Strangetown extras: Family portraits, gardening, and reader participation + sims talk

[strangetomato]

I just wanted to share a couple of photos and do some sims gabbing about CC and the Kitchen and Bath Stuff Pack.

Have you seen these recolours of the Teen Style Stuff gym wear converted for adults by cloudlessnights on MTS2? I think they're really cute. Lots of nice colours and patterns, and it makes up for the lack of gym clothes in the game. I'm a pretty big fan of conversions like that in general, and migamoo also did some really great ones, including the clothing that Ripp wears right now in this story. Imagine that - a plain black button-up shirt! It seems like something you would take for granted, but I don't, considering how specialized a lot of CC is (and the Maxis stuff too, for that matter). Basics, people, we need basics.

Speaking of basics, the new Kitchen and Bath Stuff seems awesome to me. And it has clothes! Nice clothes. Argyle sweaters with jeans (Buck and Frances just heard that and looked over), and a nice sweater and leggings outfit. Yes, actually classic and nice, not trendy (I couldn't believe it either)! They've posted the item pics at the official site, if you haven't taken a look at them yet. It seems like a good SP to me. Lots of things that have already been done pretty well by Holy Simoly, but some new things too.

I only recently started using the hula mod, and I'm really liking it. Especially the still poses from the lot loading screens. I've always wondered how other people posed sims for photo shoots like that and now I know. I'm so behind sometimes. Anyway, I thought I'd share the results of my tinkering with the poses and moveobjects/snapobjectstogrid.




A little "family" portrait. Aren't they cute? Why limit myself to Sim Couple A & B, when I can pose three together!

You can see Ophelia's garden in the background too. She already has her gold talent badge, and Ripp and Johnny are both getting there too, just from occasionally helping her (the garden got so big that she really needs some help). Here they are in action:




Sure, guys. Why bother getting dressed first? Why not?


ETA: I also just noticed this new "Cottage Garden" loveseat on Holy Simoly. How perfect for Nervous' garden one day! :D The universe just seems to be aligning for me right now.

Also, is anyone interested in some reader participation related to the next chapter? No promises that it will end up in the story, but I'm opening the floor to anything that you would like to see come up in conversation at the dinner party with Johnny, Ophelia, Ripp, Stella and Jayne (within reason and character, of course). I have plenty of my own, but is there anything that you would like to see brought up? Just curious. Maybe I'm overlooking something good...

Comments

[dothesmustle.livejournal.com]

I love a lot of migamoo's custom content. I download so much stuff, and I usually use her clothes. Her children outfits are lovely, but a lot of Maxis children clothes are adorable, too. The sundresses that came with Seasons! The children outerwear that came with Seasons! I loved a lot of the content that comes with Kitchen and Bath Interior Design Stuff, the Circuit City near my house never has any of the stuff packs, which irks me to no end.

Okay...a paragraph about clothes for my sims...I need to remember I have a life, too.

I second the Ripp mentioning Johnny's supposed lady parts conversation. Such lovely dinner conversation, yes?

Ophelia is awesome! How many gold badges does she have now?

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

It's okay, I can chat about sim clothes for ages! But maybe I need a life...

I have some of migamoo's unisex clothing for children, but I don't have that much. The children have a number of good options, and it's really not as important to me as the teens, young adults, and adults. I wish that more of the clothing was assigned for YAs too. It's annoying when it isn't.

I don't really get all the underwear sets for children that people create, though. When are the kids even in underwear? They sleep in pajamas, and they don't woohoo, so when do you ever seen the children's underwear? I just get a slightly creepy vibe from it, but that's probably just me being a bit extreme. I don't see any reason for me to be concerned with whether a little girl has boy cut underwear or not. I'll never see it anyway. I suppose that it might have storytelling uses, like going to the doctor, or something. It never occurred to me that I needed it.

I'm really thinking that it would be good to include (and well, I have already written) a scene where this comes up. But it might be different from what people expect. And not at dinner. ;) I have something that's somewhat "should I?", but I think I will...

That's her second gold badge. Both are flower and garden related. That's her thing. Johnny and Ripp have a lot more skill points than she does, but fewer badges (just bronze gardening for now). Johnny has almost maxed body, and Ripp maxed creativity ages ago, with the band. They both have high charisma too (and Ripp practices "romance" Heehee. He's good at what he does).

[dothesmustle.livejournal.com]

I like a lot of migamoo's clothes, because she uses Maxis meshes and a lot of custom meshes out there make the waistes so extremely tiny(even though I'm guilty of having those in my game, I'll download anything, really. :P)

I really wish that there were more variety of YA clothes. I mean an adult body mesh isn't very different than a young adult body mesh, it's frustrating to have all these clothes and onyl a few of them work on young adults.

I always got such a creepy vibe from children underwear sets. I don't think that outgoing children sleep in their underwear, so I was always wondering "Why would I even need that?"

Hehe, I can't wait for that scene, I mean any scene with Ripp and Johnny is amazing, they're hilarious. I'm hoping for an

"OOPS! I didn't know you were in the shower, I was listening to my MP3 player real loud!"
"Just GET OUT, Ripp."
"*staaaaaaares*"

I love the band equipment, my sims in college max out their skills so quickly with it. I never thought practicing romance helped sims gain charisma, my sims always practice their speeches, and all those speeches got me to realize sims hate MANY things. :)

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

I like your scene, especially this part:

*staaaaaares*

You know that this just begs to actually happen. We'll see...