So. Here we are. First week done. Not to spoil you or anything, but I think this will be easy to keep as a recurring feature, given the room for improvement. To recap, this was the plan for the week:
- Mon: pork fried rice, broccoli, apples, spinach salad
- Tue: leftover posole (from the weekend), cornbread, avocado, grapes
- Wed: baked chicken thighs, pasta with garlic and oil, carrot and celery sticks, steamed spinach
- Thur: Refrigerator Buffet! (need a refresher on this? check here)
- Fri: Octoberfest party with friends
Here’s the actual:
- Mon: pork fried rice, spinach and feta salad, bananas, cucumber and celery sticks. 7:15 pm. people attending: 4. Score: 1 point.
- Tue: leftover posole, chicken and stars soup, wheat bread, spinach and feta salad, apples, avocado. Broccoli forgotten in microwave. 7:00 pm. people attending: 5. Score: 1.5 points.
- Wed: cheese pizza from the freezer, cucumber slices. 8:00pm. people attending: 2. Score: 0 points.
- Thur: broiled salmon, broccoli, blackberries, caesar salad, butter noodles, pesto, cucumber and carrots. 7:15 pm. people attending: 5. Score: 2 points.
- Fri: German food at Octoberfest. 7:00 pm. people attending: 3. Score: 0.5 points.
Wednesday was clearly the problem day, but Thursday was a good recovery. My scoring system is arbitrary, invented on the spot each night when I wrote down what we’d had for dinner. I took one whole point off if everyone wasn’t present, and a half point off for missing a food group. Out of a possible 10 points, this week was a 5. A flunk! With a plan, good intentions and internet accountability, I still fail family dinner.
Week 1
- Score: 5/10
- Plan followed?: 3/5
- Effort?: medium
Tomorrow is another day. Surely, next week will be better. Halloween can’t disrupt a whole week, right? RIGHT?
cheepieaustin 
I think your scoring is unfair. I would have scored you 4 out of 5. You can’t always control who eats when, especially as everyone gets older, so don’t include that in scoring. Wednesday was the only day to truly fall completely off the plan. Plus you pulled off an amazing sounding meal on a night that should have been refrigerator buffet. You did good.
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The who-eats-when thing is a problem. There are meetings, choir, sports: we’ve got all the usual things that make dinnertime crazy. Getting everyone to the table together is part of the goal, though! Family dinner! Not me and one kid dinner! So for now I’m keeping it 50% of the score.
I’ll admit that the week didn’t feel like a failure. We had three dinners at the table that were healthy, and everyone helped with set up and clearing. That’s a big step!
Numbers-wise, I’m interested if I’ll hit a wall at about 7.
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