Sit Down Dinner

On Sunday, Corey had spent some time in the morning thawing bread rolls and putting out other things in preparation for lunch. After church, everyone just came and helped themselves to what they wanted or to something else if they didn't want it. Corey had cooked a meat pie, and when that was done baking, kids just dug in at will and Corey lamented that it would be nice if we all sat down together instead of everyone doing what they want on their own. I agree with him, but it's also a battle I haven't been willing to fight lately (aka since school started). Alas, now we're two months into school. I have maybe gotten an handle on life a little bit, but I am missing the slowdown that the covid quarantine provided. I do usually have food available, but I haven't given any priority to a sit down meal. Corey went to bed early Sunday night, and as the kids and I gathered for prayer, we all agreed we'd like sit down dinners too. "Okay, but that means that when you guys come home from school, there's no making a meal for yourself and doing what you want... Maybe one piece of fruit, but go practice music or do homework and hang on until dinner time, and we'll have a sit down dinner." They agreed to do it. And I'm proud to say that, even with me being gone for violin, I prepped before hand and we had a sit down dinner on Monday night. It was an easy one that is a kid favorite: orange chicken, rice, broccoli, and a beet & balsamic salad. I did it! And Tues night I did it again! A sit down dinner of strogranoff, rice, and broccoli, and a bowl of clementines. Daniel was so excited when he saw the rice and broccoli again, cause we always have that with Orange chicken. "Hooray! Orange chicken!" he cheered. I wonder if he'd get sick of it if we had it every night? He was very sad and cried when he saw it wasn't orange chicken - it was just some mashed up lumpy gray soupy stuff. Everyone else liked it though.

Corey had a big lunch so he wasn't hungry, and Lily had just come back from having dinner at the neighbors, but I made them come sit with us anyway. So hooray for me, I did two sit down dinners in a row. Natalie didn't eat very much, cause she really wanted to go redeem her Costa Vida gift card. She had won it in the school fun run, and I told her I'd take her after she got in 5 days consistent practicing of her violin, and she reached that Monday, but she was stuffed after the orange chicken so we decided to do it Tuesday. She ate a smaller bowl of dinner tonight and saved room for a Tres leches dessert for herself. 

They were out of strawberries though, darn. We remembered the good ol' days when Mel and Ethan worked there and gave us discounts and brought home orders that were never picked up. Good times. 

Today broke the 2 for 2 sit down dinner streak I was on, cause we had Halloween performances at Churchill - Lily in a music concert at 5:30 - here's one pic - 

and Abi's ballroom dance performance at 7. One pic of her - 

And she was Cinderella in this dance. Very pretty gown, huh!

I guess I could have a sit down dinner with half of the kids right after school at 4:30 before we head over to the school. It's good to try and focus on one thing at a time. This week it's dinner, and maybe we can all get in the habit of sit down dinners again.

One other thing from today - Around noon, Abi called and asked me if I'd let her skip school for the rest of the day. And in a moment of idiocy, I told Abi I'd call and get her a street pass so that she could skip out on the last 2 hours of school. "We're not doing anything since it's the end of the term" she said. Plus fall recess tomorrow, so I thought "ok". But then I got a call from the school at 2:30 letting me know that when Abi has a street pass, she's not allowed on school grounds. Doh! Apparently she and her friends were riding bikes around the school. So I felt really stupid and I'm never doing that again, I don't know why I did it today. If I had to run that by Corey, I would have been like "I'm not going to tell Dad that I'm getting you out..." so I don't know why I said yes. Again, just a complete lapse in judgement and clarity of mind.