Thinking it Over... Original and Revised.

Original Version

Family Tradition for Dinner

Ever since I can remember my family has always eaten dinner together around the table. Before the dinner is ready, either my sister or I would set the table and put all the dishes out. Once the food was ready we would out the food on the table and sit down to pray. At every dinner my dad, me and my sister would watch pray. After prayer we began eating whatever my mom made that night. Usually a casserole. We would talk about our days, how school and work went and whatever else was going on in our lives. After we were finished eating my mom would read family devotions and we would close in prayer. My sister and I would then take turns clearing the table and putting the dishes in the dishwasher.
Lately we have not been as consistent and we used to about eating dinner together. With my dad on a different diet, me working and my sister gone at college, we don't eat together as often as we used to. Our lives are getting busier so it can be more of a struggle to make time for a family dinner, but we still do it a few times a week when I am not working or out with friends. I don't really know too many families other than mine that pray and read devotions at dinner. It is always refreshing to be in a home where the family takes time to pray and eat dinner together. The devotions we read is a booklet that I get from my church. Dinner wouldn't always last very long. Usually 30 minutes at the most unless something exciting had happened that day.
This family tradition is one that i hope to carry on with my family when I have my own children. I think that spending time as a family together will be a great thing and teaching my kids to pray every night will be great.

Revised Version

A Family that Prays Together Stays Together

Dinner time has always been a special time of the day for my family. Ever since I can remember my family has sat down around the table at dinner time and ate as a family. Prior to dinner, either my sister or I would set the table and get everything out and ready for dinner while one of my parents was making dinner. Once the food was ready we would all sit around the table together and pray before our meal. First, my sister would pray, then me, and then finally my dad would pray. When I was younger I was always a little embarrassed when people would come over for dinner because none of my other friends ever prayed before a meal and especially not three times. It would always be awkward when the guest would open their eyes and start to eat until the second prayer would begin and they would feel embarrassed. Being older, I now am grateful for the prayer time that my family shared around the dinner time because having been made to pray out loud before every dinner taught me how to pray in front of people. This skill has helped me in other parts of my life.

After the prayers, it was finally time to eat. Usually when my mom made dinner it was some kind of casserole. The times when my dad fixed dinner, we often had salmon or any type of barbequed food. As a young girl, I never liked what my parents were fixing for that dinner so I always asked to go out to dinner and rarely succeeded in getting my family to go out to dinner. While eating dinner, we would talk to each other and ask questions about our days and our plans for the next day. Dinner lasted around thirty minutes which gave us plenty of time to catch up on each others’ lives.

When we were all finished eating, it was time for my mom to read the family devotions. The devotions were read out of a small booklet that had a corresponding Bible verse with each message. Upon completion of reading the devotions, my mom would say another prayer and dinner time was over. It was now time for my sister and I to clear the table and help my mom wash the dishes.

As a child, I would have rather just eaten and gotten dinner over with. Looking back, I appreciated the times that my family spent together. The dinner time tradition has changed in recent years since my sister is now away at college and I am working a lot of nights. This change has made it difficult to eat dinner together and we are now eating out or picking up food more frequently. Although this has changed, my family is still very strongly connected. I hope that I will be able to carry out this tradition with my own family because I think it has a huge impact on the closeness of a family.