My friend Melinda, who worked as a personal organizer for 3 years, did an awesome home makeover with a young gal in our ward. I helped out one night and when I found out about all of Melinda's home management skills I wanted to pick her brain like a vulture on fresh road kill. Sorry... I don't know where that came from. Anyway, I slipped in a few questions yet also tried to exercise restraint and focus on the task at hand. (Melinda is all about focus.) Seeing my eagerness, Melinda assured me that she would help me... but later. Well, just so happened that I got the honor of feeding Melinda's cat and cleaning it's liter daily for two weeks while Melinda was away and Melinda graciously offered her services to me in exchange for doing pet care. You might be thinking this is a very uneven exchange and you are sooo right. Even if big, fat, cat did have 2 accidents, it is still nothing compared to the knowledge and inspiration Melinda has given me. The only way I can hope to alleviate some of my debt is by taking photos of Melinda's soon to be new born. (I'm praying that they turn out stellar.
Back to home management and Dicksons' Diner... I love that Melinda's whole philosophy goes way beyond keeping your floors shiny. It's all about making your home an efficient and happy place for your family. Part of doing that is creating traditions that will give your children consistency and pleasure now and something to smile about years from now. As she and I were chatting, I broke into a huge smile when I thought about my childhood Sunday food traditions- we always cheered when we found out Dad's homemade french fries were on the menu along with one of our quick and simple after church dinners of sloppy joes or pigs in a blanket. And almost every Sunday night brought a huge bowl of popcorn which was popped over the stove in a well blackened pan reserved specifically for this purpose. If we didn't have popcorn then it was donut night where we punched holes out of refrigerated biscuits, fried them, and then added cinnamon and sugar or chocolate frosting.
Sooooo, when talking about the art of meal planning it went beyond coming up with a four week menu plan and grocery list. How could I make something fairly ordinary like meal time something extraordinary. As Melinda said, you make something common a
special event and kids will thrive on it. I already had a soft menu plan that I used as a guide but didn't stick to it dutifully. I found myself making grocery lists from scratch every week and was very wishy washy about what we'd eat on what day. I had always loved the idea of theme nights but had only implemented it with partial success. Melinda helped me get this set in stone and got me thinking beyond what we were going to eat. My homework included coming up with a name for our very own family restaurant and we took that task up together at family home evening. Clair's Catastrophe gave way to "Dicksons' Diner: where big D's and little d's come to dish." 
These are the themes for each day of the week and what we do to make it special.
Sunday- Fine Dining- our nicest tablecloth, candles, and goblets
Monday- Mambo Italiano- romantic, instrumental Italian background music
Tuesday- Topsy Turvey (breakfast for dinner)- country style rooster place mats
Wednesday- Picnic- red and white checked tablecloth, paper plates and cups
Thursday- Chef's choice- (I need something for this one- any suggestions?)
Friday- Fiesta Ole- festive tunes from Vicente Fernandez
Saturday- leftovers and eat out- no frills required
I gave myself a whole month to let my ideas gel and come up with all of this stuff. And then last Sunday I was ready. We invited Marco, a friend from Dave's work and also from church, to the grand opening. He brought the entertainment. This proud new papa treated us to a slide show of his newborn daughter that is currently missing as he serves an unaccompanied military assignment here. He was just so funny. Olivia blurted out, "I can't stop smiling!" It was fun and I'm glad we could have a guest on our grand opening day.
This is our four week menu. The letters A, B, C, and D refer to grocery lists for each week. (I shop on Wednesdays.)
I'd love to hear what you do to make mealtime special at your house. And if anyone can give me an idea to give my Thursdays a little oomph I'd be grateful. (Thursdays theme is a little weak- chef's choice- it entails some sort of chicken or beef dish. Good luck.)
7 comments:
How fun Clair! I wish I was that clever! And I love that picture at the dinner table... Olivia's funny face and Dave in the backround just kickin' back, going with the flow! hehehe
I wonder if I'd be able to pull something like that off at our house... by the time I get off work and get Madison and Tai from daycare, then running errands and coming home and doing homework, I am lucky if I'm making something that doesn't require a microwave to heat and eat haha.
I like the concept, maybe I can make a couple changes for our schedule and make it work... the only "special" dinner thing that we do is pizza every friday. Kindof a tradition at our house... the kids love it and I love it cuz I know the dinner is always taken care of on friday.
Thanks for the idea!!
wow. i am overwhelmed just looking at this. you are amazing for implementing.
thursdays. hmm. maybe "try something new" night? chef gets to choose a new recipe and give it a try? family vote at the end of the meal to decide whether it's a keeper? this keeps the door open for trying a new frozen pizza, or perhaps sushi. i would love a follow up post to see how this is going after some time. sounds like a lot of fun.
Clair, this is such an amazing idea! My husband are already figuring out how to adapt it to our own family. I have never heard of this idea before and I love it. For Thursday we thought you could get a grown ups chefs hat and a kids chef hat. Each of your kids can take turns helping with dinner (you might already do this) whoever helps make dinner on Thursday night gets the kids chef hat and you wear the other one (or your husband if he was the main chef)
BTW I need your friend Melinda too, I think. You should have her be a guest blogger once a week with organizing our lives tips lol.
Ok Clair, I LOVE YOU! I was just thinking how I need to do a few more special things consistantly with the children. It is so sad how the only time we really do special things is when Justin is gone (Friday Family Fun Nite!) is an example. I LOVE theme nights and have tried to do this but of course I failed and slowly got back to my 4pm shuffle of finding something to cook. I love the name you chose, too cut and love the Big D and little d thing!
The only things that I do like I say when Justin is gone I let the kids (only the boys right now) choose a menu for a night and then I help them in prepare the food in the kitchen, then we do family fun fridays where we usually have a picnic on the living room floor and watch a movie while we eat our meal and then I do an appetizer night where I make appetizers for dinner, our favorites are these little bacon things in wontons with cream cheese and spinich, homemade lumpia, home made fried cheese, and homemade onion rings ... and what is appetizer night without a shake or a float!
Thanks for the great ideas!
Wow! Your awesome! Just reading your blog was making me tired!!! My kids love having dinner on a spread out blanket in the tv room once a month. They get to pick a movie and we eat one of the kids "favorite".
Clair,
That's awesome! I think you will definitely be glad you've implemented it. I love the focus your friend has put on things instead of just getting it done like you said. My idea for Thursday night actually sounds like what the other's have been saying! Matt's family, and now his sister's do it, have one night a week that is pick dinner night. They rotate through the family who gets to pick what they eat. And basically they get to pick whatever. Like one time I younger child picked popcorn and they all ate popcorn. And when the kids get older it helps them learn how to plan meals (side dishes that coordinate, etc.). And that got me thinking that you could have whoever's pick dinner night it is help you make it (if that's not considered a horrible chore). And the chef hat idea sounds awesome! I hope you share more ideas that you got from melinda!
What a fun idea! I may have to hold onto this one for a while, I'll let you know if I have any inspiration for your Thursday theme though.
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