House 003 Chapter 3 < | > House 004 Chapter 1

House 003 Building Goals:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath min - Complete)
Build a Park (Complete)
House 003 Generational Goals:
Complete the Angling Ace aspiration (Complete)
Gardening skill level 10 (Complete)
Fishing Skill level 10 (Complete)
Grow a Cow Plant & collect at least 5 unique essences (Complete)
Young Adult heir (Currently Teen Age)

So, here we are with all the goals complete except for our heir. The last few days always seem to drag by for me, so hopefully this post doesn’t drag by too.

Brynn: “Aw thanks mom.. I’m trying to sleep here!”

A nice family meal.

Group gardening with Dad.

Brynn doing her homework. She almost always completes her extra credit, too. The focusing lamps are strong in this house!

Whenever Brynn is doing her homework, I try to speed it up with dad helping her out. Leaves more time for her to keep her needs up.

Hollie apparently thought she had more time to get to bed, and passed out.

Christian out on the dark porch, using the new treadmill.

Oh, no… Hollie!

I’ve never seen an alien grave before.. Have you? Very cool. It just occurred to me that Hollie spent her entire life in disguise. Because she wasn’t controllable, she never once came out of disguise so we could see what she really looked like!

Look who else is an elder!

Apparently leftovers aren’t good enough for Brynn. She even managed to not set herself on fire.

And yes, she even ate a serving of her “grilled friuts”. I put the rest away for her.

Wait.. what? Leave sugar skull offering?? Umm.. Okay..

Let’s try it.

… Interesting …

.. so I go hunting around the neighborhood.. and find this colorful teen.

Turns out you have to be friends to get the skull.. so Christian makes nice with Conner (the dressed up teen).

Success!

What?

A new collection. Interesting. Must be a holiday thing. I won’t have time to get all of them on this house, but we can get a couple. Later on I find out that the gravestone offering doesn’t work every time, which is a bummer.

Aha! Finally! Real proof that someone used the pool! And even better, she didn’t drown. 🙂  *happy dance*

Well, look who’s visiting.

The family is back together again. At least temporarily.

Yay for Brynn!!

Since working out is too dangerous, this is what Christian is reduced to… working on Logic. I have him play a few games with Brynn when she’s not busy, too.

Wonder what she’s doing on the computer?

… I had no idea they could do that autonomously… Clearly they can’t get their postcards and stuff.. but still very interesting.

What a pretty dress! We got another skull out of this teen.

Family breakfast… while Brynn is SUPPOSED to be in school.

So, since she’s home, we make her work on the garden with is. I like this size of garden, because the free services daily gardener can keep up with it without Christian having to do anything other than harvest and sell the proceeds.

Woohoo!

Wait.. that’s an achievement?  Hahaha! Nice one, EA.

Bye Hollie. I just wanted to get a shot of her “poofing”.. don’t mind the walls cutaway.

Look who else is a day of the dead teen? Remember the kid that Brynn used to invite over after school? Yep! That’s Drake all grown up. We invite him over for a group swimming party. He and Brynn seem to get along well. Which is good for Brynn.. maybe she has love prospects!

Helping Brynn with homework so she doesn’t spend so much time on it, since she’s already at the “A” level.

Welcome back, Hollie!

I guess even Grimm catches logs out of the pond… too funny.

And… it’s that time!

Now time to double-check on the rest of our goals:

The house is definitely worth more than 40k, and has two bedrooms one bathroom as required.

Our five unique essences: Inspired, Playful, Energized, Confident, and Flirty.

Christian’s final skill tally. We got both the required fishing and gardening, as well as handiness.

Angling Ace completed.

Leftover cash and final mood.

Where Christian ended up. I cut that one close!

And lastly, the house is uploaded under #thrallsdrifter and #drifterchallenge. I even remembered to do this before leaving the house this time!

House 003 Chapter 3 < | > House 004 Chapter 1

House 003 Chapter 2 < | > House 003 Chapter 4

House 003 Building Goals:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath min - Complete)
Build a Park (Complete)
House 003 Generational Goals:
Complete the Angling Ace aspiration (Complete)
Gardening skill level 10 (Complete)
Fishing Skill level 10 (Complete)
Grow a Cow Plant & collect at least 5 unique essences (Complete)
Young Adult heir (Currently Child Age)

We start off with a check of our goals.. almost done. I’m also working on handiness 10 to open up forgotten grotto for the first time.

Awww. Christian and Brynn being adorable.

Hollie showing what she really thinks of skill building.. zzzzzz. Still working on getting mental skill points so Brynn can get her grades up.

It’s really not that hard to work out, there, Christian.. he clearly hates the new workout machine. Gotta get off those extra pounds!

Hollie ages to elder, and doesn’t look to pleased with it, either.

Luckily, the back pain seems gone while she chats with Christian.

I found the fact he could joke about aliens to her as absolutely hilarious, since she’s an alien. She still laughed at the joke, though, so she didn’t take offense. Hehe.

Finally! Now I can open up Forgotten Grotto!

Hollie telling herself a story while cooking on the poolside grill. I took this as proof in case she set herself on fire…

… But all was well. I still haven’t seen anyone USE the new pool.. but at least the patio furniture has now been used.

With Christian’s newly maxed Handiness skill, I took the family off to the park to test it out. Brynn has fun on the spaceship (I didn’t tell her to do that, the plumbbob is over her head to help me find her.. lol)

Hollie chats up some random gardener.. (same note as above with the plumbbob.)

Clearly, the pond works, because this lady caught a couple of fish out of it while we were there.

“Renewing vows” on the wedding arch to make sure it works. Even Brynn came over to watch!

Awww.. !

More people at the park than I expected.. glad to know it works. There’s something to be said for the satisfaction you get knowing that the park you built yourself works and is loved by visitors!

Let’s get these boards off of there, Christian!

.. Wonder what’s in here?…

Frogs!

And time for fishing. It’s a gorgeous photo, too bad it’s almost too dark to see.

Back home.. and back to work on this garden. Such a lot of work!

Brynn doing her homework!

Dinner time with Dad.

More gardening the next day. Note the gnome we found fishing is now in the garden.

Brynn invites a classmate, Drake, over after school. They seem to have a good time!

Yay Brynn! It’s always good to see this message.

The newly re-done garden. I eliminated some of the trees, and all of the spliced dragonfruit plants in favor of the tulip and blackberries. The row of Pomegranate trees is more for decor than anything else. I also put up a fence and a whole line of garden gnomes… why? .. I don’t know.. but they’re cute! (There’s an updated house shot in the title shot for this post.. I finally got around to doing some landscaping.)

Brynn and Dad. They get along so well!

Later that day, I caught Hollie and Brynn taking a similar photo. Too cute!

Yay! Birthday time for Brynn! .. Wonder what she’ll look like?

What a gorgeous teen she is! Her outfit sucks.. but I’ll fix that when she takes over for the next house.

Brynn’s new teenage room.

And.. finally .. proof that someone used the pool. At least, I think so.. she’s in her swimwear (although she is insane so that could mean anything.)

Now that we’re just waiting for the young adult stage, time seems to be going by SO slow!

House 003 Chapter 2 < | > House 003 Chapter 4

House 003 Chapter 1 < | > House 003 Chapter 3

House 003 Building Goals:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath minimum)
Build a Park (after gardening and fishing lvl 10)
House 003 Generational Goals:
Complete the Angling Ace aspiration (Complete)
Gardening skill level 10 (level 9 now)
Fishing Skill level 10 (Complete)
Grow a Cow Plant & collect at least 5 unique essences (at three now)
Young Adult heir

First thing I did was take care of the garden.. and we were close enough to skill that I got this:

So, yay.. another goal completed! Time to build a park! Park picture spam:

Here’s what it looks like on the map screen… (full picture in the topic title picture)

The wedding area

Restrooms

Kitchen for baking wedding cakes and food for parties

Soo.. that’s the park. Haven’t gone and used it yet, but I’m pretty sure everything will work as intended.

After building the park, my first order of business is taking my relationship with Hollie to the next level. Here she is accepting my first flirt!

First kiss.. she looks so surprised!

And.. the first try for baby. Yep.. going for the heir, since all goals are pretty much done except for that one. This shot also shows I’ve finally upgraded the master bedroom in honor of Hollie.

Making things official.. the impromptu wedding ceremony.

Is that a baby bump Hollie? Yes, it is!

This is what she brings in four times a week. Not bad, but not great. Good thing I’m not counting on her for help with the finances!

Since we have very little to do, I send Christian out jogging to start working off the extra pounds he had by the time he was a Young Adult. Apparently I keep my simmies well fed.

The adorable Gummie Guppy in his home in the bedroom. With as dark as this photo is, looks like I need to invest in more lighting in there..

Christian turns into an Adult… and if you’re looking closely, you’ll notice something in the background…

We officially have all five essences! (And the Skeleton Fishbones guy in his little tank.) Essences are: Inspired, Focused, Energized, Confident and Flirty. Because I’m so very nervous having a live cowplant around, I sell him and keep the benign dead version for decoration outside. I know, not very brave of me.. but nothing said I had to keep it around my vulnerable heir! Also, if you’re following along, this means the only goals I have left are the house value and the young adult heir.

I spend some time upgrading the main room of the house:

Kitchen and Dinette

Front door and computer.

Bathroom also gets an upgrade

It clearly needs more lighting! At this time, I check house value and it’s hovering at just under the 40k without the second bedroom decorated.

And welcome our heir, little baby girl Brynn. I spent quite a while random-ing for her name, but ended up going back to one of the first choices that popped up.

Ahh.. that’s better. Lights! Hollie, trolling the forums (not a skill she needs, of course).

Hollie, in one of her favorite pasttimes… napping. This is taken after I moved stuff around a bit and added the half walls.

Proof that Hollie did actually care for baby Brynn. Sometimes. Well, let’s be honest: Rarely.

Brynn’s room finally decorated and waiting for her…

And here she is! What a cutie! She’s eating Franks and Beans (hence the weird cuboid things on the top of the bowl.. lol. I think it looks weird.

Brynn following Dad around the garden, slowing him down by talking to him. I try not to mind too much, because it’s building their relationship nicely.

Dad trying to get Brynn some mental skill and working on her first Whiz Kid milestone (which she gets quite easily).

The master bedroom.. don’t mind that the end tables don’t match in this shot..

Because this is Christian making the other one to match!

Raising a kid is hard work, Christian. Here he is helping with homework.. with the focusing lamps I put out, Brynn does her homework every day, and needs to finish them while focused for her next milestone. (Spoiler: she gets that one, too.. but no more.)

Hollie actually working on a skill she needs for work. Spoiler.. she never gets a promotion from level three because she refuses to work on charisma (I’m not even sure they CAN work on charisma autonomously.)

A shot of the newly upgraded and redesigned kitchen. Christian is in the corner there upgrading the dishwasher for more handiness skill.

The kitchen looking towards the front door.. Hollie again wasting time trolling the forums.

Brand new pool area. This is here to make up for all the house value lost due to upgrading appliances and plumbing. I really dislike the fact that upgrading objects kills their value.. I think it should be the other way around.

With this, I’m officially done with the house goal.. although I’m sure I’m going to tinker with it more before I move to house 4.

And with that.. I’ll wrap up this chapter before I go too crazy with pictures.

House 003 Chapter 1 < | > House 003 Chapter 3

House 002 Chapter 5 < | > House 003 Chapter 2

First order of business.. House 002 is now available under #thrallsdrifter or #drifterchallenge on the Gallery.

Next.. lets check out our goals for this house:

House 003 Building Goals:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath minimum)
Build a Park (after gardening and fishing lvl 10)
House 003 Generational Goals:
Complete the Angling Ace aspiration
Gardening skill level 10
Fishing Skill level 10
Grow a Cow Plant & collect at least 5 unique essences
Young Adult heir

Looks like we have our work cut out for us! I’m also giving myself an additional challenge of getting level 10 Handiness to open up the Grotto, since I’ve never been in there.

Next… meet Christian Drifter:

I elected to get him the Quick Learner trait from Renaissance Sim aspiration and switch to the Angling Ace aspiration once he took control

He didn’t do too bad for himself.. I was surprised at the 1 in Writing. I didn’t know sims would autonomously blog about their feelings after the death of a loved one.

Back to the poorhouse!

But.. a much better start than in House 2, thank goodness.

Lastly.. time to get rid of that hat. I like to be able to see my sims faces!

MUCH better. I used a lot of Outdoor Retreat stuff on him, including the hair. He’s definitely a little on the tubby side.. although I don’t know that I’ll have time in this challenge to get him back into shape. We shall see! Perhaps half-starving at the beginning of the challenge will be a good thing for his weight situation.

To be honest, there’s not a lot to say about the first day or two. There’s not a lot to collect on this map, especially since all the plants need time to grow. I got a bunch of really low quality metals and crystals, nothing worth much, and even the frogs I found were 10 simoleon frogs. This one’s going to be a tough start. He spent most him time fishing for absolutely nothing because his skill is so low. I should have had him fish with his dad in house 2.

Speaking of Dad, Xander wandered by and I interacted with him and made sure to take a picture. Sure enough, by the next day Xander had passed on.. so this photo represents the last time Christian sees his dad alive.

Finally, the tulips bloom.. well, at least I got one from each plant.. and started our garden. Once again, I think I will rely mostly on gardening to make the money for this house. It’s a sure bet, and we need the gardening skill anyway.

By the time I was able to afford a cooler, he was practically starving, and it took two “quick meals” to get him back to the green.

In another day or so, more plants came up for harvesting, and I was able to plant a “full” garden, and splurge on a bathroom set. I feel like a creeper taking a photo of him showering, but I wanted to show some progress made.

… Still no bed, though. He sleeps okay on the benches though, and his fun is staying in an okay range with all the fishing he’s doing.

Look who I found. Grimm really has a thing for fishing in my game.

Our social skill needed work, so I started trolling for young adult females. The first one I found (not the one pictured above, you’ll see her in a bit) started the conversation by reading his mind.. she’s an alien.. and she’s gorgeous. If she stays single by the time Christian’s near his adult birthday, I think I may be sneaky and bring her in for a wife. The one pictured above is Cecelia:

And was nixed because of the unemployment…

I did find a total of three young adult females on our “fishing” for females day. This one is Jasmin:

Interesting set of traits. I don’t know why, I just didn’t see her as much of an option because of that Squeamish (such an annoying trait)… she would never be ok with helping in the garden or cleaning the house.

First milestone complete!

I also spend quite a bit of time doing each “whim” that I can, and I buy him both Morning Sim and Night Owl to help him with his skill gains. Next will be “free services” so I can hire the gardener for free on days that I don’t want to fuss with that huge garden.

As promised, here are pictures of the alien in disguise, Hollie. The picture also shows that our money situation keeps improving – we now have an official bathroom.

I don’t mind the insane trait, it keeps things interesting. I think she’s a good pick.. we’ll have to see whether Christian agrees.

I rope her into helping with gardening for the day. This picture also shows the “full” garden – two rows of tulips, a row of lemon trees, a row of half strawberries, half snapdragons for splicing (in case we can’t catch a cowplant berry) and the last row is an experiment with blackberries. I don’t know if they’re worth planting, or if their grow time is simply too long to be worth the work.

No worries about cowplants now.. I’ve caught a couple, and grew both up. One will go in the family inventory in case I kill the first one. (Never having had a cowplant before I am likely to have derp moments.. lol)

Interesting.. a lady with blue hair. Meet Alessandra… I love her genetics.. I just don’t love her being an adult already. Keeping her in the file of possibilities, though.

As you can see, I wasn’t that interested in her and didn’t manage to find out all her information.

Three people I know walking by – makes for a good gardening party. One of them, if you look closely, is Aunt Kiara! Yay for her still being around.

The beginnings of our house. Yes, I’ve bought him a handiness bench, because I’m hoping to have enough time to maximize that skill too so I can go to the forgotten grotto (I’ve never been in there in any game!) We’re not hurting for funds, though, and our skills are coming up pretty quickly.

Oh no!!  Not Kiara too! That’ll be the last relative who was still alive for poor Christian.

The entire walk-by neighborhood shows up to grieve.. and I try pleading with Grimm. I really don’t want that two day moodlet!

What?!? It actually worked?! Awesome! No more two day negative moodlet. She can die on her own lot, thanks.

Grimm likes cowplants. Also, please forgive the walls cutaway in these last couple photos.. I was a bit rattled by the death on my lot.

Later that week, I finally have a house shell I’m happy with.

Another shot of the outside. I’m doing a single floor ranch style house with some great big covered porches. I like the way the rock foundation looks with the dark wood. The interior of the house is still pretty empty – we’ll need more cash to fix that up.

Oops. I knew I’d end up killing one of them. I was trying to get into a new mood for another essence, and I waited just a little too long, I guess. I pull the other fully grown cowplant and replace the dead one. They look pretty cool when they’re dead, though. I’m up to three essences, so I will be able to put the cowplant “out to pasture” before too long. I’m terrified to have it around with idiot (uncontrollable) sims on the lot.. especially that all too valuable heir.

I am up to the last bit of the whole Angling Ace aspiration, and trying to catch the last few fish in Sylvan Glade.

I did it! One skill maxed, and gardening is at level 9, so not too far behind. I can’t believe how fast I’m speeding through this challenge.

I finished Angling Ace!  I got really lucky on fish catches, didn’t get the wolf eel, but I got the shark and the piranha. I also found it really difficult to catch the screenshots of the different milestones, being that for most of them, it was hidden by an inventory screen or something else. (I also had a toothache while playing, so I was a bit distracted..)

House 002 Chapter 5 < | > House 003 Chapter 2

House 002 Chapter 4 < | > House 003 Chapter 1

First, let’s see where we’re at on our goals:

House 002 Building Goal:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath minimum)
(complete worth 41k- 2 bedroom, 3 bath house)
House 002 Generational Goals:
Marry in an NPC (complete)
Outdoor Enthusiast (3/4 done!)
YA aged heir (Currently teenage)

Now to finish that pesky aspiration and get Christian to young adult age! (Also, let me apologize for a really long post.. I might have gotten carried away with snapping photos…)

We start out with sending the whole family out to garden as a group.. it’s never too early to start them learning!

After gardening, Christian chats with his mom while Shaina dances the night away (yet again…)

See? I have other things for her to do, yet she’s the one who’s constantly dancing. I find it funny that even Jamari (who had the Dance Machine trait) didn’t max out the dancing skill.. yet Shaina does. I laughed way harder at this than I probably should have.

Elders can’t stay up as late as teens.. so Christian decides to watch sports after Shaina goes to bed.

… then stays up even later doing homework. Much like his father, he is pretty good about getting his homework done (at least since I put in the focusing lamps, before then it was a little bit more spotty.)

At this point, I took a lengthy break into build mode to update the house. I had quite a large sum in the bank, and felt the house could use some improvements. Everything from the next photo on showcases this gorgeous house.. A bit later I do a sort of house tour.

What else do teens do? Play the sims, of course!

Hooray! Now Xander can do something else with his days…

(and nights).. like…  fishing, wasting time until he’s tired enough to get another “night” of sleep in his tent.

Shaina reading in our newly redesigned kitchen.. note the dishwasher ends up getting it’s colors changed before the house is finished.

Xander baking himself a birthday cake, again in the new kitchen (I just LOVE this house, it’s definitely one of my favorite builds ever!)

Look who’s an elder now! Shaina seems pretty unimpressed, being a whole four days older than Xander, being an elder is old news to her!

Yes, the toilets are unbreakable… but the showers sure aren’t. Xander’s work is never done (except when he’s off fishing.. lol)

More family gardening time. I let Shaina sit this one out, and Xander only did a little bit before letting Christian finish it out. I really was wanting him to get some skill points for school performance. Also, if you’re paying attention, you can tell I sold all the plants relating to herbalism and scaled the garden back, considerably reducing the work load every day.

Yes!! No more tent sleeping!

Since I don’t have to have the tent out, and I’m done with herbalism too, I take the time to revamp the patio. I also take the time to clean out poor Xander’s inventory.. I still had the herbalism supplies in there cluttering it up. So nice to have a clean inventory again!

And now.. impromptu house tour:

The neat entrance to the kitchen/dining room. I had to take this shot in build mode because the columns like to hide when you’re taking pictures in live mode. Xander’s eating dinner all by his lonesome after fishing some more.

The upstairs hall all prettied up with pictures. (with bonus Xander going to bed.. lol)

Christian’s new “teen” room. He doesn’t ever use the computer up here, but I feel better knowing he’s got one!

A neat perspective shot of the master bathroom (you can see the shower/tub in the mirror!)

The living area from the door (note there should be a column there by the chess table, it got hidden by live mode.)

Shot from the other side, by the TV.. note the column IS there because I went to build mode again so you could see it. Ignore the sky up the stairs.. obviously that’s where the upstairs hallway should be! (End of house tour…)

Mom and son having breakfast…

… And this would be the shot that nearly gave me a heart attack. (I was so rattled there’s a plumbbob over her head that I artfully cut out – I was clicking on her to find out what she was doing… and panicked, just starting to shoot pictures without thinking.) What’s got me so distracted?? She’s doing this AUTONOMOUSLY!! In no way did I tell her to do this or have her queue it up by having her in a group.. she just randomly beat the gardener to the plants and whistled her happy tune.

See? Xander’s off fishing, and the gardener showed up.. and she’s still gardening all by herself. Oh.. and this is me trying out new angles to take screen shots from. I managed to get him catching a (sarcasm) really exciting Cichlid. Christian’s at school (of course) working on his “A”, and I’m just wasting time waiting for him to get home so we can head out to Granite Falls to get the last of the bugs I need to find for the aspiration.

Before Christian gets home, however, there’s another milestone to mark – Xander maxed fishing.

Congrats to Christian!

The whole family sets off after school on a weekend vacation (just for Friday-Sunday).. and I immediately have them all go to the National Forest, plop down the big tent and a cooler, and set off to find as many buggies as possible.

While Xander hunts bugs, I thought it was noteworthy that junior decided to go play chess all by himself.

Finally! And with a few days to spare, too! I find it funny that I was waiting to go get the bugs as the last thing on the list, instead of the harder things like herbalism skill or the tent sleeping. I just hadn’t wanted to make Christian miss school!

Now… with nothing left to do.. it becomes a real vacation.. and I send Xander to join Christian at chess for a game or two before I try to hunt up any more rare bugs I could find (I was only missing two bugs to complete the collection at this point.. a rare one and and uncommon.) I ignored digsites and plants, concentrating on bugs alone, hoping against hope that I’d find both of them. Spoiler: I didn’t.) Shaina was busy playing horseshoes while the boys played chess.

Fishing sure paid off this time… I had him doing that while the bugs respawned. He also caught some other first time fishies as well, but nowhere close to a collection for those.

Family campfire stories and dinner.. of course the teenager is on his phone.

Vacation: a perfect time to do your homework, right?

Christian initiated this.. so I took a picture, too. Only too soon these father-son moments will be gone!

A short time later, while checking on them while Xander ran down some more bugs.. I manage to catch them doing this. Must be selfie day!

I found it funny that all three were warming their hands at the same time… must have been cold that night.

Christian decided to make some kebabs. His first ever attempt at cooking – I was just glad he hadn’t set himself on fire!

He even ate them! I guess we can call that one a success.

Lookie who I found! A Dragon Dragonfly.. one of the two bugs I was missing. I had to hurry and cancel out of Xander’s fishing because I didn’t want to miss this little guy.

Christian tossing a log on the fire for his mom.

Just Xander fishing with a bear.. nothing to see here….

A shot of the dragonfly doing his flame breath. So cool!!

What’s this??  I did it! A death flower! My first one ever in Sims 4.

Only a few days left.. but at least Christian finally found his new computer. I just wish he’d decided to find it when he’s NOT skipping school.

Chatting with Dear old Dad. (Why Xander is eating upstairs I’ll never figure out.)

Ohh… ohh no. At least she waited until we were back home. This would be the moment I had a lightbulb go on above my head.. “hey, I have a death flower now. Two, in fact…” So I proceeded to try to give it to Grimmy.

It worked! For some reason, I figured it wouldn’t work for a sim dying of old age.. but apparently it does.

Shaina chatting with Christian now that the crowd has left… just like nothing ever happened – except –

I see your moodlet!

Dear me, Xander, aren’t you past catching driftwood yet??

Christian doing his homework while chatting with mom…

Not again….

This time I let him take her. I want to save that other death flower in case of emergencies!

RIP Shaina Montalvo! You will be missed.

… Apparently Grimm likes bugs. He stood there for a good half hour sim time just chatting it up with the will-o-the-wisp. I had to laugh.

Christian may be sad, but at least he still does his homework.

Consoling junior about his mom’s death.

Watching TV before bed. Tomorrow’s the big day!!

We made it! Christian is now a Young Adult and ready to set off on his own house!

To recap:

I guess I went a little overboard with decorating, huh?

Still plenty of money left in the bank!

We sure cut that one close, though…. let’s see his skills….

Not too shabby! All goals complete, and onto the next house! Again, sorry for the really long post.. I couldn’t figure out a good place to split the post up.

House 002 Chapter 4 < | > House 003 Chapter 1

House 002 Chapter 3 < | > House 002 Chapter 5

Checking on where we are for our goals:

House 002 Building Goal:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath minimum)
(complete- 2 bedroom, 3 bath house)
House 002 Generational Goals:
Marry in an NPC (complete)
Outdoor Enthusiast (halfway done!)
YA aged heir (Currently child age)

I spend much of the sim-week between the last post and this working on his herbalism, and I get him to level six. (I’m working on this while Christian goes through his school week, I’ll go camping again on the weekend.)

Really you two? You have to talk in the bedroom while Xander is trying to sleep? I personally wouldn’t be able to sleep with people talking in the room.

That Friday after school, I sent the family out camping again, I’ll spend most of the time at the National Forest lot and I hope to find and befriend the hermit (provided I can find the brambles.. I’ve never managed to before.)

After showing up at the campground, I immediately send them to the National Forest and put down our Cabin-in-a-bag and a cooler for Shaina and Christian.

Somehow, I forgot he was hungry before we traveled, so the first thing I do is have him grill some hot dogs.

Apparently, I wasn’t the only one hungry.. Christian immediately pounces on the cooler and has a snack.

… I wonder if Christian is wishing he waited for hot dogs??

I spend most of the first day and night hunting for bugs and plants, and futilely trying to find the brambles that lead to the hermit. I finally give up and send Xander to bed until the morning, when I start looking again (it’s very hard to see in the dark in Granite Falls).

Look what I FINALLY found! I can’t tell you how much time I’ve spent in games trying to find this place, and never being able to. After breakfast, I paused the game and did a last ditch attempt to find it… I was so frustrated, and the pictures in the guides just didn’t seem to be helping. Then, I just stumbled on it.. and oriented myself so I would be able to find it again in another game.

Hello hermit! Xander wandered around picking up plants and bugs before I finally noticed her, and then I set to making a friend. Coincidentally, he had a whim to make a friend, so we finished that while finishing the “befriending” the aspiration required. I push some more, trying to get to good friends for the fertilizer recipe…

… Success!

While Xander wanders looking for more bugs and plants (I really wanted to catch the unique-to-this-area bug, the will-o-the-wisp, so I needed to stay until it was dark), Christian spends some time socializing with the hermit in her little house. Such a cute little house, too.

I also catch this cute photo that makes it look like the hermit is chasing after this little chipmunk. (Spoiler.. she wasn’t.. lol)

Also while waiting to find that bug, I fished some in the hermit’s little fishing hole and got some salmon and bass to sell. I did finally find the bug at the end of the night, and headed back to the national forest to make sure my tent and cooler was still there.

It was! Shaina and Christian have hot dogs for breakfast while Xander catches up on sleep.

Some family time in the welcome center…

… and a bear sighting. *chuckles* Those bears are so funny.

A very dark photo of Christian and Shaina playing horseshoes at night.

… A ghost stargazing? .. That’s not something I’ve ever seen in the game. I was looking for fireflies and found this glowing figure in the dark woods instead… haha.. I had to laugh.

Back home.. Xander and Christian have breakfast before he heads off to school, and Xander heads out for more gardening.

Surprise.. Christian made it to an “A” in school thanks to the focusing lamps in the house. He barely made it, too, since he’s getting very close to his teen birthday.

After gardening, I work on Xander’s herbalism skill, since the only thing he needs for this tier of the aspiration is to identify the plants he picked up in Granite Falls. I keep getting the “skill not high enough to know what the plant is” notice, so it’s back to the grill for Xander.

Finally! At level 8 herbalism, he was able to learn the last plant!

Oh.. I found these in the forest while hunting fireflies. These are my very favorite of all the bugs out there – they’re just SO cute! I put them out on Xander’s bedside table.

… And this is that will-o-the-wisp that I waited so long to find at the hermit’s house. It makes a cute little spooky noise when you’re close to it, too.

I don’t want to neglect my plants… so I keep hiring the (free thanks to free services) gardener and having Shaina help me. I sold all the dragonfruit plants because they simply take too long to grow fruit to be worth it (I did keep the spliced plants, they don’t take as long) and replaced them with two of each of the Granite Falls plants. I figure this will be a good way to make sure I have enough components for herbalism.

Shaina ages to elder.. she doesn’t seem to be too happy about it.

They have a rather animated conversation later that day after the garden is cared for.. I though it was cute.

With everything done at home and energy left over, I send Xander back to Sylvan Falls to try to get a pomegranate again. (I don’t know why, but since I got the orchid plant from the lily and snapdragon splicing, I kinda want to get a pomegranate to make a death flower plant. There’s no particular reason for me to have it, I just haven’t gotten it in Sims 4 and would like to get one.)

.. Checking on our aspiration.. looks like we have our work cut out for us. I should probably be able to get the insects in our next weekend’s trip to Granite Falls without any problems.

I was planning on using a sleep replacement potion while he fished in Sylvan Falls, but he managed to catch my Pomegranate fairly quickly, so I sent him home, stuck a tent out on the patio, and started working on our 5 tent sleeps. It’s nerve wracking having them try for those since they’re so buggy and I’m afraid anything waking him up will cancel it out too soon. (This one was a success, by the way.)

Today is Christian’s last day as a child.. and he still gets his homework done in time. Sometimes he even does the extra credit!

Happy Birthday Christian! I can’t say I’m too fond of his look.. I may have to change his outfits and get rid of that hat when he takes over heirship next house.

Well, that’s a good place to leave it. Not much left to do.. the house is completed and decorated to my liking, I’m on the last milestone for the aspiration, and Christian is now a teen. I think I should definitely be able to get everything done before he grows up!

House 002 Chapter 3 < | > House 002 Chapter 5

House 002 Chapter 2 < | > House 002 Chapter 4

Before anything else, let’s check on our goals:

House 002 Building Goal:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath minimum)
(complete- 2 bedroom, 3 bath house)
House 002 Generational Goals:
Marry in an NPC (complete)
Outdoor Enthusiast (after child age heir)
YA aged heir

So we’re doing pretty well. Christian is now child age, so I can start on the Outdoor Enthusiast aspiration, which is what’s planned for this chapter (as you can see from the birdie title shot!)

Before I head to Granite Falls, I spend the night trying to get Xander to catch a Pomegranate in Sylvan Falls. However, we spent the entire night and only caught some toys, a lot of fish, and a couple of cowplant seeds to get some more cash. (I learned from watching Vihisha’s Let’s Play that if you plant them, they turn from a 20 simoleons to 475 simoleons! Definitely worth planting even though I don’t plan to keep them. Before this, I’ve always just sold the berries.)

The next morning, I send the family off to Granite Falls for a three day vacation. The first thing we do when we get there is chat with the Ranger for a little while, asking about camping here (since the campground is where I rented.. I put out a cot for Christian and an air mattress for Shaina and I. I also set out my old cooler in case they get hungry.)

The first thing Shaina does is make hot dogs for her and Christian. I send Xander off to start work on his aspiration: collecting plants around the area.

Apparently the log benches are more comfortable for both Shaina and Christian – they seem to use those instead of the cots I set out. I didn’t set out a tent thinking that they might be more likely to use the cots than the tents. (Looking at other blogs and let’s play’s, the tents are rarely used by the family.. so I had hoped they would use the cots.) No such luck!

A very dark picture, but Christian decides to do his homework at a dark picnic table while chatting with the ranger.

The next day, Christian spends a lot of time cloudgazing while Xander finishes finding his plants and then goes fishing for the 5 fish needed. I also take a moment to pay my bills via cellphone since they came due while we were in Granite Falls.

… That’s not a fish! But hey, 950 simoleons, that more than pays for the whole trip!

Finally! First tier complete!

Have to roast two plates of beetles, and Xander is hungry anyway.. so.. a roasting we go. Does he like them??

He sure seems to! Glad it’s you and not me, Xander!

Always cleaning up what we mess up at the campground. I like to have my sims be considerate of their environment.

Another dark photo.. but there’s a bear there talking to Shaina and Christian, making them scared in the middle of the night.

Reading the herbalism book I bought.. it seems like a VERY slow way to gain herbalism… so we’ll have to rethink that. I’ll have to do it by making herbal infusions instead.

Since our social is low and Christian is up… I send Xander over to chat with him.. and get in a good family cuddle.

After all night of collecting bugs and plants, Xander is hungry again so we roast the second necessary plate of beetles for the second tier aspiration.

Xander is sleeping in the middle of the day.. and look who finally found his cot!

Christian and Shaina taking care of themselves in the middle of the day.. for some reason Shaina couldn’t take a shower (kept queing up and then dropping) so she’s all stinky. Good thing it’s our last day of vacation!

Another dark photo.. but we run into Grimmy floating around the campground.. wonder what he’s doing out here?

Home sweet home! I spent some time adding decorative touches to the house, and I changed the front door to better match the windows. I think it looks nice!

The only thing we have left on our aspiration is getting to level 4 herbalism…

…so I send Xander to the stove to work on it. After making one sadness lotion, he puts it away… and the stove promptly bugs out, saying the lotion is still on the stove even though it’s not. I try several things, but it appears he can’t use the stove anymore. So, luckily I have enough money to sell the bugged stove and buy a replacement. I think what I’ll do is try to set up an outside grilling area for working on his herbalism.

And.. the new grilling spot works just fine.. no more buggy stove! What are Shaina and Christian doing while I spam “brewing” on the grill?

Shaina is eating breakfast.. apparently with an attitude. I just love this shot. Too funny.

And Christian is sound asleep in his room.

Speaking of the grilling area.. I figured I should show a better picture of it. Replaced the roof of the kitchen/dining area with a patio.. the door fits perfectly in the upstairs hallway.

See? Skinny rooms are hard to take photos of, though.

House 002 Chapter 2 < | > House 002 Chapter 4

Finally! Level four Herbalism achieved.

House 002 Chapter 1 < | > House 002 Chapter 3

First, let’s check our goals:

House 002 Building Goal:
40,000 value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath minimum)-
(all we have now is a bathroom)
House 002 Generational Goals:
Marry in an NPC (complete)
Outdoor Enthusiast (start after heir is child age)
YA aged heir

Welcome back! Last time, we started house 2, and put a lot of effort into getting our garden up to scratch.

… And it begins. The toilet breaks.. and that dish-washing she’s doing breaks the sink too. Xander quickly repairs both and heads back out gardening and collecting.

Family garden time.. it’s finally starting to make some money. Since I just noticed we have access to both strawberries and snapdragons, I went ahead and planted some strawberries for cutting to splice on the snapdragons. Doing this makes Dragonfruit which is worth a pretty penny and will help me a lot towards my house goal. (I hope)

Another Grimm sighting.. this time he has a friend along for his fishing adventure.

Since he’s up to 8 gardening, we sent him to open Sylvan Glade, and spent some time fishing there before his needs required a recharge at home. He caught some new fish types, including a treefish worth about 100 simoleons, which was a really nice catch. While there, I also found a couple higher value frogs, so breeding them will start making me some money. This is the first time in game that I’ve actually been into Sylvan Glade, so it was a nice trip. None of the plants were harvestable, though, so we just did fishing.

Starting with the shell of the house.. just bare walls and kid’s lighting for now.. but that will change soon.

Obviously, I will be paying close attention to this, since we need 40k for the building goal.

Shaina’s first action in the new house.. dancing. At least she’s keeping her needs up. She also tends to keep the house pretty clean.

We have a kitchen! Xander quickly starts working on his cooking skill with serving a garden salad to avoid fires. Hopefully Shaina will just get the leftovers out and not try her hand at cooking. Usually the non-controlled sims just get leftovers… so perhaps we’ll be okay on that.

Xander maxed gardening! (no surprise there, that’s all he does anymore is garden and collect!)

Occasionally, Kiara visits and gets roped into helping with the garden or hanging out with Shaina. They seem to get along pretty well.

Xander having dinner with the remains of Shaina’s birthday cake.. she’s now an adult!

Shaina watching the new TV.. and that reminds me.. impromptu house tour.. (also note I finally painted everything inside, put up windows, and changed out the lighting fixtures.)

The outside all windowed-up

View from living area to front door

View from front door into living area

View from living area to dining room

…And the kitchen… oops.. Xander set himself on fire while making breakfast, then had to run back and put out the fire while Shaina panicked

Shortly after the fire incident, the day before Xander’s adult birthday.. we have a nooboo on the way! Now the real race begins.. will I be able to finish the aspiration in time?? (Just to be on the safe side, I saved a secondary save file just before getting her pregnant so if things go south, I can pick back up just before baby. …Just goes to show how UN-confident I am that I can get this aspiration done in time!)

Xander watching TV while Shaina plays on the computer.

Meet Christian Drifter! Of course, it’s pretty hard to tell what he’s going to look like in this form.. we’ll just have to be patient.

The newest household addition: one fire was enough, thanks. I could have lost my heir!

It’s amazing how good a parent Shaina is for being uncontrolled – and a “dislikes children” sim. I don’t think I had to make Xander take care of the baby more than once (Shaina was sleeping) the entire time Christian was an infant! It was hard to get a picture, though, because of the size of the kid’s bedroom.. but that’s the way it goes.

Well, he’s not too bad, is he? I gave him the genius trait and the whiz kid aspiration (not that he’ll be finishing it…).

Now we finish this post off with a house check…

It’s done! Or at least we’re up to the correct value now. the only things I can see doing is replacing the bassinet with a kid’s desk, and some more decorative touches. I’ll include a couple of walls-cutout pictures so you can see the layout of the house better. I elected to get the unbreakable toilets.. just because I was tired of fixing them all the time.. and the showers are pretty high quality too, so that’s a large chunk of the value.

Downstairs

Upstairs

House 002 Chapter 1 < | > House 002 Chapter 3

House 001 Chapter 2 < | > House 002 Chapter 2

Before I get started on house 002, I want to say where my finished houses are on the gallery. My first house is up now, look under #thrallsdrifter.

My starting stats for house 002: Meet Xander Drifter!

(His aspiration is outdoor enthusiast, which he can’t start on until the next heir is a child… this should be interesting.)

I did manage to get some skills on him while he was a teen through group activities.

I love this shot of him … And why is he tense, you ask? (other than being completely broke…)

…. Well this should be fun! (sarcasm since he’s got no fun at the moment.. I foresee a lot of fishing to start out!)

And… here goes nothing:

House 002 Building Goal: 40k value home (2 bedroom, 1 bath minimum)
House 002 Generational Goals: Marry in an NPC, Outdoor Enthusiast
Aspiration complete, YA aged heir

Once again, we start on a completely empty lot with no cash, and since his fun is completely tanked, I have him play some on his phone before he can do anything else.

Then, we send him to fish since none of the digsite spawners are up yet and plants are still growing.

Our sleep area until we can afford a cot.. looks comfy, right?

.. And this is what we’re reduced to. Since there’s no grill in the area, and his hunger was low… it was more important that he have food from a cooler than getting a toilet (couldn’t afford the toilet yet anyway). Now it’s time to collect dirty bowls.

And start a garden. My chrysanthemum garden made me so much money in the last episode that I started this garden out with snapdragons (which are worth the same as chrysanthemums).

Oh, look who we found wandering around the neighborhood: Xander’s sister Kiara. Good for social!

.. And helping out watering the garden.

While wandering the neighborhood, I spy Grimmy – apparently he likes fishing!

The next day, I happen to notice a mailman uniform on a pretty girl, and I immediately have Xander drop everything to go meet her. Her name is Shaina Montalvo.. and she looks good! Unfortunately, the first trait we discover is dislikes children.. but she can deal with it. The second trait is loves outdoors, which is a good thing since we’ll be spending so much time outside. She looks like a good option for our NPC spouse – I’ll count that as a score!

After a few days of collecting, here’s what our lot looks like.. we JUST bought the sink and the shower, so he has lots of dirty bowls to clean up, and he’s heading in to de-grungify.

The very next time I see Shaina wandering (not in uniform this time), I start up a romance.. she seems to be receptive to Xander, as well, which is good.

Another couple of days of collecting and I feel we’ve got a good enough start to bring Shaina into the family. As per the rules, I move her in with marriage instead of the “move in” interaction.. and she agreed first try! Yay!

Here’s her stats.. and you can just see that Lindsey, our founder and Xander’s mom has passed on. Kinda sad, but I knew she was near her time when I moved Xander out.

The day after the wedding: I immediately get Shaina helping out on our just-expanded garden. Help makes the gardening go faster. In the background, you can see I’ve bought them the double air mattress and walled in the bathroom (but no roof.. because that’s silly on such a tiny house!) She spent the night playing with her phone, talking to people walking by, and finally dancing on our new stereo. Luckily the stereo outside our “front door” didn’t wake Xander, because Shaina just didn’t seem tired for more than a brief nap.

And I think I’ll leave it there for today.. more tomorrow, probably!

House 001 Chapter 2 < | > House 002 Chapter 2

House 001 Chapter 1 < | > House 002 Chapter 1

Reminder:

House 001 Building Goal: 30,000 value home
House 001 Generational Goal: YA aged heir

We’ll start this off with a photo of our heir as a child.. because apparently he kept me so busy as an infant I never thought to get a picture of him!

Meet Xander Drifter: boy genius. Sorry, couldn’t resist. But that’s the first trait I gave him. I was hoping it would help with him doing his homework. With the assistance of focusing paintings on the walls, he’s been pretty good at getting it done.

I have Lindsey help, just to make sure he doesn’t get interrupted and never finish it. He was also set to the “whiz kid” aspiration, but there was no way to get him through the whole thing without controlling him, so I didn’t worry about it much.

Overall, he’s a pretty easy kid to take care of… and since I get bored easily, I had them try for a second kid (a spare, if you will).

Family gardening. Xander isn’t old enough to help out, but he often tags along anyway.

Xander’s sister: Kiara. She was given goofball as a trait… it seemed to fit her hair (which is strangely reminiscent of her dad’s red Afro.)

At about this time I noticed that my house value had finally passed 30k.. so now it’s time for a little house tour.

The TV side of the living room

Other side of the living room

Dining room and front door (with Kiara doing homework.. yay!)

Kitchen leading to the back deck

Master bedroom

Right side of kid’s room

Left side of the kid’s room

Front shot of house

Back of house with garden

Not pictured is the upstairs hall and small upstairs bathroom.. they’re just too small to get a camera into!

More helping with homework. (For some reason I took a lot of shots of homework… )

Then.. this happened.

He had just come home from work, too. Poor Jamari had the whole household in tears for two days after passing away.

Cute sibling consoling.. they really spend a lot of time together!

More homework.. good job Xander!

Family TV time.. one of the few times Lindsey isn’t in the garden.. it’s SO much work.. I did get the “free services” LTH reward, and calling a gardener for free every day REALLY helps out.

Finally replaced the easel with a computer.. needed one to buy upgrade parts to upgrade the plumbing, and everyone seems much happier with the computer than the easel. (At least the computer gets some use!)

Funny hat, Xander… what could it mean…?

Yep! Xander is an “A” student now! All that homework paid off!

Kiara working on her homework.. actually upstairs at a desk!

Look who grew up! He seems quite pleased with himself. Since he was an “A” student, he grew up to be a “B” student in high school, giving him a little bit of a leg up. I gave him the “loves outdoors” trait, and the “outdoor enthusiast” aspiration, per the house 002 rules.

Right after growing up, he decided to do his homework, so to speed it up, I had mom help. Kiara is too busy eating cake to worry about homework.

… But at least she cleans up her own plate! One thing about Kiara I find interesting… she goes to bed very early in the evening and is back up at 3-4 AM. Why.. I don’t know.. but she continues this pattern all the way through her child and teen years. Very strange for a sim on free will!

Just a reminder as to what Lindsey does when the kids are off at school.. digging up digsites then fishing if she has time. Now that Xander is a teen, I have him help with the gardening in the afternoon to work on his skills. (Jamari used to help in the evenings, but he’s obviously not around anymore.)

Who’s wearing the crazy hat this time?? Way to go, Kiara is an “A” student now too!

Both of them doing homework at the same time!

Then some family time (mom helping Xander to get some skills up before he takes over for the next house).

Here they are gardening together. I’m not as worried about making sure everything is harvested as I used to be… simply because they’ve got 50k+ in the bank that I don’t need… the house is pretty well done, and I’m happy with the way it looks.

By this point, every day seems to DRAG by as I’m playing basically to wait for Xander to age to Young Adult. Was an incredibly boring couple of sim-weeks for me to play.. so I tried to just catch the highlights….

…Like birthdays!

First Lindsey…

… then Kiara. I gave her the “cheerful” trait, and the “soulmate” aspiration.. because she’s a spare and won’t be played.. but we can all hope for happiness, right?

Also..

Yay Xander, “A” student again!

Clearly all that homework has paid off.

More garden time…

….Family time…

… and Sibling time (yep that’s my Kiara, working on homework before going to bed early again…)

Then.. finally… guess what time it is?!?!

Xander’s birthday, and House 001 Completed!

Lindsey’s final Stats:

The only thing I forgot to get a shot of was the house value (just a little bit over 37k) and the current funds (around 70k).

Onwards to the next house!

House 001 Chapter 1 < | > House 002 Chapter 1