We’ve all been there — trying to do it all, with our toddler in tow. It’s not easy. But thanks to a nice stranger, one fellow busy mom was given a much-deserved break.
27-year-old Katie Donaldson was dining at Dough, a restaurant in Manchester, England, with her girlfriends and 2-year-old daughter, Pixie. As you can imagine, it was hard to get a word or bite in with a toddler at the table. But a beautiful thing happened thanks to one waiter who went above and beyond to sit and chat with Pixie.
Donaldson wrote about the experience on her Facebook page and it’s receiving an amazing response with 1.3K likes and comments praising this everyday hero.
It all started with Pixie taking a liking to waiter Mark Quinn (or “the beautiful man,” as she so eloquently describes). “She took a shining to Mark as soon as we walked into Dough. He kept chatting to her and as she was getting more bored of my company and more interested in what the beautiful man was doing!” Donaldson explained to Babble.
Pixie ordered a Mickey-shaped pizza (good choice) and requested that it be cut into “pixie sized” pieces — and not by her mom but by “the beautiful man.” He obliged and continued checking in with Pixie every 10 minutes. Meanwhile, her mom was having a hard time balancing her friends, her food, and her high-maintenance tot.
“All this time my food is going cold, I’ve barely spoken to my friends whilst I’ve been picking up crayons and making sure she’s eating all her perfectly sized pizza, and low and behold over comes this hero who seemed to sense my hunger (perfect timing again!) and asks Pixie if she would like to eat with him at the next table.”
Then he proceeded to give Pixie ice cream and talk about her day and how Smarties are THE BEST on ice cream. He knows the true way to a toddler’s (and lady’s) heart. Donaldson was able to have a kid (and mess) free dinner with the girls for 10 minutes. Which, honestly, is all you need sometimes to regain your sanity.
She was so moved by the waiter’s gesture, she took to Facebook to thank him, writing:
“Thank you to the waiter at Dough, for taking my 2-year-old on her first date. Thank you for letting a busy mum have her dinner in peace. Thank you for making sure my little one felt like a Princess. And thank you for going above and beyond your job for a little girl who you’ve never met before.”
Since then, Pixie’s continued talking about “the beautiful man” and when the post went viral, they stopped back to give him a proper thank you. Of course, ice cream was involved. Donaldson says that he’s firmly cemented as her favorite person (after her dad and toy rabbit, of course).
Quinn is humbled by it all, and told the Manchester Evening News, “I’d like to think I was good with kids and will always try [to] go the extra mile with customers. But there was something about Pixie that just connected and she took a shining to me so of course I did what I could to make the meal easy for Katie.”
There’s no denying that he’s a beautiful man — inside and out. And we hope there are other Quinns in this world, eager to help a hungry mama. Donaldson put it best, “In this miserable time, there are still people who make the world a better place — even if it’s just for 10 minutes at a time.”
h/t: Huffington Post