Family meal time - very sacred ?

[Hattieandcake]

We have fallen into a disastrous pattern of all eating at different times even at weekends due to clubs for the kids and work. It’s often rushed and I then cut corners with more processed food than I would like. Is it worth making the effort to sit down for family mealtime even if it’s later on in the evening ? I am inspired by visiting family yesterday who cooked from scratch and sat and ate after a day of chaos with young children - even making everyone say something they are grateful for before tucking in.

Yes I think it’s worth it - at least for one meal over the weekend.

I mean doing it once a day every evening ? Or I guess most of the week ?

We have always tried to do it every evening- with varying success depends on what’s on.

We do it every day. It's not negotiable.

We manage once or twice a week as a whole family. During the week is nigh on impossible. I do cook fresh food every day though. That’s a non-negotiable for me even though it’s costing a fortune.

We have a sit down meal every day. Weekends it's often breakfast or lunch.

In the week it's the main meal in the evening - that's anytime between 5-7pm!
Batch cooking is your friend for those busy days.

We used to eat as a family our evening meal 6 days a week. Our circumstances have changed now so DH often isn't home in time to eat as early as the kids need. Generally we all eat together about 4 days a week. Of the other 3 days, 2 of those I will eat with the kids and the other one I will just give them dinner and I eat later with DH. It's something that's very important to us, circumstances allowing. I pretty much always ate my evening meal as a family with my siblings and parents, (although my DF did work away sometimes so apart from those periods of course).

I would have thought it was an imperative. Find a meal at least once per week and make sitting together and eating together not negotiable. How else do children learn about their parents as people and how else do parents learn about their children?

Prepare together, sit together, eat together, chat, discuss and laugh together, clean and tidy together.

Yes, I think it’s worth it. We eat 7:30-8pm most days and have since youngest was a toddler at least.

Sometimes it doesn’t really work out, like there are 2 days a week when older one has an activity til 9pm. She’ll have a big snack before she goes and then eats a smaller portion of dinner when she gets home.

But yes, cook from scratch most days and we eat together. We used to not even get home from work til 5:30pm so we were never one of those families who did kids tea at 5pm and everyone off to bed.

We eat every dinner together - at least one adult with DC - but they only have one evening hobby between them so it's not hard to work around.

I couldn't be doing with endless clubs tbh. Just seems like a massive stress.

I think it is. Especially if it means decent food and not processed rubbish.
How old are your dc? What’s the earliest time you could all eat together?
There are lots of easy meals you could do if you have some time to prep. Like prepping chicken or fish and veg and just leaving it to bake in the oven.
Or prepping stuff for a pasta dish so it can be put together in the few minutes it takes to do pasta.

Mon- Thurs I eat with ds and dh eats when he gets in. Adult dd often eats in her room. Fri-Sun we do round the table family meals.

No. We generally eat three different meals (beige for SEN, light for post menopause and more robust growing teen) so eat at slightly different times as I cook.
My youngest stopped eating with the family around 8 as they were too disruptive. After 7yrs she's finally started eating downstairs again which is a start.

When the DC were small we only managed weekend evening meals as DH was home far too late - we prioritised those though.

Then Covid then WFH happened and we were able to eat together every night, except occasionally. It is my favourite part of the day.

I remember at preschool when they had the table set for an end of term party and only of the nursery workers saying she could always tell which children at as a family at a table together.

One of the most important things in life in my opinion. DCs eat tea at nursery/afterschool club in the week so it's only at weekends and holidays for us, but it seems to be enough.

One of my favourite parts of the day and it's always taught them to eat the same as us, they have a very varied diet.

We had their cousins over for dinner the other day, and they haven't stopped talking to their parents about how much they enjoyed dinner time! At home they are given a plate and eat in front of the TV earlier than their parents. We served them dishes on the table and let them help themselves to different things. It was a revelation for them! I do things kids crave that connection.

It's non-negotiable for us too. There are times maybe once every two months when my wife has an evening work function, or there's chaos on the trains and she's delayed getting home, but we eat nearly every meal together as a family. However, we have the luxury of me being a SAHD who has the time to cook from scratch nearly every meal.

DCs are 7 and 5, and eat the same home-cooked adult food as we do. If we have guests they get cordial, in a polycarbonate wine glass, otherwise it's water. I batch cook and freeze portions of things like rice, chilli con carne, bolognese ragu, as well as barbecued meat so if I know we're going to be a bit short of time after an activity then it's still quick and easy to get a decent meal on the table.

The flip side is that if they go to a party with things like nuggets or fish fingers then they tuck in like farm hands and hoover up everything in sight like they might never see food again.