungrl]

I have a step daughter who is with us on weekends for the past year, and she is 2.  We have always eaten breakfast, lunch and supper together with her as a family.  DSD gets her own special plate and a small spoon or fork to eat with (when she was younger we would help her). If she says she is finished and wants out of her highchair, we tell her she doesn't have to eat any more, but she has to stay in her chair and sit on her bum until everyone is finished eating.  If she whines or cries, we don't make a big fuss, we just continue to tell her she must wait until everyone is finished eating and show her that we are not finished.  Often she will decide she wants more of her own food, or she will just sit and babble at us or I might give her a toy to play with, but we have always enforced that she must stay in the chair. It has worked pretty well; we can take her to restaurants without problems, etc.  We plan to continue this with our next child.

S

[tylersmommy]

We've always had family dinners and it's worked well, for the most part.
The only thing I insist on is that he eat in his high chair or sitting in a big chair at the table. We do this for all meals, and it's non-negotiable. If he doesn't want to eat, fine, we don't force it. We'll offer a snack before bed. When he decides he's done, we let him leave the table if he starts getting antsy. Once he's older, we'll probably insist he stay at the table until we're all finished, but at his age, he just doesn't have the attention span for it and I don't want him sitting there playing with toys. Interestingly, he rarely asks to get down before DH and I are finished, even if he isn't eating any more. It's been great practice for restaurants (although we do use toys, books, etc to keep him entertained there). Good luck!

[Melsy]

Thanks everyone for your replies!

We generally have been doing dinner at 6pm.  It is still a bit hit and miss with him wanting to get out and mess around with the food off of our plates.  :roll:   I'm sure we'll get him eating properly before he moves out.... right!! 

Melissa - can I ask what time you do dinner and what time is Tyler's bedtime??  Do you offer milk before bed??? 

Thanks everyone for your help!

Mel.

[tylersmommy]

Mel-

Dinner is between 6 and 6:30, and Tyler's bedtime is 8:30. He can have his milk sippy whenever he wants and often does sip on it after dinner until bedtime, but that's up to him. We haven't specifically given him milk before bed since he dropped the bedtime bottle.