Eating Out: A Family of Four

We know better. We really do. We’ve actually known better for quite some time now. However we still continue to do it. We go out to eat as a family.

In public.

Where people can see us.

I don’t know what it is that makes us keep repeating this mistake. Oh wait—yes I do. I hate cooking.

I didn’t used to hate cooking. But then “kids” happened. And my whole cooking experience changed.

What cooking looks like now: Throw unmeasured ingredients together in a pot as fast as humanly possible while the kids are sitting on the couch watching TV because I know that it will only be a matter of time until the screaming, hitting, and mass chaos will begin.

Barely get a chance to stir “said” food in between breaking up fights; filling up sippy cups’ trying to convince a two-year old that he does not “need” a third popsicle because we’re eating dinner soon; caving spinelessly and giving my two-year old the third popsicle just so that I can get some peace and quiet for a second; cleaning up the spills from the first two popsicles that my little one sucked on while toddling around the house; and mentally preparing myself for the mess that the third popsicle is going to make.

All of this, while also trying to load or unload the dishwasher, start some laundry, clean water bottles from school, and a super long list of additional things.

So, yes. Cooking is no longer enjoyable. It’s barely survivable. And half the time my stuff isn’t even good. That really ticks me off.

The one absolute way I know the prepared meal wasn’t any good is when my husband asks, “So…did you like that?”

If you don’t know, that’s husband for “That meal tasted like a giant ball of crap.”

He doesn’t understand why this question makes me want to throw the dishes at his head, one-by-one, and never cook again.

All that work and it wasn’t even good. What a rip-off.

So, we end up eating out a decent amount of the time. Even though sitting in a restaurant with two little kids is about as much fun as inserting a bobby pin into your eyeball repeatedly.

Which I probably would have done on several occasions had I been able to find any bobby pins. But now that I have kids, I can’t be trusted with the things.

Plus, doing anything to my hair that includes bobby pins, takes way too much time and would never happen at this point in my life.

I have exactly two hairstyles: Hair all the way down or ponytail.

That’s it.

Back to eating out. I think part of the reason we keep making the mistake is also because every once in a while our kids will do surprisingly well. Which I guess gives us false confidence that they are finally old enough to behave like normal human beings in a restaurant.

Instead of uncivilized cave people.

But, it’s like they only have about one good “eating out” experience in them a month. And by the next time, they’re back to their old ways.

Ways which include, eating on the floor under the table like a mangy dog. I wouldn’t even be that opposed to this, because at least they’re quiet under there and nobody can see them.

But, the problem is there is usually other food under the table. Food from earlier guests.

And if they’re not under the table then they are inevitably standing on top of their chairs or bouncing on the seat of the booth we’re in.

It’s like they forget what a chair is even for when we’re in a public eatery. They become wild animals, eating food with their fingers. And I’m not talking “finger foods” like French fries or chips.

No, they’re shoving their fingers in the mac-n-cheese like they’ve never laid eyes on a fork in their lives.

It’s embarrassing. Seriously, it probably looks like we give our children slop in a bucket for dinner on the back porch and just let them go at it like beasts.

The other day we were eating burgers, when two policeman that my husband knows sat down near us. They were chatting with my husband and one of them mentioned that his wife had quit working and was staying home with their small child.

As if my husband had read my mind he said, “I don’t think I could pay my wife to stay home with our kids.”

I was half-embarrassed, realizing that I probably sounded like an awful mom at this point. A mom who doesn’t like to spend time with her children.

I quickly stepped in and said, “Oh, they would wear me out if I was with them all day. They’re pretty wild.”

Just as I was finishing my sentence, a half-eaten corn dog flew by my face, just inches from hitting my nose, and landed near the table of the police officers.

I guess my youngest child was reading my mind as well.

Thanks son for stepping in and validating what I said about you guys being pretty wild. I can always count on you to do whatever it takes to get the job done. Even if it means throwing wieners.

At least now the nice police officer probably understands why I choose to be a working mom.

As much as I love my boys, I think having a little time away from them isn't a bad thing.

Sleeping With Two Small Children

I would’ve thought my sleep issues would be long gone by now.  I mean, my kids are four and two years old.  Don’t most people only deal with sleepless nights when they have infants? 

 

So why in the heck do my kids wake up more times a night than a newborn baby?  And they don’t go back to sleep nearly as easily either.   Why am I being punished?

 

I always thought I would never be one of those parents whose children slept in the bed with them.  As babies, both our little guys slept in their own cribs.  I always secretly smiled on the inside when I heard mom’s talking about the struggle of getting their babies to start sleeping in their own beds.

 

I had overcome that hurdle.  Well, really at that time I had never even encountered the hurdle.  My children slept in their own rooms.  Always had, always would.  And I was proud.

 

But, then our oldest child turned three, developed nighttime fears of some sort, and began begging to sleep with us.  Because he was “scared”.  Give me a break.

 

And so it began. 

 

By four years old, we were carrying his limp, sleeping body from his own bedroom to our bedroom when it was time for us to go to sleep.  We have concluded that it is just easier this way.  If we bring him into our room, he stays asleep and then sleeps through the night.

 

If we don’t, he comes barreling through our door sometime in the middle of the night usually awake enough that he’s either talking, crying, or begging for a drink or snack.  And believe me, it’s torture trying to get him to go back to sleep.

 

So, we had our little nighttime routine down and really I didn’t mind it all that bad. Plus, our child sleeps almost on top of my husband, so for me it’s practically like he’s not even there.

 

But then, our little sleeping world was rocked once again. 

 

My husband and I did a completely ignorant thing a couple of months ago.  We took the crib out of our two-year old son’s room.  And the number one reason this action qualifies as “ignorant” is because the kid wasn’t even climbing out of the crib. 

 

Nope, he was pretty content in the darn thing. It was US who decided it was time to move on.  It was US who decided that we were ready to get the crib out of his room. 

 

As my husband carried the pieces of the baby crib up to rest in the dusty attic, he also carried up our last remaining chances of uninterrupted sleep.  

 

And at point all heck broke loose.

 

Why did we do this?  What was wrong with the crib?  Besides the fact that it was covered in baby bite marks and smelled mysteriously of curdled milk, even though it had been cleaned a million times. 

 

Okay, it hadn’t.  But I had sort of wiped it down a time or two.

 

Our two-year old has figured out that his big brother sleeps in our bed and understandably he feels that he should get to as well.  And I guess technically he should, if we’re being totally fair and all. 

 

So, now he is the one barreling in at all hours of the night, begging for a drink, and keeping me from ever getting a good night’s rest. 

 

Ever again

 

And a good parent, who understood that this was a vital learning experience for the newly-toddler-bed-sleeping son, probably would’ve told the child no and sent him back to his bed. 

 

Because we don’t just get up in the middle of the night anytime we want.  Even if we convince ourselves we think we’re dying of thirst.

 

Night time is for sleeping.  And sleeping only.

 

But I guess I’m not a good parent.  I’m more of a sleep-deprived parent.  And if dragging myself out of bed to fill his sippy cup with apple juice will get me back to sleep any faster—then that’s what I’m doing. 

 

I can’t lie.  I also can’t be held accountable for my parental actions at 2:00 am. 

 

But, even after my two-year old finally goes to sleep, I still can’t get any rest.  I mean, for some reason he pushes me to the edge of the bed every night.  I don’t know how his thirty-four pound chubby body can press my—ahem—“a little more” pound body to the edge. 

 

It’s beyond me.

 

It’s like when he’s sleeping he becomes this immovable statue.  Like Thor’s hammer or something.  I try to scoot him. He doesn’t budge.  I try to roll him.  He doesn’t budge.  Sometimes I even try to pick him up and move him.

 

Oh, he budges when I do this, but he also gets angry and starts crying and then I regret ever having tried to move him. 

 

And within seconds, he has me pushed to the edge once again.  It sucks.  I mean, we have a king size bed and I am forced to sleep on a space about the width of a yard stick.  And I am much more than the width of a yard stick. 

 

Maybe I should just go sleep in his toddler bed.  At least then I would have more space. 

 

You know, these kids really have no right to be running the show around here.  They don’t work.  They don’t pay the bills.  They really don’t contribute to this household in any way whatsoever.

 

Yet, they get exactly what they want.  They get every room in our house.  And just so we’re clear, it’s not our house.  It’s not been our house since they exited the womb.  It’s theirs.  We just rent the space, take care of the space, and pay for everything that’s in it. 

 

They’re simply the landlords.  A position in which they have done nothing to earn, mind you.  But inevitably it’s theirs. 

 

And they suck.