I have a real paranoia about my kids' table manners - I am sure if we were living in England they would have mastered knives and forks by now. But the other day both Adam and Ellie had their knives and forks in the wrong hands, and so I went upstairs and picked out one of our plethora of farm animals to be the dinner pig.
So far, it is working like a charm. Table manners have not improved overnight, but the kids are much more aware of what they are doing that might earn them the pig. There is a lot less inhaling of whole potatoes directly from plates going on (a slight exaggeration, but not by much). Kate has not quite grasped it, she is still trying to get the pig whereas Adam and Ellie have a healthy dread of the pig already.
However, we have decided that Nicholas is exempt. Mostly for reasons like this.
2 comments:
I TOTALLY told my family about this. I need to find a pig to use. We have belching, huge mouthfuls, knees up...it is truly frightening. I've let some of it go because when dad is doing some of it too, what can you do? But my girls are old enough that it's disturbing when my own father is here eating with us. I'm totally going to try this. Did I ever show you the article from Seeing The Everyday? I wrote an article for them and they published it. It was about...dinnertime. :D
Fabulous idea!!
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