Redemption

A month ago I posted Diary of a Wimpy Parent where I described my wimp out in a parenting moment.  Well, I am proud to say I redeemed myself and finally grew some parenting…muscles.

We found ourselves at another restaurant (we eat out too much!) after we had just visited an art exhibit together as a family.  Now this is one of my favorite restaurants and I don’t get to eat there very often.  And I hadn’t eaten much all day because I was saving up for their all you can eat salad bar.  (I tell you all this so you fully understand how difficult this decision was for me.)

As we got out of the car my daughter started to whine and complain about the choice of restaurant.  Once we sat down to look at the menu, my son started crying, then accusing, then fighting, over a lost crayon.  The waitress came by and we ordered waters to get us started which sent my third child into a fit because she wanted a soda.  We told her we weren’t ordering soda tonight- we were just having water- and the screaming continued.  Every kid was unhappy.  Since we had already tried to deal with each situation individually, with no success,  my husband issued a universal warning.  He told the kids to knock it off or we would leave.  I was surprised when the noise and crying and fighting actually escalated after his threats.

My husband and I looked at each other and knew what we had to do.  We stood up, told the kids we were leaving, left a tip for the waitress (luckily no food was ordered yet), and the family walked out of the restaurant without any dinner.  Chad and I did the Kramer grip on the way home knowing we did the right thing, yet both totally bummed we didn’t get to go to our favorite salad bar.  (This clip reminded me of how my husband and I felt on the way home- unified in purpose- I miss this show.)

The kids ended up having frozen chicken nuggets for dinner when they got home.  I think both kids and parents learned a lesson from this situation.  Let’s hope I don’t have to flex my parenting muscles anytime soon.