Mommy Dylan Date Night

My husband goes out of town frequently, so I'm pretty used to solo-parenting in the evening. But he's usually home on weekends, so when he's gone on a Friday night, like he was this week, I like to do something a little fun (for me mostly although Dylan likes getting out and about).

We have this awesome restaurant chain in California called Tender Greens. It's super-delicious, reasonably-priced farm-to-table type food (and lots of super tempting desserts!). And their kid's meal is just $6 and includes chicken or steak or grilled cheese with mashed potatoes and a variety of veggies! It's exactly the type of food I want Dylan to be eating. (On this trip he had Salt and Pepper Chicken which he loved as well as some type of roasted carrot. He's not a fan of mashed potatoes right now.) I had the Fried Chicken with the Tender Greens Salad and took a carrot cake home for dessert.

Anyway. The location I chose to go to was at a mall and we got there a little early. Dylan was in a good mood so I was able to browse through a few stores. Real shopping with a toddler is virtually impossible, but I found a shirt at Anthropologie that I could try on over the tank I was wearing and so I decided to get it. This was right at the point when Dylan was making it clear that he needed food stat. We got in line and I nearly had a heart attack when I realized that I left the entire diaper bag (with my wallet) in the car at the very farthest end of the mall from where we were. Curses! I made it there and back in record time.

When we go to Tender Greens I get a corner booth and let Dylan crawl around while we eat. It buys me more time and sometimes it's just too much work to fit a stroller and a high chair in a tight space and I just don't want to deal. I successfully kept Dylan away from the knives and got a decent amount of food in his mouth (while eating my salad with my hands, sorry).

We even had time to go back and buy my shirt on our way out!

Dylan is at a super fun age where he gives kisses freely and smiles every time he sees me. (Although it would be REALLY nice if he could learn how to talk right quick. If I could speak his weird alien language we would prevent A LOT of frustration on both our parts.)

The weather has been purely summer-like out here recently (sorry East-Coasters) so we've spent a lot of time outside. Here's Dylan enjoying his new water table this afternoon.

He just wanted to chew on the little pirate...