April 13, Spring, year 36
It was Jamie and Lauren's birthday today. Usually this means the kids get a bye from chores, but Laurie's the only one who really takes advantage of this. She goes down to the Goddess Pond to draw until it's time for the birthday dinner.
Not that I can blame either one of them. Jamie—though I suppose I should start calling him 'James' soon, shouldn't I?—practically breathes the farm. If I decided to retire today, I'm sure he'd be thrilled to run the farm all on his own.
I might just do that one of these days…
Hah, who'm I kidding? The day I retire is the day I can't lift my axe on my own, and if I have my say, that won't be til I'm at least eighty years old. Or dead. Which ever comes first.
But at least I know I'll be leaving the farm in a pair of capable and loving hands. Maybe more than that, but that's too far in the future for me to be thinking, and beside, match-making machinations aren't really to my style anymore.
You know, not that my sister would ever believe me. Or Muffy…
Agh, anyways…
Jamie helped with the chores, Lauren went to the Spring for the day, and I helped Skye in the kitchen, making their favorite foods for supper. I only slightly burned the cookies this year, so I am getting better. (What can I say, I got caught up in reading again…)
It's a little depressing to be the failure in the kitchen when everyone else seems to be so dang good at it. Well, okay, so Jamie can't cook either, and the younger ones aren't allowed to bake just yet, but still!
For presents I ordered an art kit for Lauren. It has pencils, pens, paper, paintbrushes and paints. The expression on her face when she opened it was well worth the three days in the city it took to find the right one.
Jamie was a tough one to find a present for. He's so utterly happy with the farm… eventually I decided to get him some new tack for Blaze, and he clearly loved it. It's nice having children who are easy to please.
Skye got them both some new music to listen to, Alan and Mirei… I don't know quite how they managed this, but they wheedled a piece of jewelry from Carter for Laurie, and brought in one of the farm puppies from James. And Meredith made them some cards.
I personally think the evening turned out decently. No one got into fights, Alan and Mirei went to bed on time, Meredith fell asleep before her bedtime, and Jamie and Laurie got to stay up and watch a couple of movies.
I thought about throwing them a party, but when it comes right down to it, they don't seem to want parties. I know there's several friend-presents unaccounted for, that probably were gathered today when they were chore-free.
Which reminds me, I did talk to Muffy about Robert! She says he's just shy… it took a good deal of effort to not comment that he only acted this way around Lauren, and it was reciprocated. I guess I'll never figure it out.
And asking Lauren just meets with a subject change. I don't want to press the issue, so I'll let it lie for a while. Maybe she'll come talk to me about it sometime in the future.
Robert treats everyone else just fine too, he dotes on Meri, treats Jamie civilly enough, and lets himself get pestered into playing with Alan and/or Mirei, but when Lauren shows he just… shuts down.
Argh, must not think too much about it. He's fifteen, maybe they're just not compatible together. It wouldn't surprise me any, at fifteen me and my sibs were fighting more often than we got along. I think I spent more nights out at the Goddess Pond sulking than I did in the room Pony and I shared.
Usually over the most ridiculous of things too…
Ah well, that's humanity for you I guess. We're all young and stupid some time.
Mmm? Rain?! Oh blast!