Buy me a pony

Round 29: December 2030 (Summer)

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Eliot Lane is 44, Cordy is 37, Timothy is 10, Simon and Matthew are both 5 and Charlotte is 1.
(Augustin and Hanna are both 75, Linnea is 70, Luc is 37, Ruby is 3 and Marcus is 1)

Narrated by Eliot Lane

Online shopping is the way to go. Why fight crowds and all that insanity when you can do it all from the comfort of your home? In your pyjamas, even!

I was in charge of buying most of the Christmas presents for the kids this year. So by the beginning of December, they were all wrapped and under the tree.

I was possibly a little smug about how well I'd done.

There were a few things I couldn't find online so Cordy took one for the team and braved the stores. Even with my reminders and the fact that she only had a few presents to buy, she still forgot and left it until the last minute.

The stores were packed, naturally, so it was pretty ugly. Cordy said she almost came to blows with a woman who tried to fight her to buy a teddy bear they both wanted - the last one, of course.

Cordy won. I couldn't find the damn thing online but Charlotte started reaching out for it in the store one time, so we really wanted to get it for her.

This is the first Christmas where Charlotte will be at all aware of what's going on, so we wanted to make it special. Even if she ends up playing with the wrapping paper.

Charlotte was a huge surprise for both of us but we can't imagine the family without her in it now.

Having a girl after three boys felt a little strange. But at this age at least, Charlotte doesn't seem so different to what her brothers were like.

So far, Timothy, Simon and Matthew are all very good with Charlotte.

I'm sure they'd all rather play without her sometimes.

She's very attached to her brothers though and they generally get along pretty well.

I hope Charlotte turns out to be as active as her brothers are though, or otherwise she's going to be trampled. Our boys are very rambunctious!

This Christmas Eve, Timothy decided he was too old to help leave a snack out for Santa, so he watched DVDs in the living room with Cordy instead.

Simon and Matthew are still totally into Santa though and this is the first year Charlotte has been included. We had fun doing the cookies without Timothy but it was still a tiny bit sad to see him leaving that part of his childhood behind.

But Timothy was the first downstairs on Christmas morning, so I guess he's not totally grown up yet!

I don't know how long he was down there but he looked pretty bored by the time I came downstairs.

We didn't make him wait too much longer for the presents. Timothy's main gift was a Playstation, which he's been wanting for a while. All the kids can play together as well, which is nice. They all love that...and Cordy and I will probably play with it a bit too.

Matthew wanted a skipping rope. We asked him what he wanted and that's all he ever asked for. We got him a few more things but the skipping rope was the real hit of the day. He won't be using it inside any more - we were a little lenient because of Christmas.

I think Cordy enjoyed playing with Charlotte's teddy bear as much as Charlotte did.

She was making it talk about completely bizarre topics, like the budget deficit and medical ailments. Charlotte doesn't care, of course; it's more for our own amusement than anything else.

Charlotte adores the bear. It's already covered in drool.

Simon got the noisiest gift. He's been taking piano lessons this year but he wanted to pick up another instrument as well. Hence the violin.

You'd think a kid picking up a violin for the first time would sound awful but he wasn't too bad at all.

He couldn't wait to play it for his uncle Luc when he stopped by.

Predictably, Luc told me we should have got him a guitar instead. I think he's a little young for that just yet. Maybe in a few years, if he's interested.

I love when the kids get to hang out with their cousins. Their cousins on my side are so much older than them but Luc's kids are close to Charlotte's age, at least.

Charlotte and Ruby seem to like each other more than Charlotte and Marcus do. She and Marcus are only a month apart but aren't getting along too well so far!

Marcus likes Napoleon better than he likes any of the kids.

Dad has been the most involved of the kids' grandparents, seeing he's been the one to watch them while we're at work most of the time. As a result, they're probably closest to him.

The kids do love their grandmas as well though!

I think Cordy will always be a bit weird with Linnea. They can get along when they try and I think that's as close as they're going to get.

I know Cordy finds her mother a bit much at times.

Linnea does genuinely love the kids though, so I'm happy Cordy has loosened up a bit in regards to her mum. I think it's good for kids to have all their grandparents around, when at all possible.

As much as we loved our Christmas, we were also both ready to collapse at the end of the day once the kids were all in bed. It's kind of a relief to be able to stop thinking about Christmas for another 11 months or so.

Extras:

Being that Nick and Eliot are the only two Sims in the military career, they bring each other home from work all the time.
This round was no different, except for the fact that Nick was way more interested in Charlotte than anybody else.

And hey, there are four kids in this house, so I was quite happy to have someone autonomously tend to Charlotte. And given how long Nick has wanted a baby, and how close he has now to having one, it just seemed extra sweet!

Notes:

• Title is from Buy Me A Pony by Spiderbait.
• So there's a belated Sullivan Christmas update for you. At one stage, I thought I was going to get this out on Christmas Day but that was pure insanity. It was just never going to happen!
• Charlotte had never met Ruby or Marcus before, yet Ruby accepted her huggle right away and Marcus wasn't having it at all. Odd!
• Last family update of the round! I've also put my round summary up today. January birthdays will come tomorrow or the day after that - depends on how much time I get. :)