The kids have turned into cavemen at the table lately. Laughing hysterically, jumping up and down, chewing with their mouths WIDE open, etc. I even found Eve on the table one day. Like that’s ok?! I’ve been threatening a manners crack-down for awhile, but of course threats serve no purpose so the other day I did some research (I ♥ the Internet!) and found a good manners game. Actually, I found several manners games that I merged into our own unique thing.

This evening we created a list of manners we could all agree on. Lex was done eating first so he agreed to be the scribe. We did some brainstorming, came up with ideas, merged, discussed, deleted, and finally settled on six key manners. I am not saying these are all the table manners that children need to know, but these will be the ones we start with.

The first draft of our manners list.

Once we had the list pared down to an easy six items that we all could agree on, Lex offered to re-write the list “because this one is kind of messy and hard to read.” He grabbed the markers and went to work.

The final draft, hanging on the wall in the dining room. I wanted to frame it, but Lex objected.

At this point you may be wondering why Lex is so eager to participate in this manners game. A game that will involve no reading at the table. *gasp* The reason for his eagerness, and Eve’s as well, is that the game involves M&Ms, of which we have 2.5lbs left over from Lex’s basketball cake!

Starting tomorrow each person at the table will get five M&Ms. “At every meal?” they asked. “Yes, at every meal,” I replied. “Even breakfast…?” they ask. “Yes, even breakfast.”  “Wooahh…” said two big eyed children. Each person starts with five pieces of candy and when they see another person (including a parent, a rule that thrills them!) using bad table manners they can take one of that person’s M&Ms. So if I see Eve not sitting in her chair I can take one of her candies, giving me six and her only four. At the end of the meal everyone eats the M&Ms at their place. So if you have a good meal, use good manners, and pay attention to what’s going on you could end up with a nice bit of candy for dessert. If you use bad manners and get silly or spaced out, you could end up with nothing. They are pretty excited about this!

Alan and I discussed the merits of candy at every meal. Other games I saw involved using marbles to earn desserts, but that only works at dinner time and requires me to have dessert available every night. This way everyone gets a little treat and we don’t have tons of dessert laying around. I reminded him that we also used candy for potty training. Maybe the strategic use of candy is just part of parenting. :)

Tomorrow morning, game on! Wish me luck!