I have to say that we had one of the BEST dinners we had in a LONG time the other day. Our typical dinner consists of this: Me waiting until 5:00 pm to actually think about dinner (lately I've been better about this), then cooking dinner with one screaming kid holding onto my leg, a 3 year old yelling at Madelyn, and Madelyn bouncing or throwing giant balls at the boys...after being told one million plus one times not to do that. Then we usually sit down to eat, the majority of the time it is just me and the kids, because Justin isn't home yet...so I have to strategically place myself in between three kids! On the nights that Justin is home, it helps 100%! So usually the 5 of us sit down and then it hits...Madelyn is usually falling out of her chair screaming on the floor or stomping off to her room because she "hates" what I have fixed for dinner and she will "DIE" if she has to eat it. So we have the 10-15 argument of listening to her and Justin dish it out. Meanwhile, Marshall usually eats everything without a word and if he says something it is for more food! Then we have Garrett...who typically, won't sit by Justin, nor will he talk to him if I am present in the room. Garrett plays Helen Keller in our house, he goes from place to place at the table and picks what he likes off of everyone's plate...except his own. I know it is a 2 year old thing, Marshall did it, Madelyn did it...and I so often remind myself, that this too shall pass!!! So that is a run down of our "normal" dinner!
Well, we decided to take the kids to White Water two weeks ago on a Saturday. We didn't really plan on staying all day but it ended up to be that way, because Madelyn needed time to ride the slides with Justin and then of course we had to switch and do girl time on the slides while Justin did little boy kiddie pool duty. We only made the day last long because Garrett climbed into a reclining chair and took a nap (we all know Garrett can not go without a nap...he loves his sleep). So about 6:00 we decided that we would leave and go eat dinner, not drive thru, which we do often especially when we know our kids EXTREMELY tired and are all moody. We all got changed and Madelyn threw her usually fit because she didn't want to go in and eat somewhere (she is quite the drama queen). We headed out to Olive Garden, took one look at their parking lot and thought twice about that, we then headed to Red Lobster...it was over an hour wait. There was no way that I was going to sit around and wait with my 3 tired and hungry kids...I knew we were setting ourselves up for disaster no matter what. We looked around...and found...Cracker Barrell!!! Of course that ruffled Madelyn's tail feathers even more because when she has her mind set on something....you just don't mess with her. We made it in with no wait!! Of course Marshall was so tired but still tried to pick something out on the menu....Garrett of course told me he wanted everything I listed off, and Madelyn was at the table crying and pouting. I kept telling myself, "you can do this...it's just dinner...please God, get me through this and I promise I will put them to bed as soon as I get home!!!"
After ignoring Madelyn's fit, she decided to pick pancakes. From that moment on, we laughed and had a decent conversation with each other. The boys were SOOOO good....Marshall sat and was doing everything is his power to stay awake and Garrett was entertaining himself. We seriously have not had that calm of a dinner in a LONG time...especially when my kids are that tired!! It was a dinner that was a true blessing and one that we needed greatly as a family. After dinner, we sat out in the rocking chairs that they have in the front. Justin sat and played a game of checkers with Madelyn and then made time to play a round with Marshall too. It was by far the perfect night out. We made it home by 10:15 pm that night and my little munchkins were so tired they slept on the way home....except for Garrett!!!
It's times like those that I see how much my kids have grown up...6 months ago we wouldn't have been able to do a whole day of white water and a dinner out...my kids are growing up so fast!
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