It's spring! Well, at least it is in SL. I'm excited to put away my SL sweaters, jackets, jeans and bring out my tank tops, shorts and flip flops! The sim I live on has been changed to grass, the snow has melted, and I've put in a pool!

I've been kind of playing with the idea of taking a trip to Heritage lately. While Misty will forever be my adorable child, she's seemed to have other RL priorities lately, and not logging in to SL much anymore. Which is perfectly fine, most of us go through this, and I hope she'll eventually come back to me. But, I'm finding some days difficult, especially around the holiday events (more recently, Easter) without a child around. No one can or will ever "replace" my Misty-child, she's a much better human being than I'll ever be, but I do miss the family RP. 

In other news, I've been really loving the photos that I can take now. A new computer really is amazing for the motivation and capabilities for SL photography. I really love taking the time in perfecting photos, and I really hope that other people enjoy them as much as I do.

I hope that I can continue to improve and get better with my photos, I really want to try actually hand painting elements like shadows, and maybe adding just little tidbits to make the photo really come alive. That takes quite a bit of practice though, and every time I try it, I'm happy with nothing. I won't give up though, I'm going to continue to try! Maybe a couple years from now, I'll look back at the photos I'm doing now, and be able to see how far I've come. Who knows.

So, I have been at Camp Neverwood on my mini since Sunday, and let me just say - I feel like this is how a camp is supposed to be! FSE Start of Summer camp really pales in comparison to Camp Neverwood for me. As I said in previous posts, I really struggled to have a good time at the FSE one. I heard a lot of people had fun there, but meh. It just wasn't for me. Pretty much as soon as I got on the plane to Camp Neverwood, I knew I was going to love it. The arrival experience was completely amazing, I loved every second of it.

This might be a longer post, with more photos than usual. My apologies, but I have a lot to show!

I blogged a little bit about day one of camp in my last post, but after I wrote that, I also went to storytime that night. Let me talk a little bit about how important this photo is. I'm super-shy with people I don't know, and I get really quiet, basically until I feel more comfortable to talk, and that everything I say isn't going to come out wrong. It's not logical, I know, but it's who I am. This photo was day one. I actually felt comfortable, and confident enough to get up in front of everyone, and sit on the counselor's lap. This... just doesn't happen for me, usually. It was really incredible, being able to do that.


Day two was just as amazing as day one. I went to hunt a snipe, we armed outselves with garden tools, and had storytime in the caves when the snipe found us! We battled it, then took it to the doctor to get better. It was so munch fun, I was laughing the whole time. Later, we built lanterns to set out on the water after Tribute night, which I think is on Friday.


There's always so many events that I want to attend on the schedule, and I feel like I don't have enough time to do all of them! There's an event almost every hour, and as much as I'd like to, I can't go to all of them! I go to as many as I can, and try my best. And, believe it or not, I'm still gaining confidence with everyone, and with every minute I spend there, the more comfortable I feel around them.


On day three, we made war face paint! I loved that event, was definitely one of my favorites! In every class, every storytime, every meal, I never feel ignored like I did at FSE. People say hello to me when I say Hi to them, and when I say something, they make me feel like it's important and I'm never a bother to them. I'm never forgotten about or overlooked at this camp. It's fantastic.

And, that was only the first three days! I can't wait to see what else happens for the rest of the camp!

The last day of the Start of Summer Camp was yesterday, and I will be honest... It did not get any better for me, like I was hoping it was. Sadly, I really looked for reasons to not be there, to do other things. The experience was not personal, I was ignored/overlooked by the counselors, and it was just in general, not fun. But, I did get a few photos.

One of the nights was movie night, and I took this photo. The plan was to watch Finding Nemo that night, but I couldn't get the movie to work, got frustrated, sat alone, and in the end, I just logged off and went to bed. I heard it was fun though.


The best time I had though, was during parent's night. I had asked my grandpa, Envi, to come for me, since mom had RL to do that night. So, he came to camp to visit, and I forced him to find a semi-photogenic location at camp and snap a photo with me. It was great to actually have a good time while at camp.

That being said, once this camp ended on Saturday, a new camp started up today! It took a lot of stress at first, but eventually I got into this camp! I was SO happy, when I heard I got taken off the waiting list and added to the camper list, it completely made my week. as soon as the FSE SOS camp ended, I went home and packed for Camp Neverwood. My mom was not avalable to take the packing photo with me this time because of RL, but that's okay, it still turned out adorable by myself!


Already, I am having much more fun that I was at the last camp. I feel like the 'getting to camp' experience was so much fun! We started off at the airport, like normal, then we were shot out of the sky by cannonballs from Captain Hook himself! We swam to the nearest docks, battled Captain Hook's crew to take control of the Jolly Roger, and then Peter Pan piloted the ship and flew us to camp, it was really fantastic!


The sim that camp is on... it's absolutely gorgeous! I was was struggling trying to decide on where to take today's photo, there was so many places that would have been amazing! And to be honest, I didn't even leave the bunk/campfire area. LOL! There is SO many events, And TONS that I actually can't wait to go to! Today was day number 1 at Camp Neverwood, and already I have had more fun than I did at the Start of Summer Camp. The counselors are also wonderful, even including the quiet, shy me, and including me even in RP. It made me smile even in RL, and it meant a lot to me, just the one thing that I was included in.

I am genuinely, completely excited for this week's camp activities! They all look fantastic!

During the house-to-house trick or treating, we visited a few houses that were part of actual family communities. I did not even realize that these sort of things existed! I absolutely loved the community feel of them! I say often that my family isn't big on the "role-play" aspect, like, we don't really do mealtimes, or tuck-ins... but we do things like PaleoQuest, pumpkin carving, and movie nights. But for some reason, the family sims really appealed to me. I think for a couple of hidden reasons.

First, we have decided to move halfway across the country in RL, early next year. Because of this, we need to cut un-needed expenses out of our life. The sim is the first thing that is not absolutely necessary. Second, our sim is just WAY too big. We are a small family of three, and we don't utilize it all. We had one party for Yuna's adoption, we sometimes watch a movie at our outdoor cinema, and we stand in the house to AFK. That's about it. All of these things, we can do on a smaller piece of land. Third, our house was way too big. I loved the house when I bought it, it's gorgeous, and the type of house I'd love to live in RL. However, for us, it was just too much space. But really, the cost of the sim was the main reason for the decision. 

As much as I say I'm not a "RP" type of person, I think I'm craving just a little bit more of it! I LOVE that you have to have a driver's license to drive on the family sims, you have to stop at stop lights and all that. These communities seem to have a police force, firefighters, playgrounds, and city hall. It's so much fun! I spent a good 2-3 days hopping from one sim to another, reading covenants, trying to find the perfect house.

Eventually, I found it. Well, it was mainly the plot I fell in love with! The back of the house is right on the lake, the front of the house is facing the road, so I can see people driving by and all. It has it's own fence, came with some landscaping already put down. The price is much more do-able than what we were paying for the sim (we can almost pay a whole month here with what we were paying a week for the sim), and the prim limit is SO generous. I was done putting down all the things that I wanted from the old house, and I was not even halfway though our given prim allowance. I was completely amazed!

However, I did opt to purchase my own home, and because it was an "approved house," I got to use it. It's smaller two bedroom, one bath home from Roost. I love Roost Homes, they are very beautiful, and completely customizable. I find you can tint... everything! Doors, ceilings, walls, exteriors... I love it! The Rules notecard I was given from the community manager says that if you use your own home, you are given a prim allowance that won't count against your prims, but when I check on the prim counter, my home counts against me. I'll see what happens later, when/if we ever need more prims.

Of course, it's still a work in progress, I haven't committed to an exterior paint color, and I still have some landscaping and all to do... but, I just got it yesterday! I'm still playing with things outside, but I am very happy that I was able to secure this plot, and this house! It's so perfect for us!

Happy November! I hope everyone is having a great one so far! Last night, my family and I went trick or treating! We had a ton of fun looking at everyone's decorations, and grabbing the treats that everyone set out! At first I was kind of nervous about how I had decorated. This is our first year being part of the family community, I wasn't sure what kind of "treat" we were supposed to put out, I didn't know if we weren't decorated enough, or decorated too much. I had no idea what to expect!

However, it all turned out well, and when we went to the other houses, I felt our decorations were right on track. For us, who haven't been in SL for the past few years, had no mesh things, and our first year as a family - I think it looked like we've been doing it for years. I was worrying and stressing for weeks for nothing. LOL!

We went, and I was having so many issues last night. I was having issues with my Catwa head not blinking and animating properly, things were not rezzing for me, and I was lagging so bad! I've been having internet issues, which appears to be our router. So, until we can get a new one, I really tried to handle it like a trooper! I was also extremely tired, only getting about three hours of sleep the previous night. I was exhausted!

We went as "Cops & Robber" type of theme. I was really struggling with finding a costume, because Halloween isn't one of my favorite holidays, so I didn't want to spend a fortune on something I was only going to wear for a couple hours. Also, I was having trouble finding a "themed" costume which was family appropriate. So... well, I tried.


We even got to trick or treat at some of the family community sims. I really, really love the family communities! I tried to bring it up to Jeffry, seeing if maybe we can move to one or look into it, but he prefers our sim. He says the only way he'd move to a family community, is if he owned it. Hmmm, my wheels are turning!


Our last house of the night - our home.We had SO much fun, and I'm already looking forward to Christmas! As our first year as a family, I can't wait to see what kind of family-things we can do this year! House to house looking at lights, maybe? One can hope, right?!

Last night, we took Yuna to the pumpkin patch and then we decorated our pumpkins! This was probably one of my first "real RP" experiences with our family, and we all had so much fun. When we were first adopting, one of our things was that we weren't really into RP that much. It still holds true today, we are not that big on mealtimes, tuck ins, but the RP that we do, it's so much fun, and we are always laughing like crazy! Our trip to the pumpkin patch was really our first attempt to plan an actual family event, and I was sure it was going to be a huge, epic fail somehow.

But it really wasn't! I planned this for many weeks, kept on the lookout for a fabulous pumpkin patch, made a holding pose, bought all the gacha pumpkin carving stuff we needed, and set it all out. I didn't know how the RP bits of it worked, and my wonderful friends on Plurk even really helped me better understand a lot of it!

In the end, for us and our family, it kind of came naturally! It was so much fun, and for a minimal-RP family like us, we really enjoyed it so much! The planning, the locations, the decorating, and the pumpkins, it really made for an awesome time.

I had been looking for weeks for a pumpkin patch, and really enjoyed this one that I had found. It was pretty, had pumpkins that you could pick out, and even more. You can do much more than explore the pumpkin patch, but that's all we did there.


Then we went home to carve and decorate our pumpkins. It was so worth all the anxiety I had to make it perfect! I think I made it more complicated than what it probably should have been, but I really didn't know what to expect, or anything. Next year, I'll definitely be more prepared, know what to expect, and know what will work for our family.


I saw Alicia's wonderful family on plurk actually "decorating" their pumpkin patch pumpkins. I loooooved that idea, it looked like so much fun. It also gave an actual purpose to the pumpkins we picked out! So, we copied them, and did the same! I think this really completed the event for us, and what really made it so it wasn't SO much RP. This made it perfect. It became more of a "OMG I need to add hair and shoes!" and "What is happening to daddy's eyes?!" thing. We were laughing so much last night, it was great. It probably would have been a very stiff, I-don't-know-how-to-RP thing without the silliness.