The daily witching hour....

In our household, and I suspect in many others across this great land of ours, there is a "magical" time that spans from after-school through bedtime. My sister and I affectionately call this the witching hour.

It is almost like the convergence of several rare, meteorological spectacles, all rolled up into one...and if you have a toddler, the fun magnifies several hundred times. For several hours each late afternoon into early evening, everything seems suspended as in a time warp. Shall I walk you through a typical witching hour in our home? Will it remind you of good times of your own?

Our afternoon begins with a brisk sprint through the teacher's parking lot, desperately dodging other crazed teachers colleagues making their way home. My two older sons are usually still several yards behind as I make head way to the car, to unceremoniously dump all my belongings in the front seat, to begin the trek to pick up the toddler. In the car, as I steer clear of other mothers making their way home, the typical conversation ensues; one that carefully gauges the amount of homework my children will be responsible for completing that afternoon. Depending on the amount, we run an errand or two, or we just get home.

Picking up the toddler is the first stop. My youngest son's school is located in the most inconvenient of spots. There is a stop light after the school that you must wait at for at least five minutes. Five minutes should not be too bad, right? Except that I have that invisible Mommy clock over my head...the one that carefully marks when things are going to go south for any of the said children. The one that nary forgives a mistake, the one that is forever ticking my time with these precious children away. A mere five minutes can mean the difference between a kind witching hour or one that seems to go on FOREVER...

Picking up Joshua entails a security system, signing out, and the collecting of various personal belongings; namely the sippy cup (which are in very limited quantities in our house, as this is the last of the babies in this family) and the lunch box. Needless to say, a left behind sippy cup is fair game to any other parent who is also embarking on the witching hour, or it becomes the grossest of science experiments by the next afternoon's pickup.

Because Joshua is a toddler, all modes of reasoning and bargaining are off the table. Quite frankly, you never know how it is going to go once we are out the door. First, he must wash his hands before we go, which may or may not improve his mood as he exits the building. Then comes the routine of jumping down the steps of the administrative building. Finally, is the fight to hold his hand as we make our way through the parking lot. He likes to run in parking lots...enough said, people. By this time, I am ready to curl up with a sippy cup filled with an adult beverage and pretend I don't hear or see the children I gave birth to...but the best is yet to come...

Depending on Joshua's (and the two other children's) mood, I can then decide to risk the trip to the grocery store to pick up the invariably forgotten item I must have to complete this 24 hour stretch of day or just ask Hubby to bring it (which he may or may not forget...depending on his day). Other excursions, like say, the barber, dentist or picking up an item for a project turns into a battle of the wills. Who will cave first? How many times can I be asked if we are going home next? The world may never know...

After all torture runs errands are completed, I rush home with hungry, cranky children who need to complete homework. I rush to begin some semblance of a nutritious dinner and begin the 40th round of homework battles. Some days, like today, I get EXTREMELY lucky and everyone is done early and without too much pestering on either parent or child's part. Other days, I would rather have my four impacted wisdom teeth removed again, this time without the aid of pharmaceuticals. Yeah, it's that bad...but at least with the teeth I lost some weight as an added bonus...And all this with the soothing background music of Nick Jr., slowly eating away at whatever brain cells I may have left...(On a side note, shouldn't studies be conducted on the consequences of listening to toddler programming when you are in your late thirties? Just a thought...)

After feeding time at the zoo, (and for those of you who don't have boys, there are days that I know that they must have a hollow leg, because they are ALWAYS hungry...SERIOUSLY) begins bath time. When they were younger, I could put everyone in the tub at the same time and Hubby and I had an assembly line approach that would make Henry Ford proud. These days, it is one at a time, usually the older two bickering on who should go first, who went first. Think of a really bad play on Laurel and Hardy's Who's on First, but without the comedic genius. Then comes the squirmy toddler, who still smells delicious after a warm bath and looks better than anyone in striped pajamas...Bliss, right? So close to the finish line of today you can taste it? WRONG!

Joshua has now decided that he can roll right out of his little toddler bed and hang with the big boys, namely Andrew on the bottom bunk in the room all three share, or head on out to the family room, where his father and I try to gather up enough energy to finish picking up the kitchen, get a shower ourselves and pray that we fall asleep in our bed rather than on the couch...Not good times. Because he is so tired, he cannot walk straight, because, inevitably, the other two will start complaining that any given sibling is keeping him from slumber...

But more often than not, when I kiss all three boys good night, I close the door and hear them talking about their day to each other, making themselves giggle and whisper...the stuff dreams are made of, and definitely the stuff that fuels you for tomorrow night's episode of the witching hour...