Do you eat at the dinner table?

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  • Snip8241
    Snip8241 Posts: 767 Member
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    Always! The dinner table is and has been more than just a place to share a meal. We may only sit there for twenty minutes, but there are and were no phones and no TV.

    I wondered about this at one point, you know, is it still important now that my kids are grown and out of the house? (Most of the time). Recently, at Sunday Dinner, a tradition we still keep, my daughter commented that she missed dinner every night. She said it gave structure to her life and was a comfort...no matter if we were all laughing, crying or yelling, we did it together. My son agreed. My husband then said, " Yes I still rely on dinner, I look forward to it at the end of my day".

    ....plus no one drops lasagna on your white sofa. :noway:
  • rachelrb85
    rachelrb85 Posts: 579 Member
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    99% of the time we eat at the dinner table. It helps with portion control and it's a nice family time ritual. We only eat on the couch if it's been a long day, are eating something simple, want to start a movie, etc. It wouldn't hurt to start good habits with the little one now!
  • 970Mikaela1
    970Mikaela1 Posts: 2,013 Member
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    I eat at the table. I don't think it affects my weight at all, I just think eating on the couch is gross.

    that and the couch isn't big enough.
  • nuttyduffy
    nuttyduffy Posts: 255 Member
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    We eat at the dinner table, in the dining room, every night. No TV, just ourselves to interact with.

    As a family it's when we have some of our best conversations. We talk and catch up with each others days and discuss any and everything. It keeps our family close and it's something I think is really important.

    Does it change the way I think about food? No. I've been known to cook myself a completely different dinner to the rest of the family lol

    I just like our daily family time around the dining table :happy:
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    At my desk or at the table. Never on the couch. We never watch TV either (but if it's at my desk I might browse Internet or something).
  • Celia_Arminta
    Celia_Arminta Posts: 10 Member
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    When I was growing up we never ate at the table. When I got married my husband and I always ate at the table (because he was anal about getting our new couch dirty!) Sometimes I eat standing at the counter like my mother always did, but when we all sit together as a family and talk about our day, its nice. One helpful hint I heard was light a candle and it will help calm everybody (because as a mom of 2 little ones sometimes meals are just screaming and crying). Oh, and the couch is filthy now :)
  • Shalaurise
    Shalaurise Posts: 707 Member
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    I used to eat dinner in front of the TV, but it used to be fast food every night too. Now that I am cooking 5+ nights a week, we sit down a the table. It is way easier to keep the kids from making a HUGE mess if we are all seated and eating together at the table. It has a lot of other good side effects as well. :)

    I am not irritated that they are asking me questions while I am "trying to watch my show"
    Less drink spills
    Spending time with the family

    I also have a lot of other changes associated with this new trying not to be fat thing and I don't really get to watch TV anymore. I do find that each time I sit down to watch a show, the first thing I want to do is stuff my face with something. Chips, chocolate, soda, ice cream... something junk food like. If my hands aren't occupied, I eat.
  • TiffieLand
    TiffieLand Posts: 159
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    Yup I do it dinner at the table. I can control myself better than when I eat while on my laptop or whatever... because I'm bored of just eating.. hihi
  • BoxerBrawler
    BoxerBrawler Posts: 2,032 Member
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    All nutrition aside, I personally think it's important for a healthy family dynamic to have a scheduled uninterrupted time to sit and be with each other. Most families make that dinnertime. I try to make sitting at a table for dinner a priority.

    Yes
  • BoxerBrawler
    BoxerBrawler Posts: 2,032 Member
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    When I was growing up we never ate at the table. When I got married my husband and I always ate at the table (because he was anal about getting our new couch dirty!) Sometimes I eat standing at the counter like my mother always did, but when we all sit together as a family and talk about our day, its nice. One helpful hint I heard was light a candle and it will help calm everybody (because as a mom of 2 little ones sometimes meals are just screaming and crying). Oh, and the couch is filthy now :)

    I do this too because I am a snack person by nature. I would much rather stand and pick and move and pick vs. sitting down for a whole meal. We do sit for a meal every night but I tend to be up and down a bunch of times throughout the meal.

    I read somewhere a while ago that standing while eating is good for digestion. Probably doesn't make a difference and I can't remember why...
  • ekat120
    ekat120 Posts: 407 Member
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    I just can't understand why people eat in front of the TV. We always eat at the table and chat. I don't even like eating in front of the TV when I'm by myself. My food needs my undivided attention :smile: I'm clumsy and would probably spill something anyway.
  • ASH2038602
    ASH2038602 Posts: 215 Member
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    A while back we got into a rut of eating in front of the tv. I think I was more likely to zone out and over eat. I prefer to sit at the table. Its more comfortable for me, I eat less, we spend time together as a family, and like someone else said you eat slower when you are having conversation. I know you have a young baby, but I would get in the habit now. My son loves sitting down for dinner as a family when daddy gets home. Its a time of the day that he gets both of our full attention :-)
  • williams969
    williams969 Posts: 2,528 Member
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    There's not enough room for the whole family around our little table (4 kids, 2 adults:embarassed:). Kids sit around the table, and I or husband stands at the counter, and the other sits at the desk in the kitchen. But...we all gather together for dinner.

    Lunch, I'm guilty of eating in the living room when it's just me at home. Usually while reading MFP :laugh:
  • SueInAz
    SueInAz Posts: 6,592 Member
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    I don't have a dinner table. :-(

    You prelog your food no matter where you eat it though right? It doesn't matter where you eat so long as you prelog it.

    I guess that is my main problem....associating dinner with curling up in front of the TV often makes me want to throw out whatever I had planned for dinner (not literally) and get McDonalds or something. So really, I'm hoping eating at the table changes my overall view of dinner to make me want to eat a healthier, home cooked portion controlled dinner.

    When I cook, it is rare that I would get more than my original portion....it's just following through with the plan of cooking and not hitting the drive thru is where my issue lays.
    Perhaps it would help you to start meal planning. I find that it's much easier to stick to the "plan" when I have dinner thawing or marinating in the fridge or already cooking in the crockpot. There are lots of meal planning sites on the web; some free, some not. They'll give you a shopping list and 5 meals for the week. Or you can come up around 20 "tried and true" meals that you and your family like and then put them on the calendar for a couple of months out. If you're like us, there are specific days each week when we always eat out. Friday night we always go to dinner with my parents, for example, and Thursday nights my husband bowls so I always do takeout with my son (when he was little I'd always cook something he liked but my husband didn't like Kraft Mac 'n Cheese or fish sticks). Skip those days on the calendar and fill in the rest with your 20 meals. You'll always know what's for dinner and can plan your shopping around what you'll be serving. In addition, it cuts down on food waste since you won't be buying something on sale that you never end up using.
  • seltzermint555
    seltzermint555 Posts: 10,741 Member
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    I eat at the table. I don't think it affects my weight at all, I just think eating on the couch is gross.

    Basically this.

    Not so much that I think eating on the couch is "gross" (although sometimes yeah I do think that)...it's more that I have established a habit of eating at the table, so it feels odd to me to eat without a table to set my food on. I even hate going to a get-together where everyone's balancing their plates on their laps. Even though I have a much bigger flatter lap now ;-) I still don't dig that.
  • nicsflyingcircus
    nicsflyingcircus Posts: 2,513 Member
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    The only time I may eat at the couch is with say, a frozen yogurt of something of an evening. Meals in our house are never eaten in front of the TV... okay, not never, with our floor plan, if a big sporting event we are watching is on, we can leave it on and see it from the table. But 99% of the time, no tv during meals.
  • 99clmsntgr
    99clmsntgr Posts: 777 Member
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    We eat at the dinner table (me, the wife, 2 kids and derpy dog scarfing droppings underneath) . But what I find really helps is that we prepare, portion and plate dinner in the kitchen then eat in the dining room. Rarely do we get up to get more.

    On top of eating together as a family, which I think is great, the TV is off, toys/iPods/NintendoDS's/etc. are put away. It's true family time, not just "conveniently colocated, but otherwise engaged in other things" time.
  • MysteriousMerlin
    MysteriousMerlin Posts: 2,270 Member
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    Nah. My husband's work schedule during the school year is very hectic, so I usually eat dinner alone. I do burn calories fending off the trio of mutts in the house though.
  • fuhrmeister
    fuhrmeister Posts: 1,796 Member
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    I don't have a dinner table. :-(

    You prelog your food no matter where you eat it though right? It doesn't matter where you eat so long as you prelog it.

    Mostly this ^

    I do have a table. But I try to prelog my dinner, measure it out and stick to one serving. My hasband and I totally eat in form of the TV and cuddle after dinner. Not that we don't have small children. When were were fostering children we at at the table unless it was a special Movie and Pizza night.

    That being said I definalty think eating at the table would be beneficial to weigh loss for a lot of people. Maybe even me.
  • chrissyrenee1029
    chrissyrenee1029 Posts: 358 Member
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    We honestly do both. We have a "no food in the living room" rule, but we also have a wall mounted television in our dining room, although we don't always turn it on during a meal. I try to pre-log my food so it doesn't really matter for me one way or the other. We really only put the TV in there because that wall is visible from the kitchen and we like to have it on in the background while we're cooking.

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