"Fine Dining" with my kids

So my kids are almost 5 and almost 3-years old and almost 9-months old.
We have a birthday party planned and I'll send the boys to their day-cares with something sugar, lactose and gluten-free (probably a fruit salad and some crackers for V-Man and banana muffins for A-Man) on their respective days.

V-Man is currently at overnight care and while the A-Man's big 0-3 is next week, we thought it would be nice to go and take him out for dinner.
Something that is NOT McDonald's or Hesburger.  He had a meal out during this autumn break - and today he went to a Thai buffet restaurant with me for lunch and did pretty well there.
At home he doesn't always eat what is put in front of him so I thought maybe bumping it up and taking him to dinner could be fun and enjoyable.
But SH pointed out that if we went to anywhere else - there would be a waiting period. 

V-Man doesn't do "waiting for food" very well.
There's running away, jumping and climbing - he's introduced himself and spread some autism awareness via climbing along the head of booth-style seating...yeah that was fun.
There's hand and arm flapping, there's screaming and moaning/groaning.
There's frustration as we wait sometimes 5 to 30 minutes for food.

And that's why we decided we'll take A-Man out for a special/early birthday dinner tomorrow night to American Diner.
It has food he likes and they have children meals.  And those children meals also come in an awesome cardboard-shaped car!

It's not that V-Man doesn't deserve to come out with us for dinner.  It's just a lot less stressful for everyone (especially him) if he's doing something he likes, eating food when he's used to and where he's used to - than to drag him into what could be an extremely uncomfortable situation for him.
So on his actual birthday next week, I'll bake him a cake.  And we'll celebrate together with V-Man and in the privacy of our own home.
I realize this totally makes me look like we're playing favourites and so on but we're really not.  We just want A-Man to have a nice dinner out with us (M-Girl will probably be present too) that is slightly upscale for a 3-year old and give him the chance to be the total center of attention.

For V-Man's birthday - we're going to take the whole family to see his favourite band that's visiting.  He's going to be so thrilled and hopefully exhausted after from all the jumping and dancing that's bound to happen.
Dinner is also a possibility - but it'll probably be some sort of pizza buffet or McDonald's. 
And I think he'll be tickled pink about that.

And let's be honest, while I'm at it, my kids don't quite get birthdays or Christmas.  They don't know who Santa, the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy are and they don't know their own ages, let alone why turning 1-year older is being celebrated.
And that's both of my boys!  It's not that we don't do anything - they just look extremely confused during birthday parties and A-Man enjoys opening presents but still doesn't know why.  Christmas holidays just mean that for some strange reason, there's no day-care, it's still dark and we have some decorations (when we remember).
Perhaps it could also be because of the double languages - when they're older they'll figure it out and then I'm sure I'll be writing about how my kids want this and that and started their letter/list to Santa on January 1st. :)

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