Making a Change in Dinner

Dinner together is something that is very important to us.  From the time that our kids were at least 9 months, they sat with us at dinner and ate what we ate for the most part.  It was important to us that from the beginning they learn about family meal time.  There are foods of course that little ones cannot feed themselves either because they are not ready to use a spoon and plate or because mommy doesn't like them to make super big messes.  Take applesauce or messy spaghetti for example.  That means of course that we have to eat our food while at the same time feeding the baby and making sure the older children have everything they need.  This causes some problems for impatient hungry little babies.  Mace is now screaming when he wants another bite if it has not been given to him fast enough.  This is through no fault of his own though.  For a year he was able to communicate with us in no other way than to cry.  That was the way he let us know he was hungry, tired, or dirty.  Now we have to break that reinforcement and get him to communicate with us in ways that do not cause pain to our ears.  (I'm not kidding...you should hear this kid scream.)  I remember going through this with the other two as well.  To break the yelling for food cycle, we introduce signing to our kids.  Drew only ever had a few signs because he talked early.  With Cade's talking issues he has quite a few that he learned and uses.  Tonight we taught Mace to sign "more".  When he yelled for a bite I said "more" along with showing him the sign.  He immediately did the sign and got a bite and gave us a big smile.  This happened three times tonight and he did the sign right away every time we showed him.  It's just amazing to me how quickly they can pick up on things.  He has also recently started giving high fives and waving bye.  It's fun that you can show him something one time and see him start to do it.