[*Sheree*]

Hi Guys,

I keep reading about how you should eat dinner with your toddler...my question is how do you fit it in? I mean, what time do you have dinner with your little one/ones? Do you give them a little snack or some milk beforehand to tie them over? Do you cook as soon as you get home from work or prep the night before?

My DS currently has dinner at 5pm - which is as soon as we walk in the door! If I don't get him dinner as soon as we get home he is not a happy chappy

At the moment his routine after daycare is:
- 5pm: dinner
- 6pm: bath
- 6.30pm: bottle
- 7pm: brush teeth and bed

I tend to cook and eat dinner myself after he goes to bed at 7pm. I work fulltime, hubby works away for 3 weeks at a time and I don't have any family support where I am living (as they are all 3 hours away).

Any tips and ideas would be awesome
Thanks!

[imamumto3]

we all eat at about 6pm. we have afternoon tea after school, so about 3:30. the kids usually snack on veggies while I'm preparing them for dinner. I'm a sahm so I prepare casseroles or veggies fir stir fries during the day, for grills or pasta I start preparing about 5:15.

eta. does the daycare give a late snack? ours did sandwich quarters at about 4:45 - 5:00pm and it seemed to hold the kids over until I was able to get dinner prepared

This post has been edited by imamumto3: 18/11/2012, 08:10 PM

[NotBitzerMaloney]

I simply found it was not possible until my DS was older. And even then it involved me eating earlier than I might like.
He was probably three and a half before his bedtime correlated with a meal time that meant we could eat together. I tried giving a snack and then a later dinner, but by then he was full from the snack and wouldn't eat dinner or would be grumpy and falling asleep at the table
I was - and am - happy to believe that sitting there and chatting with him was the most important part of the "eating as a family" thing.

[**Mel**]

we eat at 5:30 - DD is 3 years old.

It works for us, DH and I are both home from work at 5

[123tree]

I would eat steamed veggies with my kids at 5pm and they would have their veggies with meat. Or if we had stir fry or something i would have a small bowl about the same size as their serve.

Hubby was never home from work before eight so we would eat together then. So essentially I was having a second dinner. But two small ones.

It also made it easier because I would be gnawing my own arm off some nights by eight and digging into chocolate or other things my body didn't need.

[flushthetoilet]

When they could make it to 6 pm, we ate together. About 2ish, from memory

[duck-o-lah]

For us it's just not possible most of the time. DS and I get home from daycare and work at about 5. DH doesn't get out of bed until 6-6.30 (night worker), which is when I start getting DS settled for bed. I'm looking forward to when DS is older and can stay up later, that's the only way I can see us being able to do it.

[Covert]

DS has just turned 2 years old and our routine for the last 6 months has been:-

5pm - Bath
6pm - Dinner as a family
6.30pm - wind down and watch the Night Garden (OMG I hate that show!!!)
7pm - Teeth, book and bed.

He has afternoon tea around 3.30pm to tide him over.

[BrindleGirl]

We don't eat as a family.

I think you just do what works for you. I wouldn't stress too much about it. I think what is most important is your children receiving love and a healthy meal. Not who or what a child eats with.

[sparkles30]

We usually eat dinner together around 5.-5.30pm. But the kids get a snack just before bed (fruit/milk etc), and I have some sort of snack/meal about 7.30pm after they have gone to bed. I don't feel like cooking again after they have gone to bed, but find 5pm is too early to have the last meal of the day. The post-dinner snack seems to get us all through until morning.