Yes you heard me correctly.
While I can talk on and on and on about the benefits of a family meal and the whole family eating together at dinner time, sometimes it’s not reasonable to expect that and it’s just not worth it!
So many of the benefits of mealtime have nothing to do with food. Mealtime is an opportunity for the whole family to talk, for kids to learn social skills, utensil skills and so much more……none of which happens at a mealtime that is stressful and downright unenjoyable.
Sometimes, it’s okay to skip family dinner time, and it’s important to know how how not to get stressed over it.
Now, if you can swing dinner together as a family every single night and its an enjoyable time for the whole family you should keep on keeping on- do not change a thing!
I’m talking to the mamas who race in the door at the last second with hungry and tired kiddos with basically an hour to get them into bed before all hell breaks loose!
The mamas who are running in for five seconds to pee (maybe!) before running back out to extracurriculars!
Or the mamas whose kids may walk in the door starving from school at 4:30pm, and for whom the early bird special isn’t quite so appealing.
If any (or all of these) sound like you remember that it’s okay to sometimes skip the whole family mealtime thing!
Some things to consider are:
1. Enjoying family means when you can. Whether its breakfast on Sundays or a dinner one night in the week . DO IT. WHEN. YOU. CAN!
2. Consider having everyone sit at the table together even if you’re not all eating the same meal. If your ids are hungry after school, have a snack with them. Then let them enjoy their bedtime snack while you’re eating dinner.
And let’s just say a “Hallelujah!” to permission to not stress yourself out over enjoying the “perfect” mealtime every single night!
From one Busy Mom to another,
Ahuva
