Day 167 – Just dance

So I was out at Earthstones earlier, having found a gift card in my overstuffed inventory, when I encountered their phonographs. Oh so cute! I started playing songs and there was an intan sitting in the corner. What’s a girl to do? I pulled my alt Aidan on and we danced!

I really like the phonographs, I think they’re well done [as to be expected from Earthstones], but they’re not something I’d buy for myself. I’m sure there’s a gifty type holiday coming up, so I’ll just keep it in mind. LOL

My good friend Noel came over later to hang out. I haven’t actually seen him in world in… oh gosh, well over a month, if not more. So it was great to catch up with him for a bit.

He’s one of the few guys in SL who has been around me for an extended amount of time and still doesn’t mind hanging out. :-p Kidding, kidding.

Kinda.

Anyway… I finally put out a post for the style blog, which I’m happy about. I was doing good there for a while and then I lost it. Hopefully I can get back into it.

And tomorrow – Trivia Tuesday!!!! 7pm at my place. If you’re a plurk friend, you’ll get the SLurl there. If not, just IM me if you want to drop by. I’ll DJ and it’s usually a pretty fun time. 🙂

I bought 5 new books tonight [hello, Half Price Books clearance section! I love you!] so I think I’m going to wrap this up and read.

The Skin Quest

I got a new skin tonight. If that doesn’t seem like a huge deal, well, you’re right. For most people it’s not a huge deal at all. Most of my friends buy skins like there’s nothing to it. My best friend is an admitted Skinaholic. They change skins and shapes easily and without thinking about it.

Me? Not so much.

In my physical world, it’s hard for me to get my hair cut. I will agonize about it for weeks, months, beforehand. I will let it get too long. I will scour magazines for hairstyles that I think are cute. I will drive past salons and think about going in. And then one day I will bite the bullet, RUN in somewhere, and let someone take hold of my hair. And then I will cry.

The same is kind of true for me and skins in Second Life. I will think about it. I will look at blogs, at my friends. I will grab hundreds of demos. [Once I boxed up all my demos that I’d collected in a 2 month period. It was over 3000. I wish I was lying.] I will try them on over and over and over. I will beat myself up because my avatar simply doesn’t handle most skins very well in the face. And then, if I’m feeling brave, I will run out, grab a skin, and race home. And then I will feel buyers remorse because suddenly, my look has changed.

I don’t know why I have a problem changing. It’s not like I am any different. It’s still just me, in a new skin.

I’ve been wearing my Kimberly skins from Free Speerit since they came out. I love them. They’ve been me since I started wearing them. But in the past few months, the trend in skins has been changing to these younger looking, super full pucker mouth skins. [Yes, Gala Phoenix, I’m looking at you.] And that’s cool and all, but with my shape, the skins simply haven’t been working. And believe me, I’ve demoed them a LOT. It started to get to the point of me hating when my friends would start dancing about a new skin release. I wanted to look younger, like them, but it just wasn’t happening.

I was becoming more and more upset with my look, but I couldn’t change. The most important thing for me is to still LOOK like me. Just…a better me.

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been grabbing demos from pretty much any store I come across. Tonight I stood on my posestand and started going through them. And Noel, bless him, he sat right there with me and gave opinions and watched as I put on probably eleventy-billion skins. As we narrowed it down, I kept asking him questions. Did I still look like me? Did I look like a model? Did I look like someone who you would believe when I suggest fashion to you? Do I look like an emptyheaded stripper or do I look smart? Finally we got it down to one skin. And I wore the demo for about an hour, trying on different clothes with it. [Are you as exhausted as I am at this point?]

While he took a brief break, I ran out to the store, gagged a little at the price [$1490L for one skin?! Are you freaking kidding me???], bit the bullet, and bought it.

Blondie, makeup 2, from Laqroki.

That photo is completely untouched, btw, besides cropping it.

I don’t know. Is it still me? As soon as I got back home, I had buyers remorse. I started thinking about how I should be saving money for tier, or how many other things I could buy. I started thinking that I didn’t look like me anymore. I started thinking that I looked silly, airheaded, like I should be twirling my hair and talking about how I love unicorns and kittens.

But I do kind of like it. It’s not perfect. There are a couple of things I’d change, if I could. But it does make me look a little younger, a little more fresh. And I guess that’s really what I was going for.

Maybe one day I’ll be as carefree with skins as my friends are. Maybe I won’t cringe and beat myself up everytime I put on a different skin. Maybe I’ll learn to just buy skins because they really are pretty and I won’t be so hypercritical.

Maybe.

It’s finally a home

I’m pretty spoiled in SL. Not bratty spoiled [I think] but spoiled in that when I need something, someone is usually right there to do it for me.

As I’ve mentioned before, my good friend Noelyci built me a fabulous house back in April because I was in dire need of one and I’m exceptionally picky about most things. So he took my vague descriptions and built me a wonderful house that I simply adore. [You can buy it at his store too, along with lots of other nice prefabs. /end shameless plug]

But the problem was…I’m not good at decorating. I’m honestly not. My physical world house is just kind of there. I find something pretty, I set it down, and that’s about it. No mesh to it. But no one really comes over so as long as it’s clean, I don’t care.

It was really bothering me that I was leaving this gorgeous house empty. Or semi-empty, as I’ve had bits and pieces of furniture and photos scattered about. But it just wasn’t very well decorated, and it wasn’t very me. Only I didn’t know what I really wanted, and any shopping trips for furniture usually left me frustrated.

Enter my best friend Sophia. Yesterday she said she wanted to decorate a house or something. I told her that she could decorate my home if she wanted. I was casual about it, but inside I was actually jumping for joy because I so badly wanted this place done up.

I think she did an excellent job. 🙂

The view from upstairs.

The living room area.

The kitchen.

The dining area.

The full bath, including my dressing area.

Closer view of the bathroom.

She knows my tastes and likes well. Nothing overly modern, and she picked up on my butterflies love. 🙂 She also decorated my office, but I’m waiting to show that until I finish up in there, since I moved all my photos off the walls and put them in the dining area. Noel also built me a desk and some shelves because I couldn’t find an office desk that I liked, so he put his skills to work for me again. See? Spoiled. lol

Oh, and the bedroom is my own to decorate. It’s kind of like Graceland. No one goes upstairs unless I allow. :-p

I’m just so overly happy with how my house is now. I was spending most of my time in the house sitting on a counter. But most of the time I was just standing around outside. Now I’m perfectly happy sitting in my charming new living room or in my office. I’m so lucky to have friends like I do. ❤

So Full

I took the weekend away from writing and now I have about a billion things to say. Isn’t that the way it goes? 🙂

I had the chance to DJ the SL Bloggers Meet Up this Sunday. It was SO FUN. Unfortunately I was unable to actually catch any shots during the party and save them as I usually do, but I did manage to get a few pics in over at Snapzilla. I put them all in an photo album, and hopefully that link will take you right over. 🙂 It was truly a blast and huge thanks to Tymmerie for organizing it and Noelyci for hosting us out there. 🙂

Since I keep getting asked, my little Holly girl is doing just great! Her spaying surgery went very well and she had the fastest recovery of any kitty I’ve ever had! Really, just a couple of hours after I got her home, she wanted out of her carrier, but I did as the vet said and didn’t let her come out until after 5. She was stumbling and woozy, but so so happy to be home. I think we’re going to have to get her those Soft Paws things, though, because she just can’t control her claws and our legs are totally scratched up.

My friend Merrick has been learning Sculpt Studio lately, and again I am amazed at how freaking talented my group of friends really are. He hasn’t been using it very long, but check this out. He made an awesome 1 prim table and a 2 prim matching chair. So cute!

Noel took me sailing the other day. I hadn’t been sailing in SL in so long, so it was really really fun! I have sailed a little around Bluebonnet in my crappy boats, but I’m not a very good sailor, I guess, because I always end up crashing into something. It was nice to be out on the water with him.

Of course, sim crossings killed us and we ended up on the bottom of the ocean. But hey, it was still fun. 🙂

I’m really feeling the beach lately. Sophia was nice enough to drop down her cute open air beach cottage for me the other day, and I had to run out to Mudshake to get a lounger for it. I still need to decorate it more. Wow, that’s the story of my life usually. 🙂 But I love it.

But since I am so into the beach lately, I bought some of those “off sim” things. I love them! Some of the other Bluebonnet residents have had different ones over the past few months. I even have one that if I sit on it, I can be off world. It’s really kind of fun. 🙂 Sophia and I discovered today that if we are sitting on it, though, we can’t chat in local. However, we can shout. It’s really funny. 🙂

Speaking of Soph, she gave me a beating stick today. I freakin’ love it. LOL I think I just love the face I make when I swing more than anything else. I did beat down her husband, though. Sorry about that, Subway.

Oh, and I also censored him.

But…well then he caged us. LOL! I think Soph managed to beat him with her bat through the cage, though. We’re mean cholas, ya know.

I have more to say, about a few topics, actually, but I think I’m done for now. 🙂 My SLife is so incredibly full and wonderful. Just when I think that maybe possibly I might be getting slightly bored [which is very rare for me in any life], suddenly there’s something new to do, to see, new people to talk to or hang out with. It really is a wonderous world. 🙂

Blah blah blah. LOL

I should be working on a couple of review posts for my new review blog, but I’m tired. My first review post showed up on Avanista today, which was REALLY weird to me for some reason. We’ve had WTFug on the feed there since it started, so it’s not like I’ve never see a post of mine on a feed before, but it was more like, “Oh, hey, look at me reviewing something like I know what I’m talking about…” LOL

Oh, I haven’t done a chicken update in a while. Umm…well, there have been some deaths, some adoptions [not me adopting, others adopting mine], and some births. Duncan, the black chicken of death, grew to breeding age and killed one rooster, and then killed Pollos Rylan & Pumpkin. I guess they couldn’t handle him? But Pollo Sehra, who was recently revived from an accidental starvation, has now had 4 babies from Duncan. Unfortunately, they were all Originals, much to my dismay. Nikki and Al had run away to the beach and have been living in a pen with Randy, and now Nikki’s popping out babies like mad. One of her babies met a sad death when I was on the beach shooting an exploding trailer and it got caught in the fire. Oops. Yeah, I guess I’m almost kinda over the whole chicken thing, but not over enough to just give them all away or let them wander into the ocean.

I really didn’t plan anything for a hump day party this week. My new kitten, Holly, goes in for her spaying in the morning [we have to be there in 5 hours, actually], and I have a feeling I’m going to be spending most of the evening making sure she’s ok. She’s barely 3 months old so she’s going to be seen by the baby surgeon. My poor little girl. She’s sleeping half on the keyboard and half on my hand right now, making typing pretty hard.

But, I am DJing the SL Bloggers party this coming weekend. I’m really excited about that!! I’m torn between trying to put together a playlist or doing what I do best and winging it. LOL

Ok, since I do have to be up in about 4 hours to get Holly ready to go, I guess I should get in bed. I was trying to put the pictures together for a Belle Belle review I’m doing and I thought this one was cute, so I had to doctor it up more. Noel had to pose with me for the review because I made him. 😉 The review pics won’t be this photoshopped up because I hate when people do that, but here I can play. 🙂 Goodnight all.

Insomniac Blogging

I so should be in bed, but I’m not feeling so hot tonight. So…might as well blog. 🙂

My video card made it in! As my friends could tell you, it took me less than 10 minutes to get the package, log out, shut down the computer, install it, and run back in world. Oh so happy. Everything and everyone was just so much prettier. No more 3 FPS for this girl.

Noel convinced me that I had to give Kirsten’s shadow viewer a try, at least for photos. I will admit, it’s some cool stuff. Unfortunately the viewer doesn’t seem to like me very much, even if the shadows are off, so it will be something I simply use for pictures and not for everyday use. We did a small photoshoot tonight and while I’m still sorting through some pictures I took, I stumbled on this one and liked it. It’s not fancy, but for some reason it just spoke to me.

I guess I should get in bed. I have a big review to do photos of when I get up, and I’ve actually been hired to do a tutorial. I know, someone’s actually going to pay me to tell people what to do. 🙂 Plus the hump day party is Disco, Baby! and I need to put together a party room and get an outfit together. The disco theme was requested by a few people the past couple of weeks, but it kind of means a little more to me this week for personal reasons.

Ok…bedtime.

Chicken Frenzy!!

I heard tonight that Miriel Enfield is packing up soon, shutting down her store, giving up her sim, the whole thing. I’m terribly sad over the news. I have been wearing Miriel eyes almost exclusively for at least the past year. Her “Open Ocean” color is one that I’ve probably worn the most in my blog posts and out on the grid, just because they are clear, bright, and get me noticed. I have almost every color of hers, and what I don’t have, I hope to get before she closes her doors for good. I like to match my eyes to my outfits. If you’ve never bought Miriel eyes, you owe it to yourself to go pick up at least – at LEAST – one pair. Inexpensive and gorgeous, you won’t be sorry. I wear her Standard size, but if you prefer a smaller eye, she does have the Realistic size. Oh, and the Anime eyes, which are huge and gorgeous and I wore those for quite a while in the early summer last year. And you absolutely MUST see her sim. It is unbelievably natural and beautiful. I’m hoping my new video card comes in before she shuts down for good so I can run out there and take photos.

So we’ve been getting chicken crazy over the past few days. You see, Nikki [yes, I’m blaming her] mentioned one night in the group that she had won some chicken eggs from a Midnight Mania board, and the chickens eat food and grow and lay eggs and whatnot. I can’t resist useless stuff, so of course I had to get them, as I mentioned in the blog before. And then it was chicken frenzy!!! I swear, everyone is getting them! But gosh, they are just so fun. And not fun in the sense that you have to do a lot for them. But just fun in general.

Nika and Keeme got their chickens, which produced a couple of awesome blogposts. Rylan & Aldwyn got their baby chicks, which sent Rylan into mommy mode and they even had a family portrait taken. Sophia is living with her kitten and 2 chickens in their skybox [I’m not sure Skyhawke knows this!]. And tonight Noel got his eggs and came over to hatch one in my pen with Pollo Sophia & Pollo Pumpkin. We’re hoping for a boy.

As we were sitting there staring at the egg, Pollo Sophia & Pollo Pumpkin started going all crazy. Pumpkin wouldn’t get her ass off the food dish, even sleeping in it, and Sophia started freaking out and pacing back and forth really really fast. We moved the food out from under Pumpkin, which sent her into a freak out. But I managed to click on both crazy chickens, tell them where their home was, and they were fine again. If for some reason this new egg is a girl, I’m naming her Pollo Lola, the shankingest chicken on the block!

I need to go to bed. All this chicken excitement is too much for me.