But in reality, most engineering time in the world is spent doing maintenance work or incremental improvements. This is the nature of building intangible digital products - it's not like tangible products (e.g., building a house), there's not a clear finished line. It's hard to declare a software product as "done". There'll be a lot of ongoing bug fixes, incremental improvements...
In other words, most engineers in the world are doing things that are not hacker news/techcrunch-worthy.
To stay intellectually curious, I think you can try to build side projects while learning new technologies. But I think it's also okay to treat your day job like ... a day job, just like other professions. No need to feel guilty for not using new tech or doing exciting things. You are bring in paychecks to support your family, and this is a great accomplishment already.