What is your policy on where the kids eat?

ArcticFox

What I mean is.. where are the kids allowed to eat at home?  Can they only eat at the table/highchair?

I'm so bad about this.. I let my DD snack on the couch or take a juice box and go play or whatever.  It definitely depends on the snack - like a bowl of goldfish or some grapes are fine - but I would never let her take blueberries or a PB&J or anything messy.

This is so not funny - but funny - we were looking for an area rug for the longest time (7x10') and they were all like $300 until I found one for $80 that was pretty nice.  I told DH, 'why bother spending a lot on a rug that is going to get spit up on etc'?  Wouldn't you know, DD spilled an ENTIRE chocolate milk on the rug the DAY we got it!!  I usually am more careful about stuff that stains but fortunately we got it all out of the rug

JillAly

I'm terrible about it too.  I have a small apartment (we're looking to buy a house) so the dining room table if used more for storage than eating.  DS automatically goes to the couch to eat/drink and our ottoman is covered in maple syrup because he'll only use the ottoman for his pancakes.  Our high chair (the space saver that goes on a chair) is gathering dust!

bim38106

meals have to be at the table. No exception. 

Snacks she always eats in the family room though... unless it's some thing messy of course. But it's still not always ideal. And it's a tough habit to break! She spilled a ton of sun flower seeds all over the floor the other day and then DD2 got up and was wanting to crawl around and it was just a mess. I should have known better!

Milk she drinks in her bean bag chair all the time, but she's still using a sippy cup that doesn't leak. So it's not a problem yet... but I know she'll be switching to regular cups soon and I kind of wish we hadn't created this bad habit!

VTbride05

DS is only allowed to eat at the table, unless we are having a snack together on the deck. Once in a great while he might have a non messy snack on the rug in the living room, but that is very rare.

brightning

Only in the kitchen. 99% of the time she eats at her chair, but sometimes she wants a drink of milk and I let her just stand in the kitchen. Once in a blue moon I let her bring a bowl of dry Cheerios into the livingroom. It doesn't feel like being strict because I've never allowed her to do it.

All of the stains in our livingroom are from DH!

MamaNikki

We try to eat most meals during the week at the dining room table.  Sometimes (if we're eating fast food/pizza/it's the weekend) we eat in the living room together.  DS can eat snacks at his little kid's table in the living room, but he has to stay at his table.  We have hardwood floors.    If it was carpeted, that would be another story.

lami22005

I'm pretty  relaxed with this, too.  We let the kids have their straw sippies in the living room, but no regular cups...If they're drinking/eating something messy, they have to be at their little table or in their high chairs-spaghetti would never be eaten in the living room, unless I'm being lazy and feeding it to them.   It's not unusual for them to eat a bagel, banana, etc. in the living room.  I dislike it that I've allowed this, but with three, working full-time, etc. I've allowed things that probably never would have been with only one. 

Rink08

We eat meals in the kitchen. He eats most snacks in there too. The exception is dry rice crisps or pretzels if they are in a small ziplock bag. He can eat them in his playroom as long as he sits in one of the chairs. If he spills he has to help clean it (with hand vacuum) and finishes eating in kitchen. As soon as he switched from sippy cups to open mouth cups we made it so that drinks have to stay in the kitchen. He'll just put it on the table- go play- come back and take a drink- play again.

I figured I should explain that we use ziplock bags for all dry snacks so that we do not have to waste a bowl. If he doesn't finish the snack. we just zip it and put it in his snack cabinet for a later time.

ali2005jason

We usually eat in the living room (we live in an apartment). Our "dining room" is the play room since they have too many toys. The kids do sit at a little table though so they aren't on the floor. It's not a big deal to me because we still do talk while we're eating. Once we get a house, I will be more into the eating at the kitchen table kind of thing. It's hard to do right now in our apartment setup.

Halo79RN

we've gotten relaxed about it too. my only rule is the entire family be in the room together so we can talk. we do plenty of living room picnic dinners and watch movies together or chat. we sit at the table more when dh is not at home/working late.  IDK why?  they just flock into the kitchen while I'm cooking more when he's not home, so we stay put. 

 

I will add, part of the issue is we don't like the eating space in this house (rental/temporary home) and we need a new kitchen table and chairs.. need bigger now.  but we still deck it out for holidays and many dinners.  

RobinSparkles214

I am awful about letting DS eat in the living room. But I usually make more of a mess than he does. Sometimes I wish that I wasn't so relaxed about it because then when I do want him to eat at the table sometimes he doesn't want to sit still.

Pesky

Meals at the table.  Anything messy, at the table.  Snacks can occasionally be eaten in the den.  The carpet is so old and gross that I don't care about more messes.  I figure I'll replace it when the kids are older.

jlw2505

My house has horrible light carpet so for the most part, all food and drink stays in the kitchen.  (the carpet will be gone as soon as I save up the money!!).  They can take straw cups of water/milk to other places but we mainly use real cups at the table only.  We will sometimes do picnic dinners for special treats upstairs by the TV (to watch a football game or a movie) but not very often and we bought the kids cute TV trays for this.  We do have some snacks upstairs as well but like you, only with limited foods.