After All These Years (1.7)

Hello again, World! It's been some years since I last spoke. Oh, dear! I should definitely have updated this blog sooner, but we have been so busy!

We now have four children, myself and Mortimer. Three now attend elementary school, and one is a toddler. Our eldest three are all in second grade, and out of them, our little Sophy is the eldest. She's grown into quite the little lady! She is always very kind towards her siblings. I couldn't be prouder of her, although the same goes for all my children.

Our absolute youngest, my little bean sprout, is Tobias. Like Elliott, he has his father's hair colour, and is an absolute cutie-pie! I love him to bits.

Our second youngest, who is adopted by both myself and Mortimer, is Caden, who's definitely the most creative of our children! He's a bit of a bookworm, but he's doing well in school socially as well as academically now. The first year, I have to admit, he spent almost entirely in the library.

And of course, the second eldest, my little Elliott. He's doing extremely well academically, but neither he or Sophy seem to want to try making friends like Caden does, and are content to be friends with each other. I don't quite know what to do, frankly.

He also recently started being angry with me, because he apparently doesn't want a little brother. At all. Not Caden, no, but our youngest. He says he has enough siblings, thank you.

Sophy confided in me that he's angry because Tobias' old bed became a little too small for him and we brought out Elliott's old bed for him. Well, there was no use buying another bed when we had such a good one in storage, but now I feel extremely guilty!

As for the rest of our family, I can tell you that Cassie is no longer a teenager, and that Alexander has become a teenager, and also that Bella's allowed that her daughter can meet my children, given that her other two are half-siblings to mine and she doesn't want her darling feeling left out. Her pretty little girl is called Genesis, and is such a sweet little toddler.

Primrose is now four years old, and although still very much a toddler, she will soon be ready for 'big school'. She's very sweet! She's very like her mother, too.

We've been seeing more of her recently, as Orson has been bringing her around while Liberty is at work, during the days she isn't at nursery school. The children adore their little cousin, although she can be quite shy around them. Caden especially likes spending time with her.

As Liberty and Orson's garden is practically a play park, whereas ours is pretty much the swimming pool, we often arrange playdates where I drop off Tobias and Orson keeps an eye on him and Primrose. Tobias likes spending time with 'Wose', and she seems to take care of him, but my sweet little peapod doesn't like me leaving.
I promise to be back, of course, and tell him I love him, but it's very hard. Soon he'll be going to the same nursery school as Primrose for three days a week, like she does, and he needs to be prepared (as do I, quite frankly). And it's also the same one that Alice's twins attend, so I'm hoping they might end up becoming good friends.

Oh, well. I'll update again soon with any news!

(Author's Note: After the Grand Aging Up of this storyline, I've turned off aging in order to have this be a good story! Expect a good amount of episodes from now on!)

Cassandra's Thoughts (1.6)

Okay, so real talk. Mom's new boyfriend creeps me out slightly.

Look, it's nothing against him. I think it's just that...I don't like him, or something.

It's not like he's nasty! Nothing like that. He really, honestly tries, and he's always paying attention to Alexander, and they go walking together. He's a good person, I know.

I guess I feel kind of like he's trying to replace Dad. Like, he's stepping into the father role, like Dad's dead or something. Sure, Dad isn't around 24/7, but he's nearby, and we're always welcome! He's not dead.

And Noah always calls me 'champ', like he's the freaking soccer coach. He doesn't really talk to me much about anything except what he thinks teen girls talk about. Super duper wrong! I don't want to talk about if I've got a crush on someone, or what happened at Mal's party. The whole point of going to a party is not talking about it. Otherwise it's like you didn't go!

And he's always teasing me about any boy I mention. Plumbobs, grow up! I only mentioned Mal because I got invited to his party by his friend Rob, not because I know him.

Mom, of course, doesn't notice. She's happy, flying on a cloud of hormones above everything. She's so chilled, it's freaky - she even went around to see Juliana to tell her all about Noah and the baby. Juliana! Mom used to hate Juliana. I'm pretty sure she'll hate her again once the baby's born.

I tend to spend a lot of time on my Slablet these days. Things have just gotten too much for me, even with Alexander around - he's an elementary school kid, after all, and he's beginning to like Noah, of course.

So that door stays locked most of the time. I'm just not ready to think of Noah as part of the family, I guess. Not when he's like that. I don't want to be teased, and called 'champ'. I don't need a new dad, I've got one already.

I can't say anything to Mom. She's so happy, it just wouldn't be kind. She loves Noah, even if I don't.

And it's not like I'm posting this up for the world to see or anything. Nobody even reads my blog.

C.

Family Times (1.5)

Hello again, world!

It's certainly been a while since I last posted anything! Sorry about that, but it's been interesting times here in Willow Creek, and no mistake!

Liberty and Orson's daughter was born a month ago, and they've named her Primrose. She's absolutely beautiful, and I've passed on some of Sophy's old baby clothes, as well as buying some lovely new ones. It really took me back, shopping for baby clothes again. I've been to visit a lot, of course, but I've had to stay at home with the children quite a bit.

Also, I am now Juliana Forrest-Goth! That's right, we tied the knot! We got married in a private little ceremony, although I will need to go and visit my family at some point, because weddings are a really big thing for my family, and they won't be pleased to have missed mine, especially as Liberty, Orson, Cassie and Alexander were all there.

However, I have to admit that me and Mortimer have our differences, and sometimes I've been a little irritated, as awful as that is, by how he deals with the children. He really is a doting father, but sometimes that's not good for them. For example, yesterday was horrendous.

Instead of waking me up, Mortimer decided I could use the rest, and fed the children breakfast. Sophy was happy enough to eat in her highchair, but Elliott decided he didn't want to, and started throwing a large tantrum.

Instead of telling him off, or anything even remotely close, Mortimer put him down on the little couch the children have, letting him eat breakfast there.

Well, as we're currently dealing with Tantrum Central anyway with both of the children, that set the tone for the rest of the day. By the time I got down to the nursery, Elliott was already in a horrible mood, and Sophy didn't understand why Elliott had been allowed out of his highchair when meals are eaten in the highchair.

As I walked into Elliott's room, where Mortimer had brought both the children after breakfast, I noticed him tearing up one of the books on the shelf, and immediately had to sit him down and make him stop. How had Mortimer not noticed?!

"Elliott, stop." I took the book out of his hands, and put it back on the shelf. "We don't rip books."

I also noticed that while Sophy was already dressed, Elliott was still in his pyjamas. I tried not to sigh as Mortimer headed back upstairs.

"Listen, Mama is going to play Flashcards with you, Elliott, and then we're going to get dressed. Sophy's dressed, so we'll get dressed, too!"

Well, that was fine, up until Mortimer called down that he was heading off to work, and went without saying goodbye to the children. I suppose he was just forgetting that that's what he usually does, or he was in a rush, but that was that.

                                     

Sophy had been watching the flashcards with a lot of interest, and repeating what she could to herself, and had been very happy to do so, from what I could tell.     

                                     

However, the second the door went and Mortimer shouted a goodbye, her little face puckered and she ran out of the room crying.

     

                                     

In fact, she so tired herself out that I had to put her back to bed once I'd calmed her down. Meanwhile, Elliott didn't think much of Mama stopping playing Flashcards, and threw a huge tantrum once I was able to go back into his room, Sophy being settled down to sleep.

   

Well, luckily I can sort that out quickly. I picked him up and smiled, and began playing Airplanes with him. It's a trick that always stops him throwing a wobbly or crying.

And even luckier, after that, I persuaded him to get dressed, and took him off upstairs with me to watch 'The Adventures of Bobby'. It's a new children's show with a little bunny in dungarees as the main character, and both our little ones love it. Elliott sleeps with a little Bobby plush now, although Sophy still likes her old bunny plush.

   

The main point of this is, I could have slapped Mortimer at that point. Oh, yes, I calmed both of them down, but if he hadn't done all that, my day wouldn't have been so stressful! But when he got home, I couldn't bring myself to say anything, because he looked so downtrodden.

                                    

"Juliana, I..." He stopped, and his expression nearly broke my heart. I hugged him tightly, and he moved back slightly after a few moments.

"They took the work, but they haven't paid me. They say it's in the post, but...The newspaper decided not to pay me, Green Bean."

That was why he had been so stressed, he explained. He was waiting for a payment, and it hadn't turned up, and he was thinking of us so much that he hadn't managed to think about us.

I took him by the hand downstairs, where the children were playing.

                                     

"Mortimer, help me with the children tonight. You get Elliott into his pyjamas, and I'll give Sophy a bath." I kissed his cheek, and whisked our little daughter off to the bathroom. Sophy can take a little persuasion to get in the bath, unfortunately.

                                    

However, she was worn out again, so I managed to bathe her, and dress her in her pyjamas, and together Mortimer and I tucked her in. He looked on softly as our precious flower settled down to sleep, her bunny clutched tightly in her arms.

 He'd already tucked in Elliott, but I went to kiss him goodnight as he was settling down to sleep, and then went back to where Mortimer was waiting.

 We went back upstairs together, somewhat shyly, and Mortimer took my hand.

"Juliana, I love you." He looked into my eyes. "And I will never, ever stop loving you."

"I love you too, eternally." I smiled softly at him.

 Our differences can always be settled.


That night, the baby monitor went off, and I went downstairs sleepily to find Sophy out of bed, tears running down her face. I rushed towards her.

"Little flower? What's wrong?" I asked, and she shook her head, hiccupping slightly. I realised that it must have been a bad dream, from the way she clung to me.

"It wasn't real, darling. It wasn't real." I held her close, and started to sing the song my mother had always sung to me and my siblings when we had had nightmares.

"There is a tree, far away,

In the land of Lullaby

There is a child, in that tree,

In the land of Lullaby

And the child is dreaming there,

In the tree in Lullaby

So close your eyes and you will be,

In the land of Lullaby."

 It always works. I should teach Liberty to sing it, for Primrose.

 As for today, we've had some fantastic news! Bella of all people dropped by to visit, and I was very nervous. The last time I saw her, it ended pretty badly.

 She was happy to see me, however, and has let me know that she's pregnant. Pregnant! It turns out that the man Cassie told us about before is her boyfriend, and he's going to be moving in with them. Bella is very excited to be a mother again, and even spent some time with Sophy and Elliott! It's like she's a completely different person!

 Wonders never cease!

Juliana