The Albright Family
Narrated by Jules
Vaughn and I are really just starting to enjoy having the house to ourselves. It felt so empty when Aurelia and Phineas went to college this past August and then the loss of Eleni in September left a gaping hole. It took a little work but we convinced Finn and Aurelia to stay in school. As much as we would have loved for them to come home, their futures were more important. Instead we have family gatherings once a month or so, and the kids are all always welcome to stop in and say hi or come over for dinner. I think dinners are the hardest.
When Nico, Eleni, and Juliana still lived at home we always tried to make sure that we had family dinners every night and we kept that up with Finn and Aurelia. Seeing the empty chairs just reminds us that our little kids have all grown up.
And then we start talking about Eleni and that the babies (Valentina, Roberto, and Francesco) will never know her. Our dinners can sometimes get a bit depressing.
We've been trying to get out of that funk, though. I've started reconnecting with friends and even had a lengthy phone call with Marylena, Vaughn's stepmom. She went on for quite awhile about hoping her son Sawyer would marry his girlfriend, Lucasta Olmstead.
She's getting frustrated because Sawyer and Lucasta live together and he's helping raise her twins but they haven't given her any grandchildren together yet and she's getting impatient. I guess she accepts Nerissa and Romulus in with her biological granchild, Daria (daughter of Devin Albright), but she wants more. I mostly nodded along and agreed that an engagement would be the best thing ever. It's really the only way to handle her. After that phone call I decided to go out and relax with a new hobby, stargazing. Well, it's stargazing at night, I guess you'd probably call my use of the telescope something along the lines of being "nosy" or a "busybody".
Vaughn's been mostly focusing on sports, especially soccer. I think he enjoys kicking the ball with as much force as he can, hurting his foot is a great outlet...
We're trying to rekindle our romance now that it is just the two of us and we're not focused on raising children. We kind of disconnected for awhile, there.
We've also done a couple room renovations to keep us busy. We did a little bit in the garage so that the space would be pleasant to work in.
I'd like some more workspace, but it's not a bad space to work in. And the grandkids enjoy having a place to draw during the winter. I've already gotten some use out of it.
I took the completion of the playroom as an opportunity to have the babies over for a day. Troy dropped all three off in the morning.
And we hung out and chatted for a bit.
Before I brought the kids inside to test out the new equipment.
It was sad to see them go. I can see little bits of Eleni in all of them and it was nice to have the house full of kids again. It really renewed my want to have all the kids over more frequently so we arranged a big get-together one weekend.
Aurelia and Phineas came by. They had some free time and we were able to convince them it would be fun.
I think Finn was surprised at how much fun he had. He spent a good portion of the weekend playing with Giulio, Juliana's son. I don't think he ever realized how much fn he could have with a 9 year old.
Giulio has been taking violin lessons so he gravitated toward ours right away.
He was very excited to show us how much he had learned so he convinced his mother, Margareta, to accompany him on the piano.
The three of them make a wonderful family. Julie's been having some pangs for another baby recently but their tries haven't been successful and at 37 she doesn't see much chance of conceiving so she's trying to just enjoy her son. Margareta's been wonderful about the situation, she's content with just Giulio but she wouldn't mind another so she's just supporting Julie in any way that's needed and keeping everything low-key.No pressure to get pregnant or make any permanent decisions.
When Giulio decided to break-in the toy stove we realized dinner would probably be a good idea.
He was content with just the snacky food he could make on it but the girls suggested we all eat a real meal.
It was a good thing Troy and the babies and Nico and all his kids couldn't make it or Nico and his family. I don't know where we'd put them! We ended up having to pull an extra chair just so everyone could eat in the same room.
It was nice catching up with everyone, though. With everyone having their own lives now it's hard to stay up to date on daily occurences and what's going on in their lives.
We need to do things like this more often and plan a bit better so everyone can join in. If it works out we may need to invest in a second table...
Notes:
- Frankie and Robbie are absolutely precious and I can't wait to see what Valentina looks like when she grows up! Troy is so pretty and Eleni was too, I'm hoping the kids stay pretty. I have enough odd looking children in other families.
- Also, elders are boring and I can't decide if I want to move them in with one of the kids (Juliana and Margareta have the biggest house and extra bedrooms) or let them live alone and just keep doing family-type things so I have more sims on the lot to give me things to do. Maybe a group home for the elders? I can't decide. :/
Wow, I love the play room Jules and Vaughn have set up! I should do that for some of my grandparents.
ReplyDeleteI hope Margareta can conceive again. 37 isn't too old! I've had many Sims conceive at that age (and older!). :)
About playing elders, moving them in with their kids might be a good option for you until you get into the swing of your blog and it starts to become a bit easier to think of things to write about with them. I definitely found elders boring at one stage and struggled to think of what to write for them. These days though, it's often handy to use my elder families as an opportunity to continue a story I've started with their children or grandchildren on another lot. I'm in the middle of doing that right now, actually. :)
Thanks for the compliment on the playroom. They had two empty bedrooms and nothing to put in them so I added it when I decided Jules was going to babysit the babies.
DeleteI know technically 37 isn't too old but I've already played her family (which show me I need to pay more attention to my play schedule, two parts of the same family should not be so close if I want to continue storylines throughout the round... and in the same month is just silly.) and although they tried a few times, they failed each one. By the time I get back to them they'll be 39 or 40 and Giulio will be 11 or 12 at which point I don't think they'll bother. They're both knowledge sims so I think they'll be perfectly happy with just Giulio. :) It would also help my population if they didn't have anymore...
I think I only have one family where the kids and parents live together. For this first round you might have a point, moving them in with their children would be a better idea until I have storylines that would benefit from extra "screentime".
Thanks for reading and commenting! :)