Dining Toddler Style

Last summer sometime we quit going out to restaurants as a family. Cold turkey, quit. I don't remember if there was a particular incident, but I remember Andy and I both having that feeling that it just wasn't worth it to spend the money on a meal that we either didn't eat, ate cold, or picked up off the floor while shushing impatient babies and cajoling a fidgety twit of a 3-year-old. We decided we could meet friends and family at our house or theirs and increase our potential for enjoyment.

A few weeks ago a twin-mom friend of mine convinced us to meet them for dinner at The Spaghetti Factory, saying it's very kid-friendly and inexpensive. We decided to try it. After all, the twins could actually sit in highchairs now and eat off the menu. Perhaps it was because we were with another family with three kids under 4-years-old, or because The Spaghetti Factory is pretty loud, but we deemed the adventure a success. The kids ate. They were entertained by crayons and/or crackers. They didn't appear to disrupt the diners around us. Seeing all the other kids making a mess of the floor made me feel confident that the people who work there are used to dealing with toddler-tossed food. We had fun, Ailey had fun, and Marin and Silje enjoyed the food and new surroundings.

Last week we went out to a restaurant for Andy O's birthday. I've always thought of Applebees as kid-friendly and they have a good kid menu. Things weren't going our way from the beginning, however. We had to wait almost an hour for a table by which time it was an hour past usual dinner time for the kids. Ailey did fine, but Marin and Silje were hungry and bored with their new surroundings by then. It took some convincing to get them to eat when the food came. I hardly remember the taste of my BBQ ribs as I spent the majority of my energy doling out pieces of food, shoving the tossed food under the highchairs, shushing the screaming, etc.

I had my back to most of the people around us and was convinced that they were all getting close to mutiny with Silje's shrieking outbursts and being pelted, undoubtedly, in the head with french fries. Andy assured me that "most of them were entertained" by Marin and Silje's antics and that they were actually smiling at us. But he might just have been trying to avert my attention from the mob that was forming with a "No Screaming Banshees in our Restaurants!" banner. Then again, maybe it was one of those things that seems worse when you're the one responsible.

As for our own party, I honestly don't know what went on at the other end of the table. Perhaps Andy O enjoyed his birthday dinner (I don't think food was tossed in his direction) and was able to carry on uninterrupted adult conversation (I think people in our lives have lately developed selective hearing necessarily). Between outbursts and/or when I intentionally ignored Marin and Silje myself, I was able to catch up on Amy's life a bit. Hope your birthday dinner was good, Wise Andy!

Now don't go rushing to the phone to invite us out to dinner, I'm not sure when we'll be brave enough again. But when you do I think we'll take a reservation at The Spaghetti Factory.