What time do you eat dinner?

[jikki]

We've eaten dinner at around 6-ish for as long as I can remember - it suited us while the girls were very young.

Now I'm wondering if bumping it back to 7-ish might suit better, now that the girls are getting older. Living in Nth Qld, 5-6pm, is the best time of evening to be outdoors, and who can be doing that if you're trying to cook dinner? We've also now got taekwondo twice a week at 6pm, which has been throwing dinner plans into chaos.

I know you don't have to have a set time to eat dinner, but my girls WANT one! They like definites, and always want to know exactly when they might expect to get fed!! :rofl

So, what time do you eat in your house? And who are you 'catering' for??

We eat (for now) at 6-ish, and there is me, DH, DD9 and DD4.

[Sarasvati]

Um anywhere between 6:30 and 7:30 usually. I would rather eat earlier but am disorganised. And yes it's all down to me as the dude isn't home till after 6.

[Beatrice]

Anywhere between 4:30 and 9:30 :uhh

We play it by ear. I feed the kids something simple if I think they're likely to clunk early. Other times I don't get my act together to cook until after 8.

[Ceres]

When we're hungry, and when it fits in with the day really. I usually start preparing dinner about 5ish and am aiming to get DS started on the bedtime stuff at around 6.30 if we've just been hanging around the house all day (by the time we've done baths and stories and picked up toys it's 7.30) but I'm totally flexible. Now that daylight savings has started we'll probably be eating later as there's so many more interesting things to do in the evenings!

[Belinda]

My children freak out if they get hungry, esp if they are tired,:lemmeout so I try very hard to get tea on the table at about 5. But my children are still really young too, and I like to have a routine, keeps me sane, and my children really seem to prefer it.

[Ayla]

What Beatrice said :lol We eat when we're hungry.

[Harmony]

6 is ideal for us, A is growing out of her day sleep...well she isn't really, she'll still crash for a couple of hours but she wants to do it at 3pm lately instead of 1, and wakes up really cranky for hours, then cheers up about 7 and parties until 10 :lol Anyway, 5.30 works a little better for her but 6 is a good compromise. Later than 7 is no good for them, the whole house melts down.

[Beatrice]

My kids graze a lot, so I don't really worry about whether they've eaten dinner per se. We get meltdowns if they haven't had enough protein, so I address that when it happens and try and keep ahead of it with what snacks I offer.

[GreenGully]

I like to have dinner ready by 6pm if J is tired, but really it could be any time depending on what else has happened that day

[gypsyoak]

it depends on whats happening that day, whether it gets dark early or not, when dh gets home etc. It is never before 6 and usually before 9. DD has sufficient food to compensate for whatever time dinner is. She is starting to be ready to crash by 7:30, so in an ideal world it would be 6ish, but sometimes we are out picking dh up. (1hr round trip to bus stop)

[Mama_Kaz]

Umm yeah whenever we get there :lol Jaz grazes throughout the day so she just eats when she's hungry. We usually eat between 6.30 and 8.30 unless we're having a particularly slow day :lol

[Janet]

We eat when dinner's ready. :lol

[trust]

Depends on the day and what we are cooking. If something has been in the slowcooker then we might eat it early (usually because it is smelling so damm good) otherwise it is usually about 6ish.

I try and do some dinner prep during the day/early afternoon most days so it is easier at arsenic hour.