Today was a really good day.

We picked up Evie’s friend, Emily, and went to Pizza Putt.  For those of you that don’t know, Pizza Putt is a Chucky Cheese-like establishment…an indoor recreational facility for kids–complete with mini golf, arcades, bowling, and a gimungous play structure.

My heart melted when we were driving to Pizza Putt as Emily and Evie held hands in the backseat of the car.  Chills.

Emily is a super sweet child that has a lovely natural tendency to nurture.  She is so wonderful with Evie–hugging her, helping her, and not judging her–even when Evie dipped her hand in Emily’s ketchup at lunch.  I guess she has a wise old soul and I am so grateful that she and Evie are friends.  Girlfriend  also plays a mean game of skeeball.

After lunch, we entered the “structure” area.  Oh.My.God.  Being zero degrees or so, it was wall to wall packed with kids.  When I say that kids were literally emerging from tiny crevices, I am not exaggerating in the least.

Emily immediately guide-carried Evie up this structure thing.  I don’t have a picture of the two of them together but here is a picture of her doing the same thing with Max.

I tried not to have a heart attack.  I lasted, maybe, 3 minutes before I climbed the structure to get Evie who was sort of stuck in that little cubby hole at the top.  She was happily getting trampled by the other kids but I figured the bottom obstacles might be more appropriate for her.

Then Max went flying up that thing with Emily.  My heart was in my shoes.  As Scott said, “She was, by far, the littlest one up there!”  I ended up performing another rescue mission when Max got caught in some netting somewhere deep in the structure.  I also plucked another little girl out of the netting while I was there that said, “Help!  I am going to fall through!”

I thought Max might be done, but no.  She just went another way to avoid the netting.  Every once in a while, I would catch a glimpse of her and Emily making their way through.

But this thing is BIG and it took like 15 minutes for the two of them to get through.  I was thankful for the windows on some of the tunnels.

Because as much as I would like to say that I am a natural free-range mama, I sure as shit am not.  It took every fiber of my being to exercise self-restraint and let Max explore with Emily.

And my bravery was good.  Because Max was thrilled with the adventure.