Claire's First Date Night

(written by Matt)

Chick-fil-a's Daddy Daughter date night is a pretty special treat. The front of the restaurant is set apart with tablecloths and centerpieces with tiny glass candle holders, beads, and electric candles (Claire really wanted to play with the beads). We arrived a little late for our seating time and were shown to a table where we were handed place mats, menus, and crayons. I'm glad that we had given Claire a rose before we left because I think every girl in the restaurant had a rose, and she was enjoying it quite a bit so it's good she wasn't left out; I later found out that these were given out as people walked in so we got one from the next batch and she was super excited to have "TWO FLOWERS!"

The tablecloth was white paper for coloring and the placemats were blue and pink with conversation starter questions on them (favorite things, stories from Daddy when he was a boy, etc.); I laughed at first but this is probably a good idea. Claire was having so much fun coloring that she didn't want to order food the first time the waitress came around. The staff was doing their best to imitate a sit-down restaurant but I witnessed enough simple mistakes to gain a renewed appreciation for the difficulties of waited food service.

I ordered chicken fingers for Claire and a sandwich for myself. We spent a little time talking about our favorite things but keeping track of the crayons was enough conversation to keep us busy without the bother of anything else. When the food came, there was much discussion about what to do with the extra ketchup packet and Chick-fil-a sauce that weren't being used. We finally decided to open the extra sauce and Claire declared that it would be fun to dip chicken and/or fries two times, in both her ketchup and the sauce.

Midway through the meal, I noticed that other tables had started ordering desert. Amazingly, Claire didn't pick up on this. When we were through I asked for a dessert menu and they provided one that wisely had a picture of each one. First she wanted the cake (a brownie) but then wanted the cookie; before we ordered I had suggested ice cream which got her really excited. We ordered a cookie and small sunday. Upon arrival she gleefully reached for the cookie (too hot to handle at first) and I offered her the cherry on the sunday which she gobbled up. When I began to break apart the cookie to cool it down, Claire grabbed the spoon and began chowing down the sunday. When I asked for a bite of the sunday she began devouring the cookie. Then the check came and as I tended to paying she alternated between the two. I asked for a bite of ice cream again and she would say "don't eat it all," or I took a bite of cookie and she would say "I want some cookie too." When she arrived home, cookie and ice cream would be her favorite things of the night.

There was a Chick-fil-a cow there too. He appeared earlier while we were eating and she became very excited. She was happy to go see him up close but became very timid as we approached. The staff took our picture next to the cow (not my camera) and she stared him down. When we returned to our seats, she had forgotten all about being nervous and was excited about the cow again. During desert, the cow appeared once more and she was elated to see him. On our way out, she walked right up to the cow and gave him a high-five and a hug. Nevermind the restaurant mascot; I'm so proud of her for being able to work through a minor fear like that in a relatively short time.