Invest, 2019

Remar, summer, 2019
Abel is 24, Myra is 25, Jana is 2, Aniyah and Saniyah are 1

narrated by Myra

It is exhausting raising tiny sims. Abel and I wake up before dawn in order to have breakfast and chat before he leaves for work. Thankfully with the recession there are still building projects, otherwise we would be in trouble.

Before I can clear away our dishes, the madness begins.

It seems like I am in a never ending cycle of feeding and changing diapers as the girls scream around me.

I often find myself surrounded by clutter and toys when Abel arrives home.

He doesn't say anything about the filth. He thanks me for taking such great care of the girls all day.

We then take care of the girls together for the rest of the day 

before we collapse in bed.

My brother, Naraj, approved the next steps of his arranged marriage. We showed him the biographical details and profile of the woman and he seemed interested. She has two PhDs, a masters degree and two bachelors degrees. 

She graduated high school when she was 14 and I think she is a certified genius. My brother is smart, but not that smart, so I was hoping that he wouldn't be intimidated by her. He seemed to be smitten with the fact that she was highly educated and could have intelligent conversations.

We arranged for a digital phone call with her family. They insisted on strictly voice calling, no video chatting.

Naraj was nervous during the entire conversation, but he managed to engage her and her family enough and even ask a few questions that we hadn't thought of. 

I really think that she is a good match for Naraj and I'm so glad that after the conversation he agreed. So we are moving forward to the next step. She and her family will visit Apple Valley for a face-to-face conversation with Naraj and then the formal engagement and marriage contract.

Dad doesn't seem too concerned about the progress of the arranged marriage since he left a lot of the details up to me. He has enough on his plate.

He's a newlywed and is expecting twins this winter.

I don't think he was prepared for the possibility of becoming a father again, much less to twins. 

He does enjoy being a grandfather. He is always stopping by to see the girls and to lend a hand. 

I know that once the babies arrive, that will stop, but it's nice right now.

I still manage to work on site at the Toy Shoppe some days. 

Most days I work from home crafting toys for the inventory, or doing orders and financial paperwork. 

Rebecca is still training me to take over the store one day. It's scary to think about being responsible for a business and to make sure it succeeds as much as it did before. When I take over it will be a third generation owned business and something to be very proud of.

In preparation, I am now a partner in the business and get 25% of the profits in addition to my salary. That means that I'm more invested than ever in the success of the business. I'm so nervous, sometimes I don't think I'm smart enough to manage the business. However, Rebecca reassures me that I am more than capable. I hope she is right, I don't want to disappoint.

We did get some great news. 

We earned a special recognition of "Best of the Best". That means our shop was awarded a prize and the honor of being one of the best toy shops around. I guess Rebecca is right, we can do this. 

With the proceeds we decided to invest in some renovations of the store. Maybe one day we can open a location in the metro, maybe host some Mommy and Me classes or expand back into baby items. That would be nice.

Abel still has the power to surprise me. 

I thought that he was doing repair work in the yard since we had been discussing selling our home and purchasing the fixer upper next door, but instead he had been making plans.

He asked his cousins, Alia Shae and Emilene, to watch the twins for the afternoon.

While they were watching the girls, we went out for a date. 

It was a very simple date to Celsius 82, a local spot that specializes in grilled cheese sandwiches of all kinds. 

I had a smoked gouda and bacon sandwich which was delicious. 

Abel enjoyed a grilled turkey and cheese sandwich, followed by some delicious chocolate and marshmallow sandwiches. We need more dates like this.