Let’s talk about the time span between getting home with your kids after a long day of work and actually getting them into bed. And staying in bed. I like to think of this as the longest part of my day.

The minute the car pulls into the garage, all chaos ensues. The baby will start screaming and Henry will complain about the first thing he can think of. Tonight, his eyeball hurt.

It never fails. I have never pulled into my garage with a smiling child.

I get the boys out of the car and try to enter the house with Simon in his carrier, my purse that’s massive, and Henry’s school bag. The majority of the time, Henry decides to lay down in the floor directly in front of the door and sob uncontrollably.

Maybe his eye still hurts. Or he wishes he could be Batman in real life.

I attempt to step over him without whacking his head with the baby carrier. That has happened before and it caused an additional hour of crying.

Then the dog jumps in. He gets as close as humanly possible to me as I try to get the baby out of his carrier, then slide my four year old to the other side of the kitchen floor because luckily he has on slicky pants and I have wood floors. He can sob in a corner I don’t need to be in.

Then, I have to decide who to feed first. The screaming four year old or the screaming one year old?

Now this can be a truly tough decision. A four year old that gets something to eat after his baby brother can hold a real grudge for a night. Not fun.

But a cranky one year old that only wants to be held while you are standing up is also an issue because you’re old and your lower back is starting to hurt. You consider getting an ergonomically correct desk chair for your office.

After I have both of the boy’s food ready and everyone has actually stopped screaming, the dog decides to bark because he is hungry and also needs to be fed.

Mother. Of. Hell.

Sometimes I end up feeding myself. Sometimes I get busy and forget. And anyone who knows me, knows I hate missing a meal.

Next on the list are baths and bedtime. Those are both extremely time consuming and tedious tasks. I could start at 6 pm and still not have both of the kids down by 10 pm. Sometimes I would rather make a spreadsheet with a nice pivot table than read the Imaginext Batman book again. I should schedule both bath and bed time as my cardio for the day.

Not Fun Fact: I once had to read the same book seven times in a row. Yes, I know I’m allowed to say, “No, it’s time for bed,” and that I’m the adult but I prefer not to negotiate with terrorists.

Disclaimer: I love my children more than life itself and would stand in front of a train for them. But they can be annoying. Yes, I’m treasuring my time with them, Lisa the Internet Troll.

So then I go to bed.

That’s all. Fun huh? I tried to be one of those moms that could stay up all night, binging Netflix and drinking wine. But I need my eight hours of sleep a night or I’m just one unhappy person the next day.

So when you read this, I hope you think of the same chaos in your home. Promise me I’m not the only one. That every mom spends approximately three hours a night checking their watch for bedtime or yelling at their kid to stop jumping on the bed making fart noises.

And yes, my kid also peed on me tonight.

Until Next Time,

Jamie