PreFaaaabulous! (1)

My name is Epione Serendipity and I'm a prefab whore! This didn't happen overnight, mind you. No, it took me several years to figure out that I should be renting land, and not renting existing plots with already established houses. I kept seeing and wanting all these great homes on the blogs so about three months ago I found my own little piece of skyland.

The first house I want to share with you is the SeaFair Cottage by Liz Gealach from Thistle. How do I love Thistle? Let me count the ways-one, two, no, four-I have four houses from Thistle! If you like sweet, whimsical homes with a cottage feel to them then I highly recommend Liz Gealach's creations.

The SeaFair is a beautiful two story cottage with a soft blue exterior and yellows and blues on the interior. There is more than enough room to satisfy all of your decor desires but keep in mind that it's 231 prims. Here I am playing Chopin on a beautiful piano by Maar Auer. Can you believe I actually forgot that I even had a piano?!? I'll get my inventory organized someday.

The living room space is huge so you can totally separate and design different areas for whatever interests you. I'm showing off some holiday finds including the Cozy Nook set from Second Spaces.

I've always liked the little alcoves that you find underneath stairs. When I was little, I had one of these nooks in my house. I used to hide there and read ghost stories. The white tree and chairs are from {What Next}. I grew up having a fake white Christmas tree and I loved it! The only reason I looked forward to Thanksgiving is because I knew the next day we would put up the white tree.

Here is another great cookie making set from Just My Imagination. My cookie frenzy will start on December 26. I will be making chocolate chip, oatmeal (without raisins!), peanut butter, lemon and pecan, chocolate brownie, snickerdoodle and some sort of ginger concoction. In the background is the sanded wood dining room set by [croire].

My favorite part of the SeaFair is a space upstairs that I made into an artist type loft. I love to paint and draw and it would be so awesome to have my own studio...someday. The blue woodcutter patchwork chair is from one of my favorite shops, LISP.

The bedroom area was a great space for me to display the owl decal, another find from [croire]. Yes, that is a chinchilla from Neon Frog, sitting on the couverture ichacora bed.

There is a great upstairs back deck too!

It's December 25 so that means it's Christmas! I hope you have a wonderful holiday and please enjoy these last few days of 2010!

fashions
dress 1: Wretched Dollies, Candy Cane
dress 2: Wretched Dollies, Winter Angel
hair 1: Vanity Hair, Holy Night Special (group gift)
hair 2: Vanity Hair, Vanity Umber (group gift)
poses: Clique, Starry Eyed set

house and garden
house: Thistle, SeaFair Cottage
piano: Maar Auer, Concert Grand Piano

living room area: Second Spaces, Cozy Nook set in blue

alcove area: {What Next}, white tree, presents and cosy slipper chairs

kitchen:
Just My Imagination, On a Christmas Day cookie making set
[croire], Sanded Wooded set
plants: MBMO

artist loft:
LISP, Patchwork Woodcutter Chair
Second Spaces, Drafting Table
BP*, Canvas and Eazel

bedroom area:
couverture, ichacora bed
[croire], Owl decal
Neon Frog, chinchilla
Artilleri Home, TV Time
*Tatty Soup*, The Bibs Chair Faded in pink and turquoise

snowmen:
Facts, Elise
MBMO, Snowman with black top hat
Never You Mind, Mr Snowman
GG's Home and Garden, plaid snowman

epione's Christmas miscellaneous I

I woke up Friday morning with a migraine. Unfortunately, I had to work all weekend (three projects that need to be finished by Monday) so staying in bed was not an option. Btw, if you struggle with migraines and have any unique solutions to stop them or decrease the pain (besides the obvious ones like doing yoga, getting more sleep and going gluten-free), please IM me inworld.

It's almost 48 hours later and I still have a slight migraine but my head is clear enough to realize that it's December 19! I have way too many Christmas items and not enough days left to blog about them. Yeah, I could always save them for next year but who knows where I'll be in December 2011. And come to think of it, what will Second Life be like a year from now? LL has gotten rid of last names so who knows what the future holds for this crazy place. Anyways, I don't want all my lindens to go to waste so I'll just put a bunch of stuff into one blog post and hopefully by December 25, I will have used all my holiday goodies in some way or another.

I found these adorable doll type figures from an awesome store, Never You Mind, and I was excited to blog about something I haven't seen on all the feeds. However, after I bought almost every damn doll in the store, I started seeing them everywhere inworld. Oh well. There are snowboys, snowmen, reindeer and other assorted cuties most of which animate in some way.

Speaking of awesome stores, the bench is from Awesome Blossom and comes with texture changes and 6 sit animations.

I bought the cookie table back in November, before Thanksgiving. [Tuft]
was having a great sale on their Christmas animations and I bought them all (can you see a pattern here?). I've been sucked into making cookies again this year which will ruin my continued effort to go gluten and sugar free. It's hard to do this during the holidays since everywhere you turn, someone is handing you something made with wheat. Even my dentist gave me a loaf of pumpkin bread! Hey, I thought dentists were supposed to deter you from sugary treats?

Anyways, I do love making cookies because people always love them when they recieve them. Let's face it, there is no good deed that isn't selfish. Can you think of one? I make my cookies ghetto style (a term I learned in fashion school). I don't have a mixer. I grow my own wheat, churn my own butter and raise chickens for the eggs. *Just kidding, just kidding**. But I honestly don't have a mixer, so I have to stir the dough myself which is great for upper arm strength.

The teal coat I'm wearing is from MNK*Shop and comes in three styles. Isn't it fabulous? Magika has some great hairstyles out right now and actually, when I first came on SL, Magika was one of the first hair shops I went to. Each of their new styles comes with a mirrored image which is very cool and the optional "hair in mouth" look. I'm not a big hair chewer. No, I have other annoying habits.

I hope everyone has a great Sunday! And for those of you who are a day ahead of us, have a great Monday (and Bob's your uncle)!

comet, snowboys etc.: Never You Mind
bench: Awesome Blossom
Making the Cookies: [Tuft]
gingerbread house: Marketplace

small pine trees: {What Next}
camel: Neon Frog
wreath/santa hat: Epiphanies
rudolph poof: Belle Belle Furniture

coat: MNK*Shop, Ruffle_Coat(green)**nikukyu**sw
jeans: **DP**yumyum, Jeans 02
boots: Reek, Autumn Boots
hair: Magika, Natalie

yellow

This is the most lindens I've spent on a Color Challenge. It was also a little frustrating (but in a different way than sepia). Do you know when you get a prefab or some small building and the creator warns you to be careful when you open it because the objects are linked? Yeah, be careful with that! I rezzed this amazing little cabaret stage and when I tried to rotate it, everything came unlinked. I thought I had everything linked (I was edit mode) but no, I didn't :=\. And there are about 12 objects that form the cabaret so it was very easy to miss one.

So if the scene looks a little funky, well, it's because it is! I tp'd back and forth to the place I got it from and my land. I also took pictures but try as I may, I couldn't put humpty dumpty back together again. Finally I just threw all the objects in haphazardly!

I need to learn how to build so I can make my own little cabaret scenes. Maybe that should be one of my goals for the New Year.

dress: un Jour, insomnia Dress
hair: Clawtooth, Breathe Me
shoes: un Jour, *insomnia* shoes
necklace: Ripe, Gold Mamacita

ugh!

Let's get right to it. I've had a crappy week. No, I'm not a starving child in Africa. I don't have a fatal disease but can I have a bad day or week or year and feel...just sad? And just so you know, I do think about the starving children in Africa. I volunteer year-round not just during the holidays (I needed you to know this for some reason).

So what's the basis for all this angst? People, relationships...does it ever get any easier? When I solve one problem with someone it seems that another situation always pops up. And I can't just ignore it and run away from these obstacles. I used to do that but not now. No more. No way. The latest thang is a power play I'm having with a woman that for some reason has a deep dislike of me. She's almost a bully in her actions and words towards me. I'm not a child anymore. And she's definintely too old to be bullying (is 50 too old to be a bully? maybe not). She has MS and is in pain most of the time which is no excuse to be an angry mean bitch. And in my defense, if she didn't have MS, I think she would still be angry, still be mean and definitely still be a bitch! I almost confronted her months ago but she was going through this cancer scare and me being me, which is someone who genuinely cares about other people, I put it off.

But I'm ready to go off on her this week if necessary and I might just video it and put on youtube! When I blow up, people in my rl tell me it's a blast to watch (some have even called it sexy). I don't go off on people often but when I do, it's like Mount St Helens eruptus. My problem is that I wait to long to deal with these situations and my anger builds and builds and builds which isn't good either. But hey, I'm working through it.

The other angst is...men....*sigh*. Enough said. So painful. Like someone has ripped every ounce of your heart and soul and put them both down a deep dark hole, never to be found again. Sometimes hugging a teddybear really helps.

Enough angst. On to happier stuff. I logged on tonight and started sorting through all my holiday/Christmas stuff. I have lots but unlike Halloween where I managed to build a small inventory of about 200 items but never did a final decoration, I am determined to have a holiday theme on my land! As you can see, I have started quite a decent collection but it's already December 12 and my land basically looks like a junk yard not a lovely Christmas scene.

Hey, do you see the purple tree in the background? Purple fake trees are out-of-stock at both the Walmart and BigLots near me. There goes my plans for a whimsical Christmas.

When I finished sorting through my closet (inventory), I got out of my footsie pjs (footsie pjs are amazing in both lives!) and went shopping for all things fabulous! I started at Has Been which is having an awesome red sale (50-75% off) on selected items through Friday, December 17. I love Terrie Dreadlow's style-a mixture of vintage, funk, goth, punk with some elegance and beauty thrown in. I bought some items that had a holiday type feel to them.

I've been looking for a winter/holiday type of cabin or cottage but haven't found one yet so I decided to get the next best thing.  Something that always puts a smile on my face (and boy do I need one)- Gingerbread Houses! I bought four of them which I'll be sharing throughout December. This one is called the Gingerbread House by *LS* and can be found at the marketplace.

We will get through the  holidays unscathed. And the New Year always brings new beginnings, new ideas and new goals. Here's to unlimited potential in 2011!

pajamas: ((:Bleh:)), FabFree Xmas Shopping Tour
dress: Has Been, Margie in Black/Burgandy
hair: Clawtooth, Sugar Biscuit
gingerbread house: marketplace

faux Sepia

This has been the hardest Color Challenge so far! I am loving all shades of brown more and more. And I discovered many great shops with tons of brown looks but unfortunately I couldn't use them all! I titled this post faux Sepia because it's not exactly sepia but I hope I got the essence of the color.

dress: So Many Styles, Winter Sweater Brown
hair: Clawtooth, The Seas Met
tights: Miao, Opaque Ribbed Tights
shoes: G Field, Square-Toe Sophie
pose: Glitterati, Model Pack 14

plum

place: The Clockwork Kingdom
skin: *OC*, Jenna
hair: Clawtooth, Kiss Kiss
top: Phoenix Rising, Oxygen in Lilac
shorts: Phoenix Rising, Mia in Plum
necklace: Dark Mouse (at Disco Deals), Bohemian Flare Necklace

grid Talk

I've been floating around the idea of having a grid discussion once or twice a week or whenever I'm inspired to discuss something interesting . We'll see how this one flows. Feel free to weigh in!

If SL were RL...

1) would skyland be colder than land land (land that isn't in the sky)?
2) would Tp'ing cause nausea in some people?
3) what type of job or career would you have?
4) would people eat?
5) (do you think Epione should stop screwing around and get some real life stuff done?)

My answers:

1) I think living up in the sky would definintely be colder! Also, people have told me that when they were up near the top of the WTC that it swayed on windy days. I think skyland would sway too.

2) Teleporting would definitely cause nausea in some people! And I would be one of them because I'm easily nauseated :(

3) I always wanted to design clothes in SL but now I'm thinking I might want to be a builder of houses or furniture. Boring yes? How about an exotic dancer? But seriously, I don't want to think very much when I come on SL so that leaves out designing or building. But we're talking SL being RL, right? Whatever!

4) Yeah, people would eat but you can easily play with your sliders if you find yourself gaining weight!

5) (um...yes defnintely!)