Back To The Dinner Table: Name Your Nights

Getting back on a family dinner schedule is one of the best gifts you can give your children after the holidays. Family dinner has been shown to enhance school success, decrease illegal substance use and decrease bullying and teasing.

Take the time to name each night a different dining experience.

Sunday = Buffet Night

Monday = Hearty Meals Night

Tuesday = Spaghetti Night

Wednesday = On Broadway! As your children prepare and sing a show of any sort. Thursday = Picnic Night – Remember you can picnic anywhere anytime, in your backyard, in the park or even on the family room floor.

Friday = Ethnic Dinner Night, try some exotic food choices or simply stick with Chinese.

Saturday = Date Night, mom and dad go out and kids enjoy Pizza and salad.

Change up your schedule when kids get energized or you run out of recipes. Check out www.cooks.com, www.rachaelray.com, www.allrecipes.com and www.bhg.com for monthly recipes.

GEORGIA COOKING IN AN OKLAHOMA KITCHEN

A few of you moms have said, "Lynne we can't do organic and low sugar all the time, we need to break loose sometimes." Agreed!

If you're gonna get loose, do it with Trisha Yearwood's decadent GEORGIA COOKING IN AN OKLAHOMA KITCHEN. She even has his and hers variations! That will do a marriage good.

Here's a sample for the upcoming holiday season.

Green Punch - Serve this punch with Cheese Straws. It’s a Yearwood family tradition - Perfect to serve at Christmas parties because it’s a beautiful bright green and makes a pretty punch bowl.

Ingredients:
 2 13-ounce packets unsweetened lemon-lime soft drink mix, such as Kool-Aid,
2 cups sugar,
1 46-ounce can pineapple juice,
12 ounces frozen lemonade concentrate thawed, 32 ounces (1 quart) ginger ale. 
Put 2 quarts of water in a 1-gallon container. Add the drink mix and sugar and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Add the pineapple juice and lemonade concentrate and stir well. Just before serving, add the ginger ale. www.trishayearwood.com.

The Extended Family Dinner

Research shows that sitting down to dinner is an important protective factor in maintaining the health and well-being of your children. Establishing a set dinner time is the first step. Engaging your children in activities that extend the dinner hour is the second step.

Children love doing homework with you at the dinner table, they love playing card games, testing themselves at math facts and bringing new, sometimes even made-up vocabulary words to the table. Take your time, talk, laugh and talk for hours.

After dinner extend the fun by labeling each night a different family activity.

Monday Night is Discovery Night

Bring the "Discovery Box" to the dinner table. Place unique, familiar or fascinating objects in a box and allow each child to pull an object and talk about it. After dinner go on-line or take a trip to your local library to learn more about topics related to the things in your discovery box.


Tuesday Night is Reading Night

Prepare early readers, by bringing everyday objects to the table that have words or print on them, such as cereal boxes and other items in your cupboard. Play reading and guessing games using the printed materials. Play games with the words, making silly sentences, tongue twisters and fun stories.

Wednesday Night "You are a STAR"

Play find your "Star Word." Assign one word to each child. That is the word that makes them A STAR at this meal. Frequently occurring words such as "The, and, it, him, her, she, he" are good beginning words. Then have each child bring a book to the table, choose a page, and name how many times their STAR word appears. That number becomes the child's "Magic Number" for the night and every time he encounters that number for the rest of the evening he gets to make a wish or discuss his current life dreams and aspirations.

Thursday Night it's Show and Tell

Play show and tell at your family table. Have your children bring an object, a piece of art, a song or something to share. Shine the "spot-light" on one child at a time and allow only him or her to share.

Friday Night is Family History Night

Bring family photos, heirlooms or pieces of family history to the table and talk about your family ancestry and historical family member's life experiences.

Saturday Night is Game Night

Play board games, cards, chess or checkers at the table after dinner to enhance your family experience.

Sunday Night You're on Broadway!

Put on a show, dance, sing, do a skit Laugh and "lift each other up" with genuine compliments, enthusiasm and joy.

You will enhance family relationships and help your children develop self-esteem when you extend your family dinner with family fun!

Put Family Fun on the Calendar

The New Year is a great time to plan your Extraordinary Family Fun for the entire year. Take one of those calendars you received for the holidays and plan out family activities for the coming year.

Begin by placing all your family birthdays on the calendar. Talk with your children about how they wish to spend their birthday and have some fun researching birthday party ideas - just the two of you.

Visit the online calendar for your local newspaper and write down cool events and happenings.

Take your school calendar and write down all the holidays.

Celebrate with Friday is Family Date Night and assign date nights between one parent and one child, the other parent, grandmother, or relative can cozy up with the remaining children for a group date. This fosters nurturance and attachment with your children as you schedule these special relationship moments for your family.

Get hip and put community events, art classes, cooking classes and freebees on the calendar today!

Visit the following resources for more ideas:

http://www.dailycandy.com/
http://www.cardfountain.com/printable_calendars/fun1.php
http://familyfun.go.com/printables/