Out to Eat with a Baby?

Do you fall into the category of definitely leave the baby at home or don't go out to eat OR of course the baby is going out to eat and if they cry, well they cry? Or maybe you fall somewhere in-between depending on the situation.

I'll never forget the first time we took our son out to eat and he screamed uncontrollably in a very nice restaurant, and while it was five years ago, I'll never ever forget it. We left with boxed food.

Last weekend my husband wanted to go out to dinner and he wanted me to pick the place but gave his opinion first, which was great with me as long as the baby seemed to cooperate. It's family friendly but it's a nicer than a kid-friendly place. I planned on nursing right before we left so she would be fed, changed, and comfortable - hopefully sleeping through our meal. 

Things don't always go as planned. I nursed her, changed her diaper, and was hoping on the short ride to town she'd fall asleep. No such luck but she was calm and playing with toys. We walked into the restaurant and asked for a both to slide her into - we only waited like five minutes for a table, in part because we decided we'd do a 5:00 p.m. dinner, a little early for a Saturday night but we'd miss the crowd. The baby started to fuss with her toy and kick her feet like she was upset so I looked to my husband and said "this may not work." 

I don't like my children to cry/scream at a restaurant (well at all, but babies will be babies) because I don't want someone else's dinner ruined because of me or my kids. Now if it's someone else's children, I don't mind. I look at it like things happen, babies cry, the parents want to eat out and they don't have a choice but to bring their child. They won't ruin my time and actually, it would bother the mom and dad much more than me, I've been there and I understand. 

Anyway, the host took us to our table and the car seat wouldn't fit in the booth so we placed her on the back part of the table and pulled the shade hoping she'd fall asleep. As you can imagine, she didn't. She started to cry a little louder, not a meltdown but crying harder. Of course we were trying to entertain her with toys, cover her with a blanket, take the blanket off, shush her, rock the seat, all those things you try to do. I said we should probably just go and forget it but my husband wanted to wait and see, he thought she'd calm down. We ordered and she stopped, maybe we could do this. 

The waitress was phenomenal and brought our salads right away but the baby started to cry again, the table behind my husband wasn't happy with us. The woman in her booth seat thrust herself against the back of the seat to push at my husband, then turned around and gave me horrible looks. Well that's all it took for me to really get upset. I stood with the seat and swayed her hoping I could get her to fall asleep while my husband tried to eat his salad and wait for our waitress to ask her to just box our dinners. Because the woman kept turning to look at me and my husband with hatefulness I was becoming more upset and when my husband stood to switch me so I could eat my salad, I was too worked up to eat. With tears in my eyes I said I'd walk to the vehicle and wait for him to come out. The waitress and host came back to say it was okay and we should stay, but I couldn't. They even told my husband that if the baby stopped we could come back in and they'd re-plate our food. (So very nice.) 

When my husband stood to leave the woman gave him a mean look and huffed at him several times so he acknowledged her by asking if she had a problem, what was her problem, and then mentioned something about "like she never had kids or heard kids cry." He was upset because he knew I was in tears so I can't imagine his tone was pleasant. She turned her head and refused to acknowledge my husband spoke to her at all. 

Please keep in mind that I was in the vehicle at 5:22 p.m. 

We brought our food home and had a nice dinner together. It's just sometimes nice to go out to a restaurant to eat, we don't do it often and thought we'd try. I don't want to ruin someone else's experience but if you don't try, you'll never know. I'm not sure what the nasty customer would have preferred we do - in my opinion, other than the tears, I think we handled the situation the best for the other patrons. 

Do you go out to eat with little ones, and what has been your experience if they cry or scream? I'd love to hear from you. 

Trick or Treat 2013

Just some pictures from our Halloween fun!

More Stress? Gen X vs Gen Y

While reading my twitter feed and catching up on my news I saw this tweet...

I was born in the earlier 1980s so I'm not sure if I fall into Generation X or Generation Y because they overlap, but my mother is definitely Generation X so I would say I am the Gen Y. In comparing what I believe her situation to have been and experienced as a kid versus my situation now as a mom of two wonderful children, I would say motherhood stress is higher as a Generation Y.

And here's a couple of reasons why I think this.

Family Involvement 
Then
When I was a child my parents lived 30 yards from my great grandma (when I was 5 years of age she was 65) and only about two miles from both of my grandmas. I am very fortunate to still have these grandmas in my life.
I remember being at my great-grandma's house a lot of my life, who didn't want to go to grammy's?! I also remember spending a ton of time at one of my grandma's because my cousin was always there. We are very close in age so we were the best of playmates. Fortunately for most of my life, my mom stayed at home with me but I also remember being with family, whether she was there or not.
Also, we lived in a small town and for better or worse, everyone knew everyone. So kids played outside with the neighbor kids. I was outside and while my mom or dad checked on me, I was not under constant supervision. A certain level of trust comes with familiarity.
Now
My kids have the closest family about two hours away. Yes, my husband and I made the decision to move away for work and to hopefully provide a great life for our kids. But family isn't close, and while they are not halfway across the country like a lot of other families, it's too far to just have my kids drop in for a couple of hours. The time has to be scheduled if they visit.
We live in a very nice neighborhood and our son goes outside to play but there aren't a ton of kids his age around so mommy and daddy play outside too.

Financial Situation 
Then
As I said my mom stayed at home with me as did a lot of other moms at that time and being from a small town the cost of living wasn't as high as other places. We did fun things and sometimes went out to dinner, but it was a treat. And dinner out wasn't all the time, my parents watched what they spent. I do need to tell those reading that my parents didn't talk a lot about anything financial in front of me, they didn't want me to worry or know about their financial situation.
Now
Now more than ever both parents work outside the home, I am blessed and right now get to be a stay at home mom with my two, but a lot of people can't or don't do this. In order to afford expenses both mom and dad get up and go to work while the kids go to school or childcare of some sort. When we first moved away from family, both my husband and I worked so our son went to daycare. The daily drop-offs were stressful. Was the lunch and snacks packed? Did I give the daycare enough diapers, wipes, and clothes? And we hoped our son didn't catch a cold from another kid because mom was taking off work to keep the little one at home. Thousand of moms do this every day, I did too, it's different from when I was little.
And let's not forget - because dad and mom may both work, no one wants to make dinner so let's pick something up or go out. This was me - definitely!

Competition
Then
I have never felt I had to go without something growing up, my parents always provided for me, I had toys, clothes, fun things to do, and I never felt deprived but they also knew how to say no. They knew I didn't need everything in sight and they didn't spend like crazy, it always seemed to be in the range of normal.
Now
I have a hard time not getting something for my son. (The baby is just too little to need material anything beyond  warm clothes, diapers, and a couple toys.) We go to the store and he asks for a drink, or a toy, or something to eat, and the list goes on. I am working on saying no more often but I want to get him something. If I get a drink at the gas station, I feel like I should get him one too. I know that's a simple example but it's true and my husband, while not as bad as me at this, likes to pick up something for him too.
Our son now and then will come home and tell us a kid at preschool has this or that, and then asks if we can get him the same toy or whatever the item is. Some kids at school have iPads and he wanted one. (Both my husband and I quickly said NO). While I don't want him being the only one to not have something, I refuse to always get him something just because everyone else has it, especially at five years old!
I feel like competition to keep up with the latest thing is more present now than when I was a kid which causes a lot more stress.

I've given a couple reasons why I think it's more stressful now but I'm interested to read your thoughts. How do you feel about the tweet? Please respond in the comments. Thanks!

Fall Pictures

Taking great photographs and capturing those great moments with a camera isn't my strong suit but I try to remember to take as many pictures as I can when I remember my camera. I love looking at actual printed photos of my kids but I seem to keep the majority of them on my computer and generally when I send pictures to the grandparents or extended family they are sent as a picture message through the phones. Printing a picture I've taken with my phone...well those never turn out. 

My husband and I tossed around the idea of getting a photographer to take photos of the kids outside in the fall. However, when I started looking into some of the ones I found online, I saw the cost associated and because the baby is only 4 months, I didn't know if it would be worth it. What if she screamed the entire time, how long would it take before both kids melted down, and with not knowing a trusted photographer, well we decided against it. 

Although we decided against getting them professionally taken this year, I still wanted pictures. I decided I would try to take some staged photos, knowing that I couldn't take any that would be extraordinary by any means but I wanted some to put into frames in the house. I set up the little scene below and tried my best. And for our purposes, they turned out just fine. I figure having really cute kids helps my photographer ability. ~smiles~

Fall 2013

Baby is starting to scream and
my son is doing his version
of smiling.

Really screaming now
and still fake smiling. 

The baby is now in my arms
and I asked my son to think of something funny.
Finally a real smile. 

Fun Fall Things To Do For Families

I've mentioned in a previous post that my favorite season is fall, my husband's favorite too, and we try to do all sorts of fun fall-like things. I'd love to hear some of your favorite things in the comments, so please feel free to share. Below are some of things we try to do each year.

1. Jumping/Playing in the leaves.

2. Going to a pumpkin patch.

3. Attending a fall festival.

4. Carving our pumpkins. 

5. Winding our way through and beside a corn stalk maze. 

6. Trick or treating...well just the treating. 

7. Joining the class for the farm field trip.

8. Baking something with apples. (I have a delicious Apple Crisp recipe that I plan to share in an upcoming post. Simple and delicious.)