Get a gaggle of Moms together and you get an unabridged, uncensored and often hilarious slice of real life!

Every couple of weeks, I’m lucky enough to hang out with a group of fellow Mom friends. Moms who need a Moms’ Night Out! We all relish the chance to outsource bedtime to our spouses/partners, get out the house for a few hours and let down our hair. Most often we’re too tired to get too crazy, but what we do get is the opportunity to swap stories, discuss our challenges and explore whatever’s on our minds – without judgement and with shared interest and laughter. If we are lucky enough, like last night, we also get an entertaining waiter to spice it all up a notch!

So you want to know what’s on Moms’ minds. Here goes:

• Homework – with kids ranging from 4 to 11, we are all tackling homework in some shape or form. And I’m not talking about doing our kids’ homework for them, I’m talking about figuring out how to fit it into their already busy days. Some kids don’t get home till 6pm yet there’s still the expectation of a project to complete. Others get the opportunity to do their homework after school – but would rather not. Some rush through it. The older ones have 1.5 hours of homework every night. As parents we are trying to figure how to help our kids find the time and focus so they can apply themselves and learn, without burnout or frustration.
• Logistics – the daily chaos of dropping off and picking up numerous kids to and from different places is a challenge we face day after day after day. Thank heavens, we get to divide and conquer with our partners most of the time. But there are so many moving parts, it makes us dizzy.
• Diversity – our kids have all been learning these past few weeks about Martin Luther King Junior. For our kids, inequality is an utterly foreign concept. It’s interesting: they live with families and communities that are a beautiful mix of colors, religions and cultures and to them, this is perfectly normal. They don’t see the differences. As we discussed last night, racism is a learned behavior, one we hope they never learn.
• Smartphones and apps – we all have them, we all love them, some of us even admit that our smartphones have “changed our lives.”  Hooray for our smartphones that let us multitask, work flex hours, keep up with friends, gossip – and play. Last night it wasn’t long before we were comparing the apps we use for managing our store discount cards, couponing and so on.

What didn’t we discuss last night? Men, politics, recipes, fashion, diapers, labor, sex – but who’s to say those won’t be on the agenda next time?