Dinner

Today M had the day off, and my brother is still here, so we all went into the District today after B-man got home from school. We first went to Arlington National Cemetery, then the World War II memorial, and then a quick stop off at the Vietnam War memorial. After all that we got back in the car and figured out dinner.

We decided to take our brother to a fun place right across the street from the White House called Old Ebbitt Grill. It is a pretty nice place, but you don't feel out of place in shorts. At least not if you go early enough in the day. Skate and I were sitting at the table waiting for the rest of the family to join us. We had so many adventures. Here they are slightly in order. All of this was happening very fast.

1. B-man noticed the HUGE mural with three women painted in "the buff." This is a nice establishment. He sits down and says, "Mom, look." And points right at the mural. He was sitting next to my brother, and he had been sitting there for ten minutes without noticing it. I had to try and explain why it was okay to show people without clothes on in art to a five year old. Slightly impossible.

2. The table has a table cloth on. J quickly tries the trick where you pull the table cloth off the table without breaking anything. Luckily we averted that crisis.

3. B-man first decides he wants shrimp. Plain shrimp. Then for a brief moment he wanted crab. Then he decided on a hamburger. This was his order "I want a hamburger, no cheese please. But pickles and ketchup." He got extra pickles but was slightly disturbed that they were spears. He wanted them "in the hamburger." I cut them up and slid them in. Another crisis averted.

4. B-man after a few reminders of manners started telling everyone "Thank-you Sir!" He even asked for more water when his glass was full just so that he could thank the server.

5. While all of this was going on we were basically giving J anything he wanted off of our plates or the food that we brought for him. B-man was being especially helpful with J and kept handing him fries off his plate. Is it bad for a baby to eat fries? We didn't really stop him since it meant we could finish our own food.

6. As we were walking to our car I realized that every time I looked back at B-man and he keeps trying to hide a mint he had in his hand. It was one of those mints you get on your way out of the door of a restaurant. I could tell that he thought he wasn't supposed to have the candy. That he had stolen it. Which was hilarious because of course they were free. So that was another fun conversation we had about being sneaky etc.

The dinner was great, and exhausting. We were working so hard to keep the kids quiet that it wasn't like we had amazing stimulating conversation. But hopefully we helped B-man learn a little more manners, and we all got to eat in a great DC haunt.