This is a repost of a letter I wrote to our parents a while back...
Dear Parents,
Dear Parents,
After the last letter, a friend
of mine jokingly said, “Geez, how often do you eat out, that skipping sodas paid for a trip to DC?” Honestly, almost never. And I hope that you all didn’t
think the Necessary family is dining high on the hog all the time. One glance
into my house at 6:00 on a weekday evening and you will see that what
constitutes a dinner around here is far from glamorous.
But we do try to eat meals
together. Which has so many challenges:
1.
There is no one meal I can think of that
everyone will like. I have two kids who beg for chicken pot pie, one who
studiously picks out the green beans (and you should see the look of disgust on
his face! I’m sure its funny. In a parallel universe where I didn’t have to
cook it or sit with him at the table.) One likes raw broccoli, another likes it
roasted. One kid asks for seconds and thirds on mashed potatoes, one barely
chokes them down. Two love spaghetti, one hates red sauce. And on and on and
on. I like to have lots of salads and I love a great piece of steak. My husband
and his blood pressure prefer meals that have little to no red meat. My kids
shy away from almost all vegetables. However, through as much patience as I can
muster, and over the years, we have definitely made progress. They are willing
(if not eager) to eat the meals I provide. Sometimes that involves drowning
everything in Ranch dressing, sometimes it involves strategic bites of the yucky stuff followed with bites of
something else. But they do eat their meals. All I insist is that they try
everything and that they not complain. They don’t have to love it, but they can
politely choose to eats lots of the stuff they like and little of the stuff
they don’t.
2.
It’s hard to find time to eat together! I know
my family is typical in this regard. We have sports practices, piano lessons,
and other activities that manage to fall into one of two time slots: When we
should be eating dinner, or when I should be cooking dinner. It makes it tough.
If I make an early dinner, my husband isn’t home from work yet. If I make a
late dinner, the kids are gone at practice. Some days there just isn’t a way to
work around it all, and dinner is left out on the counter for people to eat
when they can. What I do insist, is that whoever is home eats together.
Everyone eats at the table, and usually we get it worked out that we eat in two
groups, if not all at the same time.
Sometimes I will feed the kids early and then my husband and I can eat
later (which allows for adult conversation! It’s nearly miraculous!) However,
we do find that we are all together at the table at least a few times a week.
And it doesn’t have to be dinner time, either. We do family breakfasts and
lunches on the weekends. And on
weekdays, I try to pause my own running around in the morning and sit and enjoy
my coffee while the kids eat their breakfast.
3.
There is rarely time to cook dinner! I have
learned a few tricks over the years, like chopping the vegetables and meat in
the morning, so it’s all ready to cook at dinner time. It’s okay to buy things
pre-cut, too, if that saves your sanity. I sometimes make two (or more) of a
meal and freeze the extra, so I have a meal that I can pull out easily on a
busy day. It’s also okay once in a while to bring in take-out, it’s okay to
serve frozen lasagna, and it’s even okay to order pizza. I think the process of
eating at home, together, is more important than the food itself.
4.
That crunch time just before its time to put the
meal on the table IS NOT FUN. If you have preschoolers, there is a good chance
that while you are doing the last-minute dinner stuff, they are very thoroughly
applying your make-up to their face. Or dumping out every last building block.
Or drawing a beautiful picture and practicing their scissors skills… on your
utility bills. And if you have a preschooler, you likely have a baby. Who is in
his witching hour and is either screaming or you’re trying to hold him while
you pour drinks and set the table. It gets easier, I promise. Just be patient
and realize that a beautiful presentation, or perfect timing, aren’t as
important as just getting everyone to the table. And those will come, with
time.
5.
It’s messy! If you cook dinner, that means you
also have to clean up from cooking. You will have pots and pans, plates,
glasses, silverware, and more. You will also need to wipe down the table, the
chairs, the floor, the nooks and crannies of the highchair, the children, and
somehow even the walls and the ceiling, I swear. And if you don’t get to it all
fast enough, you end up with jelly on the doorknobs and a trail of crumbs that
puts Hansel and Gretel to shame. (Even if you didn’t serve jelly. I don’t know
where it comes from, but it appears. I think preschoolers actually produce
jelly from their pores.) They say you will miss the mess and the fingerprints,
and even the little spills some day. I beg to differ. There is no way I am ever
ever ever going to look around my empty nest and think “Boy I wish there were
sticky handprints on my light switch plates and spilled juice running down my
cabinets.” I will miss so many things about my babies when they are grown. The
mess is. not. one. of. those. things.
Clearly,
the logical solution to all these problems is to eat every meal from the ice
cream truck, where no one will complain about what they have to eat, and you
can leave the mess in the park!
No?
Okay,
there is no clear solution to all these hurdles. But I can promise you, they’re
worth working through. I really do love meal time with my kids. We don’t have
much time in our day to have family conversations without distractions like
homework, cell phones, hunting down cleats and balls and water bottles, driving
carpools, and folding laundry. But we do have a family meal at least a few
times a week. And here are the reasons why:
1.
We have the best conversations at the table.
From the time they were little, we have taken the time to go around the table
and each person gets to say something great that happened that day. I get to
hear things they might otherwise forget to mention, like a friend who walked my
son to the nurse when he scraped his knee at recess, a teacher who read my
kid’s paragraph to the class as an example of good writing, or a perfect throw
on the handball court. The conversations that spring from this tradition are very
fun, and they often evolve into important things, like how to treat their
friends, what problems are occurring on the playground, or what big school
projects are coming up. My youngest son is actually the one who insists that we
each take our turn telling our favorite moment each night. It’s great to know
that these conversations matter to the kids, too. It really is often the only
time in our usual hectic week, that we all really do focus on each other, all
at the same time. And even if Dad is out of town, or one kid is at practice,
the rest of us still take the time to eat together and connect with each other.
2.
My family eats healthier food when I cook. I make sure that we have fruits and vegetables
at every meal (although I have to admit our proportions aren’t always the
best). I insist that they try everything, and then they can choose what they
have second helpings of. I order my fresh produce from abundantharvest.org, and
the box of fresh organic vegetables that we get every week insures that we eat
lots of local, seasonal, varied fruits and vegetables. I readily admit, I have
a long way to go in making sure that we are always eating what is best for us.
It’s not easy, and it’s not fun when you work hard to make a balanced,
nutritious meal, and you sit down to hear complaints. However, even when our
meal isn’t the best in regards to healthy choices, it still beats anything we
can choose from a drive-though.
3.
My family is learning to eat new foods. If we
went a restaurant every day, I think that my kids would eat chicken strips and
French fries seven days a week. No exaggeration. At home, they don’t get that
choice. They have tried tons of new vegetables from Abundant Harvest, and they
have learned that they actually enjoy some of them! Sometimes it isn’t easy,
and sometimes I have to resort to tricks. We called broccoli trees and they
pretended to be dinosaurs when they were little, but that got them to eat it.
And now all three kids actually do eat broccoli without roaring. It does
happen, I promise. When I make a particular meal of meat pies, I used to let
the kids stuff their own pie, and then write their name or draw on it with food
coloring. They were so excited to eat their own product that they gobbled it
up! I used to keep a set of food markers (you can get them at cake-decorating
stores) and draw happy faces on all kinds of things, from quesadillas to apple
peels.
4.
My kids are learning to help. One great way to
keep the kids from destroying the house while you set the table, is to have the
kids set the table! Win-win! This goes for chopping vegetables (once they are
old enough to use a knife), getting out condiments, folding napkins, pouring
drinks, etc. They can also help clear the table, and load the dishwasher.
5.
My kids are learning to cook. Not always, but
sometimes, I recruit their help in the kitchen. They can now brown ground
turkey or ground beef, steam vegetables, cook rice, boil pasta, make a salad, bake
a cake and cookies, measure ingredients, and much more. It makes me feel better
that they won’t starve in their first apartment, and that I can count on help
on days I really need it. A bonus result is that they are far more willing to
eat the food that they cooked! (This is a long and slow process. Expect to have
more spills, more messes, and more utensils to clean. But if you know that
going in, you won’t mind it quite as much).
6.
It saves lots of money. I can’t feed my family
in a restaurant for less than $60, and I can’t make it through a drive-through
for less than $30. I can, though, feed
them at home for much less money. I don’t even do all the coupon-clipping and
sale-shopping that I probably should. I do buy organic meats and fresh produce,
and still I spend less in the market than I would in restaurants of any
caliber.
7.
It saves time. It doesn’t always seem like it,
but honestly with a little forethought, you can whip up a healthy dinner in
less time than it would take to drive and pick up a meal from anywhere. Here is
a typical way I make my meals piggy-back on each other, to save time: Monday we
might have a pot roast that I cook in my crockpot all day. In the evening, I
just roast some broccoli and make enough mashed potatoes that I have some
leftover for Tuesday. Tuesday, I use the mashed potatoes to make Shepherds’
pie. Wednesday, I shred the leftover pot roast from Monday, and make burritos.
I will cook rice to go into the burritos, making enough that I will have some
leftover to make fried rice on Thursday.
None of these meals takes more than 20-30 minutes, but it does take
advance planning.
8.
We enjoy special meals, too! We find ways to
make some dinners exciting. In the summer, we try to eat in the backyard. We
make special deserts to celebrate special occasions (like getting an award at
school or making a goal). We eat breakfast for dinner, or make homemade pizza
with a pepperoni happy face. Once in a great while, I am the “cool mom” because
I let them have frozen yogurt, piled with fresh fruit, for dinner.
9.
When we do eat out, it’s a treat. My kids don’t
always remember to thank me for the things I do and provide for them, but they
do realize that eating at a restaurant is a special thing. It is costly, and
time-consuming, and they know that. However, it is worth it sometimes! And they
know that too.
Miss Chris suggested that we
take the next couple of weeks to share Thanksgiving recipes with one another. I
know (because I see the lunches that you pack your kids!) that you make some
great meals, and that you have an understanding of what a preschooler will try.
You will find a card in your child’s cubby. Please play along and write a
recipe on it that you think others will enjoy as well, and add it to your
child’s classroom door. Look for recipes from the other parents on all of the
classroom doors, and be sure to contribute yours too! I will be snapping
cellphone pictures of your recipes to bring home, and I hope you do too.
Miss Susan
p.s. Thank you so much for all
the kind responses I have gotten from this series of letters! I truly enjoy you
dear parents, as much as I enjoy your children. I have had some amazing
conversations with you stemming from these little letters. You are a warm and
supportive bunch, and I can’t thank you enough!
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