My Real Life

February is always a crazy month around here, and it’s not just due to birthday madness.

In February, we rehearse for the play until 5:00 each day, which means that we all have to be super-organized, or else we’ll lose our minds.

This past Monday was a particularly long day, as I had play rehearsal, then I went to tutor.  After that, Monkey Girl and I picked up Baby Monkey, ran home to pick up Monkey in the Middle’s basketball shirt, then went to his school, where he was in after care, and got him dressed just in time for his practice to start.  (Practice is held at his school.)

A few minutes in, Real Man arrived, and we chatted for a bit, then I left while he stayed, to run to Walmart to pick up Baby Monkey’s birthday present. 

I’ve had the shopping done for the big kids for awhile, but he’s a little harder to shop for.

When I was done shopping, I called Real Man from the car and said I was leaving and he told me that practice was just ending.  We quickly devised a plan and agreed to meet.

So, Real Man clipped the monkeys in their seats and started out of the school driveway.  He pretended to take a wrong turn, and continued to pretend to take wrong turns until (fabulous timing) we both pulled into the Wendy’s parking lot at the same time.

The kids nearly lost their minds.  We haven’t taken them out to eat in a long, long time, however we still have the gift cards to Wendy’s that my parents got us for Christmas.

We found a table in a back corner, got our orders and sat and ate and laughed.

We caught up on everyone’ s day, talked about our plans for the rest of the week, discussed superstitions that might help us have a snow day on Wednesday (jammies inside out and backwards) and just enjoyed each other.

I sat back and looked at them all and my heart just swelled. 

With these monkeys in my life…it’s always a good day to be me.