What kids want: Family dinners
Kiwi kids are sad they’re not spending time with their parents, according to a groundbreaking study into parents’ lifestyles. The Dinners Make Families survey of 521 children and 630 adults reveals 79 per cent of kids wish they could have more dinners together as a family. Many said their parents were too busy. Dinners, cooking, conversations – we’re simply spending less time with our families at home than a generation ago. Miller and Savanna Van Sambeek’s favourite day is Sunday because their dad cooks a roast and the whole family eat it together. During the week, long work hours as a business manager mean Adam Van Sambeek isn’t always home on time to eat with his wife Melle and their children. Miller, 10, loves the Sunday ritual of helping prepare dinner and talking about ‘‘all the fun things that I’ve done’’. Sometimes ‘‘it’s a bit sad’’ to have dinner without dad during the week but ‘‘he’s earning money so we can actually eat dinner so that’s nice,’’ Miller says, before adding that his mum is ‘‘an awesome cook’’. The study by independent researcher Sarah Woollett was commissioned and developed by My Food Bag and the Sunday Star-Times. My Food Bag founder Nadia Lim tries to set aside time to sit down for dinner with husband Carlos and their 2-year-old son Bodhi. ‘‘We find dinner ends up being a much happier, relaxed time when we involve Bodhi in the process of making and serving dinner – like helping to mix a few things and setting the table,’’ she says. ‘‘We make a point of putting our phones away as they can be such distractions.’’ Waikato University food psychology researcher Rebekah Graham says the survey illustrates how hard parents are having to work to keep a house and a family. Twenty years ago, families could live comfortably with one parent on a middle income working 40 hours a week, she says. Now young parents, particularly in Auckland, are struggling to find the time to have dinner together with their children.