Mealtimes

I'm just wondering what you expect of your toddler at meal times.

We try a mix of eating together and him eating by himself, someone always sits with him though.

Recently his ability to sit still for more than a few minutes, seems to be getting worse he manages about 5 or 6 minutes before charging off we get him to say all done and wipe his hands he does seem to have finished and doesn't often come back asking for more later, what he eats can vary from virtually nothing to quite a lot, more often than not, not a huge amount but he doesn't snack heaps so that doesn't worry me.

Guess i'm just curious what others do and what should I expect of him, is 5 minutes ages really.

 

I have my meals with Gabrielle when we are both home. I expect her to sit at the table till we are both finished, even if she doesn't want to eat anything. If she says she doesn't want whatever is on offer I just tell her she won't be getting anything else and leave her be. She is good with breakfast and normally lunch and usually doesn't eat much (if any) dinner.

We eat together for breakfast and lunch but for some reason if we sit with DD at dinnertime she plays up and won't eat so it's better if we leave the room

gah today typical example, hungry mum, do you want dinner now, oh ok, so we both sat down with something I know he likes.

He happily tucked in ate for about 5 mins, then starts to wiggle, I try to distract saying anything or just starting conversation but end up saying please sit still, then he says all done, so I confirm and say if you are finished you can go so he does........then an hour later, he looks for it again, I don't want to make this a habbit but equally not sure how to stop it.

he sits and eats a really good breakfast with me and lunch is a bit ho hum, sometimes he's bothered sometimes not.

I guess I could try to say wait until i'm finished see how that goes.

Sounds familiar! DS eats earlier than us and eats at the table in his Mocka chair, which he can't get out of. I usually sit with him, to remind him about his food but he doesn't last long and he doesn't eat everything.

So I serve him less at tea time now - knowing that he won't give it a good go - and he'll have a sandwich or fruit for supper before bed. I'd love it if he could sit nicely and eat everything but he can't/won't and that's a battle I've chosen to work around.

I've also noticed that DS will eat more at a non-table setting, i.e. on the couch, but I don't want to compromise on the table, our couch is already a mess!