Bring Your Family Together For Dinner

Family dinners were once a common occurrence in American households. Everyone was expected to sit down together and share a meal. The value and importance of family dinners has not changed, but in this age of distraction when family schedules seem to be more chaotic than ever, gathering the family at dinner tables can seem almost impossible.

So how can you change that? There are a lot of little things you can do to up the odds of getting the family together. For example, you might try scheduling one day a week for everyone to sit down for a meal. Or if everyone is too busy in the evening, why not try a weekend lunch? The important part is getting everyone to sit down and have a conversation together.

Even if you manage to get everyone to sit down to as a family at dinner tabletalk can lag. With differing ages and interests, family dinner conversation can be difficult to initiate or keep up. But it does not do much good if you gather the family at the dinner table when the only thing you hear is chewing and forks clinking against plates. The most important thing is to make everyone feel comfortable talking. Parents can ask their kids what their favorite part of the day was. Not every conversation has to include every member, but everyone should have the opportunity to share at point and feel like their voice is being heard.

Or when you gather the family at dinner table games can be a fun, simple way of getting everyone engaged. One game you might try is having everyone try to guess what ingredients are in the food. By making them fun family dinners can become an event that everyone looks forward to. By gathering the entire family at dinner table, family members not only learn more about each other and the interests, they can forge relationships that lead to more confident individuals and pass along family values.