If you’ve read my initial post about recycling country style, you know that my grandmother always had meals on the table at noon and 6pm, on the dot. Since I spent a lot of time with her during my childhood, I naturally grew up with those meal times firmly ingrained in my routine. Then reality reared it’s ugly head.
The teenage years brought skipping lunch, snacking when I got home from school, and eating dinner after homework was done (sometimes after 8pm.) Yeah, at the time, I thought talking to friends was more important than eating lunch. Homework took a long time because I was such a perfectionist and wouldn’t quit until it was all “just right.” Oh, did I forget to mention that I didn’t eat breakfast either? Well, there you have it. I didn’t. No need to throw things. I know now how wrong all of that was. If you must throw something, make it a blueberry muffin. I love those. 
My saving grace was that there were weekends! I spent most of the days with my family eating healthy things and at decent times. On those days we’d linger over the kitchen table talking, laughing, and planning. Those weekends were wonderful!
The young adult years brought busy days and nights along with those bad eating habits again. The family table was still in the kitchen. My parents and I drank many morning cups of coffee there but eating at the table became a race to finish and move on to something more”pressing”. Well, at least I was eating the right foods even if it was done quickly.
Then came motherhood and falling back to the family table tradition. Finally, it all made sense! As the kids grew into teenagers (uh-oh) schedules became crammed full of activities and commitments. It became harder and harder to get together for meals. For a while, I felt like our family table had move to another house because we so rarely saw it. That was because it was always buried under the clutter of mail, homework, projects, or just junk! We did make it through and found our table again, but it was tough!
What I want to know from you is do you know where your table is? How are you doing with making family mealtime a priority? As a child, did you have family meals where everyone spent time talking over the day’s events? Tell us about it!
