My Entry in the Home & Garden Expo Decoration Contest -- Final

So here I'm going to do a final walk-through and shopping guide of my entry in Home & Garden Expo Design Contest -- more than you wanted to hear, but it's more for my own benefit because it involved thinking through certain problems and solutions.

The back story is this: The time is the 1960s -- the furthermost date we have is the snippet of "Yesterday" on the bulletin board which would put us in 1965. If this fellow fought in the Spanish Civil War, that would make him born around 1918; let's say he was 21 during the war (1936-1939) and now in 1965 he's already in his late 40s. He has worked as a journalist, explorer etc. and then later as a travel writer. He continued to spend some free time hunting. He has this "Writer's Retreat" which is like a camp in the Adirondacks with this rustic house. There was this girlfriend, but "Why she had to go? I don't know, she wouldn't say. I said something wrong. Now I long for yesterday.  Most likely, but maybe she died.

Front yard of the Buccaneer house:

Front entrance

Living room.

 

Bedroom.

Hunting corner

"Psycho" cabinet.

Den.

Den wall.

Artisan Fantasy cabinet

"Kitchen"/food prep area

Spanish Civil War photos (converted from "Genoa" photos by THOR) PS Did you know that Capra has been exonerated from the claim that this was a staged photograph after exhaustive research?

You could cam around a house a hundred times as I did and still miss this little hidey-hole -- behind the staircase. Too bad I didn't notice, I would have put something in there. I'm not sure what...That lamp is the house creator's.

Study.

Study wall and Hemingway chair.

Side garden.

Roof-top patio.

Roof garden.

Back porch.

Back porch.

"Security". Now, how can there be such an anachronistic thing as a mini-drone in 1965? Well, maybe in his adventures he got one that the government was experimenting with... But I actually think it's good to have a marker somewhere that this is a story, a scene, an invention, and one way to do that is to stick something anachronistic into it.

 

Here's the Shopping Guide:

 

RFL Items (purchased at the Expo):
Front entrance -- HHVET Victoriana - Pupper Planter by Ivy Delacrux
Back porch -- ~AB~ Pachypodium Palm and ~AB~ Chinese Palm by Azalea Bluebell
Study -- Z.O.E. Staircase Bookends

 

Other credits:
Outside front yard:
T-Spot Wild Carrot Plants in a Line Color A
T-Spot Wild Carrot Plants in a Line Color C
HHVET Victoriana - Pupper Plante

Side yard:
[Schultz Bros.] 12. Cherry Tomatoes
BOX [Schultz Bros.] 12. Cherry Tomatoes

Roof Deck:
Turtle Pond by Simply Shelby
Apple Fall Chester Outdoor Dining Table
[SF] Sirloin Steak
Steak Sauce by Thaino Designs
Bad Katz Steak Dinner
*:..Silvery K..:*Tomato Giver(2Li)
Kitchen Korner KK - BBQ Ribs Basket
Zinnias Adobe BBQ CJLGG Hunt Prize 2017
{what next} Dahlia Outdoor Drinks Cart (tintable wood)
Single Row of Growing Strawberry Plants by Lunar Tripsa
Sparrows Love Strawberries by Lunar Tripsa
Cosmos Small Round Garden with Summer plants
7 - Seven Scientific Telescope
7 - Telescope Box

Back Porch and Entrances:
[ContraptioN] Wainwright's Toys: Ornament Drone *???* v1.0
~AB~ Pachypodium Palm
~AB~ Chinese Palm
Atmo-Wind - Cornfield Rustling 1:50 by Hastur Pierterson
Cricket by Apotheus Silverman with loop by Eep Quirk
Lark - FC Rocking Chair (A)
{LORE} Woodland Table
R(S)W Cookie Tin - No-Drama Llama

Front Entrance:
[DDD] New Onion Garden Plot - 1x4
[ keke ] watering can - zinc
..::THOR::.. Vintage DIY Entryway
[ keke ] rug 43 . deer . cream
Lark - Flower Press Closed - 2 2
8f8 - 11. Our Secret Hideout - Bird Spot with loopsound + on/off for instruments by Eep Quirk and Birds by eudois of Ed's Place.

Bedroom:
POE6 * Winter Dressing Screen by SEQUOIASTYLE by Sequoia Nightfire
Vagabond - Paisley's Wardrobe
Apple Fall Fern Specimen
Apple Fall Unknown Specimen
[V/W] Breeze Perfume C05
~TBR~ Lilly of the Valley PERFUME (Wear Me)
[CB] Upstairs Armoire (touch drawers for rezzer menu) - Cedar Bay
POST: DeWitt All-Purpose Console (sm)
POST: DeWitt Shaving Mirror
POST: DeWitt Enamelware Basin (water)
POST: Fabron Aftershave (group)
POST: DeWitt Straight Razor
Lilith's Den Rustic Wedding Bed Couch
ERSCH & Le Coq D'or - TRIBE Gacha 07 Hair Clip
..::THOR::.. 4- The Stacked Blankets
Lark - Imaginarium Librarium Roots
LISP - Mulberry Vintage Jewel Rug - Mint
LISP - Mulberry Vintage Jewel Rug - Chocolate

Living Room:
cinphul // specimen [aerq - feint]
Lark - Flower Press Open - 1 RARE with Rez Object on Touch by Old Bohemian and Dried Leaf Flower Texture 2 by Enchantedgal-Stock
[IK] Craft Room - Table (Insurrection)
.::THOR::.. Skull Dreamcatcher RARE
Hunters Kiss - Deer - by hyasynth Tiramisu
..::THOR::.. Old Hunting Trophy with Play sound on touch by Medhue Simoni and deer sound by DD Graced
(luc) Driftwood Glass Bowl V1
~RB~ Red Deer Terrarium
(luc) Driftwood Glass Bowl V1
Shaman by Loren Zafeiri
~RB~ Red Deer Terrarium (Raikira Belfire)
..::THOR::.. Mojave Rug
Lark - Homemade Paper - 5 1
Dark Wood Tantalus - Kittycat's (Kittycat Ninetails)
Apple Fall Crumpled Newspaper
..::THOR::.. Handmade Coffeetable
*AF* Hacienda Arm Chair
*AF* Hacienda Couch - Cuddles
[-BLUE SKY-] Mohave Cactus - Tribal
Fancy Decor: Geode Mobile (touch to spin)

Back Entrance:
rifle in chest 4 prim complete by Laika
FAC Deer Trophy And Rifle Display (Fairy Angel Creations) with shotgun by Kaboom Karlfeldt
Binoculars by Ex Machina
Saddle Ridge logo Cap - Duck Hunter
[IK] Craft Room - Bureau
{CdB} Japanese Cabinet (Casa de Bebe)
[ keke ] seven secrets
[ keke ] the psychopath
[WT] 7.62x54 Spam Can by Michael Hatfield
SPELL : Absinthe Safebook (modified)
:BAMSE: The Poet - Gun
::GB::Western boots / Black
Concept} 02. Escape. Suit case + books

Den:
LISP - Craftsman Fireplace - Touch on/off Fire - Jade (modified)
FLWVM 1yr Lantern-v.2-green by Terra Tepper
Midwinter Candlestick 3LI by Del-ka Aedilus
*AF* Milltown Hand Blown Glass Sculpture
LISP - Mulberry Vintage Jewel Rug - Chocolate
LISP - Art Deco Sofa - Blue - touch shadow for phone - swirl
LISP - Reclaimed Grandma Chair - Birds Green
FINAL TurnbuckleSideTable by Maxwell Graf (thanks for donation)
-tb- Rotary Phone - Yellow with dial sound by Kaboom Karlfeldt and sound script by Medhue Simoni
Mesh Old Wooden Tray by Katelyn Barom
[AG] Round Geode - High LI by Logan Bauer
NOMAD // Lily of the Valley A
Fancy Decor: Turtle Shell 2
Haruka Aoyagi ART PANEL - Evening
YURI ART PANEL - White Coat Goddess of Mersy
Fancy Decor: Turtle Shell 1
RELAXING LEMBANG by Sandi Benelli
Haruka Aoyagi ART PANEL - Sweet scent
*AF* Collector's Chest Ultra Rare (Artisan Fantasy - thanks for donation after my inventory loss).

Kitchen:
..::THOR::.. Old Halfmoon Table
*MC* Last Summer Days / Books Letters & Paperweight #16
brocante. farm bucket sapling / green
ionic : la mesa del pueblo with ax chopping by ekaterina visconit
Ogi Crate cutting block by Ama Galaxy
Adorably Strange Wares/SIGMA/ tray (AO) (modified)
[MB] Sushi Restaurant-Soy soce
..::THOR::.. Old Genoa Photo Holder
Sari-Sari - Kitchen Essentials - Knife Strip
*AF* Juice Stand Cutting Board Veggies with play sound on touch by Medhue Simoni and chopping kale sl by Mark Winterfield
[ keke ] hard to find bowl 3 - mint
-David Heather-Soap Dish
..::THOR::.. Dirty Coffeeshop Sink (modified)
Vintage Ice Box Eb by StoraxTree
brocante. farm bucket stack / green
..::THOR::.. Hunting Knife With Polaroid (draggable) with Madonna image
..::TH::.. Cutter
*LODE* Head Accessory - Iris [red] 2
..::TH::.. Leaf 3
..::TH::.. Magnifying Glass..:
:TH::.. Botanical Book
..::TH::.. Wooden Plank Table
..::TH::.. Wood Slice Stool
Kellye's Kitchen Pistachio Salad
Marrakesh Door by RubyStarlight Writer

Study:
Music: Kurt Elling - Bonita Cuba (Media On a Prim). Thanks to Whirly Fizzle for tech assistance.
floorplan. hemingway chair
OHeMO - decor pillow (resizeable) extra object
:: N :: Lancaster Worktable (Newchurch)
Road to Morocco Camel Music Box v1.5 by Liam Metaluna
..::THOR::.. Model Kit Box with mortar sound by Kaboom Karlfeldt and sound script by Medhue Simoni
Map and Map holder - Ex Machina Livingstone
..::THOR::..11-The Travel Memories
*Secret Shelf* Texture Change Map
..::THOR::.. 11-The Travel Memories 3
..::THOR::..11-The Travel Memories 2
ionic : Stories From the Mountain (Frames)
Pewpew! Plane Toy - Mustard (Touch for Rotation)
Apple Fall Model Plane - Large

ionic : Young and beautiful Drawing by Duluduleau <3
Soy. OSC- OLD METAL TRUNK
:BAMSE: The Poet - Desk RARE
:BAMSE: The Poet - Chair RARE
:BAMSE: The Poet - Typewriter
:BAMSE: The Poet - Documents with Apple Recycle Sound by Whirly Fizzle and sound script by Medhue Simoni
1984 by George Orwell prop by Prokofy Neva with Summon Spirit script by Innula Zenovka
..::THOR::.. Vintage Aircraft Project1 with sound by Kaboom Karlfeldt and sound script by Medhue Simoni
Ocean Paperweight by Prokofy Neva with coral by Akira Iceghost and ocean sound by Ed's Place
..::THOR:::. Donkey Cap with donkey sound by Ed's Place and sound script by Medhue Simoni
[ keke ] metal box w thyme
[Merak] - Old Travel Documents
32 - 8f8 - Storyteller's Burrow - Pipe Set with match sound by Ed's Place and sound script by Medhue Simoni
[BMS] FT Film Can by blossom Adamski
Milly keepsake box by Thaino Designs
AsteroidBox. 1940s Camera - Dirty Decor with camera sound by Ed's Place and sound script by Medhue Simoni
..::TH::.. Metches Box "Kraken Book"
[ zerkalo ] Antique Memories - Leather Journal
:BAMSE: The Poet - Steel Vault with click by kaboom Karlfeldt and sound script by Medhue Simoni

Raindale - Bitterwood bookshelf
Apple Fall Old Coat
:: N :: Dakkar Shipyard Shelving, Copper (Newchurch)
Z.O.E. Staircase Bookends
Art Oluja Blinking CYlent
cinphul // Gotrik Offering Platter [Nite]
*AF* Collector's Beetle Dome
*AF* Collector's Butterfly Dome
..::TH::.. Inkwell Storyteller
..::TH::.. Nautilus Static Model with sound by Mark Winterfield and sound script by Medhue Simoni
{C&C} Lapis Lazuli Pyramid on Pillow (Candle and Cauldron)
*AF* Collector's Arrowheads
.Bee designs :. Indian gacha Godess
..::TH::.. Adventure Book Set 2..
..::TH::.. Adventure Book Set 1
~Libertine~ Collectable Egg 02 "Odyssey"
*AF* Collector's Prized Egg
PILOT - Aviation Book Stack
SQ Carpet "Indian Ruins" - (SunQueen Ginsburg Another Fantastic Carpet from Where Worlds Collide)

Home & Garden Expo Contest -- MJ Zaurak and the Granelda House

So I'm going to try to blog the other contestants in the Home & Garden Expo Decoration Contest, but at the rate I'm going, the contest will be over. It ends June 1. Come and vote for me at House No. 4! 

This is an entry by MJ Zaurak in the Granelda house made by Sandi Gras. It's kind of an adobe hacienda type house, and I seriously contemplated having this be my house to decorate since I have so much Mexican stuff, but that's just it -- it's all taken up in rentals at Hacienda Casita in Polia, and I was afraid if I raided all those, especially the single-copy things, the rentals would be left barren. I also just had an idee fix about Frank Lloyd Wright (which I actually didn't even implement) and took the Buccaneer house.

 

So MJ has a sculpture out in front by Lucas Lameth (luc) The Dancers Sculpture, Copper-- I don't ever recall seeing it and I thought I had all his stuff. That's what we're in this contest for, to shamelessly grab shopping and design ideas. Hold that thought, we will return to it.

I don't care for the fireplace in this house -- like I didn't in the Buccaneer -- although I must say that most people expect fireplaces to be in houses. I'm so used to putting out my own in rooms and skyboxes that I forget this.

So I think this arrangement does well both to mute and echo the roundness of the fireplace (which is what I find irritating about it). The colours are very Tex-Mex and the rug is perfect with them.

This I must get - 13th Moon-Agate

So now see what this chair arrangement has been coupled with -- Bloop- Suzen JueL. I love using original art, and this is raucous and that's what we're here to be in SL. The reality is, it does echo the chair colours. But it's just a tad "off" for me. I might try to find something else. But there may be nothing else that fits as well. And remember, like hot Mexican food, you need to hurt the eyeballs a little, it's good for the Doors of Perception.

But relief is not far away with this minty arrangement that is very soothing -- repeating three chairs unabashedly with a muted brown, and the curtains and of course Plato's platinum lamps which I also use, at the hacienda, and not to be "retro" but to put those colours in the scene.  "Vinyl is Forever" which actually sells for a fair price at gatcha yards adds the feeling of eternity. That brown chair is Zinnias Casa de Verano Armchair and I'm thinking: how can there be a Zinnias chair I don't know? I thought I bought everything in the store. And that's just it. You can never buy everything in the store and there is always something more. {vespertine} record showcaseshelf is also a a solid piece and lends authenticity to the scene.

 

Moving to the next room....This is the kids' bedroom? Is that Susan JueL piece with the boobs appropriate for young children?! But they may be teenagers and trying to piss off Mom. These ionic bunkbeds don't work for me here. I've found it is impossible to put anything with those ionic pieces except other ionic pieces -- I have them in rooms at the Grote Camp. They're like TOO rustic. And the issue maybe that there are just no other bunkbeds for a house like this. There are a lot of 1970s type or suburban type bunk beds but they don't fit. Actually I can think of one gatcha bunkbed that would fit.

See, if you have LAQ Decor you have upgraded the room considerably -- if this were the Sims Online, the room points would have been upped, and then not a dead plant but those bunk beds would drag them down. LAQ's desk is wonderful. And I think here it is recoloured to very good end, perfect colour (the original is shabby vintage white I think and that's too-too).

To be sure, I have to say, the JueL piece matches the LAQ Decor ~ Secretary Desk, and maybe it could grow on me, but....

As I said I'm afraid of kitchens. Here's a person who is not afraid of kitchens. Art work, shabby stools worn by the big family, clutter artfully placed, greens -- it's all good.

I like this corner, the colours in the urban scene replay on the stripes on the table cloth and then the rug. Your mother told you never to mix a print with a plaid or different prints, but this is SL and there are no Mothers. I don't care for the plates. I generally avoid wall plates. But then, they balance out the scene and that's a plus.

 

You have here DRD - RK - Rustic Kitchen - Shelf - Large
DRD - RK - Rustic Kitchen - Hutch

and they're great.

Look at the woods on those tables.

This is a very lived-in realistic RL type corner. The purple coat ensures that. And it's my old friend the one-prim hall furniture! And this time on mod! What?! So since this piece says "from PrimZ Etc 2013" then I guess the piece began life as a builder's full perm and got repurposed.

Zinnias Vintage Poster-Revolutionaries -- again, I don't know how I missed this find from Zinnia's! It isn't politically correct due to the guns, and if they're communists, they aren't PC for me, either. But it's a great piece, and this is SL.

It's hard to do gazebos well as they are so overdone in SL and this is pretty good. The first thing is to avoid candles in cages and sticks in vases -- and MJ has also avoided the temptation of propping a guitar in the corner. So plus plus plus.

Then it's pretty spare and nice -- I see my old friend *:..Silvery K..:*Garden party(KiwiDrink server)9 which I have out in the Flamingo Motel Annex in Grote -- the colours are perfect for this house and scene.  That's actually DRD Gardenhouse Terrace chair although Zinnias has a very similar wicker chair. Notice that Annabelle's thing which I bought because I thought it was a giant carrot (it's a palm tree) is also perfect for this rustic scene.

Then this tile to die for -- again from Zinnias. I checked in inventory and I actually had it. So it takes an event like this to shame you into realizing you have too many things you have forgotten in inventory! Zinnias Cascada Wall Fountain -- and I must put it out at Hacienda Cascada of course.

Look at the whole effect -- I like it.  That's actually not part of the house -- it's Zinnias Santa Fe Arbor. Again, I miss a lot from Zinnia apparently!

So let's go back to the bedrooms, and on the way remind ourselves that (NO) CATctus - Prickly Pear RARE is one of the more perfect gatcha items in SL, but it will cost you $400-500 on the MP.

So, no, these bunk beds didn't get any better for me because now I ask the sort of logistical questions I do for my own houses. Why did Big Sis get this big bed and this whole corner AND a room divider AND a planter (ionic) but the little sisters -- or the other foster children? or? -- got these bunk beds and no room to put their stuff! I worry about the family dynamics here. Or, as one visitor suggested, maybe this is a half-way house for addicts out in the desert where they can't escape. We should look for copies of the Big Book.

Meanwhile, Big Sis has a really nice set up. It's very crowded just like the reality of a big family and cluttery and realistic. -tb- Bon Voyage - Suitcase Clutter RARE at the center here. That lovely emerald bed is called *bbqq*-Crawl Into Bed[PG]

This is in the bedroom, and lets you know that this family once had a more elegant life (before all those kids) and had Apple Fall pieces they either inherited or got at estate sales -- but then again, if you have Apple Fall, why ionic bunk beds?

The parents' room doesn't suffer from such great contradictions although you still see elegance and hippiedom straining against each other. Now see that little sculpture? It's a small version of what is in the front yard. I love things like that. So ARIA - Solace Flowers -- very beautiful. Zinnias Huichol Tree of Life Tapestry -- surely I knew such a thing existed. %Fritz Chair *MESH* 02 RARE! - COPY is the one item that really doesn't work for me, but on the other hand, the flesh tone may be intended to mute the other brash colours. %Cloine Chaise MESH is perfect for this house and this scene.

Here is where you learn that JueL can do things other than stick figures and boobs (emanate - Suzen JueL Resistance) -- and that's a good thing. I'd buy that sort of piece. This is great with the FC- Full Perm Mesh Flowers Succulents frame. Is that Fantasy China? I didn't know they could make anything other than blobby omelettes and Spanish stew that looks like garbage. Well, good then! And yet another missed Zinnia - Zinnias "Verano" Draped Ceiling Decor red stripe. I haven't been the student of Zinnia that I thought I was.  ROIRO - Hana sofa (RFL) doesn't work for me. Usually most ROIRO things are absolute treasures and sell for young fortunes but again, this flesh colour...but again, it may have had a purpose.  5_{-Maru Kado-} My Hideout_Rug (red/3Li) is perfect here.

On the roof was [Cb] Solar Panel Array - now why don't I think of things like that?

Yet More on Home & Garden Expo - Kitchen and Study

So this is what I called "the kitchen" in this house because I didn't want to put the kitchen in the tiled area by the living room. I looked at various tables and bars THOR had but in the end I decided to save money and just edit the existing "dirty sink" and take the sink out, then cover up the whole with an AF chopping board with vegetables -- not one of his best but it was what I needed. The Second Spaces knives and "hard to find bowl" by keke which seems to be ubiquitous in my inventory and not hard to find at all. I don't like it very much either but I needed some small salad bowls. I need the logic everywhere. Then there was no room for a refrigerator so I put in this old ice chest from StoraxTree.

Why here? Because he has less steps to walk to up to the roof deck with the barbecue which is where a lot of the meals are going to be. I put in this Japanese steak block which is weird, it has a limited number of steaks inside, but it fit the idea of "food prep". Then some soy sauce. That tray was from ASW's "anti-prom" set but I took all the macarons off it -- it is very, very hard to find good trays in SL. unKindness has a tray but it's too gigantic and not on edit. I later took the ionic frame out of here, too cute. THOR's Genoa photos then became the place where I could do "Spanish Civil War" without prims especially after not finding a non-Communist Internationale .

So now we come to the study off the "kitchen" which was supposed to be "the bathroom," but who needs a bathroom in SL? This is why I rarely bother with them. I love Apple Fall's coat -- there aren't that many realistic mesh hanging garments, and I've started collecting them as they add realism. I'm going to put the shopping guide in another pot so you can get all these wonderful props. Bamse's Poet desk isn't my favourite desk. But it's low prim and then the other things in that set go with it and fit. The chair is odd, but then so is the inhabitant of this house.

I loved everything I put on this shelf by Newchurch -- although I swapped out some things since this picture.

Here is a man living with his memories from wars, world travel.

This Nautilus from THOR is from Jules Verne's book and it's pretty cool. The ink stand gives you a different first line of a sea travel story on each click. I wish more creators did things like that.

I had this arrow set from AF and it's funny, I never looked into the whole set. And it's absolutely wonderful, especially the ultra rare cabinet with arrowheads and other treasures in it.

I don't know what this is exactly from THOR. It's a bit cumbersome and doesn't lie flat. It's not in a set, and he may have sent it to me.

I just finished reading this fictional account of George Orwell's life, so I have him on the brain, and I had to add this. Paperweights are so hard to fin in SL -- there aren't any. So I made one.

So the snippet from the Beatles' "Yesterday" then ultimately dates the house in the 1960s.

 

The Agonies of Decoration - Further on Home & Garden Expo Entry

So as you can see, we have a problem if we use the not so bad . PARIS . travel book out of a gatcha. I love the leather travel book. It looks like it could be 1930s or 1940s or 1970s faux at the latest. But the travel book is welded together in a two-prim bundle with photographs and a styrofoam cup. The Polaroid places it in the late 1960s when we actually used them. But the damn thing is on "no mod" and it's not just the anachronistic Polaroid that has to go, it's those over-bright pictures that need to be taken off light if not glow. And even if we were to tolerate the Polaroid -- there's the plastic styrofoam cup. I think that isn't earlier than the 1970s. I can't remember such take-out coffee cups before about 1978 myself when I came to NYC but maybe they had them long before that in big cities. Even so, they didn't have them in the 1940s. So because it can't be edited, I think, well, burn some prims disguising it.

So first I hide the styrofoam cup with the kitty cat cup from Bamse's gift box gatcha. Then I put Thaino Designs memory box to cover the top of the cup. It's getting busy, but it has to be done.

Then I've got to try to douse those pictures. So first, Asteroid Box's 1940 camera -- perfect!. And Storyteller Burrow pipe by 8f8 which has a little leather match holder that is like the leather of the travel book, all good.

 

Well, maybe the Asteroid Box camera is a little cartoony. So look at some other cameras like this one from Amala.

This other little one was cute, too. The film can could be deployed...but at this point, I think taking out the not so bad piece is a better idea. And what to put in? Thankfully, zerkalo has a leather diary, too. Not the same. But even better in some ways. Because a thing that has what it is written on it is more 1970s or later, not 1940s or 1950s.

So here's the scene finally -- less prims, better.

Still More on My Home & Garden Contest Entry

So a frustrating few hours today trying to get Media on a Prim to Work -- for the simple reason that the houses here aren't parceled, and I couldn't put in a jazz stream (my original idea) although Saffia said she didn't mind jazz -- still, for the entire sim, it seemed an imposition and anyone could of course change it. I could have tried to get house parcelled -- they may do that next year, but I was actually more interested in trying to get MOAP to work.

After all, I have it working so well here in Graphica, where I have my hacienda house, courtesy of ionic, with two flamenco dances and a Kieszca dance. They work fine. It's one of the more popular sites. People take the free dance machine and tip even. I found today that one of the flamenco youtubes had been removed leaving a black hole. So I put in another one. There was no advancing to any other songs or anything like that. They stayed put. You could click them on and off -- but then, these MOAPs clearly showed the dashboard so you could click "off" on one and "on" on another. 

I studiously keep "autoplay" off on my own browser on YouTube -- I HATE that it defaults to that it is even a "thing". I don't to have autoplay and a zillion youtubes playing one after another. 

I thought the problem might be yet another need to turn that OFF (it seems to drop out when you switch Google accounts) or that the video I chose was a playlist, one of those YouTubes set up to play like 16 songs at once. But it wasn't. So it was a mystery HOW it was playing a playlist of that singer, because it WAS.

Whirly Fizzle, who is always helpful and constructive and curious on the forums, unlike the legions of annoying idiots there who are far from scientific, so I decided to risk contacting her inworld -- when I saw a thread on the MOAP subject from the past she was speaking on (since lost but Google it). I didn't want to go through the chore of putting it on the forums and wading through piles of insults and stupidities.

First, Whirly found a "surgically clean" version of the song, at least, it seemed to be, i.e. not automatically advancing, as my first version did, although for the life of me, I can't see how. But she cautioned me I'd have to get the "off" button turned off on the dashboard to prevent advancement -- and she was right -- it advanced to a random Harry Nilsson song (!) and there was no way I could do that. Sure enough, I couldn't get the "off" turned off. There was an ad in the way. I couldn't get it to click when I saw it appear now and then. I doggedly pursued it with an enlarge form of the MOAP and finally nabbed it. And I hope it works because the other version didn't. I was going to be resigned to putting my first MOAP out, but that turned out not to be a thing that looped through 12 or 16 songs and started over again. It advanced through a few, then stuck on one, then kept playing that one. Sigh.

HOORAY it seems to be working -- we'll see. It has made it through two rounds of the song and started again. [UPDATE: Oops! I spoke too soon. I just came on the site and it was playing "You're So Vain." Ugh. How did that happen??? These are videos that are not on autoplay to advance, and not on a playlist.

Why do I want this song which I completely randomly came across? Because it's sad, and about someone who had to leave Cuba with his parents, then his parents died -- it seemed like it might fit the story of the writer in the house. 

 

I actually bought a gramophone with the Internationale on it, which MIGHT have fit him as he apparently fought in the Spanish civil war. Except it was the COMMUNIST version of the Internationale and there is NO WAY I am putting that out -- with a hammer & sickle to boot!  -- in this writer's house. He reads Orwell, for God's sake.

So on to the "working hunting corner" which is unlike the "aesthetic hunting fireplace." Here you have binoculars from the Ex Machina Livingstone Gacha set by Hattie Panacek. They're a bit too cartoony and shiny (they fit with the other Ex Machina set better) but I didn't have any other binoculars that weren't a zillion prims or that had a strap. So I went with this. The hunter's cap is Saddle Ridge logo Cap - Duck Hunter and "only" 7 prims so great! The table is [IK] Craft Room - Bureau - that may have even been a rare.

I actually found a hat that was EVEN MORE PERFECT but not only was it 39 prims, you really couldn't put it down so gracefully.

///BENJAMINZ/// HUNTED CAP - RED - from a gatcha.

Isn't it WONDERFUL! I will have to content myself with wearing it my sometimes, it was only 50L.

So as you can see I fixed up the deer rugs by tanning the cream one in keke's series. I tried out the group gift from Dragon's Magickal Wares but it's Celtic, and really, as I said, no fairy/magic/shaman/Beltane/Celtic stuff in this story, really, and it didn't quite work. It can't be too fancy, this is Camp, you're wiping your muddy boots. So again, the little grim ensemble here has FAC Deer Trophy And Rifle Display and rifle in chest 4 prim complete by Laika (who BTW has a great mainland store) as well as {CdB} Japanese Cabinet.

Why isn't the deer head above the the fireplace? Well, the girlfriend had banished it to this corner so she didn't have to look at it, and there was the more aesthetic (if you will) skull and driftwood. Also, this FAC item is all in one -- you couldn't very well put a rifle above a hot fireplace, even if not loaded.

So let's look inside {CdB} Japanese Cabinet -- and here's where we get STORY!

So on top, you have two books from keke's weird "study collection," one says "7 secrets" and the other says "Psychopath" -- and really, gun owners and hunters tend to be in that category in my view. Please, spare me the gun nut propaganda, you won't persuade me. I'm all for more gun control. Both my father and my son had the terrible experience as boys of shooting a bird and then feeling bad when it died, and then never shooting a gun again, and that's fine by me. 

You see the writer has put a pistol in a hollowed-out book -- this is ionic's Absinthe Safebook, which fortunately was on mod so I could remove the absinthe props and put in a pistol from Bamse - :BAMSE: The Poet - Gun. What is a poet doing with a gun, you ask? Well, this is sort of Hemingway stuff, and that's all our writer to a "T". Why is our writer doing this? I don't know! Creepy, huh!

Then you have a Russian prop that actually says "Sniper's Ammunition" on the box -- awful! This guy isn't a murderer, however; he's just an adventurer. He just got this from a yard sale or something. Still. I couldn't find any other ammo boxes that fit in my inventory so it it what it is. Then there is those wonderful cowboy boots - ::GB::Western boots /  Black - it's rare that you can put accessories and shoes out (see above re: hairpin and hunting cap!) and not use gadzillion prims, even hundreds. This pair is only 2! Then there is a suitcase with books from the Concept set with the raft, Concept} 02. Escape. Suit case + books - the blue fabric looks 1950s to me.

So now back to the hallway set -- only 1 prim! I do like it. But it's a little bit too sculptyish. And a little TOO nautical perhaps when my story isn't nautical. So I decided to swap it out. I will put it in the Mermaid Tavern in Iris, however, I'm glad I found it.

AND....I just found a second copy of the 7-prim hunter hat rezzed so hooray, I have 7 prims now to work with! Or 8, even. So now I will substitute this. I like it, and it tells a story -- the raincoat is there, the Navy cap is there, but her coat is gone... and I put the flower press on top, to show that she was taking that with her, and put it on top while she was buttoning her coat, then forget it... But now I will try THOR's...

I wasted a BUNCH on THOR's nautical gatcha trying to get the Captain's Pocket, which was a leather travel purse but failed -- and now I have enough of the other knick-knacks for the study shelf and some giveaways in the land preserve. Still, $647 for this hallway set (there's two other pieces in it) was a lot for me, since I like to pay only 50 out of a gatcha for decorating items (but then spending $2000 on that gatcha sort of defeats the purpose!). 

This is a great piece of THOR's, but you'll agree, the wood texture on this is ass. THOR is the undisputed MASTER of wood texture in SL. He makes all his own stuff, no full-perm Katy and Bad Katz models with him. He makes BEAUTIFUL textures (I will show you more) and exquisite wood works. But here, he caved to that prevailing "shabby chic" ethos of SL and put this awful white grey-green shabby stuff on this piece and it HAS TO GO. The hat and everything is perfect. It has a stupid candle on it AND a hurricane cover -- more stupid SL conventions -- I mean who puts a candle on a WOODEN HALLWAY SET in your HALL! NO ONE. I mean, even in the 19th century. It might catch fire. At least it lighted up the scene, which is more than you can say for so many SL lighting attempts but it had to go. Sadly, it left a sooty mark from the shadow that every creator feels they now have to add. Some of them make that be a prim so you can remove it, some of them bake it in. This one is baked in, so it's a good thing that the flower press was going to go there anyway!

So I put "reclaimed wood" texture off the Internet on it which is my favourite this week for everything, I found it when I was trying to match the floor in the Storyteller's Burrow -- and it's nearly the same. I'm not even going to RISK re-tiling it because it may become hopelessly muddled and take ages to line up. It's good enough. Inworld it's crisper even than these photos. And I think retexturing really brings out this mirror better, which is wonderful, it gets eaten up by the grey-green shabby chic version.

Obviously, travel books, a blanket (because it's Upstate, and because I had to take out the blanket basket by the fireplace as it was too many prims) and the travel magazine -- all good. The pillow? I don't know where he's going with that. Like, you always sit on a pillow on your hall set? I guess you could to put on or take off your boots? Ok then. This piece has loads of strange poses, part of that culture of making everything a fashion blog photo session which I definitely do not like. But I suppose decorating rooms to rent out that you won't live in is from the same opera, so I can't really complain too much. I just find all those fashion shoots so "not lived in" I can't stand them.

So basically I am now happy with this entrance hall. You may not be, the judges may not be -- can't you picture them with their clipboards, shaking their heads, marking off points not only for those indoor onions (!) but a tacky recolour job on keke's deer rug. And deers, wow, too obvious! And -- who knows. BUT I LIKE IT.

Further on My Home & Garden Expo Contest Entry

So back to take a peek at my competitor -- and she had a great idea, putting that step chest at an angle to solve that corner. Why didn't I think of that. I never think of things like that. Nice pots, too.

So here's Ria Bazar's Arizona kitchen -- that's all of it, except for the Apple Fall piece on the right. Simple, elegant, normal. Surely she has prims for food now, but this area is done.

 

I'm still angsted about using this area as the bedroom, but I actually don't want to swap with the study -- which in my conception, is my only choice unless I take my "food prep area" (as you will see) and swap that out for the study, put the bedroom in the study, and the kitchen in the kitchen. But you know, unless in the next few days before the deadline I get second thoughts, I will leave it because I like it myself.

So let me show you what I did with the bedroom/living room. I think it still needs editing for parallel construction. Maybe it needs rugs. I'm out of prims so it means choices.

 

So basically, I had to use this built-in fireplace. That changed my mind from my original conception of art deco/Frank Lloyd Wright if there were no fireplace, as I had one I wanted to use with this house (which is now in the rec room).

So the fireplace props are more aesthetic. No actually dead deer heads with fur and taxidermy. This is a bleached skull by THOR, a beach glass and driftwood peace by Lucas Lameth, a little jar (~RB~ Red Deer Terrarium) by Raikeira Belfire , and then this funny full perms shaman thing by Loren Zefeiri which like all such things, you can only use in your own builds with no-copy, and sell for more than $50. I actually made a complicated sculpture with that shaman, but it has "issues" so in the mean time, it's just going as decor here.

The cactus bowl is from THOR, and the rug is bigged up and greyed, also from his Mohave set; the coffee table is his too but I think from another set. Then I put Artisan Fantasy hacienda chairs which I have on my actual Hacienda in Polia. The colour isn't exactly what I wanted and it has politically-incorrect fur and hide but I don't care ultimately, this is the Buccaneer house, remember? There's a grander sofa of his but I think it's not on copy, or least I didn't have it in inventory and it's out at the Hacienda, a dignified, big green piece, maybe I'll put it here, but the cuddle couch seemed like a good solution.

Because while this is supposed to be the "main" space, I'm thinking of it as "the recesses of the house" where the writer retreats from the external "public" spaces of rec room/food prep room with its "hidden" study which is after all associated with work, even with work at home, and the path to upstairs for the barbecue "kitchen". So this is the "living room," if you will but actually more private. He doesn't have company in here. 

As you know, company always gravitates to your kitchen so he put the kitchen/food prep/rec room in the other, smaller room. This room, however, has the cuddle couch for those private moments with the girlfriend.

I definitely wanted a Kittycats' drink set, but which one? First, I put out Southern Comfort, which is a nice tray with green drinks, maybe mint juleps, and snacks. After all, "Buccaneer" is the south, right? Ok, wait, let's look this up:

Buccaneers were a kind of privateer or pirate peculiar to the Caribbean Sea during the 17th and 18th centuries. Originally the name applied to the landless hunters of wild boars and cattle in the largely uninhabited areas of Tortuga and Hispaniola.

So, hmm, I have a bit of pirate stuff as you'll see. But this guy, if a buccaneer, is a retired buccaneer now, anyway, living with his memories. Maybe he has a lame leg, a war wound or a hunting accident, there's a cane in the wardrobe.

Often I put a much bigger plant on a fireplace. I don't know why I just wanted to stay with this little succulents bowl.

I have a feeling this creator drew this shaman, then decided to cut it out and mesh it up. And that's ok. It's hard to figure how this will "fit into a build." per his TOS. I put it in a sculpture with some other items but the full perms creators sneer at you making any "art" of what you sell from their stuff -- I think some people sell the stand-alone thing as "their art" without any adornment and they hate that, as it is literalism and violates the spirit of their license. I think I have a cool sculpture/interactive idea, but it needs some technical fixes first, then I'll show you. Or what I would do with this guy is shrink him down and have him be one tiny thing in a box of geodes and whatnot that is a "treasure box". What else can you do?

Just another "anti-hunting" note. Well, I feel it is, but actually, I don't know. I love this little cameo from schadenfreude called "Hunter's Kiss" -- part of a little series of animal portraits. "Hunter's kiss" -- well, that's a contradiction in terms as the hunter is going to be killing, not kissing this animal. It almost verges on kitsch but it's very poignant. So let's say even the woman in this house made this set-up. But maybe not. Maybe the only reason this writer goes hunting is that his father and grandfather were hunters and he couldn't wimp out of that family tradition. We don't know.

I'm absolutely happy with my decisions to put onion and vidalia rows in the indoor planter. I bet Ms. Varriale never envisioned this use of her beds.  But nothing says "Spanish" and "southwest" like vidalia onions, no? And I have to have the fresh vegetables for the salads. It's cold out and these onion beds actually do very well here. So that's that. The rug here is from a set of rugs of different colours with deer designs. Not that inspired, but it's ok. Rugs bother me. I used to have a wonderful set of rugs, many single-copy Storax rugs, and they were all lost in my 15,000 item inventory loss. So I have this now from LISP, and it's ok, because rugs scare me a little, trying to paw through all of them, 90% of which aren't going to work, is too depressing. I can see judges marking off points for that rug decision which is "mint" with "grey colouring". So maybe I need to go back to the drawing board.

When I stand by this big Chinese hutch by Casa de Bebe, I have qualms about where I'm going with this entry way.  If nothing else, that rug colour has to be fixed.

So I dithered over the hall set. I was rummaging through hall sets and though this was good and then it turned the story for me -- it's not on edit, I can't remove the hats, so then there has to be a guy in the Navy with that cap and a woman with that floppy hat, but his raincoat is there and her coat is missing. It's only one prim though. Sculpty, but I think the texture looks good. If it were on edit I'd remove those dumb baskets and put boxes there or something.

I looked at THOR's hallway in his store and dithered about it. It's good, but it's very white, and colouration with colours can look terrible on furniture. It's also too shabby for the worn but still noble look of this house. This guy comes from money. Maybe some of the furniture is from Mom and Dad's house. Remember this is Camp, not their main house.

The thing is, what he has there -- a box, books, a pillow -- that's just more what I want in a hall set than those dumb baskets. The hat is also perfect for the 1950s guy. I could even stick in a woman's hat or stole or something. Hmm. I do have a lot of THOR stuff already and this thing will probably be like 10 prims, I need to check it. There's its whiteness. I might be able to retexture it actually...anyway this has to be decided by the 27th. It's another $700 or whatever and I don't want to be spending more on this. I also do NOT like the blogola system in SL where you are paid for blogging in free non-transfer goods. I reject that, although on this bid, I accepted two blogolas completely by accident as I will tell you.

There's also Zinnia's WONDERFUL southwestern hall set but that is too far in the Mexican direction -- we're Upstate New York, remember?  We're at best doing faux Tex-Mex by Northerners who don't know what they're doing, actually when they throw around striped rugs and cactus bowls.

In the next post I'll explain my real hunting corner.

 

SL Home & Gardens Expo Decorating Contest

So I'm excited to have been chosen for the Home & Garden Expo design contest. Anyone could apply and then they say they picked names out of hat at random -- I think otherwise I might not have gotten in, although one person who seems to be in charge there -- Saffia Widdershins -- has generally been cordial to me over the years.

You can see my work here in House 4. Here's their blog about the contest.

You got to pick the house you wanted to design out of their list, I picked "The Buccaneer" by Skyrider Varriale. This is a very nice house with a western/southwestern/Frank Lloyd Wright sort of feel to it. So when I heard "Buccaneer," I said "This house has to have a gun rack." I had just got another antique one recently by Laika Amat (rifle in chest 4 prim complete), and I had Fairy Angel Creation's deerhead and rifle as well (FAC Deer Trophy And Rifle Display). These went into the Shaman's Hut level which is actually anti-hunting. I bet you will get some PETA types who will complain and this is the sort of thing that makes you lose a contest but that's the last thing I care about. I'm not likely to win a thing like this because I don't decorate according to SL norms. And I'm not really an interior decorator in SL or RL such as to do the right thing you need to do. 

My goal with decoration here is the same as my rentals which is a) make a house seem real and livable, not just something to photograph for a fashion blog b) tell a story with it. Here, I'm not as constricted as a rental, I suppose, because I sometimes have to do things in rentals that will enable them to be liked and rented because the market for offbeat is very limited.

I've tried to learn something about decoration from trial and error for one, just by seeing what rents and what doesn't. Some things get appreciated even by just one person and that's enough. Often people want everything removed, or they put tacky stuff among the eloquent pieces. Oh, well.

This is a good house -- it walks well, it's spacious, it has interesting features like the indoor garden and the roof terrace. But for me, the problem was to decide "where's the bedroom" and "where's the study" because I wanted this  to be a story about a war journalist or non-fiction writer, let's say a former military man, and then explorer/traveler (always a popular SL gatcha theme so it builds itself), a collector, and then later a photographer, travel writer, hunter, and so on.

And there just didn't seem to be a good place for the bedroom. There's no second floor, unless you count the terrace which I suppose you could make the open-air bedroom like a camp or people sleeping out on their verandahs which we used to do in the old days in Upstate New York, especially if you had a second-story porch. You could take Concept's Hemingway set and put the bed, pots, etc. up there and it would work. I have those out in the "Soviet Spa" in Winnipeg.

I looked at that Hemingway leather bed up on books as blocks for this space and decided -- no. This guy may be offbeat and a writer and all that but he's not so nutty or lacking in ship-shape to put a bed up on books. It can't be.

So in "Buccaneer" there are two rooms that were obviously the kitchen and bathroom because they had wood plank walls and adobe tile floors. That makes for an awfully cold bedroom floor in the winter. But I felt that plank wall shouldn't go to waste on a needless SL bathroom and even a kitchen isn't what I want.

For one, I refuse to put in bathrooms because they're stupid -- we're not in the Sims Online. Very rarely I will put one in, i.e. when I have Dreamland Design's wonderful Turkmenistan set where I could put the lovely bathroom items in wood into a room that fit that purpose in a skybox (you can see it in the B&B in Winnepeg).

So there's no way I was going to burn prims in this contest on a bathroom, the guy can go out to an outhouse that isn't in sight -- this is in the woods in the Adirondacks, see. It's Camp. We're 90 miles out of NYC at least.  So that left the issue of his bedroom. I could put it in the smaller of the two front rooms but the door to the porch seemed too close to it in the smaller one, and I didn't like that feel of a door leading to the outdoors from a bedroom. That was my only complaint about this house. 

So I decided to make what was supposed to be the kitchen the bedroom, and the bathroom a study, as it was smaller and more cozy for thinking and writing. Of course, this leaves the problem not only of a cold floor but the expanse of space and not much privacy given the living room is right there next to the kitchen. But then, this is a guy up in the woods alone, except he does have this girlfriend...or did...

So...first let me give you an idea of how this house looks before I clutter it, and how it could be decorated NORMALLY by one of my fellow contestants named angeleina (she's at no. 11 at this contest):

This L-shaped couch by Mirage is brilliant because it solves the problem of what to do with this big space, yet still make a cosy fireplace area. The brown is perfect, it's all perfect. The little tables pull the two spaces together -- I don't even know if she's going to leave them like that but I like them. If I get this house I may get that couch, too. BTW her hanging plants integrate the spaces also. I decided to decorate my house first, then look at the others, so as not to get distracted/discouraged. Now I'm kicking myself for not having hanging plants. I'm not going to have them, though, I've decided.

She's got a great hallway and a set I didn't know -- she's from the South in RL and can get away with the "y'all" and "Buccaneer is probably more south than southwest? That floorplan console is great, I have that, another 50L Friday thing. PS those are all hive plants -- I got that same set and I dithered about using hive there, too! But you'll see I had a different inspiration...

The thought crossed my mind that I should use this geranium milk jug from Apple Fall but it was a little too fussy for my character and even his flowery girlfriend.

Then you can see how she's made a proper kitchen. Kitchens scare me a little. I don't hardly cook in RL, and in SL I've really only spent time on one kitchen (in the B&B in Itame) that went through many accretions and iterations. Elsewhere, I tend to take a set and put it in. In Grote, I have Desmond Shang's old wood and marble kitchen fixtures from an old prefab Victorian mansion of his.

You can see how the open space flows and works -- my graphics card is acting up so I have to come back and take that properly -- the only thing I thought was a problem in her kitchen was that the backdrop wall didn't match the wall of the house, but I have that issue with ionic stoves and such and I just let it be.

So standing here you can see how this space has been conquered, with the right flower pot and I imagine she isn't done yet with the fireplace.

I was actually thinking of just taking DRD's "cake disaster" counter and making that be my "kitchen" so I wouldn't have to get into the agonies of logic that kitchens induce in me (as you will see).

But I had other problems to solve as you will see. To me the LOGIC of the house and its activities becomes a driving force, needlessly so, because it's SL and you can do anything you want, and fly and such, but still. To me, if you put a thing in a room or house, you have to explain how it got there and what you do with it. There has to be a chain of logic. How did that watering can get filled if there is no hose outside? You can leave these things out (and I will have to) but it's nice when they all "fit" logically.

I think she's going to make the smaller of the two front rooms the bedroom, judging from just these two pieces, but obviously she isn't done yet and it will be fascinating to me to see how she solves the "where to put the bedroom"  for this house. 

All of a sudden looking at this room with a fresh eye, I see you could make it the bedroom by closing all the shades, even with that door there. But really that door like that gives you very little room for a bed to be comfortable, in my view. I would never feel like the feng shui was right in this house with a bed near this door.

So, casting common sense to the wind -- and I may go back on this later -- I decided to make the kitchen the bedroom because it felt both more protected and more accessible -- at least in the recess of the house -- which I will come to.

I couldn't envision doing this woodsy FLW/southwestern sort of house without Sequoia Nightfire's room divider from the POE contest of some years ago - POE6 * Winter Dressing Screen by SEQUOIASTYLE. It's a wonderful SL antique, I love it. I have put it sometimes in Barnesworth Anubis' Marleybone skybox.  The dressing screen is no-mod and a whopping 14 prims and can't be stretched but that's ok, I put it out first and build around it. Sadly Sequoia doesn't seem to have a store, she does couture, sim builds, as it says on her profile, but not furniture, so there was nowhere to look to see if she had anything more modern in the sense of being less prims. Oh, well. My motto: every decoration has to start with an old-school high-prim SL antique!

Then what can be the bed? See you can't have plank beds like Pew or Floorplan, which I might have used, given that cold floor plus the living room. So maybe Newchurch's iron bed (I'd put that if it were a rental, where you need an adult bed) or something sturdy, iron, wood, manly, no frills here. While I was struggling to find something I pulled out out Lilith Den's wedding bed. Now that is a weird piece. It's like from some previous century or Arabia or who knows. I have put it sometimes in weird skyboxes with alcoves. It has sort of Moroccan lights. The bride and groom climb into this...box, I guess you'd have to call it. But that's ok, because it fits with Sequoia's room divider, I love it, and furthermore, it has a top to put more things on. And creates a sense of warmth and security in what might feel like a cavernous living room/open kitchen space with a tile floor which really has no business being a bedroom. I may still swap this with the study. 

We're now deeply in the weird realm and this is how you lose contests. But honestly, I want the guy's bedroom to be here, where at least there is one protected wall, the blinds, and the room divider (admissible under the contest rules). I mean, let's face it, it's not like he needs privacy and there's a gang of frat boys here and he no longer has a girlfriend, ok? And even if he does, they're up in the woods, remember? So we're leaving it.

Also in this room you will see a few reminders of this woman -- her hairpin is on the floor like that famous poem by Taniguchi Buson. Yes, it's another 10 prims -- 500 goes by faster than you might think. But what a hair pin -- by Ersch, beautifully made. Did the woman in my story die? No, as you will come to see. But she left. In a hurry.

Which reminds me of my other goal besides the first two: to put out items from the merchants I always shop at and whom I find the best, because a contest like this should really feature them, I'm just a glorified mover. So I made choices sometimes by accident when searching for things, sometimes hunting for a specific merchant, sometimes just trying stuff, but if you're going to have a hair comb, it should be by Ersch.

So there's also some perfume bottles -- two, where one might do, but I wanted to have lilies of the valley and this is what I had in inventory. The blue one is from Velvet Whip, most of whose stuff is too drawn/cartoony for the look of this house. But I wanted blue to match the hairpin, which originally was next to the perfume bottles before it fell to the floor, see. I usually put VW stuff in houses where I already have drawing/cartoon items like alchemy sets or magic sets. The other bottle is actually a not very good sculpty but somehow it fit.  I really wanted to try to do this contest without buying anything but the three things required from the Expo itself, which I will come to.

The chest that is really "her" chest is from Vagabond and is paisley and sort of Indian-like -- Zaara has a better version of this type of Indian/Boho chest with even working drawers; so does Myrrine, that look more like the RL equivalents -- this one isn't scripted, doesn't open, and isn't even as well made. But sometimes you have to paint with what fits the scene -- I wanted something softer, and even added gray colouring to it, and something that wouldn't be primmy or stand out or draw too much attention because Lilith's bed is the center of attention here.

On top goes these terrariums. BTW a word on those LISP carpets -- they are PERFECT for this "bedroom". Just perfect. Look at them! These are 50L Friday specials. She's got a set of them, different colours. These are PERFECT. And warm up that cold floor, thank God. BTW maybe I should put a wood stove in here? 

So he gets a shaving table from POST just because it's a cool shaving table from POST.  I used the "small" that has less stuff (than the large, which I put out in the Celtic Mystical Forest) but this could even be sacrificed with maybe just the mirror or maybe just the bowl if I need the prims because the wardrobe has a shaving kit inside -- see?

So about this wardrobe. I debated whether to put in one of my ABSOLUTE FAVOURITE PIECES in SL but decided I MUST. I recently discovered it while trying to find a texture change map that I saw in a store, and recalled I'd lost from inventory. It's [CB] Upstairs Armoire (touch drawers for rezzer menu) by Cedar Bay (Tibouchina Freschi)

Sadly this creator doesn't have it anywhere, doesn't have a store any more, etc. but she's still on the MP. The reason I debated is that it is a bit odd, and it has photo real, which is my least favourite thing in SL -- mainly because it's so poorly done. But this is actually an example of a very good rendition of photo real, and the entire thing is 5 prims.

This bureau is an absolute delight -- you can click and get "hers" and "his" but more than that, you can carefully edit various combinations of objects and clothes. The issue with putting out all his clothes is that the frock coats are too dated -- they seem like Victorian era -- and this is supposed to be a guy in the 1950s, let's say, perhaps he fought in the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s. You could say, "Oh, well those are his father's but...no." So fortunately you can put in just the tweed, and also not put in the shoes which are also very dated. The rest can pass.

On top of Lilith's bed goes Thor's blankets -- because her bed didn't look warm enough. Then this Lark books/tree root thing. It doesn't belong, given that you can't explain how a tree is growing here, whereas you could if you were doing a magic/wiccan/shaman thing. But I decided at the outset -- no fairies, no shaman, no magic, for this build; this guy is a hunter, former military, not very fantastical. He has this tree trunk here because he's a lover of nature and adventurer, not because of any wispy fairy stuff. And it's not hers btw because he's more the writer/reader.

 

 

 Alright, I will have more in awhile...

 

Iolair Design -- Celtic Furniture -- Delightful Find - Now With SLURLs!

Lately as I said I have gotten so sick of events, and so sick of the latest mesh creations which consist of gazebos, candles in cages, photo frames, couches with blankets artfully draped on them that have no or only 3 texture options, console tables, things made in fact originally by Katy been then retextured, loungers -- well, you get the idea. There's very little new under the sun.

I now have 100,000 plus items in inventory. Since hitting 100,000, I've been battling every day to whittle it down -- deleting name repetitions and empty notecards which are obvious low-hanging fruit, as well as endless packaging garbage from merchants like folders, group joiners and landmarks, but also just plain ugly crap that will never be used.

Since the Postcards are broken and I now have to manually take photos and save them offline AND remember to keep the SLURL -- well, I'm done for now. I need a break, and likely I will take one for a month or more from events. I'm just done buying them, because I realized that even if I put out 100 items a day from inventory that were not used, I would only have used 36,500 items after one year. Not all of the 100,000 items are furniture, of course, but probably half of it is, and it's daunting to think that it might take two whole years to use every piece of furniture I have bought in my inventory, deleting some along the way. I love decorating, but really, it's heart-breaking to accidentally come across some things I bought in inventory and FORGET! A crime! Like the AIR stuff (will show later).

Lately, I've been scouring the MP for 49L items that are just weird or even Soviet for a build, or actually quite well made even if prim or sculpty, with the occasional mesh find.

When I started the Celtic forest, I decided that every single 30L Saturday Sweet Revolutions tree, log, grass etc which has sat in inventory for years without use HAD to be used. It's insane not to. And much more. (SR, run by Gwen van Aurora, is the store where I got the big swamp trees and such for the Shaman site in Tofalar).

For example this past Saturday -- why would you not buy a 30L Tourmaline Tree and glowing jewel-like teardrop plants? But then...will you use them? Well, I'm determined to do just that now.

The Celtic Mystical Forest kit comes from this store called CELTIC MYST dEcO ++mAgIcK Deco Designs++ that has all this amazing Celtic, fairy, druid, medieval, etc. stuff which I love. I guess it is my Irish roots. To be sure, it's sculpty. I don't like sculpty as a rule for houses and furniture, it doesn't look good and why buy it when you can buy mesh? But for forests it can be pretty good, and sometimes better. Although in this case, Celtic Mystical doesn't do grasses at all well, but fortunately their kits are on "mod" and they don't put in shadows to prevent you from removing things. More on this later. I will show more of that when it is finished.

So it is SO REFRESHING to find a store like Iolair Design which is off the beaten path. I'd never heard of it. It is run by a German woman (or at least, an avatar with a quotation in German on her profile), so you wonder -- why Celtic? It has a bit of a heavy German feel to some of the Celtic furniture. But that's ok. One likes sturdy furniture in SL that won't break after years of use! These Oxford chairs are wonderful. I got a moss green one.

Then there's this jewelry box, which unlike so many mesh things, opens! Hooray!

These Faberge type eggs aren't exactly Celtic - but I guess their theme is broader to include "Medieval". They don't "do anything" although one of them keeps time.

I loved these cut-glass flasks. They don't dispense anything. But they're mod so you could put something in them. They really look good!

More later on the couch...

So I'm making the Celtic Mystical Forest above Ravenglass and it's just wonderful! Take the teleporter at the Ravenglass Docks

The only thing I got at Shiny Shabby was Silas Marner sculptures out of a gatcha because they are original

I am so, so sick of events. They are so repetitive, the items seem to get worse and worse and more and more repetitive.

I don't even like Alice in Wonderland very much. I always found the story made me uncomfortable even when I was a little child. I just don't like it. But I ended up with Alice as a theme in the Celtic Mystical Forest for various reasons and so here we all are. 

I like some but not all of Silas Marner's works. I don't like the kitschy kid stuff. I don't want kid statues on my SL lawn, but I bet that's popular. But I do like his weird and whimsical items, they are quite original. And these are classics, but they are original takes on those classics.