Taking your baby to the cafe? No need to leave the cot at home

Finding it hard to find a kid friendly cafe where you live? Check out how this inventive, New York family overcame that hurdle PLUS we have a giggle at the lengths folks will go to in order to nab five minutes peace!

For years, New York food spots served up grub to hip struggling artist and scenesters. So what happens when the hipsters grow up and start breeding? Times, they are a changin’. Both the cafes and the clients need to get creative to accommodate the new wave of New York babies hitting the streets.

A perfect example of the lengths parents will go to in order to enjoy their favourite food is this ingenious Brooklyn couple. Fancying a feed at Williamsburg’s Rosarita Fish Shack, they thought outside the square and wheeled up with their wooden crib. Placing the crib next to one of the restaurants outdoor tables, the couple enjoyed their brunch in peace, while bub was happy to be out in his familiar territory.

“That certainly was a first, said Rosarita’s daytime manager, Susie Kenny, “We were laughing all day. It was a highlight.”


I’ll be filing this under “Now why didn’t I think of that?”

Some more unique (and maybe questionable) methods employed by parents to get some peace:

A friend of mine used to tie her toddler’s walker to the clothesline while she got her washing done. Baby Fiona would just go around and around and around in circles. Speaking of washing, our own Suze English has admitted that more than once, she used her laundry sink as a playpen while she wrangled with her twin tub washing machine, and when it came time for hanging it out, the good old Jolly Jumper was attached to the clothesline itself!

Bron Maxabella made friends with her portacot, taking it to the beach and on picnics as the perfect playpen, with mozzie nets artfully draped for maximum effect.

For me, this whole parenting gig has been an exercise in thinking outside of the box. With three kids to juggle and another on the way, I’ve had to get creative every now and then in order to get some kind of functioning order happening. However my husband wears the crown for creative thinking at our place. It was him that created the raincoat wearing during mealtimes policy when our son was a toddler, he was also known to vacuum Cael down in his highchair after meals that involved rice. It was he again who invented the game that whoever hopped off their chair at the restaurant would have to do the washing up, but my fave trick he used to employ was the stashing of baby Ivy in the bathroom sink while Cael had his bath.

ivy squish

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Have you got any great ideas for the, “Now why didn’t I think of that?” file? How have you creatively occupied your kids?

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