Zen Family Habits

This is a guest post from Courtney Carver of Be More with Less.

There is always time to nourish your body with food, but when do you feed the need to connect with your family? Between work, medical appointments, taking the kids to their activities, or the dog to the vet, how often do you relax over a family meal? If you can’t remember the last time, this information will help you get back on track.

Health Benefits from Dining Together:

• Frequent family meals are associated with a lower risk of smoking, drinking and using drugs; with a lower incidence of depressive symptoms and suicidal thoughts; and with better grades in 11 to 18 year olds. (Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 2004)
• Adolescent girls who have frequent family meals, and a positive atmosphere during those meals, are less likely to have eating disorders. (University of Minnesota, 2004)
• When families eat together frequently, children have better language skills compared to kids from families who don’t have family mealtimes often. (Source: Harvard University)
• Sitting down to dinner at home is healthier for your waistline and your wallet than dining out or driving thru. (Source: Common sense)

While the last question you usually want to hear is “What’s for dinner?”, prioritizing a family meal is clearly important. Whether you are a family of 2 or 12, a meal may be the one time during the day you sit down and talk about your day and connect with each other. If it’s not already, you can make mealtime a family habit, but start slow. Start simply by establishing one night a week as a “special family dinner”. The “special” part will be the purpose, not what you are serving.

How to Have a Special Family Dinner

Set the date: If you have older children, let them know your expectations for a family dinner by setting a date. For younger children, the date announcement will give them something to look forward to. After a few weeks of family dinners once a week, establish several evenings a week for everyone to plan on being home for dinner.

Plan ahead: Don’t make the meal preparation wear you out so you can’t enjoy the meal. Prep your main course early. Pastas, soups and other dishes can be ready to go hours, or the day before your meal.

Ask for help: Ask your family to help set the table, make the salad dressing or pick music for dinner. You will get some much needed assistance and your children will feel good about contributing.

Give thanks: Be grateful out loud for the food and family at your table. This can be in the form of prayer or thanking each other for helping and participating. Let your children learn gratitude from your example.

Connect don’t criticize: Make criticism and “fixing” your family off limits during dinner and encourage a positive experience so everyone will look forward to the next meal.

Don’t worry about the dishes or the TV: some of your best conversation might happen after you are finished eating, so don’t rush things. The dishes will wait and TV will never replace what you might hear from one of your children.

Remember that you can keep things simple and still have fun. Choose one of the ideas below and see how much more involved your family will want to be.

5 Fun and Simple Family Meal Ideas

1. Picnic time: make a picnic and eat it outside or in your living room. If you are running late, put sandwich fixings on a platter and let everyone make their own creation on the picnic blanket.
2. Salad bar: arrange bowls of your family’s favorite veggies, cheese, croutons, and a few dressing choices on the counter. Add in unique ingredients like apple chunks, walnuts and chia seeds to encourage your children to try something new. Stack the plates, forks and napkins and let everyone create their own salad and bring it to the table.
3. Breakfast for dinner: turn the day upside down and serve pancakes or waffles for dinner. For extra fun, encourage your family to wear their pajamas to the table!
4. Dessert first: teach your children the importance of eating nutritious food, but also show them that you don’t have to take things so seriously. Surprise your family by serving angel food cake with strawberries (or another dessert) before the main course.
5. Around the world: learn about other cultures during dinner by serving an appetizer from Italy, main dish from France and dessert from Spain. As you research the recipes, pull some additional information from each country to share with your family.

The #1 benefit will not come from the food, but from the company. Not only will family meals contribute long term benefits as shown above, but you can also enjoy the immediate gratification of getting closer. This “special” family meal will remind you about what is really important and help you to prioritize other areas of your life.

Bon Appetit!

Courtney is a writer and fine art photographer. She writes about simplifying and living life on purpose at bemorewithless.com.