Sunday dinners with the kids

We just finished our regular Sunday dinner and we had a lot of fun joking with each other and exchanging our views on various topics and laughing a lot. When we finished and all had left the table I remenbered how our Sunday dinners were like when the kids were in their teens and we could only get them all together on Sunday. For Cora my wife this was the time to tell them what they were doing wrong and needed to be corrected. It was also a time to remind them about a long list of rules. We sometimes even had a checklist prepared so that we did not miss out on anything.Sunday dinner then was a tense moment where there were at times high voices, some angry reactions, and even sometimes crying and at the end long silence while eating.This time was like a sergent telling their men " Now hear this". What was even worse was after all the kids were in their room Cora and I would get into arguments because I did not support her in some instances or I was not strong enough at other times. I noticed also that our children were starting to dread Sunday dinners.

This went on for sometime until one day I told Cora that we should make our Sunday dinners happy and pleasant occasions. I asked her if it was possible to avoid making this time as a reprimand and correction time. Could we not instead plan positive and enjoyable things rather then negative ones where we could listen to our children rather then talking to them? I told her there is always time before or after dinner to correct whatever is needed to correct individually. We don't need to embarrass them in front of their siblings.

Cora agreed to try this out and it was difficult to avoid correction and reprimand every sunday since this was the only time they were all at the table. But we tried and slowly we were succesfull. Our dinners slowly became happy occassions where we did some sharings on what good things were happening to us during the week. We slowly tried to listen instead of doing all the talking. I realized after some time that this was working because they sometimes invited their boyfriends or girfriends to Sunday dinners and joined us in our sharings. This meant they were relaxed and were enjoying it. since then Sunday dinners were occassions I really look forward to and I think even now our children looks forward to it to. As a matter of fact Cora and I now treasure these Sunday dinners because we know our children look forward to this occassion as much as we do and I am sure they will probably try this out with their own families.