Christmas lights, 2026

Round 16: December 2026

Toby Parker is 34, Erin is 31, Naomi is 3 and Iona Fielding is 14.

Narrated by Erin.

We found out I was pregnant just a few days ago and so far this pregnancy has been terrible! I feel sick and tired almost all day long.

Seeing Toby with Naomi makes me really happy and I can't wait for us to have another baby. He's such a good father.

We haven't told anyone yet although I think Iona's a bit suspicious. She's insisted on helping with our holiday arrangements, mostly cleaning the house and decorating the tree. We were watching the tv one morning after her Christmas vacation started and she kept looking at me and looked like she wanted to say something.

She baked a lot of cookies for us. When she started high school she was certain she wanted to go to politics when she grows up but now she's talking about becoming a chef.

We're not great cooks though so on Christmas Eve we ate spaghetti. This town seriously needs a deli or a catering company so that people like me can buy a decent meal for holidays!

The best part of the meal was definitely Iona's cookies. She even insisted on serving them for us although Naomi was long gone from the table by then.

After finishing our cookies we lit up the tree and played with Naomi.

My family came over on Boxing Day. Lilly was so happy because she had gotten a call from Rianna just before Christmas. She will start teaching at Allerdale Elementary School in January!

I didn't want to stress about cooking so we just bought some frozen pies and pastries and heated them in the oven before our guests arrived. I guess they tasted alright anyway if you look at the speed the dishes went empty.

It's so great seeing my mom interact with her grandkids because she used to be so career-oriented that she didn't have much time for anything else. She's much more relaxed now that she has an assistant researcher who she can trust.

I went back to work after Christmas and on the second day I got really sick. I had pain in my stomach and started to bleed so I called the doctor and she told me to come to the hospital right away.

She did some exams and it turned out that I had a miscarriage - just as I feared the moment the symptoms started. I was so devastated because it took us a long time to get pregnant and now this happened.

Dr. Williams explained to me that it's very common to miscarry in the first weeks but nothing she said really helped and I think we both knew it. I know it was still very early but I was already attached to this baby and felt miserable. She said nothing suggests that I couldn't have another child but I should give myself some time to recover before trying again.

It makes me really sad to think that Toby and I might not have another child. But on the other hand I have two beautiful daughters and a wonderful husband so in any case my life is good.


Notes:

• Title reference: Christmas lights by Coldplay.
• Man, what a sucky Christmas update! I was planning to make it a really happy update with the pregnancy announcement but it ended up being the total opposite. I haven't given up hope on another baby for Erin and Toby so I'll most likely pop in every now and then to see if she can get pregnant again. It took a few tries this time.
• This is the last update of Round 16. I will start updating the profiles as soon as I can and also playing whenever I can but work and school have officially started so it might take some time before you see a new update.