* Simply Betty - Changes - Part Four

Betty waited for her parents to leave the kitchen before slinking out of her bedroom with her breakfast dishes. It was pointless sulking - there was no one to sulk in front of. She couldn't quite believe that her parents had forgotten her birthday...

* "El" Dor Ado

I'm currently waiting for a brand spanking new desktop to arrive, so don't really feel I can get on and actually *play* the game at the moment, in case it's a waste of time and I'm unable to transfer all of my saved files over to Windows 7... these things never go according to plan, do they? So, instead of playing, I've been revamping various homes throughout my game and this is my latest offering...

* Asilomar

This one is an EA Makeover of the rather hideous and tasteless three bedroom home of *The Single Moms*. It took me aaaaages to do because I furnished it... which bored me shitless, so don't expect another furnished one any time soon - I have a life.

* Simply Betty Abroad! Part Three

  

Betty felt like she had won a million simoleons on the lottery when her parents told her that they'd happily fund her trips abroad. They didn't explain their decision and Betty didn't ask - in case they changed their minds. Instead, she wasted no time at all and booked a flight to China, to a place called Shang Simla....

* Living Sims Issue 19 is out!

 

Living Sims has issued it's 19th edition and I have a whole two page spread from my Small Quarters 3.0 entry! I AM FAMOUS! You'll find the article here - though it contains nothing that isn't already on this blog. I just had to share, it's a personality defect. Like it or lump it.

To go straight to the first page of the magazine, just click on the image above... and enjoy :D

* Smash & Grab

I've caved.... I can't do the *no CC* thing any... more. I am currently in the midst of copying and pasting urls from TSR so that I can do a smash and grab tomorrow on a 24 hour downloading spree (I have Kudos points and I'm not afraid to use them). I'm going to slither through Sims Lulamai.... mash my way through MangoSims and annihilate ATS3... to name but a few.

Should you come across a gibbering wreck muttering "Mine all mine" or even, predictably - "My precioussssssssssssssssss"... just save us both any embarassment and look away.

I will be wearing my big pants (knickers to you) in case I run out of pockets.

* Simply Betty - Part Deux

After a couple of days settling into life in Champs Les Sims, Betty was already bored. It was all very well sampling the local food, drinking the locally grown nectar and getting to know the locals... but it was all just a bit... local.

* The Riverview Arms

Yes. I know. It doesn't look particlarly interesting - but if you bother to read on, you'll see that it's a vast improvement on it's previous incarnation as The Watering Hole Juice Bar in Riverview. This one has been revamped for me, but I'm sharing it with you :D

* The Nectary

I've been working on revamping the Champs Les Sims Nectary since I first decided to send Betty Simovitch *adventuring*. Not just because of aesthetics (although that's always going to be part of the reason) - but mainly because the Nectary was so poorly designed by EA for gameplay in it's initial stages.

* Simply Betty!

I'd like you to meet Betty Simovitch. I imagine you already know her - either as Betty Newbie, wife of Bob and mother of Brandi, or simply as a young Betty Simovich embarking on a new relationship with Bob, her beau... well... this isn't that Betty. This is Parallel Betty. 

This Betty has been to see a clairvoyant by the name of Wilf Truscott - he shuffled her cards, told her she needed to buy new underwear and stop swearing... and that she was going to marry her best friend Bob Newbie, get old, boring and grey with him, and have a daughter who she would name after an alcoholic beverage - but she'd manage to spell it wrong because she wasn't going to do very well at school and no... she was NOT going to become a Rock Star.

* Small Quarters 3.0

It has taken almost as long to organise the photos and cc list for this, as it did to bloody build it. It's enough to put me off for life... or until next time at the very least. This is Crystal Springs Vista, a small but tall cabin in Sunset Valley, built overlooking the Crystal Springs Lake. I built it for the Small Quarters 3.0 Challenge at LivingSims. Stupidly, I decided to offer it up for download at Sims 3 Musketeers, which has involved scouring the web to put together a detailed list of Store and Custom Content... and where to get it from. Also, for whatever reason, blogger decided that "No" today it was not going to upload my photographs - took me ages to work out I could do it via Picassa... I'm slow, not stoopid. Honest.

* Holly's Bedroom

Real Life has kept me fairly of busy late. I've been redecorating and refurnishing my own home, instead of my sims - far for more costly and there's no click of a button to paint the walls with - just an old fashioned roller and tray! We've got a few finishing touches to add, but I've finally found a bit of time (and inclination) to load up my game and play. 

I'm still trying very hard not to use too much custom content (if any), because it does slow my game down when I play it - plus, with a bit of imagination there's really no need to fill the spaces up with junk, just for the sake of a few pretty pictures. Although I am using what I refer to in my head as key pieces - those cc items that really can't be found in the game - mostly things like cushions and blankets, and the odd flower display... and sometimes an item of furniture, but not often.

* The Grand Dame

This old lady is the Grand Dame of Dogwood Lane. It's a revamped version of one of the houses in Riverview (can't remember the number of the house!).  It's perfect for a large sim family that don't mind sharing bedroom space. I absolutely LOVE this house, but as yet, have never played it. It's where the Lobos family live (or in my game they do). It's highly playable without being overly fussy.

The download is at the bottom of the page, along with a shedload more of pictures. The picture directly below, made it into one of the LivingSims magazines. I can't remember which one now though, because although I'm going to squeeze this and some other downloads into the year 2010 - I'm actually typing this in July 2012... beat them apples.

No, I have NOT time travelled, I've simply altered the date of the post, to around the time that I actually built it. I am so SMRT.

* Glade Cottage

Glade Cottage is the remodeled home of Vadim and Fatima Simovitch. Parents of Betty. This version is only partially furnished so there's plenty of scope for any sim that moves in to make their mark on the place. Set in beautifully landscaped gardens, it'd make the perfect home for any one child sim family.

* Altos Alternative

I mentioned yesterday, that I was building an abode for the Altos that was slightly less austentatious than their present home... I lied. It is autentatious, it also has delusions of grandeur - thus the rather grand name, Abington Court. It is, however, a lot less *tacky*. Though I've yet to furnish it for them (and I will, even if simply to find out if it is possible to furnish something so damn big without giving in to impatience and poor taste (and CC)), I'm hoping to make the interior elegant, but with obvious signs of new money... so no dusty old furnishings this time - I'm saving that for the Landgraabs!

* Sunnydale

I've just built this house for the Sekemotos of Sunset Valley to move into - but even unfurnished it's now out of their price range, so *oh me oh my* I'll just have to build them another one. Have to confess that not using CC on it, was fairly easy. I didn't feel the need to hunt down specific doors and windows.... but I haven't furnished it yet - that's where my will power will most likely desert me. If I furnish it at all - my attention has already been drawn away and I'm in the midst of building a home for the Altos, one that's slightly less austentatious than their current abode. Whether they like it or not - my Sunset Valley Altos are going to be given a lesson in class!

* Losing The Battle

I've just built another little cottage, similar to Lavender Cottage, but fully furnished throughout. I don't know how the interior ended up quite like it did - possibly influenced by all the matchy matchness that is Galaad - what I do know, is that I am losing the battle with my CC addiction... I know... it was only yesterday (or the day before) that I mentioned maybe getting rid of all of my CC - but I made the fatal mistake of taking a peek at older sims 3 photos taken with a fair whack of CC - and they were so much more lively than what I've been doing!

I'm completely stumped. On the one hand I want to be able to actually play my game without the stuttering that CC creates (it's not major, but it's there), and on the other hand - I want my game to look exactly how I want my game to look! What to do? I've already got all third party CC compressed from many and smaller .package files into less and larger .packages - I even wrote an entire bloody tutorial, months ago, to help my friends do the same.

* 477 Sunnyside Boulevard

I've just built this for the Summer Lovin Theme at Sims 3 Musketeers. I've named it, very imaginatively - 477 Sunnyside Boulevard.

* Another Fresh Start

I've been enjoying revamping Riverview without custom content - much more than I'd imagined I would. It makes everything that much faster (because I don't have as much to choose from), and I'm trying a little harder to be more inventive with both my design layouts and my use of patterns.... in fact, I'm on the verge of ridding myself completely of all my Custom Content, because I've also decided to do the same thing with Sunset Valley (pictured above)... revamp it without using CC.

* Galaad

A couple of days ago, I asked friends for suggestions on decent neighbourhoods that I could download and install, because I was/am bored with Sunset Valley, Riverview and Twinbrooks. Fashionista125 came up with a couple of decent ideas, one of which was Neverglade by Pyro. I found out as much about it as possible before installing it, then spent a couple of days investigating it with the camera. I never played it, though I did build one little starter home for it - Lavender Cottage (see image above). 

I uninstalled Neverglade this morning. It was massive, too large for me ever to enjoy playing it, and the dark and brooding atmophere was making me suicidal. Though all that being said, it was exceptionally well made and appeared to have all the elements that EA made neighbourhoods have - it just wasn't to my taste. I wanted something a little smaller.

* Azalea Cottage

Azalea Cottage has well established vegetable gardens and a small orchard - ideal for the sim with a green thumb. Set in beautifully landscaped gardens, there's also a pool.... that sounded really good, didn't it. I have to confess that I'm pasting some of these blurbs from S3M, and maaaaaaaaaaaaan they are dull. I was trying to be all professionaly and estate agenty *rolls eyes*.

You'll find the download and more pics, at the bottom of the page :)

* A Personal Challenge

I'm addicted to third party custom content. I spend more time hunting it down and compressing it into single large .packages - than I do playing the game. The bummer with CC, is that it causes choppiness, lag and prolonged loading times. Gameplay can be a real chore when a neighbourhood is bogged down with it... and though I love to build and to decorate, I genuinely love to play too.

So, to enable a smoother game, I've decided that the Riverview neighbourhood that I'm making over, is going to be CC-less. To a point. I'll use the EA Store stuff that I've purchased (mainly because it'd be pretty bloody stupid not to after I've paid for it!), and Huge Lunatics Bed Blankets, Mango's Bed Cushions (Set Garor), and Haru's Default Texture Replacements... and if I really can't cope with the lack of decorative wallage (paintings to you)... maybe some of SimsArtGallery's Double Hung Paintings.

* Plum Tree Park

There's nothing I enjoy more than taking an EA *lot* apart, and making it over to suit my own games needs. Not just residential lots, either - the community lots all could do with a face lift, and bit by bit they tend to get it. It's a bit of a cheat really... doing makeovers - because the basics are already there to inspire you. It's a lot harder to come up with something from scratch than it is to improve on something that's already there. Having said that, it's one of the aspects of the game that I enjoy most!

* Whitsands Bay

I was recently challenged by Robodl95 at Living Sims to create a beach - no details other than that just "I challenge you to create a beach"... I originally attempted to use the large beach at the front of Sunset Valley, I forget it's name - but after coming close to head butting my keyboard and smashing my monitor and developing a nervous twitch in my left eye that could only be cured by eating copious amounts of chocolate - I switched to Recurve Strand, one of the smaller beaches in SV. Even then, I demolished it at least three times - until I built the beach huts, after that it all came along fairly smoothly. 

* Student Digs

Meet Sonia Mayberry. She's my current *floating sim*, which basically means that she is motherloded up to the eyeballs so that I can move her into various houses/homes and take photographs using the TAB button. TAB does not work for me in build/buy mode, not even once (which other players find, does occur). Sonia is a young adult, and is currently posing as a student for a challenge that I've just completed for Living Sims. Gotmilk challenged me to create a studio apartment for a broke student, using only 12,000 simoleons - the apartment had to include a desk and computer... I managed to do it all for around 11, 574 simoleons. I'm thinking Gotmilk was incredibly nice to give me such a large budget to work with - I hope she wasn't expecting grungy... I can't do grungy. Grungy makes me want to get out a scrubbing brush and a bucket full of bleach... so grungy doesn't occur in my game. Ever.

* Mad Mad Meadow

I do occasionally play this game, as well as build stuff for it. A while back I came across a sim in the Riverview Neighbourhood who lives in an amazingly insane house, surrounded by flowers and potted plants of every description. It made my eyes cross. After spending a bit of time with her, I discovered that she herself - is insane. Not just a little bit, either... we're talking *voices* insane. Her name is Meadow Carpenter-Rhodes, and I just had to give her and her home a makeover - but one in keeping with her needs. Her lifetime want is to produce 7 Varieties of Perfect Plants. It's been hard work, but she's nearly there - this is where she lives.

* A Home By The Sea

I'm currently in love with building and decorating challenges, and if you scour the right forums - you can find plenty to choose from. This project was a challenge at Living Sims, to create a Beach Cottage for a Sim with particular traits, likes and dislikes. Took me bloody ages to come up with something that didn't look like I'd recovered everything in deck chair fabric. I chose more nautical colours, and quite like the end result.... though I really over used the wicker texture - won't be using that again in a hurry!

* Vale View House

This large modern home is perfect for an expanding family or one of many generations - there's room for everyone. Set in large open grounds with tropical landscaping, there's enough room for the addition of a greenhouse and vegetable patch, or just leave it looking pristine. There's a large pool to the rear with BBQ and lounging area and much more inside.

* Riverside Swim Club

The Riverside Swim Club sits on the edge of the river in Riverview. A favourite haunt of the locals, it has a cafe, pool (obviously), separate changing rooms and views out over the river.  A great place for sims both young and old, it's ideal for teens to get together and blow off some steam and for parents to gain those all important body skills.

* New Azalea Acres Community garden

This community garden is a revamp of the original, found in Riverview. It's better (if not bigger) than the orginal. There's now a much wider selection of vegetables and fruit trees, along with a BBQ area, toilet facilities, and sheltered seating areas. Set in neat semi-formal gardens, all of the fruit and veg are of ordinary quality, though look a little closer and you'll find some of the varieties themselves are of extra-ordinary origin!

* An Introduction (of sorts)

So, if you're looking for Oz - you missed it about three miles back. You have instead, stumbled into what I hope is going to be the space that I post Sims 3 blurb and images from my game. If you don't play Sims 3 this'll bore you... if you do play Sims 3 - this may still bore you.