Monday - Adventures in Family Dining
May. 15th, 2006 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ninanevermoreToday on my drive into work, I was thinking about the fact that it was nice to go to a restaurant yesterday with Jeff and our son, and not as stressful as I thought it would be. The last time we took our son with us to a restaurant was last August, when he was 10 months old. After that experience, we vowed that we would not try eating out with him again until he was much, much older. We were thinking that about the time he entered high school might be fine.
When babies are very small, you can take them everywhere because they stay in their carrier and don't move around. You can stash their carier on the bench of a booth or even under the table (hey, I admit it), and they will sleep.
About the time they start eating solid foods, this changes. For one thing, solid foods can be thrown on the floor. Solid foods can even be thrown across the room. Even when a baby who is just starting to self feed does not mean to throw food on the floor, his hand to mouth coordination is not yet fully developed and the food winds up on the floor anyway.
In addition to the immediate area looking like a food-based hurricane has blown through, there is the noise factor. Few sounds are louder than that of a 10-month-old baby who is just learning how to use his voice to make interesting sound effects. These sound effects can be used to see that no adult within a 50 foot radius of him even attempts to hold a conversation with another adult when they both could be doing something useful like entertaining a baby.
But yesterday, I was craving Mexican food. I not only wanted Mexican food, I wanted to eat it in in a Mexican restaurant. We have a pretty good one in town close to us, a family-owned restaurant called Los Pinos (it means "The Pines," named for the pine trees that dominate the area we live in). There are certain types of restaurants that should never be chains and should only be family owned if you are going to eat in them: Chinese and Mexican restaurants fall in this category. Los Pinos serves up a guacamole salad to die for, wonderfully fresh with a slight hint of garlic to it. I wanted some of that guac, and I wanted to eat it some place other than my own house.
Rather than make a 40 minute round trip to use my father for free babysitting, we decided to risk taking the little man with us. I figured we could dole the food out to him a little bit at a time and the floor should be fine.
Actually, the floor was more than fine. Our son is going through a growth spurt and he did not waste any food by tossing it aside. Quesadillas are his new favorite meal, and he could not shovel them into his mouth fast enough. He was so busy eating that Jeff and I were able to hold a conversation - a real one, about grown up things. Our son was curious and happy to be someplace, any place, where food was being provided. The novelty of being away from his own dining room suited him just fine.
For the record, he is the scrawniest toddler I have ever seen, but he can eat his own weight in food. For awhile, I was worried about him being in the upper percentiles for height but in the 4th percentile for weight, until my mother-in-law sent me a picture of Jeff as a toddler. My husband also looked like some third world, half starved waif at that age. Now the only thing I worry about is that when our son reaches his teens, we may have to take out a second mortgage to keep him fed (that, or see that he gets no privacy).
My only complaint about the evening was that because it was Sunday, the mariachi players had the day off. They usually play Hey Baby, Que Paso? by the Texas Tornados for any baby that comes in. I think my son would have enjoyed that. When my friend Joe used to play that song at the open mics, I used to spin my son around the floor and dance to it with him. As far as my son is concerned, it's our special song.
All in all, my Mother's Day dinner was a success. Jeff and I discussed it, and we have decided that we can take our son out to eat again, so long as whatever restaurant we go to has tile floors and serves quesadillas.
I'm thinking that Mariachis would be nice, too.
When babies are very small, you can take them everywhere because they stay in their carrier and don't move around. You can stash their carier on the bench of a booth or even under the table (hey, I admit it), and they will sleep.
About the time they start eating solid foods, this changes. For one thing, solid foods can be thrown on the floor. Solid foods can even be thrown across the room. Even when a baby who is just starting to self feed does not mean to throw food on the floor, his hand to mouth coordination is not yet fully developed and the food winds up on the floor anyway.
In addition to the immediate area looking like a food-based hurricane has blown through, there is the noise factor. Few sounds are louder than that of a 10-month-old baby who is just learning how to use his voice to make interesting sound effects. These sound effects can be used to see that no adult within a 50 foot radius of him even attempts to hold a conversation with another adult when they both could be doing something useful like entertaining a baby.
But yesterday, I was craving Mexican food. I not only wanted Mexican food, I wanted to eat it in in a Mexican restaurant. We have a pretty good one in town close to us, a family-owned restaurant called Los Pinos (it means "The Pines," named for the pine trees that dominate the area we live in). There are certain types of restaurants that should never be chains and should only be family owned if you are going to eat in them: Chinese and Mexican restaurants fall in this category. Los Pinos serves up a guacamole salad to die for, wonderfully fresh with a slight hint of garlic to it. I wanted some of that guac, and I wanted to eat it some place other than my own house.
Rather than make a 40 minute round trip to use my father for free babysitting, we decided to risk taking the little man with us. I figured we could dole the food out to him a little bit at a time and the floor should be fine.
Actually, the floor was more than fine. Our son is going through a growth spurt and he did not waste any food by tossing it aside. Quesadillas are his new favorite meal, and he could not shovel them into his mouth fast enough. He was so busy eating that Jeff and I were able to hold a conversation - a real one, about grown up things. Our son was curious and happy to be someplace, any place, where food was being provided. The novelty of being away from his own dining room suited him just fine.
For the record, he is the scrawniest toddler I have ever seen, but he can eat his own weight in food. For awhile, I was worried about him being in the upper percentiles for height but in the 4th percentile for weight, until my mother-in-law sent me a picture of Jeff as a toddler. My husband also looked like some third world, half starved waif at that age. Now the only thing I worry about is that when our son reaches his teens, we may have to take out a second mortgage to keep him fed (that, or see that he gets no privacy).
My only complaint about the evening was that because it was Sunday, the mariachi players had the day off. They usually play Hey Baby, Que Paso? by the Texas Tornados for any baby that comes in. I think my son would have enjoyed that. When my friend Joe used to play that song at the open mics, I used to spin my son around the floor and dance to it with him. As far as my son is concerned, it's our special song.
All in all, my Mother's Day dinner was a success. Jeff and I discussed it, and we have decided that we can take our son out to eat again, so long as whatever restaurant we go to has tile floors and serves quesadillas.
I'm thinking that Mariachis would be nice, too.
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no subject
Date: 2006-05-15 11:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-16 07:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-16 07:31 pm (UTC)Ok, I admit, even when things are interesting, I still get excited about Mexican food. When it's good, it's really good.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-16 07:48 pm (UTC)Taking kids out for a dinner is hard. I've had a lot of experience, and still would rather not. My kids often ask me why this is, and I'm not shy about telling them. Consequently, they do get better - or go very long times between invites.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-16 07:56 pm (UTC)