We took away our kid's electronics.... here are the results

     I get home from work on Saturday to find the boys eating at the bar in our kitchen and wife on the table. Normal behavior until I did a double take and noticed that the boys were not on their tablets. I was a little taken back. Whenever we have the boys by ourselves, we usually give the boys tablets at dinner time to regroup from the day and keep them occupied while we clean up and prepare for the next day. I asked what happened and 

Sarah said, "I took away the boys electronics"

Me: "Even the switch?"

Sarah, "Even the switch"

Me: "Cool"

    We had been debating this move for a while now as we have "lost" our boys to their electronics. They never want to hang out with us, run to the grocery store or pretty much anything. It's all tablets tablets tablets. All the time. We rationalize the behavior by it's been a long weekend, they had a long day at school, etc. 

    Truth is I was too much of coward to pull the cord. Sarah was not.

    I braced for screaming and begging for electronics.

    It was quite the opposite. Our kids were more engaged. Hudson even engaged us in conversation at the dinner table. Take tonight for example, I asked Hudson to build his perfect Thanksgiving plate. He thought about it for a min then replied. Turkey and Pumpkin pie. Hey! good answer. Then he asked, "Mommy, what do you like?" It was really cool moment. After dinner we played a board game called Don't rock the Boat. As in Hudson was engaged in the rules, Noah participated a bit then got bored and played with some of the 3D prints that I made. Still a victory in our book as he did not ask for a tablet. During the game Hudson came up with an idea for another game. We looked at prints to make and set a plan to print them. It was fun to get the creative juices going! 

    Even our nighttime routine went well. Both boys cleaned up the game, cleaned up the playroom and went upstairs to get their jammies on (no arguments either) settling down for the evening.

    Sarah turned to me, "We should have done this a long time ago"

    Yep.

    Our kids our more engaged with us. They want to talk to us, want to play games (non-electronic games).

    This little experiment that we conducted has been a huge success (so far). We have decided to keep the experiment going indefinitely.

    For the parents looking to re-connect with their kids I suggest you take away electronics and limit your own screen time.