Sitting & Eating Dinner With Kids

We celebrate many different holidays throughout the year. Today has been declared National Family Day, and in particular, a day to eat dinner with your children.

Study after study has shown the great benefit of something we used to take for granted---the family meal. Sitting down with your kids and talking about the day is a great way to keep connected with them and find out what's going on in their lives. It also helps in more ways than you'd probably think. Children who eat at least 3 sit-down dinners with their family every week are also less likely to smoke, drink or use drugs. They also tend to do better in school and are less likely to have sex at an early age.

Granted, we all have busy schedules and with a busy day at work, hectic after school activities and homework, it gets harder to sit down together and eat a meal. The important part isn't what's served but what's talked about at the table. Use this as an opportunity for your children to share what "they" want to. They might not want to talk about everything that went on that day, especially if something is particularly bothering them so don't push the issue. Just let them know your there to listen. And when they do bring up controversial subjects, like drugs or sex---don't judge them since that will just cause them to tune out, but give them your beliefs and then listen. So, tonight sit down with the rest of the county and enjoy a meal with the most important people in your life.