This month’s theme for Family Dinner Book Club is Honesty, and our lead book is The Empty Pot by Demi. Here you’ll find a menu that can be prepared with the help of your children, as well as festive table decorations. Head over to Growing Book by Book for a full reading list of books about Honesty. Then visit Sunny Day Family for family activity ideas. We invite you to share a picture from your dinner with us anytime during the month on our Family Dinner Book Club Facebook or Instagram page!
Ping is a little boy living in China, surrounded by beautiful plants and flowers. It is time for the emperor to choose an heir, and to aid in his decision he gives each child a seed to plant. Ping struggles to grow his plant despite his best efforts. He chooses honesty when the time comes to present his plant to the emperor and his brave choice is greatly rewarded.
This month’s dinner menu includes a platter of plants (fruit) and some tasty empty pots with colorful seeds inside. Pudding dirt cups are a fun recipe to make with kids. They can measure, scoop, and mix, and then they get to immediately eat their creation instead of waiting for it to cook!
I stuck with the theme of seeds for the simple table decorations, too. We painted mini clay pots and filled them with dirt. Then we spread peanut butter on sticks, coated them in bird seed, and stuck them into our decorated pots. These mini bird feeders were a pretty table decoration during dinner, then we put them outside for the birds to enjoy. You can continue using your little pots as bird feeders, or you can clean them out and use them inside the house!
The Empty Pot
Family Dinner Book Club
Menu
Char Siu (Chinese BBQ Pork)
Steamed Rice
Stone Fruit Platter
Pudding Dirt Cups