Poor Dining

We are slowly moving down the road of growing a family instead of adding to it.  We know this because of  the milestones we pass along the way.  As the LW and I, mostly the LW, have been knee deep in pregnancy, nursing, diapers, and various starts and stops throughout the last 10 years, milestones are a big deal in our house.  Potentially the biggest for us at this stage of our development is moving away from diapers.

Our 4th and final child is a handsome young lad who usually responds to the monicker of Win.  He is a blond 2 year old who is into more mischief and trouble than the other three children combined.  He played a large role in us deciding we did not want to add any more faces around the dinner table.  We love him dearly but he is a handful.  He is loud, challenging, chases his siblings around with various weapons, and makes his older sisters cry on a regular basis.  But, he is also loved, and probably the favorite among the three other kids.  They cannot get enough of him.

We are in a season of potty training with Win, and it is more than a little difficult.  He just doesn't seem to want to get it.  Case in point:

The Stribling Clan loaded up all of our beach equipment in, on, and around the family truckster and headed to the beach for a long weekend.  About halfway down I-16 we pulled off at a Zaxby's for dinner.  All kids like chicken, so we thought this would be an easy stop.  And they did.  Each child ate more than their fair share of nuggets, chicken strips and fries all dipped in the special sauce.  The trouble started when the three older children, and one friend's child who was riding with us, began screaming hysterically.  Win, smiling ear to ear, is standing in the middle of the aisle, in a pile of poop.

Imagine the LW's shock and dismay to witness this scene in a public forum.  Win is not satisfied with merely pooping in a restaurant, he wants to track it all over the restaurant, too.  He is not interested in just soiling one section.  He wants to have the place condemned and force it to be shutdown due to his personal health code violations.   A kid a couple of tables down from us turned green and just about passed out in his plate of chilli cheese fries.  I felt bad for him, until I realized what my job was about to be.  We then begged/ threatened the kids to calm down, scooped up Win in such a way that we would not get contaminated, and scooped up the poop before the restaurant knew it needed haz-mat suits for uniforms.  It was terrible.  Not only did the stress level skyrocket instantaneously, but we also just did not feel like we could clean our hands enough to return to the dinner table.  There is just not enough hand-san in a bottle to give you the comfort level you need to move forward at certain times in life.  The whole thing just left us feeling sick, and completely unsatisfied.

So, all that to say, that was a top 3 worst dining experiences to date.