While pregnant with my first child, I read all the books, websites and blogs I could in an effort to become a "good" parent. During my "research", Hubbs and I formulated a list of things we would and wouldn't do. Our own personal Ten Commandments, if you will.
Then I gave birth to our baby boy...
And, then...and ONLY then...did reality set in.
I wasn't ever going to co-sleep -- co-sleeping was the only way I could sleep soundly after I'd had our son. Hubbs and I had decided, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there was no way we'd have a baby in our "marriage bed" -- he and I LOVED having our little guy snuggle in between us from time to time (our daughter, the Olympic Athlete Sleeper, not so much). And so on and so forth.
One of the many "would nots" we listed was that we weren't going to be like those terrible parents that turned to fast food when time got tight. Oh no! Our kids were going to eat healthy, home-cooked meals. In fact, we weren't even going to introduce any fast food until after our son reached the age of 4.
Well, this got thrown out the window very swiftly after I went back to work (not that that was the first time we'd visited a fast food restaurant with our children). Which brings me to the subject of this post --
On Tuesday evening, Hubbs was going to be staying in the city to meet up with his brother for dinner. This meant that the end of my 70 to 90 minute commute would consist of picking up the kids from daycare, getting them home and feeding them before they both completely melted down from utter starvation. (ask any parent and they'll tell you that kids reach full-on, desperate, starvation mode within two hours of the previous time they ate)
Monday night, we went grocery shopping as a family and I had the forethought to purchase one of those yummy little BBQ chickens from the grocery store as well as some veggies and dip. I figured I would pair those two items with some oven fries and the kids and I would have a nice, relatively healthy dinner.
Fast-forward to Tuesday.
I left work at 4pm, arrived at daycare by 530pm, had the kids secured in their car seats and ready to make the drive home by 5:40pm. They were so great during the pick-up that when they asked if they could watch a movie in the van - even though the rule is no movies in town, only on longer road trips - I agreed.
Well, once I had the movie on I didn't want to disappoint them by cutting it off all of five minutes later after arriving home so I racked my brains trying to think of what I could do to give them some more van-movie time but still satisfy the hunger I knew was bubbling within each one of them.
Wendy's!
Without giving it a second though, I was taking them through the drive-thru and ordering them each a kid's meal. Fries, Nuggets or Cheeseburger, Chocolate Milk and a Toy.
What's - probably - worse, is that I was really happy about my decision. I sighed a huge sigh of relief when we arrived home and they each walked in through the front door with their respective kid's meals in their little hands, walked over to the coffee table and went to town on their suppers.
I flopped my tired-self down onto the couch and smiled as they happily ate their fat-laden-diabetes-and-obesity-risk-increasing meals and washed the food down with chocolate milk. I went even further and turned on The Madagascar Penguins to buy myself even more peace, quiet and rest.
It. Was. Magical.
At my leisure, I walked into the kitchen, dressed the baked potato I'd bought myself from Wendy's and paired it with the BBQ chicken and veggies and dip.
My dinner was super yummy.
My kids were happy, fed and entertained.
My kitchen was clean with no dishes to do.
I'm not going to lie. Best. Supper-night. Ever.
And just like that, I'd become "that" parent.
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