Hi all! It's been a while since my last post, and I'm so sorry! My laptop got really crappy, it used to be a good gaming laptop, but ever since the dedicated graphics card went out on it, it turned real bad... real quick. Buttons on my keyboard stopped working, it had some weird noises happening, the screen wouldn't stay turned on unless plugged in... ugh. It was laggy, almost impossible to do much of anything. I was done.

So, I recently bought parts and built my own gaming computer. While it isn't top of the line or anything, I took my time in choosing parts that I could possibly upgrade later. So, it works out I think. It was my first time in building my own, I've really only ever added simple parts, like RAM and graphics cards. Never an entire computer. I was nervous, but it was surprisingly easy. I don't think I'd hesitate again to build one.

Because of this, I am finally able to get back in SL, and actually enjoy taking photos again. I've been gacha-collecting backdrops, playing and experimenting with SL photography. It's been fun. It's amazing how much a laggy computer can suck the life out of SecondLife. Bonus is that I can play other games lag-free now too! :)

As I get more comfortable with our trial daughter, Yuna, I've been trying to use her Yuus/Nuuu HUD a little more. I love being able to pick her up and carry her around, it also makes for better photos, too.

Well, last night, we planned to all watch a movie, and I wanted to hold her a during the movie. We tried by using the HUD, but it was a huge fail. I tried holding her before and after sitting, but well.... it didn't work well. Eventually, we just used the HUD to sit, and although we were hovering probably 2-3 meters in the air off of the ottoman, I rezzed some books and we sat on them just so that we could watch a movie together. Even then, it looked absolutely ridiculous. LOL! However, the experience made me want to make my own pose for watching movies, and just general parent/child cuddles.

As I was thinking about doing a pose last night, I also decided to try my hand at an actual animation. Sure, I didn't want or need it to be fancy, just a tiny bit of leg movement so that it's not completely static.

It turned out really well, I really like it! It's subtle, not static, and does exactly what I envisioned in my mind. I've got my alt, Ennaline, with me in the gif, but I'm hoping it will be just as perfect with Yuna, as well! I've raved about Anypose several times on my blog, but this animation, is yet another reason why I LOVE (!) it!

Remember me saying, "Oh, I'll never blog fashion again"? Me either. LOL! No, but seriously... the more I shop and play in SL, the more I miss it. I miss playing around with clothing, seeing how many fun attachments I can wear and all of them looking okay. I also miss wearing weird, random things on my head, and calling it fashion. I really think that fashion blogging is in the blood, and there's certain things I miss about it. I decided to take it up again. I'm going to blog the way I want to blog, and that's it. Because, I do it for myself, and no one else. That's how it should be, right? Interested? Check it out at Sai the Fabulous!

That being said, I've been working on several pose sets at a time. Currently, I have about three family poses, and three pose sets that's ready. I just need to dress up, make vendor photos for them, and bag them up to be released. It's a lot of work, and I hate this part of having a store. So, I procrastinate. And, how do I procrastinate? By making more poses, of course! It's a never ending cycle.

I saw a photo of a horse on Lolita's blog the other day, and instantly wanted them. She gave me a marketplace link, where to buy the horses, and I had to get them. Cheap, full permission horses (of course, I also found that a pack of deer and a golden retriever also hopped into my cart from them as well, I suddenly needed ALL THE THINGS). A light bulb went off in my head. Poses!

So, I've also finished a couple poses to use with this horse. Once all the minor tweaks are taken care of, and I mirror all the poses, I'll put the poses I made for sale, with the horse included! I think it will be awesome. AnyPose has really taken a lot of the guesswork out of working with complicated props like this, and made props fun. Of course, the poses that come out of AnyPose still need to have minor issues tweaked in an external program, but it still makes it so much easier. It really keeps the fun in making poses (for me, anyway).

It's been a little while, hasn't it? I haven't been online much at all the past two weeks, as Jeffry and I had some RL to take care of. Well, it's all good, and we are back again! I have been working quite a bit on my alt's little store, now that I've decided to start making poses again. I have made a bunch of them, and am in the process of testing them out now! When I had [ImpEle], I did all my poses in Qavimator. It's a very ugly program (and sadly, it has not changed at all these past several years), but it gets the job done. I have made it my personal mission to really learn more "professional" programs. So I've been playing quite a bit in DAZ Studio, and Poser Pro.

As if I needed something else to do, I've been playing with nail appliers! I feel like I want to try everything at least once. I've tried mesh clothing, clothing appliers, furniture and mesh prefabs by now, and hated all of it. I think everything I make lately is terrible. I really struggle with finding my "niche", I guess. I found myself the other day, halfway through making a nail applier. I don't know what spurred the thought on that I wanted to do it, I just did it. And oddly, I was quite pleased with the result! Nails are my "thing" in RL, as I am very proud of my RL nails, it took me many years to get my nails healthy after biting them for as long as I can remember. I think I'll do these as well as poses. Not to mention - they make great group gifts!


A extremely fun little outing Jeffry and I took last night - Alicia's birthday party! It has been SO LONG since we actually spent time with SL friends. There was once a whole band of us Ch'know friends who would just get together randomly and hang out... just because. I really enjoyed those days, and I wish to make them happen again! A whole bunch of awesome people gathered together for her birthday party in SL, We all danced and played laser tag. It was a really fun couple of hours! However, I now really, really want my own laser tag area... and I can't find one for myself!

So, with my alt's store, I have been dabbling a bit in mesh. It's been a process of learning several different programs, and I've come to to conclusion: I suck at it. I have decided I spend too may hours a week cursing and fighting with Blender, and the stupid weighting of mesh. Not to mention, everyone is making for different mesh bodies, and I am completely left in the dust, because I am not capable enough in Blender to know how to do these things. So, unfortunately, I think I'm giving up mesh.

I had gotten a Wacom tablet as an early birthday gift from my husband. I decided to use it and try my hand at creating appliers. Well, that went downhill quick as well. I am coming to the conclusion that... well, I suck at anything SL related. Then, suddenly... I found myself about to upload a pose.

I had a HUGE moment of "WTH am I doing right now?" I had told myself - no poses when I came back. However, there were a few things that got me somewhat excited for poses again. The mesh bodies now, make poses beautiful, and not as ugly with the standard SL avatar. I battled a lot with the lumpiness of the SL avatar for years when I made poses for [ImpEle].

There's also a variety of poses that I want to make. As my readers (and friends on plurk) know, Jeffry and I have been looking for a child avatar to adopt - I now want to make poses for our future family. I hate buying couple's/family poses, because of the differences in everyone's shapes, I can never edit them to look like they are supposed to. So, I like to make my own - that way, I have full control over how the pose fits.


I logged in my alt to make poses with me, who, ironically, started out her existence as a child avatar. I had all the Toddledoo stuff from ages ago, it was just a matter of dressing her in it again.So, yes - preview of a pose that will soon make it's way into .ennaline.!


Another reason why I'm so excited to make poses: AnyPose! While AnyPose isn't that great for single poses, I much prefer to do them manually in another program - this is FANTASTIC for couple's poses! And also family poses! I really wish I had known about this waaay back when I had [ImpEle] open. It would have cut down soooo much irritation and stress while working with two avatars. No longer will I have to have Jeffry and I log on the beta grid and me telling him to sit on the poseball, nope, stand back up, tweak an arm, and on and on and on. I can edit up to 9 avatars IN WORLD. The concept is incredible.

I'm also finding it really nice to use for more difficult-to-pose-for things. Like, making perfect poses for gowns, poses for toddledoo's, and mesh clothing. Things that aren't as standard as the normal SL shape is. Because, with AnyPose, really - what you see is what you get. I like making a pose for a toddledoo with this HUD, then taking it into my posing program and just perfecting a few things that you can't do with AnyPose (stuff like making the feet parallel to the ground and minor things like that)