Thanks Painter Mommy for the picture!

Not too long ago we had some friends over for dinner and they asked us how we get our kids to sit down at the table.  I drew a blank when they asked (of course) but later really thought about how we taught them to do it!  We have a few rules in our house when it comes to eating dinner.  Some of these rules are: you must sit until Mommy & Daddy are done eating, no toys at the table, and you must eat everything on your plate if you want to eat a snack later.  How do we enforce these rules?  Children who refuse to sit at the table get to stay in their rooms (when this happens, we make sure to have some extra special activities going on: a movie, playing a game, etc), if they bring toys to the table, we say, “What a bummer, these toys must be put away until we have to clean them!”  If our kids do not like what we are having for dinner and refuse to eat it, they get NOTHING to eat for the rest of the evening!  If they get to the point where they are crying because they are “so hungry” they have the choice of eating what we had for dinner or staying in their rooms until they can be sweet!  Even when they are babies and they start to throw their food off of their tray, we say, “Uh oh,” take them out of their seat and put them in another room.  This has worked well for us!  Do our kids always sit nicely, no, do they always eat their dinner, not a chance, but they know that they are in charge of their decisions and that each decision has a consequence!  If they do sit nicely and eat all of their dinner they can usually pick out a snack to eat before we start getting ready for bedtime!

What are your tricks for getting your kids to sit for dinner?