Family time around the dinner table has always been important to me. Except, of course, when other, non-family adults are present. Until last year, my enthusiasm for let's-all-gather-around-the-table didn't extend to "real" dinner parties with my children present. If I was having guests over for dinner, I either farmed the kids out to a neighbor, or I employed an increasingly common dinner-party tactic: Let the kids eat first and get them out of the way so the adults can sit down to the real meal.

Then, in November 2011, my husband left for a yearlong deployment overseas. We had a sad, empty spot at our dinner table that my boys—then ages 11, 9 and 4—wanted to fill. They envisioned inviting their teachers and coaches—and even the president!—to dinner to sit in their dad's spot.

Inside, I panicked a little. Okay, I panicked alot. Because I've always sent my boys away during what seemed like the "important meals," they had no table manners whatsoever. They were not afraid to belch after a large meal or talk with their mouths full. The folded paper towels I use for napkins meant nothing to them. (Why use a napkin when you have a perfectly clean shirt to wipe your hands on?)

And yet, I was as desperate as the boys not to face my husband's empty chair for a full year.

We agreed to invite one person to dinner for each week my husband was gone.

In the beginning, I was terrified. I ate on the edge of my seat, ready to swoop in if my 4-year-old resorted to his favorite attention-getting tactic: mooning people. I coached the boys with my eyes and hissed under my breath in order to avoid total embarrassment: Please do not reach across your teacher's plate! My efforts were mostly futile. These were kids who had never been expected to join the "adult table," and now they were learning social graces on a steep, week-to-week curve.

About two months into our dinner project, I almost threw in the (paper) towel. My boys had wrestled on the floor in front of our minister, and they went to their rooms for Time Out during dinner with a representative from the local Good Shepard Food Bank. I didn't know if I could stand any more humiliation. I was sorry that I had let the public in to see what life at the Smileys' dinner table is really like.

And then an interesting thing happened. Our guests who witnessed the worst of my children's behavior (my youngest did moon the governor of Maine) didn't shun us—they moved in closer. They offered their support and help. "We've been there," they said. And, "we are parents, too." Suddenly I was surrounded by a growing village of people eager to help raise my three boys in the absence of their father. Our dinner guests returned to take the boys to baseball games or to play at the park. Many of them became father-figures, role models and confidants.

My boys' confidence at the dinner table began to grow. They were using their napkins and asking good questions. They had learned how to carry a conversation, when to listen, and when to let the guest talk. My oldest son, Ford, shook hands with our guests and thanked them for coming. My youngest son stopped mooning, even if he still delighted everyone with his personality and wit.

By the end of the year, we had dined with 250 different people, most of them strangers. Our guests included a U.S. senator, a Major League Baseball player, an Olympic Gold Medalist, a congressman, school teachers, artists, musicians, policemen and authors.

I can't say that my boys ever became model dinner party participants. They were still kids, and there remained the occasional tense moment (Ford told a politician, "You say you're not a democrat, but you talk alot like one"), when my cheeks flushed and I wanted to sink into the floor. For the most part, however, my children were growing. They were having life experiences I couldn't have given them if they were shooed away at the neighbor's or relegated to the children's table.

And yet, the greatest lesson from our year of dinners was for me. Although I wanted to hide our less-than-perfect family moments, I discovered that letting people in to see it all—good, bad, and full moon—brings the opportunity for support and mentors. Nobody's family is perfect. Most of us need help with this parenting gig. When you bring a outsider to the table with your children, you are giving them—and yourself—that chance.