There are a lot of things I take seriously as a mother. Things like safety, manners, honesty… Raising kind humans who love Jesus and know how to load a dishwasher.

But if you ask my daughters what the most powerful force in our house is… they would probably say lavender soap.

Let me back up a little for those of you who might be new around here…

I’m a divorced mom with 50/50 custody of my girls. That means on the weeks I have them, life runs on a pretty tight schedule. Between my full-time job, part-time job and their school (and now practice) schedules, we realistically get about three hours together in the evenings during the week.

And those three hours? They disappear faster than a McDonald’s nugget around my kids. It usually goes something like this…homework, track or softball practice, cooking dinner, eating dinner, cleaning up dinner then bath time!

So, that brings me back to the lavender…

Ever since they were babies, I’ve used lavender during our nighttime routine. At first it was lavender baby wash, then lavender lotion, and now we’ve graduated to a good old-fashioned bar of lavender soap sitting in the shower.

It’s supposed to be calming, relaxing, sleep-inducing…

Apparently my girls have taken that information and turned it into a full-blown scientific conclusion: lavender soap is basically liquid NyQuil.

In their minds, once that lavender touches your skin, it’s over. Game finished. Lights out.

Which is funny … because during the week, when a set bedtime is non-negotiable, they’ll drag their feet into the bathroom like they’re headed to a prison sentence.

But on the weekends I have them? Oh honey, it’s a whole different story. Because let me just say this right now before the parenting police arrive … Every other weekend at my house, we do the most. We are off the clock – off work and out of school – which means NO BEDTIME!

Judge me if you want, but when you’re sharing your kids’ childhood with a custody schedule, you learn real quick that time becomes sacred. I’m squeezing every drop out of the hours I get.

We stay up late and watch movies with lots of snacks, cuddles and laughter! That is quality time that I guard fiercely. Which brings us to this past Friday night… and the lavender soap scandal.

Kameron, my four-year-old, had already finished her bath and gotten dressed. Now, Kameron has a small habit we’re working through. She will exit the bathroom like a tornado victim. Water still in the tub, towel on the floor and washcloth … honestly there’s no telling!

So I walked in there to clean up and immediately noticed something was… off. The tub water was still sitting there and it was bright blue … like bright blue. 

I just stood there staring at it for a second before calling out: “Kameron … what did you use in this bathtub?”

She walked in, completely calm. “Oh … the soap.”

Now listen. There is a perfectly good bar of lavender soap sitting right next to the tub. The same soap she has used approximately one thousand times in her life. But then I spotted the real culprit sitting on the edge of the counter … the Dawn dish soap. The same Dawn I had used two days earlier to wash the dog.

I looked at her and said, “Kameron … why on earth did you use the Dawn?! The soap is right there!” 

Without missing a beat (and with the seriousness of someone explaining a life-or-death situation) she looked me straight in the eyes and said: “I ain’t using that lavender stuff… it’s Friday!”

So, I say all of that to say … I now have a weekday soap and a weekend soap.

I hope you all have a great (lavender free) weekend!

(Paige Gurgainers is a mom of three girls, digital journalist for Webster Parish Journal.)