Effington

Round 18: Days 86-90

last update/next update

Narrated by Ottilie Draper

Dad has been continuing to train Lake to take over his pottery store. Lake has been working really hard, because any day he's not at work, he's down at the store.



It might be good for Dad to hand over the reins to someone else for good. He doesn't seem to have the magic touch for sales that he once did.

I think he enjoys being at home with his granddaughters much more anyway. He was so proud of Rose when she brought home her first A+.

He even plays tea parties with Rose and her dolls, which is something Lake isn't so keen on.

He is very close to Patience too...

...even though she has a definite tendency towards stroppiness!

She's walking now, so we'll see if her attitude improves. Maybe she was just frustrated by us having to carry her everywhere.

She loves playing with Rose's dolls but I'm not sure Rose appreciates her dolls being covered in drool.

Although Rose is growing out of dolls anyway. She usually has friends over after school and she plays with them instead.

And she still loves gardening too. We did warn her that her plants wouldn't do well in the winter but Dad insisted he could get them going again.

Sadly, Dad didn't live much longer than that. He was almost 80, so I guess it was just his time.

It breaks my heart to see Rose so upset though.

We are all having a rough go of it though. I can barely sleep at night and I just can't bring myself do much more than the bare minimum at work.

I don't think Patience quite understand where her grandpa has gone. She's okay one minute...

...and then she's screaming her head off the next. Poor baby.

It seems like Dad really did work his magic on Rose's tomatoes - she was able to harvest her first crop in the middle of winter. She was so excited about it and I think it helped her with her grief, knowing her grandfather had helped.

Patience is now just about ready to start school. She got a chess set for her birthday and she is absolutely obsessed with it. She even plays it by herself.

Rose has also had a birthday recently, turning 13. She's developed a little bit of an attitude problem. Anything we ask her do elicits a roll of the eyes. I hope it's just a phase because both Lake and I are sick of being glared at.

Notes:

• Patience's aspiration dropped right into the red when Elias died. It's pretty easy to raise toddler aspirations so a snuggle from Mum shot it right back up again. The next day though, she dipped right back down to bottom red again. She did age up in gold though and hasn't dipped again, so hopefully that weirdness is over.
• Rose looks like her mother and grandmother but Patience doesn't appear to have any Gottlieb/Draper features. She's all Lake.
• Rose stands like that all the time but I think it's because she's lazy. She looks like she has an attitude problem though, so that's what I'm going with.