Happy One Year To My Blog!

That's right, it's been one year since I started this blog. Can you believe it? I kind of didn't think I'd make it this far. When I started this whole adventure, I was in a pretty bad place in my real life. If it hasn't been obvious, fall and winter are generally my lowest seasons, the month of November especially. What may have seemed like a roller coaster of emotions to some was just me, trying hard not to let it show. Unfortunately I've never been able to write without my feelings plastered right on the page, so thank you all for sticking through the mess.

And thank you to those of you who have stuck by me pretty much from the very beginning! What started off as just something to do, something to distract myself, has truly been one of the best things I could have ever done.

I could do as some are doing and telling you all my favorite posts of the past year, but this is my 788th post (846th, actually, because believe it or not, I've written a lot of posts that never actually made it for one reason or another) and going through all of them would be useless as I have laughed at so many of them.

But, I do love pictures, so I'll show you some of my favorites that kind of highlight the past year. :)


The first picture to ever appear on the blog.





The first time I met Cen. OMG, how noob do we look??





My first try at skirt making.





My first [and last] try at hair making.





The first time I realized I'm short!






The first time I met Tymmerie and played Primtionary!





The infamous Bush Barrette.




Toothbrush night at Liquid Rage. LOL!





Fashcon Free Day. 'nuff said.




Mardi Gras. The night Cen and I decided to be Asian twins. LOL





We had camping at the Viper Pit for a while. Cen and I used to ... decorate them.




The very short lived Ninja Kitty!




The woman who inspired the term "watermelon ass."




Our first date. :)




The night we moved in together. :)




One of the first pit parties...and the AFK toy!!




What actually ended up being my biggest seller. LOL




The day Cen beat me up because I didn't like some shoes. She's mean!




Without these girls, I'd be totally lost. :)




The night we got partnered. :)




Someone called me greedy, and I proved I do eat kittens for breakfast.




The Thorne-Darwin wedding!




My amazing birthday party. :)





I'll go ahead and stop there because...well, over 20 pictures already. LOL Plus things got really weird after September and there were more emo moments than I'd care to count and blah blah, you know the drill. :)

Everyone have a marvelous New Year's Eve, and PLEASE be safe if you go out!! I expect all of you to join me in 2009 for more blogging, more fun, and more ... everything! <3

A random giftcard idea

So I was standing in line behind this super slow man at the grocery store and while I waited for him to scan each individual potato chip, I looked at the "impulse buy" stuff. I'm a sucker for all the little stuff at the checkstand, which is why I do self-checkout. If I'm busy, I won't pick up a pack of tissues, a lollipop, and another lip balm, right?

Anyway, so the wall is filled with giftcards - Walmart, Chili's, iTunes, all that stuff. My eye fell on this.




Holy shit, what?! Someone can buy this card so someone to have Neocash over at Neopets??

Can Linden Lab look into this?! LOL I mean, how cool would that be? You're at the store, you pick up a card because you have a little extra cash since you decided NOT to buy the double fudge brownies, and then whenever you need some $L in here, you punch in the code and there you go. Or your friends/family can buy you a card for holidays or special occasions because you're impossible to buy for and what you really want is some expensive shoes in SL. Or you have a friend that you'd like to introduce to SL but you know that they won't put money into it right away and having no money sucks, so you buy them a card so they can have a great experience right away. [And it suckers them in because they want to keep looking good or buying crazy fab avatars, so they keep buying money!!]

I don't know. Maybe there's a reason why this wouldn't work, but if there was an SL giftcard, I'd probably be the first to buy it. Or make someone buy it for me.

Blogger Challenge - What's In Your Bag?

So the ladies over at ShoppingCartDisco decided to throw down a little blogger challenge. I can never resist a good challenge! The challenge? What's in your bag?

The answer? A big ol' mess!!

This challenge struck me as funny because just last night I was thinking "Oh man, my purse is crazy messy. I need to clean it out." I probably should have before I saw the challenge. LOL

Rules:

"Dump out your bag (no cleaning!) and post a pic of it. Men with messenger bags, this applies to you, too. Bullet-point the contents with amusing commentary."

If you carry a backpack, you should do it too! :)

I'm not sure how amusing my commentary will be, but here we go. First...here's the mess.





* 12 - yes, count them - 12 lip glosses, lipsticks, and lip balms. One of them is even in a lipstick case. I think I have a problem. It should be 13, btw, but my favorite lipstick that I wear frequently right now is on my desk.

* 2 blushes. Why 2? I dunno. One's a brighter pink, one's a more mauvey pink. I don't even use either of them lately.

* 6 kinds of lotion. What?? I have dry skin! Well, kind of. Anyway, nothing wrong with moisturizing, and if it smells good, that's even better. Don't judge.

* Powder, eyelash curler, 2 mascaras, eye shadow, eyeliner, and makeup remover wand. For someone who barely wears makeup anymore... I don't know what to say.

* Hairbrush and scrunchie, even though scrunchies are apparently totally out. I have long, straight hair. The wind makes it look pretty messy sometimes, and if I go out to eat, I need to be able to pull my hair back so it's not falling in everything. I refuse to have short hair in RL.

* Wallet, random dollar bill, and about $10 in loose change. I am REALLY bad at just throwing change in my purse. But at some point I will not want to break a larger bill and I will use the self checkout and pay for my items in just change. I wait until a store isn't busy to do this, I'm not that rude.

* Cell phone & the headset/ear pieces thingy. We have a lot of school zones around and you can't use a handheld phone while you drive, so I have to keep that thing in there. I really need a Bluetooth thing.

* The cable thing to hook my camera up into the TV. I had to show my mom the christmas tree picture!

* An empty pack of gum, a pen, and spray on antibacterial gel. There's nothing funny about that. Oh, and a lighter, even though I don't smoke. I...I don't know how that got in there!

* And a bunch of receipts and coupons from the past month.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go write "My purse is not a trashcan, a piggy bank, or a cosmetics case" about 400 times on the wall.

The aftermath

Did you all survive Christmas?





I just wanted to thank the designers who were so generous this holiday season. It is because of you that people of all financial situations in SL were able to have fun and enjoy themselves with loads of fun and beautiful new gifts. It was definitely appreciated!!!

And to my wonderful friends - thank you. Thank you for the cards, the gifts, the warm wishes, everything. I am blessed beyond words to have you all in my life.

Now...to sort all this stuff!!

Merry Christmas!!!

Since I know I'll probably be pretty busy later on, I wanted to get my holiday post done now before I head to bed.

I wish all of you a joyous and wonderful holiday, full of love, laughter, and pretty pretty presents. :) Everyone stay safe, try not to kill your relatives and guests, and have lots and lots of fun!!

Yay pictures!

I've been increasingly lazy lately about dumping pictures off of my desktop after I've resized and everything. So today my desktop was a total mess. There are icons I can't even see anymore because all my snapshots have pushed them to the side. So I figured I had a LOAD of photos that I haven't shown in my blog. Well, not so much. LOL Mostly there's pics that I have already resized and fixed, but never dumped the original. But there were some that never made it in here, so here we go! :)

Ok I swear. Anytime I teleport in somewhere, 95% of the time, it's next to the craziest looking avatar on the sim. I don't know WHY.



There's a fun skating rink outside of Artilleri!



O hai dere, Moose.



In the studio at Sacred Photography.



Layne set up a great winter spot on her piece of the island. I snuck over and played with her stuff last night.





Just hanging out. I thought it was a pretty picture.



My awesome hair from 69 and the Wonder Bike from Happy Mood that I got as prizes doing the Creators Stamp Rally. Love love love!!!

Episode 781: The One Where I Show Too Many Photos With Me In Them

Ok, I'm marginally better today, since I can't seem to hold a grudge or stay too angry for long. lol RLBF did something yesterday that just...ugh. If I were a different sort of person, I probably would have thrown a shoe at him. As it was, I just stayed quiet for the rest of the day, which is probably scarier to him than if I'd just thrown the shoe.

So last weekend my friend Sophia asked me if I wanted a picture done in my new skin. Her husband, Skyhawke Sodwind, does marvelous photos! They bring out the best in everyone, and aren't post-processed to death like so many SL photos end up being. Of course I agreed right away! LOL Tuesday night, I headed over. Cen and later Brody joined me in bugging the Harlow-Sodwinds. ;) Ok, so we probably didn't bug them TOO much. :) What came out were 2 gorgeous photos of me, and fabulous pictures of Cen and me and Brody and me.










The picture of Cen and me was put together with separate pictures because we couldn't find a 2 person pose that looked good with both of us. And I'm impressed with the shot of Brody and me because in the studio, my arm was totally going through his shoulder. LOL If you look at my hair in that picture, it's all feathered out and pretty, too. If I wasn't so adamant about always wearing prim lashes, Sky would have given me lashes! But well, it's rare I'm ever without prim lashes, so he didn't get to do that for me.

Big thanks to Sophia, who has truly been my angel the past few months, for asking us if we wanted to come in for photos, and to Skyhawke, who brings out the best in people without totally changing how they look. You both are awesome!!!

Moon Child

I am exceptionally angry in my real life at the moment. It will pass, but until it does, it's better that I don't blog much.

But I did find this quiz that was kind of cool, so have fun!

Your result for What Planet are You From? Test...

You are from the Moon!

27% Moon

Okay, yes, I know the moon is not a planet.

The moon, is, however, the Earth’s only natural satellite and the fifth largest natural satellite in our solar system. For this reason alone it could be that it has life on it, right? Yes, there have been many explorations to prove otherwise, but for many years people on Earth believed that the moon was inhabited. It is also the only celestial body that man has stepped upon.

There are a dozen gods and goddesses associated with the moon. The word Lunar, which relates to the moon’s cycle, is from the Latin word Lunar. One of the reasons that people tend to associate a female deity with the moon might be related to the female menstrual cycle. With that said, it’s is definitely time to move along before I get myself in trouble.

What does this say about you?

You desire contact with the world around you. You have a loving and nurturing nature, but you can suffer from mood changes and go through cycles. You aren’t afraid to stand up for what you believe in or to even stand up for the little guy that tends to get beat up on or forgotten. You probably even tend to put other people before yourself.

As a child of the moon you have a cold and warm side. When someone wrongs you it better be something they never do again. You may forgive them once, but you will never forget and a second time can cut them totally out of your life. You can be the life of the party, but only if it suits you. You are just as happy finding a few people that you can talk to and more than likely there are very few people that you can’t talk to.

You probably usually have a smile on your face and make people feel comfortable with you. You are just one of those people that others open up to and then wonder why.

So, moon child, in a way you are just like the tide. You ebb and flow in life and you like it best when you are in control.

Take What Planet are You From? Test at HelloQuizzy

Dress Up Challenge - Suggestion 6

I've reached the end of the suggestions in the Dress Me Up Challenge, and I think this last one is fitting for the end of the challenge for me. :) [Unless you all have more suggestions, of course. Was there ever a real "end" to this?]

Juliet Inglewood said that I should dress up in a Christmas gown, just in time for the holidays. In all the shopping I've been doing, I've been keeping an eye out for the perfect holiday gown, but wouldn't you know it? The perfect one practically fell in my lap yesterday in the form of a group dollarbie gift from Evie's Closet. Well, I say fell in my lap because I didn't have to hunt it down, but I did go to the store to get it. :) Evie's is one of my most favorite gown stores in SL, and the moment I saw the dress, I knew it was perfect.







With the beautiful deep crimson of the dress, and the great hollyberry spray around the waist [and a hair ornament as well, which you can't see in the photos], it's absolutely just the perfect dress to wear to a holiday party. I'm wearing it with the Tasha hair from ETD and the gorgeous delicate jewelry from ~flirt~ that is available in the Peace On Earth hunt. You can't see it, but I've got my Pornstar chucks on under the dress. LOL! They were the shoes I was wearing when I put the dress on, and hey, if no one can see your shoes, why not be comfortable? ;)

Thank you, Juliet, for making me put on a very luscious gown and letting me be a girl for a while! And thank you everyone who have played dress up with me!!

Dress Up Challenge - Suggestion 5

Ok, I have to admit, this suggestion for the challenge threw me for a loop. :)

My friend Meara, who is quite the fashionista herself, suggested an "uber fashionista" look for me - clothes, new shape, everything. When she suggested it, I thought, "Oh, well that's easy enough." Turns out? Not so much easy!

It would have been completely easy to just run and deck myself out in head to toe Armidi or Cubic Effect and be done with it. But then I realized that doing that wouldn't make me a fashionista. That would make me a label whore. If there's one thing that I really don't like, and can spot easily, it's someone trying too hard to be "classy." Oh you see them all the time. It's like their look just screams "I spent money! I am better than you because of it!" The last thing I wanted to do is look like I was trying too hard.

But at the same time, it does kind of take a bit of money to be the Uber Fashionista. It has to because of the stores that they're expected to shop at, and the quality of the items they're expected to wear. Of course, with all the hunts and group gifts and whatnot, it's getting easier and easier to put together a wonderful look with very high quality items inexpensively.

The shape part of the challenge was the easiest part. I slammed the height slider up, the legs, hips and torso were made longer, and the chest was made smaller. For the face I was inspired by a few of the fashion bloggers and a designer that I admire.

So what did I end up with? A look that I think is fashionable, but hopefully doesn't look like I was trying TOO hard to be that way.







The main part of the outfit is called Malina, and it's from MichaMi, a store that I wasn't too familiar with before but most definitely will be returning to. The legwarmers and scarf are from Ce Cubic Effect. The belt was a Maitreya group gift from...who knows when. I don't remember, but I did darken it because it was brown. The shoes and hair are from ETD, because hello, sale! LOL The skin is from Minnu, and was given as a gift this summer. I just couldn't see buying a Minnu skin for the challenge because they look so horrible on my regular shape, so luckily I had this one in my inventory. Hooray for gifts! I think I look just hungry enough. :-p

I will admit, putting clothing on a super tall shape was amazing. Everything fit so much better. Those adorable leg warmers are going to have to be modded later for my regular shape because when I popped back down to being me, they were crazy looking!

Thank you, Meara, for the suggestion! It was really out of my comfort zone to do this, but I had so much fun and I have now seen some fabulous stores that I wasn't aware of before just by browsing fashion blogs and hopping around the grid. I don't think being a fashionista is really in my future, but at least I know now where to find some great pieces to work with my everyday look!

Dress Me Up Challenge - Suggestion 4 - And a recipe!!

Yay, back to the fun stuff!!

Suggestion #4 for the Dress Up Challenge comes from my SL bestie, Cen, who wanted to see me as a traditional housewife. Believe me, that really IS out of my comfort zone! LOL!!

I immediately knew I wanted to wear the cute Cherry dress from Ivalde for this challenge. I think it worked out quite well!!


Chillin' in the kitchen.




Laundry?!




C'mon over, pie is ready!




I paired up this cute dress with some pearls I found on XStreetSL, the pinup heels from Stiletto Moody [you better believe I'm getting use out of those shoes!!!], and Tyra hair from ETD. Oh, that pie was a freebie on XStreetSL.

The biggest problem to this whole challenge was figuring out where I could go to take pictures. Our home doesn't really have a kitchen [we have a sink, some counters, and a table], and as far as I know, no one else on the island has a kitchen either. We kind of just wait for Tymmerie's parties to bring a take home plate, I think. ;) But then I remembered the simply wonderful Vignette sim. I knew there was a house there with a cute little kitchen, so I gathered up my skirts and ran over! The best part about taking pictures at Vignette is that you can drop posestands. Oh it just makes it so much more easier!

Thank you, Cen, for making me look pretty and feminine for once!! :) And because Cen also threw down another challenge where we share recipes, I leave you with this awesome apple pie recipe!


Paula Deen's Crunch Top Apple Pie

Ingredients
Dough and Filling:

* Dough for a double crust 9-inch pie (homemade, frozen, or refrigerated)
* 3/4 cup sugar
* 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
* 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
* Splash of vanilla [this is my addition, because I like it.]
* Dash salt
* 3 1/2 cups peeled, chopped cooking apples
* 1 (16-ounce) jar applesauce
* 1 tablespoon lemon juice
* 2 tablespoons butter, chopped into small pieces

Crunch Topping:

* 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
* 1 tablespoon sugar
* Dash salt
* 1 tablespoon butter, at room temperature

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

Line a 9-inch pie pan with half of dough. Combine sugar, flour, cinnamon, and salt in a bowl. Stir in apples, applesauce, and lemon juice. Spoon apple mixture into pie pan and dot with butter. Cut remaining crust into strips; arrange in a lattice design over top of pie. For crunch topping, combine flour, sugar, and salt in a bowl. Using a fork, cut in butter until mixture is crumbly. Sprinkle over top of crust. Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 degrees F and continue to bake for about 45 minutes, or until crust and topping are golden brown.

Serve with ice cream because you HAVE to! :)

Oversized Shopping

I have a bone to pick today. [No no no, not Bone. Don't hit me, Sehra!!] As I've been shopping quite a bit lately for the dress up challenge, I've finally realized something that I have kind of thought for a few weeks now.

Shopping is getting to be too BIG. No, not just big in "Oh my god, everyone's shopping constantly!" But big in the size sense!

I understand almost everything in SL is oversized. Prim skirts are almost always hula hoops. Couches are so huge, a person looks like a 5 year old trying to sit. Couples poses are never "right" because you'd have to be a whale or a giant to get it to fit correctly. I get it. And you don't want your store to be TOO tight and small, because of camming. But good grief!!

First of all, let's talk landing points. You paid for a whole sim, good for you! Guess what? Most of us aren't there to look at your sim when all we want is a skirt. Forcing us to land on one side of the sim when your store is on the other side of the sim is just rude! I cannot tell you all how many times I've landed somewhere and asked, "Where is the store???" A lot of the time, I'll just leave. Hey, you don't want to show me where your stuff is right away, that's cool. There's someone else who wants my money. Put us at the front door. That way, we can go in and shop, and then explore your sim later if we have time. Artilleri is a store that I believe does this correctly. You land at the door, and then you can turn around and go check things out when you're done. Not only that, but there are scooters to ride around the sim! That's even more fun!

Second, what's up with having several buildings? If you only have 7 hair styles and 10 outfits, there's no need to have us walking halfway across a sim to look at things. Condense! ETD has a million hairs and a lot of clothes and accessories, and they're all nicely packed into one not-overly-large building. If you absolutely feel it necessary to have 10 buildings spread out all over, please provide a TP board so we can get where we want to be without getting frustrated. I promise you I personally will spend more money if I find what I need quickly.

And last - just the size of the buildings are getting enormous. If I have to turn up my draw distance to 400 just to see to the other side, it's too big. If I have to fly to get from one side to the other, it is too big. [I totally hate flying in stores, anyway. Personal preference.] The worst offenders of this are the people who make huge stores for 5 items. Honey, set up a tent. If you're going to have a gigantic store, you need to fill it up. And maybe you have aspirations to later fill it up. I don't know. All I know is that when I walk in to a huge store and see 4 things, I really start to wonder.

Maybe I'm the only one who has these problems. Maybe everyone else is happy with running all over a store to find one item. But much like my real life, I will spend more if you show me more without me having to jump through hoops. Maybe others are the same. Just a little something to think about.

Dress Me Up Challenge - Suggestion 3

I really do have a post that isn't a challenge post coming up. When I started writing it, it just sounded so bitchy, I have to go back and doctor it up. :)

But how I could possibly be bitchy when playing dress up, I have NO idea! Suggestion #3 comes from Krissy, who wanted to see me in the Vibe outfit from Bijou. Krissy is actually the person who introduced me to the wonder that is Bijou back in August. I really should be mad at her for that. ;) It's a store with designs that I love, but that aren't quite in my comfort zone. It's very...Carrie Bradshaw. But oh, the clothes!! I decided on the Vibe outfit with the purple scarf vest, because I loved the richness of the purple.







The outfit is made up of a sweater, scarf vest, and low-rise super tight jeans. I paired it up with some ballet flats & hair from ETD. I would totally go to a club wearing this, in RL too! I'm not a huge fan of gold, but I love the sequined gold splashes across the sweater.

I really like outfits where I can get a different look out of them, or use the pieces with other outfits. The Vibe outfit is awesome in that it comes with a few layers, including the sweater minus the purple vest.





I paired the sweater & jeans with white Liah boots from Jaywalk, and Jinglebell hair from Gurl6, which I THINK is still a dollarbie. I know it was at the end of last year, and I sure wore the smack out of this hair at the beginning of this year. I'm not a big fan of Gurl6, but I really do like this hair.

But one word of warning if you go get this outfit. The jeans are very low-rise. So not only do you need a wax, but you will be showing a bit of your crack.






Funny story, but RLBF was over here bothering me as I was editing that picture, and he said that if he was Santa, he'd totally stop there for my avatar. Then he asked what kind of Christmas porn I was making. *rolls her eyes*

Big thanks to Krissy for pushing me over to Bijou again, and for suggesting this really cool outfit!! I saw others I wanted while I was there...I may have to add "Bijou gift cards" on my list for SLanta!! Whew, that list is growing and growing... LOL