To expect parents to keep their children relatively quiet in a pizza restaurant...?

[confuseddoiordonti]

I have just got back from a pizza (Planet Pizza in Bristol in case anyone's wondering) and me and DH were driven bonkers by the number of overexcited shrieking childen in there (we got there just before 7pm.)

I am not against children in restaurants, and I realise this is a pizza place rather than the Ivy, but I do object to them charging about and shouting where there are people there with no dc's (like myself.) I realise that some noise is to be expected and I don't have a problem with that, but I do have a problem with the same children running about, shouting and crawling around under tables. Am I being unreasonable by getting a) pissed off and b) wishing they were someplace else so I could eat my pizza in peace...?

Lastly, while I was tempted to go over and ask some of the parents to get their children to keep it down a bit, I did chicken out and hoped they'd realise the kids were too noisey themselves (they didn't.)

There are places though I would avoid like the plague - such as Frankie and Bennies (chaos and darkness) or Chiquitos, especially if there was a pinata party going on.

With a pizza restaurant, have never heard of Planet Pizza, but would expect Pizza Hut to be noisy and full of shrieking, so would avoid, however would think that Zizzi and Pizza Express is as much a cheap place for adults to eat as well as bing classed a family restaurant.

I don't think it is especially dedicated to children.

Were they really running around being absolute terrors though? Or were they just A Bit Noisy? Because, often, people tend to exaggerate behaviours just a little bit in order to demonstrate their grievance. Or have different tolerance levels to others. So what you might consider being an absolute terror might just be Talking At Once.

But yes GetOrf I do agree with you.

My 3 year old is very well behaved in restaurants and behaves as she would at home ie. expected to sit at the table while eating and not screaming or running round. We do choose places that we know have quick service as otherwise she can get bored. We have tried to take her out (and DS 11mths) to cafes/restaurants from an early age so that she learns what is acceptable and what isn't. I get seriously pissed of with badly behaved children and even more pissed of with parents who ignore bad behaviour (I can cope with silliness if I see the parents trying to do something about it).

So OP YANBU

getorfmoiland Planet Pizza is more of a Pizza Express type place than a Pizza Hut one so yes, somewhere that's a cheap place for adults to eat as well as as being classed as a family restaurant

Thats why i avoid eating out with dd 2.6 like the plague, she is quite a babyish for her age. She sits there for five mins and then wants to get up and run and throws a tantrum if she has to stay put. I give her things to do at the table like books, crayons etc but gets bored after about 10 mins.My dh and I are quite rigid on discipline but at the end of the day dd is only little so will lean how to sit still in time. There is nothing worse than loud noisy kids in restaurants and so i would not like to subject dd to any poor diner at the moment. We are teaching her how to sit still at our family table at the moment and then when she is good will graduate to eating out.

pavlov They were more than A Bit Noisy, but to say they were being utter terrors would be unfair. Prob best described as overexcitement and tiredness which resulted in lots of shouting to each other and / or banging toys.

I feel as if I need to emphasise again that general noise isn't a problem, and I agree it's unreasonable to expect small children to be seen and not heard etc, but it's a small space in the first place so there was no escaping.

My DD is a bloody nightmare in restuarants. She is also a bloody nightmare at home. She is being taught how to behave when out and about, and she is learning very well. She is starting to understand consequences to her behaviour and soon enough she will be a joy in a restuarant. Why on earth should I stop going out, at a respectable time of day, to a place where children are welcome, because someone else does not like the fact that she does not behave like a well trained dog?

restrainedrabbit we are in grave danger of losing our kindred spiritedness!

I don't recall saying anyone shouldn't go out at a respectable time of day because their children don't behave like well trained dogs...

restrainedrabbit I too find it less of a big deal if the parents look to be trying to do something about it, but that was not the case at all. It was actually ignored.

ok...fair enough, that was my interpretation but, thats the alternative. If I cannot, at this stage control my child, I should refrain...

YABU to a)be pissed off- you should expect nothing less than that before 7pm in a pizza resturant, and should think of it as a bonus if there are no screaming kids.

YABU to b)wish they were someplace else so I could eat my pizza in peace- you should have asked for a doggy bag and taken the pizza home. It's all very well to say you are entitled to eat where you choose, but this isn't the case for families, we have to pick restuarants that cater for children. If you wanted to eat in peace, you should have put more thought into your choice of resturant, you have, after all, got far far more choice than a family with two small children!!!

I have 2 DS's, 3.5yo and 8mo, they are both well behaved (most of the time) when we eat out as we do it quite often. However, we know that not every child is the same and expect to find children causing havoc in restuarants that are child friendly...like simplesusan said, I wouldn't be surprised to find pissed up idiots leering over anything in a skirt in a Wetherspoons - and I certainly wouldn't feel as if I had the right to complain about it, it's to be expected!!

princesstoadstool perhaps not good, quiet and still but hopefully quieter.

I know they behave differently at home as opposed to school / nursery but I think you can, at least to an extent, get little one's (bearing in mind, not all these children were 2 - the smallest was about two) to behave a bit more. I did say on the original post about expecting parents to keep their children relatively quiet!

Princesstoadstool - no many two year olds find it impossible to sit still for any length of time - which is why I always take my child out of the restaurant to run around - I would never let them run around in a restaurant, I just can't believe that that acceptable behaviour, no wonder there is such a big gulf between people with children and people without children.

relative is open to interpretation though is it not? I mean, its subjective. What i would consider to be relatively quiet, would be different compared to perhaps you, or other people posting. Some people might consider quiet to be silent, others might consider anything other than screaming as being quiet. I have observed some people waiting in the Drs surgery with their 1yr child saying 'shhhh, shhhh, shhh, your being too noisy, be quiet' to the child who is just talking baby babble!

Exactly Princess you cannot they are still very young toddlers still in nappies or just out of them so expectations should not be high thats why we dont eat out with dd at the miniute. When she is a little older say 4-5 than our expectations would be a bit high and for an older child they should be able to display proper table manners and sit in a relatively quite proper manner.

piglet - what is quiet and proper though? Because some people laugh very loudly indeed, and if you have a whole table of people laughing, that could very noisy, especially as kids tend to laugh louder than most...so, say, no laughing?