to think my SIL should've kept her DS under control?

[BettyButterknife]

Went out for a meal at the weekend with most of DH's family (13 of us). SIL's DS is 3.5yo and quite a handful. My DS is coming up to 3yo and totally in love with his cousin - proper hero-worship stuff.

So anyway, food comes and I expect my DS to sit up at the table and eat with everyone. SIL's DS eats fast, my DS is a very slow eater, so about 20 minutes into the meal SIL lets her DS get down from the table. My DS sees this and says he's finished (he hasn't) and can he get down too.

Long story, but there's a history of SIL feeling like the rest of the family question her parenting methods, so I was put in an awkward position where I'm trying to explain to my DS that we all stay sitting at the table until everyone has finished, and that it's not acceptable to run around in a crowded restaurant with waiting staff trying to do their jobs, carrying trays etc. All the time nephew is standing there next to DS completely confusing the issue. In the end I let DS get down as he was crying while nephew was laughing and winding DS up, and I felt there was only so much I could say without potentially starting a row about how to parent.

But AIBU to think that if you're going to take children out for a meal you should expect some control over the situation?

Perhaps you ought to have used that phrase.

What you actually wrote was "an ambient atmosphere" which is meaningless.

LeQueen you did a business deal in a public cafe and then complain about being disturbed by the public?!

I don't think children should be running around in places like that, but really, you could have been disturbed by anybody!

This is a bigger issue imo.

It is to do with different families having different rules. Then of course when you go out with a different family (or even part of your own extended family) tensions can arise.

This is what we do. (not being smug, just what we choose to do) I am in the camp of not letting the dcs get down (within reason). Having said that I am realistic. If we go out with extended family we don't tend to have starters and coffee, just mains and sometimes pudding. Also I take colouring books etc. Oh and we have the advantage that the dcs are v interested in food so we take them when they are a bit hungry.

If there are any differences in parenting smiles, I just say firmly and clearly to my own dcs that different families have different rules. No point imo in pretending that you are happy for your own dcs to get down if you are not. I use the same phrase when dd1 complains that cousin x or friend y is allowed to do whatever activity I don't allow. I don't care if friends/ils overhear me saying my piece about different rules, firstly because it is true and secondly it is honest and not an unpleasant or offensive statement to make.

Oh yeah the tea room thread. Well heres my opinion again (for what its worth)

Children should not run around areas where the behaviour expectations are to sit down. Yes all children are different and if you have a child who needs to run around you visit a family setting with play equipment etc - it's not rocket science.

IME I have a friend who hasn't in the past instilled this and as children have got older, my DS5 her dd's 4&6 she has decided they are now old enough to be expected to sit. Result??? They are more vocal at this age and create more fuss about sitting - because we never use to have to - so I suggest these family restuarants.

After about a year (we go 5/6 times a year) she actually asked me if I suggested these places as her DD's wouldn't sit in a restaurant .

Have never let the DCs leave the table until everyone has finished eating, and had their coffees etc. Bad practice IMO.

It has meant that I spent most of the time when they were 3 and 4 hissing. You know, whispering that they are going to get into A LOT of trouble if they don't stop whining and upsetting other people and preventing them from enjoying their meals. I did used to take a lot of colouring in things etc as well.

Ultimately YOU are parenting YOUR child. You might feel a bit holier-than-thou about it in that environment, but the worst thing you could possibly do is send out mixed messages. It'll take you a good ten restaurant meals to get it out of his head now.

well, there is a fundamental gap here. You are criticising her for not "keeping her child under control" - what you actually mean is "not making her child do what I expect and meeting my standards.
By her own standards she may well have thought he was behaving perfectly well and was in complete control.
SO you are judging her because she is not meeting your standards, but why should she? one could just as easily have said - why didn't you relax your standards so that they matched hers?
by the way, I take it there is no dad around, otherwise he is getting off the hook rather, isn't he

The other thing is, there is a fair bit of exaggeration here isn't there - either children are sitting "nicely at the table" OR they are running amok, knocking other people over, screaming their heads off etc etc. Total crap, frankly. According to the OP the nephew was "standing there" - well he may having been running around later - we don't know - but it's a big leap isn't it? jumping to rather nasty conclusions to suit your own prejudices and make you feel more superior about your superior, "non-Lazy quality parenting maybe?
my children haven't always sat quietly at the table, but they don't run around wailing like a banshee. They might potter round the table, sitting on a few various knees, chatting or playing on the floor around the table. that's LOADS more likely tbh than this nightmare extreme vision.

I am actually PMSL at LeQueen's comments here about her business meeting in the cafe - how classy . But mostly "It was very inconsiderate of his parents to take him there." WHY exactly? Had you booked out the entire cafe for your business deal? Do you not have an office?

Ah thanks for that

But to the matter in hand, next time take something for them both to sit and do quietly, perhaps she doesn't take her DS out to eat much BECAUSE he is a pain, perhaps she doesn't appear to make good parenting choices because you all make her nervous by questioning her choices.

Put it down to experience and plan ahead for next time, somewhere more child friendly or with an outside area perhaps so someone can take turns to go out and play with the children as lets face it, surely most of us can recall long drawn out boooooooooorrrrrrrrring adult meals as kids?

LeQueen Of COURSE we do! But even our beauty salons have private areas with comfortable seating for business dealings....so do places like hairdressers, perhaps your salon is especially small?

I personally think its parental choice as to where one takes the children and until we start getting signs on cafe doors similar to those not permitting dogs, there is not a lot anyone can do about it!

I completely agree with Harpsichordcarrier. There is a middle ground between sitting at the table and running around getting under people's feet. The OP herself says that the nephew was just standing there.

Sounds like you are upset that SIL doesn't parent YOUR way. Which ment your parenting skills were challenged when DS wanted to leave table earlier than you wanted.

You were happy for DS to get down from the table once EVERYONE had finished their meal - and are peeved because SIL didn't apply same to her child who got down when he was finished. Making 3yo sit at table until everyone has finished eating is not necessarily a great idea & at a family meal is probably not best place to get into control battle over it.

Whilst I don't think it's reasonable to have kids running riot in a bust restaurant (it doesn't sound like this was actually happening), neither is it reasonable to have young ones sitting still until everyone has finished meal.

YABU

FWIW if we were at a large family meal, and DD wouldn't stay put, there would always be an aunty/uncle/grandparent etc ready to scoop up DD and keep her occupied/distracted. In situations where there is lots going on like this I find DD may be too distracted to listen to a (possibly little stressed) parent, but is more than happy to be distracted by other family members.

Surely that is part of what family is about - when they group together, they work together and look out for each other, so all members of the party (including the wee ones & their parents) have a good experience?

"Surely that is part of what family is about - when they group together, they work together and look out for each other, so all members of the party (including the wee ones & their parents) have a good experience?"
That's why I try to avoid family meals.

I'd love to see the OP's answer to why her brother isn't somehow culpable here.

Really, this is simple. Bring distractions. Decide whether to let your son get down because the older boy does or whether to be the bad guy and make him conform to your expectations, and stick to that decision. If you decide to let him get down, that means that you or his father have to take him outside to run around in the garden/on the street/somewhere that he's not going to be knocking over waiters.

It's not about who's parenting better. It's about deciding how you want to parent (and that includes deciding how to handle situations where other people parent differently) and sticking to it. And you don't let small children run around in restaurants, it's hugely dangerous.

For full disclosure, my almost-18-mo-old has only been walking for a month or two and is beginning to resist sitting in a chair during a meal out, which she used to be happy with. In circumstances where a restaurant or cafe is not busy, I will let her down inside only because she won't toddle more than a few inches from our table and is therefore not in the path of waitstaff. I also only go to one or two regular places, where I make it clear to the staff that the second she gets under their feet we'll remove her, and I know they'll tell me if I'm being temporarily oblivious.

So obviously you judge the situation. But don't blame your SIL because you had to confront one of the classic parenting conundrums - what to do when someone else parents differently - otherwise you'll be on here in a month complaining that another mother offered her children McD's in your child's earshot.

LeQueen - ignore their baiting...

I agree with you 110%.

Manners are, to my mind, like a badge that we wear which shows the rest of the world that we are considerate of others, grateful of their efforts on our behalf and, above all, not selfish.

The earlier we get to wear this badge, the more comfortable we are with it and the sooner we find it opens doors for us.

It is actually a very elite club, hence the hatred it engenders in our leftie friends.

Hadn't replied until now as it seemed like a unanimous response that I was BU, and I didn't really want to bump it anymore than it had been!

In answer to some of the questions, SIL is my DH's sister rather than my brother's wife. Her husband is about as useless as they come, but that's a whole different thread.

Nephew wasn't just standing there - much running around, bumping into waiters, writhing on the floor pretending to be various animals etc. which my DS thought was BRILLIANT.

We'd brought books to distract DS, whereas SIL hadn't brought anything. In the end, my mum and MIL took them both out to a small park up the road.

I guess I have to graciously concede that this is a case of different parenting styles and to stick to my guns next time. I haven't come across this too much before, and the politics of this particular situation were fairly sensitive, hence my reluctance to really put my foot down with DS. But thanks for the responses, I appreciate getting an objective view

I don't get why the kids have to be there to begin with. For the short time that they are small enough to be a problem in restaurants, why not either politely decline the invite, go on your own while DP stays home, or get a babysitter.

I didn't go to restaurants when I was very small - nobody I knew did. It's only recently that we seem to think that kids need to be taken out to eat regularly.

The fact is, I don't agree for one minute with people like my own SIL who thinks that toddlers should be taken to adult restaurants 'or else they'll never learn'. I didn't go to restaurants until I was about 15, and I didn't arrive shouting, throwing food and trying to climb under the table due to my ignorance and lack of early years education in manners - I was 15 and no longer interested in doing those things anyway.

My neice was absolute hell on wheels in Starbucks for years on end but now she sits and texts her friends and ignores the adults. She hasn't been educated into this state - she has got older.

Bullett234, it doesn't sound very peaceful to you when you go out for lunch, as you are awaiting the next time your little boy jumps up to go exploring.

I wonder if this idea might help you: you could have a harness on him, with a handle hold for you on his back. If you held the handle loosely, you would sense when he was preparing for flight. You would have to have meals you could eat with one hand!

This is all just theory on my part, as I have not dealt with autistic children, and send my congratulations to you for coping with the daily challenges.

As an input for this thread in general, my grandchildren (five, ages 1 to 6) are good at staying seated. We have been to a restaurant where we were seated next to a fountain, and they could stand and look at that. We color with them to entertain, and they might go sit with someone in our party. But never are they allowed to just wander around! That behavior would range from nuisance value to downright dangerous.

I wasn't baiting!

I just think it's ironic given that I've many times been disturbed by braying business folk shouting into mobile phones in cafes but never once decided that they shouldn't be there in case they disturb my sleeping baby.