Children who regularly sit down to a family dinner, parents are told, will be less likely to use drugs or develop eating disorders and more likely to be successful in school.
But getting a healthful meal on the table that kids will actually eat after a long day of work, school and extracurricular activities is anything but simple. With the pressure to eat together every night, the logistics of the family meal make dinner more daunting than desirable.
Exactly how do you get food on the table in a timely fashion? How do kids become adventurous, not picky, eaters?
How can conversation be easy, and table manners and chores seem routine? What are the rules governing dessert?
See Wednesday’s Family section in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for suggestions to make dinner a meal you want to come home to.