The Worst Witch

Julia received a surprise gift in the mail early this week: a DVD of the made-for-tv movie from the 80's, "The Worst Witch." Sent by Auntie Shannon, this gift was a passing-down of our childhood favorite Halloween movie, and even though the music and special effects are completely outdated, Julia was absolutely enchanted by it. In fact, one might say obsessed. She has watched it every single day since receiving it, and has taken to randomly quoting lines from the movie throughout the day, often to people with no familiarity with the movie, with no reference to what she is referring. For example, our Tuesday night baby-sitter showed up last evening and received this greeting from Julia:

ILANA: Hi, Julia.
JULIA: (in a faux British accent) When I say faster! I order DISASTER! Mildred Hubble, the DISASTER AREA. Go ahead, smarty-pants.

Hi, Ilana. My daughter is not weird AT ALL.

Despite her everyday viewing of this movie, there remain a few things she hasn't quite sorted out in her head. Given that the witches all live at a boarding school together, it's understandable that Julia would think they are somehow related. After I explained that they were all at school, not living at their collective home, she recognized that the girls were not all siblings. However, she can't quite dismiss the idea that Mildred and her roomate, Maud, are not related. She consistently refers to Maud as "Mildred's sister," despite conflicting evidence presented in the movie's dialogue.

MILDRED: My mother always wanted to be a witch, but she just didn't have the gift.
MAUD: My family were all witches. I never doubted that I would be one too.

Another point of confusion for Julia is the fact that although the people on the screen are real people, they are not actually the characters they are playing.

JULIA: Mom? But are the people in this movie REAL people?
ME: Yes, they're real people. But they're not really witches.
JULIA: How are they not really witches?
ME: Well, they're playing characters. Like the girl who plays Mildred is not really named Mildred Hubble.
JULIA: (dumbfounded) She's NOT?
ME: No, her name is Fairuza Balk and she's just pretending to be Mildred Hubble.
JULIA: But Mama, why are they just PRETENDING to be witches?

For someone with such a vivid imagination and proclivity towards pretend play, you'd think this concept would be a little easier to grasp.

Things got really complicated when she tried to understand how Miss Cackle and her twin sister Agatha were not really two different people.

In addition to watching the movie and talking about it non-stop, Julia has also been acting out her own witch games, complete with broomstick rides, and of course, Madeleine is right behind her, imitating her every move:






Julia also mixed up various potions for me, each one consisting of five ingredients: sand, dirt, a rock, a stick, and a few blades of grass. As she gave me each potion, she informed me of its desired effects. I had sips of a sleeping potion, a potion that made my ears full of earwax, and a potion that made me feel weird. I started talking like weird girl after tasting that one, but Julia quickly informed me I wasn't supposed to do that, even though I thought I was being really funny.

On a completely unrelated topic, Madeleine and I rode the sixxy-nine bus to the Y yesterday, and she spent the bus ride loudly proclaiming the following: "What color is pee-pees? It's YELLOW! Oh yeah, it's yellow. PEE is YELLOW!"

Just in case anyone on the bus wasn't sure of the color of urine, Madeleine made sure to set everyone straight.