To think this woman shouldn’t have interfered in the restaurant?

Same here..I think many would happily pay extra for a child free experience {and many of us are parents, too!}
Don't take an unruly child out if it can't be trusted to behave and be quiet.

Op, I mean this gently, the woman wasn’t the issue here.

i understand you struggled and we have all been there, but if you’re kid swings back or runs off, you tell them sharply no, and then explain why it isn’t ok, using words they understand. You could fall, you would ger hurt etc. give them consequences, if you do that again, then you will sit on my knee, or we will go home. Give them a reward. If you stop doing this I will let you do x or y or you can have a x or y.

it sounds to me like the child was bored and no one was interacting with them. If you bring a young child you need to be prepared to entertain them, bring colouring stuff, or give them a tablet to play on, whatever works for them, interact with them regularly, help with the game or colouring in, compliment how well they are doing.

if you keep them engaged and active they don’t run off or swing on their chairs,

And you’re perfectly entitled to feel like this, as was she. But would you constantly comment and interfere?

Not understanding most of the comments on here. The AIBU wasn’t in relation to the 3 year olds behaviour and whether or not it was ok for him to be swinging or running to the soft-play area. It was about the other woman. No grown-up adult should be shrieking repeatedly about a child who is absolutely nothing to do with them. If she feels that strongly about him falling then she says it once, civic duty done! Anything else is just needless dramatics!
YANBU to think her behaviour was unnecessary OP!

That woman sounds like me. I get stressed as hell when I see small children doing dangerous things while the adults in charge of them seem totally oblivious. I get sweaty palms seeing 6'3" men carrying babies and toddlers across their shoulders, hanging onto them by the ankles. Not that I think they'll drop them, but one accidental stumble and that child's head lands on the pavement from a great height.

Same with very small kids standing up and leaning over a shopping trolley, or running too far ahead of their parents near traffic. Or running around in busy car parks, in and out of parked cars where there is poor visibility for drivers reversing. It's all I can manage not to scream 'FFS watch your child!' at them.

If I were next to your child doing this in a restaurant my anxiety levels would be sky high.

We {and many others } had a meal ruined by someone's hellion rolling around on the floor kicking and screaming and running about - for well over an hour.

Control the child or don't take them out until they can be trusted to behave in a sensible, non disruptive, quiet manner.

I have only read all of your posts @Goldenrainbows because nearly every other post was telling you why the poor lady wasn't at fault, but that you were. I completely agree with the majority of posters here, and for some stupid reason I am going to give it a go at getting through to you too, OP. I already know it won't work so I must be having a very boring Sunday morning...

I take it @Goldenrainbows that your 3 year old child was somehow managing to swing on the back of their chair in complete silence? I also take it that you must have admonished him in complete silence? I take it that if the lady had been sitting at her table "correctly" she would not have been able to see the slightest bit of the moving child, or you getting up to stop your dear child, if she had only been sitting at her table correctly? Lastly - for these particular questions - I take it presume that there was no movement of air between your toddler and the "interefering" lady, who should have been sitting at her table correctly?

You say that that lady (and the other person with her) should not have gone to such a family friendly restaurant if they didn't want to witness unruly and sometimes dangerously behaved children. I am wondering if the restaurant is one that belongs to a chain of hotels, such as Premier Inns. Because if it does, the main reason it is situated where it is, is so that weary travellers can park and unpack their car, and then walk a few steps to the restaurant, therefore meaning that they can both relax and have an (alcoholic) drink if they want to.

If the scenario in my previous paragraph is actually somewhere near correct OP, do you and the other Mumsnetters who agree with you, that adults without children, or at least without children they have no control over, believe that they should never go to a family friendly restaurant and then expect to be able to enjoy their meal?

Imo OP, that lady was so disturbed while having her meal, and so worried when she looked over her shoulder the first time, that when she could see what was happening she felt the pressure (of the village) of being extremely worried that your very young child was going to do themself a mischief, which could potentially have been very harmful to them. In her situation I might have also turned my seat around and watched yoir dear child, because no adult at your table seemed to be doing so. Of course that poor woman's meal was being ruined, just because you were there in the same room as her, does not mean that you can judge how much your child's behaviour, and your lack of parenting behaviour, badly affected her own enjoyment. You have also not shown an ounce of empathy for anyone outside of your own family.

MacDonald’s is there for a reason.

well i guess you have learned now, OP?

but at the risk of adding to the pile on, Yoda was correct: Do or do not. There is no try.

I think yabu too but think your last reply was a bit worrying. Are you okay?

I do think YABU I don't know what you were doing to stop him? Lesson learned, you can't go there again until he's a bit older. A shame really as it should be enjoyable and it's better than gluing him tk a screen or taking stuff to entertain him. 3yo and restaurants not a great fit.

I'm imaging one of those awful play places where all the kids are running around and its not 'ruining' anyone's meal if he misbehaves. I do tell my kids that I don't care what everyone else is doing and I'm just responsible for their behaviour.

The chair rocking thing is the biggest worry and it would gave ruined her meal if he'd fallen. You need to rethink your calm acceptance that he's going to repeatedly do it. And running off same.

My strategy would be to go and sit in the car with him (leaving my meal to go cold or asking if they could keep it warm if they bring it out whilst I go and deal out some proper consequences. I wouldn't need to do this because DH wouldn't stand for it and would be dragging him out to the car park.

He's just a bit young for it. Hopefully at 4 he'd be able to play whilst he waits for food then sit and eat and play again.

You said you didn't ruin her meal because the tables were spaced apart, so how come she distracted you to the point that you couldn't parent your child properly?
A stern look, or a 'I'm dealing with it thanks' is all that was needed. Was it just you and your son there, or did you have a partner there too?

I understand that young children might get a bit silly if there's a play area but if he continued to rock in his chair and run off, I'd have taken him aside and told him he'll have to go in a high chair if he can't behave and sit and eat. Either that or leave.

It really doesn't sound as if you were firm enough with him.

This should be available as a template or response button! Encapsulates so many AIBUs here!
Thank you, @Newyearoldhair !

There's no suggestion she didn't want to be around kids.
Without knowing the details...they are away, we don't know what other eating options there are but she could easily have kids herself who were behaving more appropriately.

I have no issue with play areas, laughing, shouting, getting up and down etc.
But running around uncontrolled and chair swinging are dangerous. Throwing food would be something else that would annoy me.

We took our kids out to lots if different restaurants from being babies.
They were always welcomed (in this country!) and allowed to be kids....but that doesn't extend to behaviour that is either dangerous or affects others.
Just like at home, whether a play area, or toys we took ourselves, they could play till dinner arrived, then they sat and ate, then they could play again.

Ignore the "you ruined her meal comments"! How pathetic. If a hyperactive 3 year old bothers you enough to ruin your meal then perhaps don't dine out at restaurants aimed at families i.e ones with softplays.

I don't take my toddler to restaurants anymore as he wouldn't be able to sit still and it's a stressful experience all round. I wouldn't want to disrupt other diners. BUT it's a massive overreaction to claim it would ruin someone's meal. He wasn't going up to them and it sounds like he was just running back and forth to the play area and being silly not listening. If he was being horrible to other children then I'd say you were being unreasonable but sounds like a typical 3 year old to me!

I bet she wasn't "shrieking"...

Or, was she turned to watch her children in the play area?

As annoying as she may have seemed your child was repeatedly doing something very dangerous and she felt you weren't doing enough to stop it.
Put that in another situation, a child playing with knives, drinking alcohol, running in the road. Many of us have been in a situation where we were very concerned about a child but felt we had no power and end of being hypervigilant.
I have been in a swimming pool on holiday and spent more time hovering over an unaccompanied 3yr old who's parents are 3 rows back, than supervising my own children...because I was worried.

Forget the running off to play, forget any silliness
I imagine her main concern was the chair swinging and she couldn't help herself due to concern. If you had properly stopped this the rest would have stopped.
Telling a child to stop each time they do something is not dealing with the behaviour. There have to be consequences and in the case on dangerous behaviour physical controls to prevent accidents.
Eg. At 3yrs....You need to sit on my knee until you have eaten your food and you can sit in a chair properly. If you can't sit properly we are going to sit in the car/go home

the ‘in this country….’ always comes up in these threads, but in the countries that get lauded in comparison, kids aren’t generally encouraged to ‘act like kids’ in every environment. They’re expected to be taught how to behave, learning the skills they’ll need going through life.

It is usually different in tourist areas, but that behaviour wouldn’t be tolerated outside of those, and if it wasn’t your parents dealing with it then a stranger wouldn’t hesitate to step in. That can mean getting yelled at, or even swatted, speaking from experience. That’s the thing about these ‘child friendly’ cultures - it goes both ways. I don’t know how many British parents would be happy about their community not just taking on the role of welcoming their child, but voicing opinions on parenting to them, and disciplining their child too.

Me too. The number of times we had to pick the kids up and leave is crazy.
My two both have autism so grabbing them and leaving and saying ok we'll try again another day happened a lot. It's just what you have to do if things go wrong.

Exactly. I did do this - took mine out to the car while meals were on the table until he’d calmed down. I will not tolerate my DC behaving badly.

I also made it clear afterwards to DH that I wasn’t impressed with him because the meal was with my family and he just sat there and carried on eating. I asked him what he thought should happen when we’re out with his family and he accepted that it should have been him.

If hes swinging on a chair there are two options, after being told know an adult puts one of their hands on the chair to prevent it happening again or you leave the restaurant.

If he runs off he is instructed to stay in the chair and told if he runs off you’ll have to go home as running in any restaurant is unsafe and poor manners.

How did you get him to the restaurant if you couldn’t go outside as there is a road?

Unless your son and you are completely silent of course she could have known what was going on as she would be able to hear any noise your son was making, and she would be able to hear you verbally explaining to your son why it was wrong and what the consequences will be.

That woman sounds like a busy body OP.

if she didn’t want to eat near children then don’t go to a restaurant with a play area and sit right next to it!

Was there another adult with you ? Sounds like you were on your own with a child but you keep saying “ we”.
I am asking as a few weeks ago DH and I were having lunch in a child friendly place ( so we expected some noise) but there was a child who kept getting up , running around , bumping into people and chairs and generally being a pain . Only the mother was trying to stop the child while the father sat and ate his lunch ! The child then bumped into a waitress , stuff got spilled and the mother shouted at the waitress ! The father still sat 🤷‍♀️

Are you OK OP? This parenting thing is tough.