Cavalier eternal

Round 24: Spring 2020

last update/next update

Jace Novak is 63, Magdalena is 56 and Tessa is 11.
(Gordon is 24, Lia is 23, Maia is 18 and Rebecca is 11)

Narrated by Jace Novak

Magdalena and I are both missing having Lia and Maia living at home with us but I have to admit, it's been kind of nice as well.



Tessa is relishing the undivided attention she's getting and we're enjoying the quiet.

It's been about 10 years since we've been without a teenager in the house, although with the amount of time Tessa spends on the phone, it's almost like we still have one. And we will have one again soon - Tessa will be 12 next year.

Tessa is a pretty good kid. She's very similar to Maia in that she's currently obsessed with bug collecting. We've been getting a lot of rain lately and she hasn't been able to continue her collection.

For a while there, I was concerned that Tessa would take after Maia in the academic department. She was neglecting her homework and fell quite behind. All she needed was the threat of not seeing her friend Rebecca on the weekends to kick herself into gear.

Tessa and Rebecca are going off to high school together next year. I'm glad she'll have a friend with her but I think she'd be just fine even if she didn't. She's a very confident girl and makes friends easily.

Rosa Lucida finally became one of the top ranked businesses in town this month. It's taken me 21 years to get it to this level but it was most definitely a proud moment for me.

I'm happy I've been able to keep it in the family. Previously, I had Lia and then Maia to help me out so I've been a bit hard-headed about not hiring any employees. I hope I can continue to avoid that, but the workload is getting hard, I won't lie.

Maia is on break from classes right now so she was able to come and see us at home.

We had Lia and her boyfriend Gordon over on the same night and it was very nice to have all three girls back in the house with us. As much as we've enjoyed the quiet around here, we do miss them both.

Lia got back together with Gordon about a year ago now and things seem to going well between them.

I know that Lia is happier, which is the most important thing to me but Gordon has another thing coming if he thinks I'm going to take my eyes off him for a second.

All seems to be forgiven between Magdalena and Gordon but I'll be watching him and watching him closely.

We did have a perfectly nice meal together though. Gordon hasn't yet given me a concrete reason not to trust him since he and Lia got together, so he's safe for the meantime.

Over dinner, Maia let it slip that the main reason she'd decided to go to college was because of Jacob, her now ex-boyfriend.

I don't know why she thought we'd want to hear that but Magdalena and I were both a little disappointed by that. We thought at the time that maybe she was taking her post high school life a little more seriously finally.

Thankfully for her, Maia managed to smooth over that faux pas by telling us that she's maintaining a 3.5 GPA, which she's expecting to raise next semester. Magdalena and I were stunned but we're so proud! I'm glad she didn't decide to throw in the towel with uni once she broke up with Jacob, because it sounds like she's really finding her own way there now!

Extra pics:
Is it any wonder Tessa has no table manners, with Jace as an example? Maia is a slob too, but Jace and Tessa have zero neat points. I'm convinced they look more disgusting while eating than my other slobs but I might be imagining it.

Notes:

• Title is from Against Me!'s Cavalier Eternal.
• Tessa was the first child to be born after I started using the LH aging system (though she was conceived under my old system), so I feel like the fact that I'll be aging her up for Summer 2021 birthdays in a couple of days is quite momentous.
• Tessa is the complete opposite of Lia. Tessa's an outgoing slob and Lia, as most of you would know, is a shy neat freak. Neither of their parents are that outgoing, so Tessa was a bit of a surprise.
• One more family to go before Summer 2021. I have the Gottliebs scheduled to play first up and they are still homeless. I really better get on that!