The Rat Race

Our evening routine is filled with utter chaos. No matter how hard we try to streamline this process, it ends up looking like a Chinese fire drill. Even with my new kid-friendly schedule where I'm usually home by 4:00 (giving me a full nearly 2 hours extra), I still can't get the schedule down.

Here's how it's supposed to look:

4:00 Son arrives home from school; if daughter is with grandma, pick her up; prepare supper while quizzing the children about their day

6:00 Eat supper, do homework, prepare for tomorrow (lay out clothes, pack lunches, etc)

7:00 Baths or tv/game (we rotate every other night) and medicine dispension

7:45 Kids in bed; followed by the rat race that is me doing laundry, reading lesson plans, cleaning house, cleaning up supper, etc.until 9; I then try to sit for a while

Here's how it actually plays out:

4:00 Son arrives home. Go get daughter - talk to mother or mother in law for an hour about this and that while kids make a total mess that then has to be cleaned up

5:30 Arrive home and panic because I haven't started supper yet

6:30 Eat supper (or give up and head out somewhere) and try to do all that other stuff I'm supposed to do in this time frame, but never get done because people call, kids get hurt, etc.

7:30 Tell the kids we'll do baths tomorrow, dispense meds (this never gets forgotten), read book after book after book, tell the kids good-night again and again and again, listen to them get up to go to the bathroom again and again and again.

8:30 They are finally asleep....move on to my chores....ah, heck with it, I can take a few minutes to rest. Zzzzzzz.....

10:30 Wake up and realize I still haven't packed lunches or done any chores. I go to bed annoyed and wake up three thousand times a night making my mental to-do list for the next day.

Why is it that I can NOT get this down??? Someone PLEASE tell me I'm not alone in this quest!!

(BTW, husband is here 2-3 nights a week for this routine, but he's got his own list of to-do's that we won't go into - just thought I should mention that I'm not actually a single parent here!!)