Heather and I used to love to eat out. That was kind of our thing, in fact. Back in the day our weekends revolved around dining at exciting new restaurants or old favorites, but then we became parents. Having a kid changed things, but not entirely. We still eat out – just now with a maddeningly unpredictable (yet adorable) third member of our party – and lately I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m pretty much over it.
It’s funny… when I first became a parent I thought eating out was going to be cake because Maddie always slept quietly in her car seat the whole time. I remember leaving restaurants, smug, and saying stuff like, “What are these parents complaining about? Maddie was perfect! Didn’t make a peep!”
It wasn’t long, though, before eating out with a kid got a lot more complicated. Soon eating out meant:
~Ordering my meal as fast possible. I’m used to saying, “Actually, I think we’re ready to order now!”
~Picking restaurants based on whether they hand out crayons with the menu.
~Eating with one hand while coloring with the other.
~Interrupting my meal to change a diaper.
The worst part is the constant stress that comes with trying to eat out with a kid. Heather and I are hyper aware of the possibility that Annie might disturb others, so we’re always poised to whisk her outside as quickly as possible. Eating out with a toddler is kind of like living on a fault line. Things may be quiet at the time being, but that can change fast – and I can never relax.
Parent tip: Yo Gabba Gabba on your phone is a must.
To be fair, Annie is a good kid the vast majority of times we eat out, but it’s stressful nonetheless. And while I’m being a grumpy old man, can I say I refuse to spend seven bucks on food I can make her at home for a dollar? Those seven bucks would be well spent, however, if I could relax and have a conversation with my wife that wasn’t like this:
“I agree, I feel like this election is going to be… Put down the fork! … a real seminal moment for… What? Yes, Elmo does live on Sesame Street …you know, America, and… More milk? Okay. We’ll get more once the waitress comes back… What were we talking about again?”
Basically, I’m not sure it’s worth it to keep eating out with Annie until she is a little older, but at the same time I don’t love the idea of only eating out when we’re able to find a babysitter.
Too bad she isn’t always this easy to eat out with:
Cause trouble? Who, me?
Katrina @ They All Call Me Mom says:
Ahhh, this post makes me laugh! “Eating with one hand while coloring with the other” — I can so relate to that! And why do they only give you 3 crayons? What happened to the box? We need the entire box! Because what, they give you red, blue and yellow. Then the toddler drops the blue crayon and won’t be appeased with just the red or the yellow, so you have to crawl under the table to get the blue one. Then in the next minute, she’ll drop the red crayon and you find yourself back under the table again. This wouldn’t happened if we had the entire box of 24 or 36 crayons! Damn those cheap restaurants with their 3-crayon-only rule!
NoL says:
The whole reason breakfast out became the dinning norm at our house. Kid has a longer patience level, and the 7 am crowd is usually charmed by a toddler.
Annalisa says:
Depends on the toddler. The last time we took our toddler out to breakfast… oooooh boy. Let’s just say it didn’t go well. Didn’t help it was superpacked trendy restaurant (that we always loved, but is now always ridiculously packed with people).
What we’ve found works is to eat someplace where the waitstaff likes kids enough that they interact with them, and is not too busy to do so. Our favorite sushi place right now is within walkable distance of our place. Not only is the food spectacular, it’s also not packed to the gills every single night, since it’s near tons of other restaurants. If we pull off getting there before the “dinner out” crowd shows up on an off day (read: in and out before 8 PM on a Monday night), it’s a pretty relaxed experience since the hostess has enough times to have conversations with our toddler (they love her there… and she knows, so she turns on the charm big time).
lb says:
With one kid, we ate out. With two kids, we ate out a little. With the third kid, we just stopped entirely. I remember the moment like it was yesterday. The big two were being annoying and the baby reached for something and spilled a big glass of chocolate milk right in my shoe. I just looked at my husband and said “Never again”. And we didn’t eat out with the kids for about 5 years, at least not when there was any other option. But now the little one is six and we are more able to brave the occasional restaurant and have it not end up in (my) tears. I’m sure there’s a lot to be said for training kids to be good in restaurants at a young age, but I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t spend $70 to take our family of 5 out for a meal that I could make at home for $15 if I wasn’t going to enjoy it.
Lindy says:
keep at it! We’ve taken our daughter out to eat whenever we go out. First few years were hell… hell I say HELL! But we kept at it. Slowly the wisking them off mid scream comes around less and less. Pack a “restaurant” bag- filled w/ cheap toys, pencils, crayons, and paper. If you do that you don’t have to worry about crayons w/ menus. Also you don’t have to worry about the nuclear meltdown that happens then the PINK CRAYON OMG THERE IS NO PINK CRAYON AND NO OTHER COLOR WILL DO!!! Like I said it gets better. My recently turned 6 yr old is a STAR restaurant goer but it was a hard slog to get there. I don’t think kids will ever learn how to behave if you don’t expose them to situations. Good luck!
Jennifer says:
Oh 100% agree! With two kids mine would fight over crayons because they would only get one of a particular color between the two…or no green! NO GREEEEEN! So yes I learned to save and carry the crayon reserve as well.
Jessica Makuh says:
This post was awesome. So true! My kids are 6 and 4 now and I have to say it has gotten easier. We are enjoying eating out with them even more recently. You have something to look forward to! In fact, they like certain restaurants now and request them. We can also talk to them about the restaurants and the different food and they contribute to the conversation. It’s nice!
Amanda says:
This post made me laugh! And your attempt at having a conversation with Heather while eating out is spot on. Often, my husband and I will just look at each other like “why do we even bother trying to have a conversation?” and I’ll say to him, “never mind, I’ll talk to you again in 16 years”. I often equate taking our kids out of their environment (i.e. our home) to me being an octopus because I feel like I have to have eight arms to grab and catch everything and anticipate everyone’s next move. And let’s not even talk about that moment in a restaurant when your son suddenly goes still in his highchair and an alarm goes off in your head alerting you to the fact that he’s about to hurl his fork at the people at the next table, and the next 3 seconds play out in slow motion as you hurl yourself across the table to tackle him. LOL! Good times :)))
S says:
This reminded me just how much I miss eating out at restaurants. As the sole chef in the house (and not a very good one at that), I yearn to sit in a place where someone else has to cook and do the dishes for me. Takeout sometimes appeases me just fine, but it’s not the same. You’re right. Toddlers do not make it easy or relaxing.
I just keep thinking that some day we will all be able to eat in restaurants again. Some day!
Casey says:
I can SO relate. Our daughter is almost 4, and while it’s not “horrible” or “awful” – it’s just not fun. We are interrupted every 3 minutes, and can’t hold a conversation. So unless it’s some place like Panera or fast food, we just don’t even bother these days…don’t really want to spend $15 on a meal we can’t enjoy. I always wish we had “free” babysitting swaps with other parents. Why don’t we all do that more?!
traci says:
Keep eating out so that she will learn how to act in a restaurant. Keep it to simple quick family places. BTW – my kids are 12, 10 and 8 and I still order asap, it just makes everyones life easier. I look at the menu online if it is a new place have everyone know what they want and be ready to order.
ColleenMN says:
I agree with the traci, keep eating out. Eventually they will be great dinner partners! Go at times that work with their schedule so they aren’t tired or excessively hungry. Let them have a nutritous snack a short time before so you don’t worry about what they eat at the restaurant (bread, crackers). Skip the awful kids’ menu and order something from the appetizer menu; those are usually small portions and are delish. When she acts up, just calmly leave and take a moment for her to get herself back together; she’ll get the idea. Don’t be afraid to leave if it’s really bad. We never had to do that but we did have our moments.
Lisa says:
Going out to eat is just as stressful for me and my hubby. We cannot finish one sentence without being interrupted. It makes me nuts to keep constantly hearing my own voice repeating “sit down, be quiet, color another picture, please! eat your dinner, SIT DOWN! WE ARE SPEAKING!!”. It is endless and our daughter is 4. I would have thought that she would be more, um, calm by now. But that does not seem to be happening. And eating in our home is pretty much the same. Last night was a major challnege just to eat for 15 minutes without the constant “watch me dance, look I am a ballerina, mommy my ballet shoe is untied AGAIN!, mommy, mommy, mommy, MOMMY!!!!!!!!!!!”. It was all I could do to stay at that table instead of running to the bathroom, sitting on the toilet and enjoying my steak. I can only pray that this stops soon. I sound like a mean old lady, but man it is tough to eat with a child. How people can manage eating (somewhat peacefully) with more than one child is beyond me. So the steak in the bathroom sounds like a perfect solution for now. Food for thought: make sure your bathroom is big enough for a table and two chairs if you have children. It may lengthen your life!!
Zoë says:
My husband feels the same way as you, but an old boss of mine gave me great advice (which I see echoed by others here): “How will kids learn to behave in restaurants if they never get to eat out?” Now we don’t go out often, because we’re on a budget (plus we have three kids), but when we do, we discuss restaurant behavior with the kids – no screaming/fussing/whining, no peering over the back of the booth at our neighbors, no hiding under the table – then we tell them what they’re not supposed to do. Seriously. They giggle and roll their eyes at our foolishness, but everyone relaxes and has a good time, and every now and again, a stranger will come up and compliment the kids on their behavior. I think it helps that they see us managing the kids too, by making sure they behave, and not letting them run riot. Plus we go out early, so we don’t have tired kids or a packed restaurant. So go on, give it a try. You all deserve a nice night out.
Amber says:
My husband and I were both apparently “mini adults” in this regard. Never caused trouble at a restaurant, EVER. He seems to think that this will mean any future child of ours will behave the same way, but I’m very nervous. I have seen ALLLL the stuff mentioned above and also live in a city where kids are not really loved in restaurants (SF), so the risk factor seems high!
Annalisa says:
As I said in reply to another comment above, the key is not where, but rather when. We live near downtown Seattle, with a toddler. There are more people with dogs or cats living here, than people with children under five, and dog parks to match. Often, we’re the only people in any given local restaurant with a toddler.
In order to be able to avoid offending the child-free crowds (who are often not very polite about it… and from whom I got random venom just by being pregnant and in a restaurant), we try to dine out on days where there are sport events, which means that crowd is elsewhere, or on “off days”.
Many restaurants do most of their business between Friday night and Sunday nights. We avoid eating out on weekends like the plague, unless we have a sitter. It’s just easier to do takeout. Monday and Tuesday nights are much better “dining out with wee ones” nights, since many good restaurants only see 1/2 to 1/3 of their regular crowd on those nights. The magic hours too are between happy hour and dinner crowd times. That means being prepared to walk in to eat at 6:30 PM and be out no later than 7:45.
Some places you’ll just have to give up. I’d love to do fusion Asian, Hungarian, or Mediterranean food. But truth be told, unless a restaurant has stuff that my daughter recognizes as food, it’s gonna be an uphill battle. So we stick to Asian noodle places, full service Japanese restaurants (i.e., sushi but also noodle dishes), Italian and contemporary american cuisine. We save more adventuresome dining for nights when we can get a sitter.
Heather says:
We always just took the kids with us. It was teaching them how to eat in a sit down restaurant. Yeah, it was a little tricky but looking at my (obviously perfect, har har) kids eating at a restaurant now I can see that it was worth it. The manners aren’t perfect, but they’ve long known what it and is not acceptable.
Look at it this way. Annie will scribble on paper instead of drawing a “perfect” lion, but if you took way her markers when she did she wouldn’t have a chance to learn how to draw.
Melissa S. says:
Mike – I am dying laughing! I have a “excitable” 21 month old (and one who was the same when she was that age!) who is always unpredictable when we are dining out! And that picture of Annie watching Yo Gabba Gabba at the table is us to the T!! That is all Keira will watch and that will keep her entertained – so NetFlix with all the Gabba episodes is a necessity! Now she wants to hold the iPhone and watch it, which is a problem because when she doesn’t get what she wants, she throws things!!! Something new everyday with these kids!!
Susan A says:
I don’t know if anyone has already mentioned this but to save money on kid’s meals, we often just share our dinner with my son. Portion sizes are often so large that it helps me out if I share with him. And if needed, order a side salad for my first course and share that as well. Plus, he should get exposure to different food besides the same choices of chicken nuggets, hamburger or pizza ;o)
Valerie L says:
I feel where you are coming from. I find that I still take my son out to eat more to teach him proper eating-out habits. Doesn’t mean it is tons of fun for me, but valuable for him.
Kimberly says:
My husband feels the same way as you do. But I always wants to take my 5 and 2 year old out to eat so that they can learn and also taste different types of foods. Also we donot order from kids menu ever. We always ask for extra plates and give them small portions from our food since the portions are already too big for one person to finish. Also we also share the appetizers. Nevertheless, we have had to leave the restuarant a few times because of meltdowns and screaming. But most of the times they kind of behave. But I have to agree with you about conversations. They are usually interrupted too many times to make any sense.
I agree that you have to pack a snack and some favorite toys in case of emergencies :).
Jennifer says:
I don’t know-I feel like if you don’t eat out regularly, then they don’t know what to expect. They don’t know how to sit and wait-stuff like that. My two are 20 months apart and when my little one was around a year, they were a nightmare. We would occasionally have to take one out to the car, and put them in their car seat for a time out. Loads of fun for the parent stuck with that duty, but it worked and they are wonderful to eat out with now and have been for quite some time. I never allowed mine to stand in the seat and bother everyone-and sure we had our bad nights, but as the preparer of food on a nightly basis it was STILL worth it.
hdj says:
We have one and she’s mostly well behaved. I get annoyed if she’s tired and lays down but it’s been a long time since we’ ve had “toddler” issues. But we would go to more family friendly places, play games with her, bring books and let her play games on our phones.
Now my biggest issue is that she’s such a good eater, she won’t eat off the kids menu and always – ALWAYS – picks THE most expensive thing to order.
elissa says:
I think the same thing. But I also feel that if I never take my kids to restaurants they will never learn how to behave in one.
Ali says:
Agreed and then some. Our boys are 2.75 and 11 months. It’s a challenge to dine out. Actually, the baby is great. It’s the toddler. We base our restaurant choice on the noise level. Otherwise, he’ll have some sort of Tourette’s outbreak every few minutes and scream something unintelligible just to hear his own “echo.”
Tamara S. says:
Once we had two young kids we pretty much gave up on eating out. It just always drove me crazy to be spending lots of money on food that we don’t get to enjoy because of the antics of toddlers. But my toddlers are not entertained for very long with coloring and crayons- that may buy us five minutes if we are lucky. We’d be willing to take our almost 5 year old out to eat because generally she’s better behaved now at the table- but my son that was born the same month as Annie- no way!!!! It truly has made our life so much simpler getting a sitter when we go out to eat.
Keri P says:
haha…Mike, I feel your pain. We’ve always taken our kids to restuarants so they would get used to dining out, but we know our limits. We don’t go to fancy places, or places where food takes more than an hour. Our kids are two and four now and we went to Outback on Sunday night (it’s loud/kid-friendly) and had a great (uneventful) dinner. Then just as we were about to leave, my son said he had to poop and my daughter chimed in that she did, too. Really loud. I turned red and the teenagers next to us started to giggle. Oh good times…Someday we’ll go somewhere nice again
Tara says:
We have a 2.5 year old and we go to places that are really loud. I really miss the Vietnamese place we used to go to; the staff loved our son and would pick him up and carry him around and show him everything. It was so nice!
Bonna says:
I do not have any interesting memories of eating out with my children as toddlers. I have two that are four years apart. I think we always planned things AFTER the nap. Not sure – it seems so long ago although they are only 14 and 10. I may have selective memory, but I think the kids were fine as long as they were occupied with the kids’ menu and crayons (or any other diversion the restaurant tried to come up with) or the complimentary bread. Pretty sure it was the bread. The problems came when they became older. The bickering between each other over NOTHING of substance! Absolutely nothing…
Ashley says:
Thank you. Thanks for reading my mind…. Something else that irritates the crap out of me is if my little man is being an angel and some old person wants to come up and talk to him… Really?!??! Thanks!
But like some said – if you don’t take ’em they wont know how to act… I certainly pick better, well other, places now. Red Lobster has been replaced with Buffalo Wild Wings… eh- who am I kidding.. its pretty much Chick-fil-a these days.
Rachel C says:
I know Yo Gabba Gabba may be a Godsend for parents with kids in a restaurant…but I was just out to lunch with my husband, and the family in the booth behind my husband was playing a video on their phone for their 3-4 year old. I’ve gotta say, I’d rather hear a little bit of whining from the kid than listen to a video play over the music being played in the restaurant. And I assumed the parents would put the video away when the food came. Nope. They kept in on throughout their meal. I was ready to serve them a knuckle sandwich. How about some headphones?