Eating as a family, especially for dinner, is so important to me. I sit at the table with my girls for 3 meals a day. When hubby is home he eats with us too. No TV, no music, no phones, no toys, nothing but US. Having that time to talk about our day or discuss world issues (you’d be amazed with the things my girls come up with) is irreplaceable. Next year Honeybun’s kindergarten will start at 7:20 and with a new baby in the mix I’m sure family breakfasts will go out the window. I also know someday the kids will be bigger and busier and family dinners will become less frequent so I’m trying to monopolize now!
We started family dinners, literally, from day one. The day we brought Honeybun home from the hospital she sat at the table with us for dinner. At the time we ate at a pub height table so a regular high chair wouldn’t have worked. I also didn’t want to give up any precious space so we opted for a Space Saver High Chair that belted to one of our regular table chairs. It’s also nice because it reclines so even the tiniest new baby can sit in it. She got used to sitting at the table with me every meal (when she was awake). By the time she was ready for solid foods she was used to the chair and sitting for a meal so it was a super easy transition.
The first few weeks with Sugarplum were a bit harder. We were living in Dublin when she was born but chose to come back to Florida for the birth and spent the first 5 weeks of her life living at my Aunt and Uncle’s house. We brought over what we could for those first few weeks but did not have everything, including the highchair. We did, however, even in those early days sit her as close to us as possible while we ate. We put her on the floor next to us or in her car seat. If we had room at the table we would even strap her in the car seat and put her at the table, securely wedged so she couldn’t fall (still probably not the safest idea but it was the only way to keep her from screaming). Unfortunately even when we returned to Dublin she was never a good sitter (we later discovered she had some physical issues that were making her uncomfortable). I think being at the table with us, especially big sister, helped her learn quicker how to use utensils and drink from a cup. She still likes to get up and run around during dinner sometimes but the point is still that we all sit down with our food and we have family time.
I fully intend to continue this family time with our new baby also. We still have the space saver high chair which we’ve been storing for the past year and I can’t wait to strap it to an extra chair, load up the baby and cozy him/her up to the dinner table. Who knows how many more years of family dinners we’ll have and I don’t want to miss a single one!
