Date Night: Striking Out and the Circus!

On our first night to get away without this little man:(We'd been out before without the other 3, but he came along sleeping peacefully in his carseat...however his carseat seems to weigh a million more pounds now and he doesn't sleep nearly as much anymore:))

We started out the date at WalMart buying tissue and benadryl, Strike 1!

And yes, I had a horrible head cold, headache and all (1 of 4 from the past 2 months! ugh!) Strike 2!

Then, we decided to head to a local Thai restaurant that we had been wanting to try. It was one of those lower lights, small and quaint, nice and quiet restaurants, that would be so nice for looking dreamily into one anothers eyes as we talk, holding hands across the table, at least hear what the other person was saying, etc. ;)

UNTIL, about 10 minutes after sitting down and enjoying the quiet company--a CIRCUS came waltzing in: 2 moms, each with 3 (VERY wild) children under 2. They were seated RIGHT next to us. It was hard to keep our drifting eyes from watching the main EVENT. We couldn't really hear eachother over the high frequency of tantrums, mother's giving warnings, jumping up and down from their seats and the 8 of them playing "guess what nickelodeon theme song I am singing now?" It was slightly distracting, and we were doing all we could not to giggle at their expense because it was VERY comical! Strike 3!

All I could think was "GOOD thing we are paying someone to watch our circus so that we could go to a nice restaurant and be entertained by someone elses!" AND "You poor mothers--next time try take-out and feeding the kids mac-n-cheese, it's MUCH less stressful!" It was honestly kind of painful to watch them because I felt SO much empathy for what they were going through.

Needless to say, we ate a little more quickly than we had been eating and we couldn't really concentrate hard enough to talk about anything of very much value...so we headed home a little earlier than planned and decided that 3 strikes meant we were out and would have to try again another night. :)

BUT, I came home with a greater sense of appreciation for my own little, sweet circus--my kids really are good and behave really well for the most part--and I have an awesome husband that helps a TON with the circus management. I really feel blessed to have such a wonderful family of my own.

(I also came home with a greater sense of appreciation for the many, many couples that we may have disrupted while they were trying to have a calm and relaxing night out---however, we really NEVER take the kids to nice restaurants--but if you are one of those couples, I'm sorry about the distraction :))