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Last night at 9:45 p.m. my phone alerted me to an incoming text message.It was a text asking if Mary and Anna were going to be at art class in the morning, and that's when I realized once and for all that my children have a better social life than I do.

It's not just that someone wanted to know if they would be in class. It's that I had to respond back with their regrets: "Sorry, Mary and Anna have a play date with the neighbors in the morning." My kids had a prior engagement at 9:30 a.m. on a weekday. I've had years to make friends in this state and I don't even have firm plans for Saturday night that don't involve an insomniac four month old.

We headed out early this morning, the girls in their finest casual wear sweat suits, spent a couple of hours playing with little people of both the toddler and Fisher Price variety, then left to meet Tim at work for lunch. Then Mary had to go inside and say hello to the principal of the school, the man who puts the fear of God in his his high schoolers but with whom my four year old is on a first-name basis. Leave work, make it to ballet with a few minutes to spare, then head home for late power naps and eventually dinner.  Monday  it's another whirlwind of play dates, play and learn classes and a visit from Tim's cousin, who adores my daughters about as much as they love getting attention from a super cool 20 year old in college.

Mary is cool. It boggles my mind. Where did they get the genetics to be so socially adept? I have many memories of my school years, and not many of them depict me being suave, particularly popular or anything but a music and theater geek long before shows like Glee made such a thing cool. But no one makes friends faster than a preschooler. Mary walks in to any situation and immediately has a new best friend. They hug goodbye after a five minute interaction, ask for play dates. Mary, like every other four year old out there, automatically assumes everyone thinks she's fabulous.

And she is. She might not always be the coolest kid on the block. In fact, given her parentage, that's pretty much a certainty. But that's not what it's about. She's self assured. Sure, she talks too loud, and too much sometimes (mommy's girl!) and is blunt and sarcastic (again, those genes are powerful). Someone once informed me that I had to be careful."Those traits she has today will only be magnified when she's a teenager."

Probably. But if they stay that way into adulthood, she'll also be incredibly confident, and you can't put a price on that.

Hang onto it, kid.