First, some housekeeping! Tomorrow morning is the Weekend Review, so if you've got a review or product giveaway on your blog, make sure to come back tomorrow morning after 9am and link it up!
Last night, I instituted a new house rule. You see, before I had a child...okay, more specifically, before I had a toddler, I always said that dinner time would be television-free. In my ideal world of being the perfect mom who did everything right, I would be able to just turn off the TV at dinner time and we'd all sit down to a meal and converse and laugh over wholesome, home-cooked meals encompassing the five food groups.
Well, introduce an exhausted working mommy who comes home, plays with the kiddo, manages temper tantrums, cooks dinner (while managing temper tantrums), cleans (while managing temper tantrums), and puts a cranky toddler to bed and you get a mommy who throws the television at dinner rule out the window so that she can get some freaking peace and quiet.
Well, after yesterday's pediatrician visit, encouraging us to get more food into our picky kid, I instituted the no juice before dinner, drinking milk with dinner, and no television during dinner rule.
What a change. I was shocked that she didn't fight it. She I told her she could have water before dinner, gave her water in a cup and she said "NO WANT IT". But she didn't have a tantrum.
I sat her down at dinner and turned the TV off. She asked for it. I told her I was sorry, I made a mistake before and that we weren't going to watch TV during dinner again. She said, "Oh! Okay!" She asked for TV a couple more times, so I repeated myself. She eventually stopped asking. Again, no tantrum.
But the eating. Oh the eating! Within a half hour, she ate all but one bite of her chicken nuggets and a couple of tater tots. She drank her milk (flavored lightly with ovaltine). She ate A BITE OF CARROT. (My picky kid ate a veggie! Yay!) For dessert, I gave her a cup of Dora the Explorer yogurt and she ate that up, licked the cup clean and asked for more. This coming from a kid who normally ate three bites of dinner, refused milk and yogurt, and took an hour and a half to eat.
Plus, we talked. We talked about the rain outside. We talked about her best friend at school. We talked about the different colors of the food, and how yummy it was. It was nice. And tantrum-free.
I think I like this new rule! I should have stuck to my guns and done this all along.
Now if I can just get her to eat her gummy vitamins. But that's a story for another post.
1 comment:
That's great! We too said we would be a tv free meal eating family who ate at the dinner table every single time. We get it done about 1/2 of the time. We jokinly tell people we have two dining room tables, one in the dining room and one in front of the TV.
We are trying harder to do all meals at the dinner table (in the dining room) together as a family. It's hard but it's something that we are working on. Good for you for sticking to your "new" rule!
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