Meal time

Julie likes to not only cook well-balanced meals for her family, but also have them eat together at a quiet kitchen table:

…we usually sit down but I find - I find if I am talking with them…That slows them down with their eating and that takes them almost a half an hour or an hour to eat…And then their supper, I have to warm it up two times…So…so I try not to uh - like I'll try not to talk because it - what it does to them is that it - it distracts them.

Lynne also says that her family eats meals together, but they don't chat because they like to watch television programs while they eat. Similarly, Beth wants her children to sit together at the kitchen table to eat their meals. However, Doug points out that Beth, often ends up going in the living room to watch a television program once the meal is on the table and her children typically follow her.

Natalie and Jane disclose that they have trouble getting their children to sit at the table at mealtimes preferring, like Beth, to sit in front of the television. Natalie explains:

[My son] got some programs. They start at 4 o'clock and they never stop 'til 6…So it's a battle to get him to come to the table. Usually he comes in the kitchen, "I'm hungry Mom. I'm hungry Mom" like for two hours before supper. And soon as supper is ready for him, "I'm watching TV." And I get upset because I don't want them into the TV…The last week's been quite a bit of TV…"

Natalie admits that this routine of having dinner while watching a television show was what she grew up with as a child and she feels it is not appropriate, "It's gotta change 'cause I like supper at the table." She expresses how she likes to talk to her children and sitting with the television on prevents this from happening. Beth also tries to get her family to sit down together at the table and eat. When they are together she indicates, "Oh, we talk…and laugh and we um have…arguing because [my son] had three crackers, [my daughter] had two…stuff like that."