Passing the time at restaurants with 5 year old

[Anonymous]

In addition to hangman and drawing:

The tiny pots of play dough or some other clay.
Brain quest smart cards

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I Spy is a good one.

We also do the hand raising game, where someone calls out yes/no questions and everyone at the table raises their hands. Ex: “who went skiiing today?” “Who is wearing a hat?” “Who is excited about the pool tomorrow?” “Who is sleeping in a bunk bed?” “Who slept super late today?”

We also don’t do any leisurely meals. Order basically as soon as you sit down, get the check quickly, don’t linger. If I’m out without my kids, I love a 2 hour meal, but with two kids under six? We try to be in and out in 60 min. We don’t use screens at all though.

This is the way! If your kid needs games at age 5 to behave at the table, then you are there too long. My oldest has always been well-behaved, but my middle kid, what a nightmare. My kids are old, we never had any electronics to keep them occupied.

We approached eating out like a tactical operation. Review menus online ahead of time so you know what you want to order. Sit down, order food and drinks immediately. When food is brought out, ask waiter for check. Pay for meal as soon as waiter brings you the check. If you know there is likely to be food left over and you want it to go, ask for a to go box when you ask for the check. If things are going well, you can still have a leisurely meal. If they aren't going well, you have paid so can leave whenever you need to.

The bolded is really, really kid dependent. We're strict parents and I have one kid that could entertain herself with literally nothing and one who is much more needy (and yet another that's in-between).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are on vacation so going out to eat every meal. I need ideas on how to pass time the at restaurants without always resorting to iPad. We color and practice writing letters. We played hangman. We talk. What else can we do? Other games? TIA!

Mine did all the above and played with Wikky stix

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are on vacation so going out to eat every meal. I need ideas on how to pass time the at restaurants without always resorting to iPad. We color and practice writing letters. We played hangman. We talk. What else can we do? Other games? TIA!

Mine did all the above and played with Wikky stix

And they also liked those sticker books.
Never used an iPad.

[Anonymous]

By 5 we did not bring anything special. Kids menu and crayons is enough. I’d also recommend a notebook and pen or a picture book like I Spy.

[Anonymous]

Target has small tubes of little Lego type toys in their $1 section by the entrance doors. Easy to throw in a bag and small enough to build at the table.

[Anonymous]

Mini notebook and a tiny pack of colored pencils. Drawing, writing stories, tic tac toe, hangman, dots, scribble drawings, eyes closed drawing, challenges like Pictionary, etc.

Could also bring a pack of postcards to write/draw to send to relatives.

Also talking games like telephone, would you rather, what would you do if (fill in the blank: you had $100 in the toy store, you found a kitten on the sidewalk, a friend was crying, you needed to perform a song to save the world).

And never ever electronics. If they know it's never an option it's so much more tolerable because there's no reason to whine for the phone or tablet and their attention spans grow better.

[Anonymous]

Play doh or clay
Coloring , mazes, find Waldo type books,
Tic tac toe
Dots game where u draw dots. Then take turns drawling lines to make boxes. If you draw the 4th line and create a box you put your initial in it.

[Anonymous]

My kids like to ask me seriously random questions like “do shrimp have brains?” And I google the answer. Yes it’s screen time but just for me.

[Anonymous]

Usually paper and drawing is enough. But at that age, we also would sometimes do “scavenger hunts” where the kid or the adult would draw three pictures of something you could see to find them. The kid pictures made it especially challenging since they can’t draw well at that age. Sort of like I spy, except for drawing

[Anonymous]

We never did screen time at restaurants. We do screen time elsewhere. So tix tax for, playdoh, and always had crayons/pencils and little notebooks. Now that the youngest is 5 we all just chit chat, tell jokes, play word games without bringing too many extra things.

[Anonymous]

Teach them table manners at home and they will know how to behave in any public place.

[Anonymous]

If you do screen time, please use headphones.

[Anonymous]

I have a tote bag of small restaurant toys for my kids. Coloring pads, crayons, magnetic rubics cube type thing, little Elsa/disney figurines, wiki stix, water wows, matchbox cars etc.

[Anonymous]

I would venture that my 4.5 year old is actually on the high end of the scale as far as being chill at restaurants but it can swing wildly depending on hunger and tiredness.

Top tips:
Look at the menu before hand so you can order as soon as a server comes to your table. Also so both parents know what the other wants in case they have had to step away with kiddo. When the food arrives, ask for the bill when the food comes if you’re not going to order more. Waiting for food and waiting for the bill are the hardest periods and you can just eliminate a lot of it.

For breakfast, give them a little something before. A banana from the lobby yesterday, crackers, anything but an empty tummy waiting at a restaurant.

I like to bring some little toys and drawing stuff.

When that fails, take turns taking kiddos for walks. If you’ve done the order planning and have phones, you won’t miss the food coming or anything.