When you have kids, you are inevitably forced to makes sacrifices. One of these sacrifices is forgoing eating meals out at places that serve "real" food and sticking to places that offer kid's menus and stupid gimmicks to entertain them. One such place is Applebee's. However, in one fell swoop that place has been forever stricken from the list of acceptable restaurants as I am too embarrassed to ever show my face there again. Oh, sure, you may say "just go to a different location", but I am convinced that there is a poster of my family that has been copied and posted at EVERY Applebee's location there is, with a cautionary warning. Here is my story...
Me, hubs & our 2 girls (ages approx 3 and 5 at the time) decided to eat out, and Applebee's was the closest restaurant to where we were. We go in and get seated & order drinks. The kids wanted milkshakes so they both got the strawberry one. Now, any smart mother knows that you NEVER give the kids anything like a drink or dessert with lots of chocolate. Its messy, it stains and they WILL spill it. The 3 year old spilled hers (surprise, surprise) at the exact same time that the 5 year old had to go to the bathroom. Since both kids are girls, hubs lucks out and never has the unenviable task of taking the kids into a public restroom (*gag*). So, I give hubs explicit instructions to order another drink for the kidlet..specifically saying NOT THE OREO ONE. I took the other kidlet to the bathroom and when I came back to the table, guess what I saw? Yup, hubs got her the Oreo shake. WTH?? So there she is, most of it already on her face forming a miniature chocolate Hitler mustache on her upper lip...and somehow on one of her eyebrows (?) but she had the biggest smile on her face. All the patrons at the tables around us were pointing & laughing at her...and I'm guessing hubs, because the look I gave him should have killed him 10 times over.
So the food finally comes and "mini Hitler" ends up getting more on the floor than in her mouth. I mean, it was a mess. The other kid spills her drink...on me, and I just wanted to get the hell out of there. When the waitress came over to ask if we wanted dessert I declined and asked for the check...I could even see them getting the vacuum ready for when we left. No...not that cute, little Bissell rug sweeper thing that restaurants usually use. This was a heavy duty job for the actual vacuum!
So we pay the bill and start to walk out. The 3 year old is acting up and walking too slow for my liking, so I pick her up and start walking out, followed by the other kidlet and hubs. As I'm walking, kidlet accidentally kicks my sandal (a 3" high slide-on shoe) about 3 booths ahead of me! So here I am carrying the other kid, trying to walk fast...but it's more of a uneven hobble, trying to slide my shoe on once I walk up to it, but it was upside down & I was having trouble flipping it over with my foot. I finally manage to get it on and practically run to the exit (of course hubs and my other kidlet walked ahead of me while I was dealing w/the "shoe fiasco" (oh yeah, thanks for the help!?) so they were already waiting for me at the door. As we head out, the silly hostess asks if we want balloons for the kids. I pretty much screamed, "NO!" and ran the hell out the door, never to return again.
I suppose the moral of the story could be, "just eat at home, its not worth the hassle." I just look at it in terms of "one less public place I can ever show my face again." Ah, the joys of parenthood.
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lol, I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one those types of things happen to. My 1st kid was a perfect angel. We took him everywhere. My dd, was a tiny terror, we stopped going out with the kids as much with her, then came along the 3rd, he was one big Dennis the Menace. We do not take him anywhere for sit down meals anymore, & the kid is now almost 7, lol
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