Lately on the blog I’ve been talking a lot about how we spend our time. Finding time to sit down and have meals together is so important to our family. Keeping four young kids engaged long enough to be able to enjoy a family meal together is tricky! Well, the 10 month old is pretty good about sitting there since she’s strapped in her high chair. However, the other three are another story. This family dinner post is in partnership with Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are completely my own.
free printable placemats
My kids have always loved the coloring placemats that they get at restaurants. My kids will color and doodle to their heart’s content while the husband and I try to hold hands under the table. That’s parenting at its finest right there, people.
| Read: Cinco de Mayo Printable Placemat |
I decided to make a couple of reusable coloring placemats that we could use at home. Since I was making it anyway, I figured why not share the printable with you?! They’re sized for ledger paper (11 x 17″) so they’re perfect to fit under your dinner plate or soup bowl. I took my file to my local print shop and had them print and laminate them for me. To do both came in at under $7. This makes it totally affordable for something that we’ll be able to use for family mealtime over and over again! To color on them, your kids can either use dry erase markers, wet erase markers, or even crayons!
a fun family dinner
I thought I would make our maiden voyage with our new placemats extra special by finding something fun for dinner. Like most kids, my little ones love having foods featuring their favorite characters. So I was excited to find these cute new Goldfish® Special Edition! Cheddar Disney Pixar’s Finding Dory Crackers (in fun colors that have been sourced from plants) at my local Target. In my opinion, the perfect companion to crackers is soup and I was able to get some Campbell’s chicken soup with fun-shaped pasta featuring Disney Pixar’s Finding Dory characters as well.
How do you find time for family dinner when things are busy? What’s your favorite inspired mealtime idea?
15 Responses to finding time for family dinner
This is so cute! I love Finding Nemo/Dory too! Character packaging is just so much more exciting 🙂
Ah I am the worst at doing dinners! But I love those goldfish haha
Emmy Jake NYC
I love this idea!!! My little man has virtually no attention span for dinner, this would be awesome to help him out!
These are great! My niece and nephew would definitely love them 🙂 Thanks for sharing!
Such a great idea to make the reusable mats. I may have to print these out for my little ones. Thank you for a great idea!!
Thanks! My kids have really enjoyed using them at mealtime!
I love the placemats! Maybe they’ll help keep my two year old seated at the dinner table for longer than 5 minutes.
Thank you Christy! Good luck! 😉
Cute idea for kids! My little sister would love these.
Nellwyn | http://www.thecardinalpress.com
Thank you so much! Please share with her. 😉
I am trying to be better at finding time for family dinners, they are so important! The placemats are so cute!
It really can be hard Jessica, and we don’t even have older kids yet! I can only imagine how tough family time will be to find when we have teenagers with lives of their own! Ugh.
These placemats are so cute and such a creative idea. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks so much for stopping by! Glad you enjoyed them.
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