Eating meals as a family is a great tradition for a reason. According to the Parents website, it can
motivate your kids to build better eating habits while improving their communication skills and
self-esteem. It can even enhance the entire family’s well-being—91% of those who eat together
regularly report feeling significantly less stressed.
Yet, though family meals are a great practice to follow in your home, it can be more challenging
if you’ve got smaller kids on board.
Keeping them comfortable and engaged at the dining table may be hard. To facilitate them and reap the benefits of eating together in the dining room, it’s thus essential to ensure you’ve got a kid-friendly area.
Try these tips to design a space your kids will love eating in.
Select a durable dining table
Choose a dining table that can accommodate your whole family easily.
Of course, your selection should match your current space.
Rectangular dining tables, for example, best fit narrow rooms.
They’re also great for multitasking—so your kids can use them for drawing or doing homework.
However, you’ll also want a table that’s durable and child-safe.
For example, wood, laminate, or metal tables are sturdier and safer than glass ones.
They’re also easy to clean and maintain, even if your kid makes a mess.
Meanwhile, round dining room tables like the reclaimed oak plank model from RH don’t have any sharp edges, which are ideal for families with younger and energetic kids.
These round tables also create a more intimate dining setting, making it more fun for your kids to talk over dinner!
Picking a dining table that can accommodate their energy will help them associate more positive emotions when eating.
Provide comfortable seating options
Your kids will not enjoy eating in your current dining room if chairs restrict their movement, are
too hard, or are too low for the table—causing them to strain just to reach their food.
Fortunately, you can choose from plenty of other options to suit their needs and preferences.
Using a dining set with bench seating could well be the ideal setup.
Benches are low enough for kids to reach and use without assistance, preventing scuff marks on your floor from pushing and pulling chairs.
Since they can be shared, they also promote togetherness within the dining area during mealtimes like round tables do.
Sets like the Pierce Espresso even come with a mix of benches and chairs to suit family members of every age.
Consider getting these with upholstery for added comfort.
Leather or pleather can provide excellent cushioning while being easy to clean, so you and your kids don’t need to worry about accidental spills.
Add storage to the space
Storage is already a must for the dining room, especially if you own multiple sets of cutlery and
dishware.
However, you can also use it to make the space more fun for your kids.
With even more storage, they’ll have room for their toys—effectively creating a dining space they’ll love
because it doubles as a playroom outside mealtimes.
If you want a versatile setup that can grow with your family, look at a dining room banquette with fixed seats.
Just like beds where you can add storage underneath, sets like those designed by Timmins + Whyte come with built-in drawers beneath the bench cushions.
This makes for a brilliant toy storage area that easily allows your kids to store everything from toys to iPads when it’s time for dinner.
You can also look at the additional storage offered by Triple Tree’s extendable dining table, which has a sideboard that doubles as shelving.
As an added bonus, such furniture can be convenient if you live in a smaller home or apartment.
Curate kid-friendly decor
Finally, make your dining room visually appealing, especially if you are short on space and will
be using the room as a play area for children.
Alexis Cosinuke, a designer from New York, adapted her dining room to accommodate her young children. Her advice is to add children-friendly accessories, like a mural or fun wallpaper so that it doesn’t feel so formal.
For example, you can line the floor with colorful rugs and decorate the walls with family photos or your kids’;
art.
And though you can always paint the walls in bright, airy colors like pastel pink, blue, green,
or purple, using wallpaper can help your kids feel like this space is a fun place to be.
Toddlers just beginning to recognize shapes and colors, for instance, may appreciate wallpapers with
simple dotted or striped patterns that can boost their cognitive development.
These small changes will not only boost your kids’ engagement and happiness in the room, but once they grow older, you will be able to easily switch back to something more formal.