Resigned

“Justine shook her head mournfully. “I do not fear to die,” she said; “that pang is past. I leave a sad and bitter world; and if you remember me, and think of me as of one unjustly condemned, I am resigned to the fate awaiting me.” – Frankenstein, chapter 8

Did she feel it, the impending doom in the air? Justine, the maid so dear to the Frankenstein family that she was all but a family member. Perhaps not, perhaps she spent her last days in the contented happiness that the family had provided her, in doting over young William and taking care of the house of her benefactors.

One could hardly blame her for feeling and expressing her gratitude so constantly, for it was the Frankenstein family — especially the late Caroline Frankenstein, Victor’s mother — who had convinced Justine’s mother to let her ignored daughter live at the Frankensteins from the age of twelve.

So it was that Justine’s worry and concern for William, the youngest of the family, became the first step of her downfall. If she had not heard of William gone missing and had not spent so much time looking for him that she had to seek shelter in a barn for the gates of Geneva were closed already, the creature would have never seen her, never felt the bitter twinge for her beauty and therefore would have never placed the incriminating locket in the coat pocket of her sleeping form.

With the locket from around the murdered child’s neck found in her pocket there was no hope for Justine, suddenly seen as the most ungrateful wretch in the world, someone willing to turn against her benefactors in the most dreadful way imaginable. No one seemed to question the logic of this, the only defense laid in the heartfelt pleas of Elizabeth who had only her firm belief in the innocence of Justine on her side.

Justine confessed for the fear of hell, for the threats from her confessor, but in private she still convinced Elizabeth and Victor of her innocence, thus dropping the last of the misplaced guilt off her shoulders. She became the second victim of the creature, albeit indirect, and in doing so: also the second victim of Victor Frankenstein himself.

A Tattered Page is a new in-store event that draws its inspiration from books. The first round focuses on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and you can find the shopping guide from the website. The hair and tears tattoo by Pale Empress, the prison with poses by [Black Tulip] and both dresses — light by .Luminary., dark by Pale Empress — and both necklaces — light by Eclectica, dark by House of Rain are a part of the event.

Scene:
Light: Garden of Dreams – The Atelier
Dark: [Black Tulip] A Prison for your Mind*

Body: Skin: !Imabee – Petal Florentien darkB & Eyeliner 1 | Eyes: IKON – Hope Eyes Denim | Lashes: Redgrave – 39 – Luscious | Hair: Pale Empress – Justine* | Hands: Slink | Tears Tattoo: Pale Empress – ATP Frankenstein Justine’s Tears*

Outfit:
Light: Gown: .Luminary. – Justine Cream* | Necklace: Eclectica – The Frankenstein Miniature*
Dark: Gown: Pale Empress – Justine Dress* | Necklace: House of Rain – Find Forever Gone Locket Closed*

Poses: flowey – a twinge in your heart | Picture This! – Jewelry Model 3 Mirror | [Black Tulip] A Prison for your Mind (poses part of the prison)*

The Wrench Hand

“Miss Abigail, a moment of your time?”

“Abby. By Gear and Gadget, do I look like a nob? ‘m a wrench hand, you can drop the blasted misses.”

“Abby. I was just wondering what exactly it is that the… wrench hands do in the Spiral?”

“What does it look like we do? Pick daisies? We make sure the bloody thing doesn’t blow up while you folks prance about in the fancy dances. ‘n it ain’t easy sometimes, let me tell you.”

“Ah. At least I am extremely grateful for that, let me assure you. But isn’t that dreadfully dangerous? Isn’t there some more… mechanical labor for such tasks?”

“Are you kidding me? Do you have any idea how much the Prototypes cost to create? They’re delicate machinations, the gearwork alone- …I mean, humans are always expendable, doesn’t cost much to make one of us, huh? Add a few implants for ocular accuracy and heat exhaustion and you have a new wrench hand.”

“…and how do you feel about that?”

“How do I feel about that? ‘m bloody- …oh, good day, Gazer, good day… grateful and happy to be able to keep us safe, naturally. What else?”

A Clockwork Spiral continues spinning, completely safe and stable, honest. The outfit by The Little Bat, necklace by AZE Jewelry Designs, goggles by Goth1c0, monocle by Souzou Eien, back exhaustion pipes by ~SongBird~, eyes by !Chop Shop! and the poses with the various wrenches by {Rook} are all available there.

Scene: A Clockwork Spiral

Body: Skin: !Imabee – Petal Florentien & Eyeliner/Lipstick | Dirt Tattoo Layer: Miss Shippe’s Studio – Digging in the Dirt | Eyes: !Chop Shop! – Gearhead Brass | Hair: !lamb – DIY Haircut Ink | Hands: Slink | Dirty Hands & Nails Applier: Izzie’s 

Outfit: Top & Pants: The Little Bat – Steam Outlaw Red* | Boots: The Little Bat – Abby Boots* | Necklace: AZE Jewelry Designs – Impedimenta Gear Necklace Gold* | Monocle: Souzou Eien – Archivist’s Monocle* | Goggles: Goth1c0 – Jasper Steampunk Goggles | Bracers: The Forge – Steamer Bracers | Back Augment: ~SongBird~ Smoke Stacks Augment*

Poses with Wrench: {Rook} – Wrenched Set

 

Crazy Colours

In case I haven’t mentioned this in the last months: I love crazy hairs. I usually wear a bob or an updo, but I go into complete squee-mode at the sight of a huge hairdo full of random things stuck into it. Hair Fair is normally a good place to spot new fanciness, but this year there was nowhere near enough weird-fun involved. Make more craziness, hair designers!

Ashtoreth by Tekeli-li is my absolute favorite from the whole fair and the one I knew I’d buy the second I put on the demo. I’m tempted to go and get their Hathor, too. ❤

Her divineness demanded crazy colours for the look, so I went sort of windlight-happy. I took the first two pictures in the Epic Toy Factory, which is always a pleasure to adventure in: at the moment you can even ride a dragon while locating the hunt prizes! Clothes worthy of a goddess were located in Bare Rose, skin is by Imabee, pose by LAP and the face tattoo is by [sYs], their prize in the Touch of Sensuality Hunt. All the eyes in this post are by The Plastik and lashes (when worn) by Redgrave.

Speaking of windlight-happy, this skin by Imabee (latest group gift) isn’t green except for the teal make-up. I just played the windlight up for the sea feel. The picture is taken in the pirate playground after all. Or mermaid playground, considering it is under the sea. The hair by Griddie is as huge and crazy as their hairs tend to be and it’s free in a fatpack of colours in the Hair Fair. The swim suit is by Miamai and it’s a Truth District Opening gift: available still today, go grab it! Speaking of available still today: today (July 8th) is the last day of Kozmetika’s Summer Event, too. The mergirl is wearing a combination of a freebie make-up by M.O.C.K. (in the said event only) and a fairy glamour mask by Random-Onics & Pink Wolf (Midsummer Night’s Dream Hunt prize). Pose is Mela’s and the bracelet is the latest subscribo-gift by Miel.

Of course I find these things way after pink and cerise colour challenges are over already! *shakes fist* The lingerie set is by Seldom Blue, their prize in the Touch of Sensuality Hunt. (The prizes are 10L, not freebies.) The hair is a freebie by BC322 from Hair Fair and if you like pigtailed lolita-style, they’re selling this in more normal colours there as well! Adorable. The skin is by [sYs], a Modavia group gift available only in their Modavia location. Additional eye make-up by M.O.C.K. (freebie available still in Kozmetika). As for the pose, it’s a part of the singing tree by World’s End Garden, their latest group gift. Three poses, one couple pose, birdies and butterflies = happiness. As for the background: home, sweet home.

Hive Mind izz Preciouzz~

This post is pretty much just inside jokes about the awesome hive mind that SLUniverse.com is, but the important bit is that there’s a sale going on with the proceeds going to the forum’s upkeep. I stumbled into their forums somewhere during the RedZone fiasco, looking for information and liked the atmosphere so much that I stayed. Since then life’s been one pool party after another! Psst, Cristiano, we need another one. <.<

The honey-dripping sheer top is by PixelDolls and the wonderful hive mind hat is by Bewildebeest, both from the sale. I’m not usually too yellow-friendly, but they were so awesome together that I had to get both. Exile sent a blonde hair as a subscribo-gift just in time to cover some very visible sheered-over bits. *grins* I used old freebies from Poetic Colors and Imabee for eyes and skin and ported to SwayLand for bee-pictures. The pose is by Poise and I’m not sure what our honey-covered heroine is up to, it could be anything from checking her new hat to being scared of the bees.

And like that wasn’t bad enough as the inside jokes go, I had to do this…

I made the shape myself and yes, it’s ridiculously unrealistic on purpose. I was trying to make a bee-girl, see. Huge head, short frail torso, big bum, long legs, tiny nose, huge alien eyes and so forth and so forth. While I was at it, I made the pose myself as well. The skin is the exact same Imabee as in the first picture. It’s insane how much shapes change a skin’s look, hm? The black markings on the face and the black legs and arms are all a part of a tattoo layer by The Plastik. The partial outfit is by Dare Designs and an attempt to get a striped look without actually having black-and-yellow striped clothes in my inventory. Hair is by Deviant Kitties, eyes by Absentia and the wings by Fancy Fairy.

I’m trying to resist this, but it has to be said: “My hive mind brings all the noobs to the yard, and they’re like, it’s better than yours, damn right it’s better than yours.” That said I shall now crawl to bed and die of shame and change my name. *nods, hides*

52 Colours: Neon Carrot

There is only one possible look that can sport neon carrot: space bunny! So, I poked around in my scifi costumes and bunny folders, opened some old boxes and tadah!

After a moment of photoshooting I realized something was missing. After a few re-arrangements this photoshoot got a secondary name: “Latte dreams.” Latte is my Ozimals bunny there, blissfully asleep. She’s dreaming of carrots. Or is she? Perhaps she’s dreaming of being Miss Neon Carrot, a brave space bunny zooming around with her carrot shooting gigantic gun and saving cute bun-boys from trouble! (No, the gun doesn’t really shoot carrots. It’s a dream!)

The picture is taken in a derelict space pod by ReTox and the wonderful gun is called ZE-X7 Hydra v17, but I have no idea of the maker. I’m pretty sure I got it from one of the older Steam Hunts, though. The awesome plugsuit is by PixelDolls (from their Hai Nakama series) and it was tintable, which made me a happy bunny. Hydraulic boots are by Gilded, jacked-in-arms wire things are by Burning Chrome and the pulsar bracelets by sYs. Latte’s carrot is made by Babydoll Lafontaine.

The hair with carrot tiara, the bunny ears & tail, the little flying bunnies circling around and the bunneh pride collar are all by Sanu. Many of these were old hunt prizes, though. She always has the cutest little hunts with stories. ❤ Skin is by Imabee, but I added a golden mask tattoo layer by Evie’s Closet to it. The monocle is by E&D Engineering and the eyes by Ruin. Pose is by Poise.

52 Colours: Banana Mania

Wot. This is a colour? An official, actual colour? Banana Mania? …aaalright then. Obviously it’s the banana -after- it’s been peeled, sort of soft beige-tan-nude in tone. Just as obviously I had to do something silly for a colour that’s named like that. Originally I had all kind of ideas of banana phones and whatnot, but… honestly, the softness of the colour itself was clashing badly with anything stronger, so I had to go with Plan B.

Here’s Miss Banana Mania, although she’s so much trouble that I think we’ll just call her Bania for short. We encounter her right after she’s been pressing her nose against the glass of the fish tank and has whirled around all innocent-looking. “What mermaid in my mouth? Oh, THIS mermaid? No idea how it got there! …I’ll put it back. Just turn your back first!”

The fish tank is from Dark N Crazy Furniture Designs, the fishies swimming in it are from 7 Seas Fishing (I placed their transparent fish tank inside the visible fish tank and then copied random fishies over). The background is from a cute skybox by Kis Kis (used to be NUT). Miss Bania is made out of a skin by Imabee, hair (& hat) by Curious Kitties, eyes by MaXeyes, lashes with colour splashies by Dimbula Rose and animal face tattoo of cuteness by JM:Mai. Oh, and adorable butterfly tattoo by Minajunk, nail polish by The Laughing Academy and geek finger tattoo by Soap. She’s wearing a top by Wretched Dollies and a skirt by Oyakin. The necklace is by Bombard and the poor mouthie nom mermaid is by Evie’s Closet. The pose is by Kristen Pick.

Luna warned us that there’ll be several strange colours in a row, so let’s see what the next week will bring…

So Steamy~

As usual, after I train my caming skills to extreme with Twisted, I assault Steam Hunt. They’re always during the same months, after all. Steam Hunts are mostly about furniture, gadgets, strange machinations and textures with some top hats tossed into the mix, but this round there were some excellent clothing choices as well! I used Sky Everett’s hairs in all the pictures as well as lovely golden eyes from Poetic Colors. Skins changed, but none of these were a part of the hunt.

Here’s a random noble lady, concerned over something, perchance a theft of something valuable. The matter disturbed her so greatly that she forgot her after-masquarade bath for the moment.

That half-mask with the elegant face piercing made me squee. It’s by Orquidea and absolutely breathtaking. The outfit is by Rag Dollz and matching gold-painted skin by Imabee. She’s sitting on a steampunk throne by Julia Collection while the bathtub by Damned Good Design is momentarily forgotten in the background. The holdable mask (a part of the outfit) lies on the edge of the bath. All the pictures except the last were taken in a steampunk loft by D&M Dream Furniture.

Perhaps this has something to do with her worries: an airship pirate obviously feeling way too smug for being innocent. Of anything. She’s been up to no good, that’s clear.

The whole outfit is by Dare Designs and perfect for daring pirate girls. It comes with a skirt option, but those just get in the way! The crates she’s sitting on are a part of a fun celebratory prop combination from Lemons & Cream, it came complete with champagne and a booty chest! In the background you can see a work table by E&D Engineering and outlander’s sideboard with accessories by Noctis. Skin is by Nightshade.

The pirate girl has reason to celebrate because she’s hidden her loot so cleverly that even the best detective in town has been driven to drink. Or at least to consider one, while fiddling with her trusted gun on the table.

This outfit is beyond awesome. I love Wretched Dollies as is, but when they turn into western steampunk complete with guns, it’s time to break out that champagne! The goggles are by Grim Bros, the hat is by The Mad Hattery and the skin one of the latest group gifts by Mynerva. The table with everything on it is a part of POST’s metropol set and there’s a fainting couch by The Naughty Victorian on the background. The sketches on the wall are a part of the loft.

Now, where did the pirate girl hide the treasure? In the magical gear forest guarded by steampunk fairies of course! …of course there are such things, stop looking at me like that. If there weren’t, there wouldn’t have been several pairs of wings as prizes, nor magical plants, flowers and awesome things as well!

See? A steampunk fairy! Wings by Wildz Creations and dress by Ezura. The skin was a 50L Friday purchase from The Plastik a while ago and I felt that the curliques on it worked with the wings~ Trees and shiny things on the background are by The Epic Toy Factory and I warmly recommend visiting them to see all the nifty things. It was impossible to capture the entertainment of teaching daisies to dance or hopping up and down on shrooms or wandering in the magical airship where the prize was hidden, you have to go and see for yourself! I set my own little magical gear garden in the conservatory by Primwynly.

I feel like I cut the story into a cliffhanger. Who knows, maybe I’ll make a colour-post about what it was that the pirate girl stole… one of these days. We’ll see~

52 Colours: Ecru

Ecru — what a strange sounding word. For some reason it doesn’t sound like this vintagey respectable shade of tan. Darker than beige, lighter than brown. I stared at the sample at 52 Weeks of Color Challenge and had two visions. One, a vintage pencil skirt suit. Two, a safari outfit. Despite a friend’s request to combine both, I didn’t go hunting for a vintage safari outfit, although I did buy something just for the colour challenge. First time so far! Although I have a feeling that these light, soft colours will be problematic for me. I tremble in fear just thinking of pastels.

Miss Ecru has packed her bags — even the one with a steampunk propeller — and poured herself a glass of champagne for bon voyage, and is ready to go! Where will she go? Who knows~ Perhaps she’s off to Paris for delightful dallying, perhaps to London for the latest scandalous season in high society, perhaps to Madrid to laze underneath a parasol and fan herself in the heat… the destination does not matter, it’s all about the moment of departure.

Skin by Mango Mango!, eyes by Poetic Colors, hair by Waka & Yuki, lashes by Imabee and additional make-up underneath the veil by Mynerva. Jacket and gloves by Miamai, shirt by Sn@tch and the skirt by Mimikri. The skirt is the one thing I purchased, I couldn’t resist the sale in Mimikri. It ends on March 7th, so if you haven’t checked it out yet you better hurry! The adorable little house is by Zacca, the small purse-size mini trunks on the window sill by Sey, the champagne by Waverly Kline, suitcase by Oblonski, the steampunk shopping helpers by The Brass Needle and pose by POSEbility.

Catching Up With Colours~

A year full of colours, perfect excuse to dig into your inventory and play dress-up, different colour every week. That’s more or less the nutshell of LunaJubilee’s 52 Weeks of Color Challenge. She lists a new colour every week. I didn’t even know there were 52 colours, yegads. My colour perception is practically male: light brown, dark brown, what’s the difference? Fortunately she provides a colour sample every time so I can try and match that! And hey, it’ll be randomly educational, too! Not to mention fun. ^_^

It’s week fifteen of the challenge now, which meant I had fifteen looks to cover. To make the post less picture spammy I actually used a photo studio and then just snip-copy-pasted three in one. Since I was lacking in my usual environment creation fun, I challenged myself in another way: matched the styles of the colours per picture. Can’t make it too easy on myself, right?

The first three colours — grey, blue and goldenrod — turned out to be manga-ish school girl characters. Although I think Miss Blue might be a teacher. I started with flailing about if I’d find anything in goldenrod, going ‘That’s a colour? O.o’ a lot until I finally located that shirt. It called for school girlness, so Miss Grey and Miss Blue just had to live with it. All of their poses are from Ks2cool.

Grey: skin – Frick, eyes – Kosh, hair & scarf – Curious Kitties, tattoo – Moloko, gloves & top – The Loony Bin, leggings – Aoharu, lip piercing – Virtual Insanity, armlet – Zenith Fashion, coffin purse – DV8, belt – Gauze

Blue: skin – M.O.C.K. Cosmetics, eyes – Umedama Holic, hair – Wasabi Pills, dress – Miamai, tattoo – Schadenfreude, stockings & garters – Vinyl Cafe, butterflies – Minajunk, bird ring – KUE!

Goldenrod: skin – Imabee, hair – Red Queen, eyes – Poetic Colors, top – Paradisis, skirt & gloves – League, boom box – katat0nik, aether headphones – Belle Belle, socks – Rotten Toe

Plum was another tricksy one until I did a search for it and found this exact colour sample match hair from my anime hairs folder! Much rejoicing. ^_^ Then I poked around in my lolita folder and found a dress with exact same hue whales on it. Obviously Miss Sepia and Miss Yellow weren’t that difficult to dress up once I had the lolita style decided.

Plum: skin – Violent Seduction, eyes – Rita Eyes, hair – Little Heaven, dress & tattoos – katat0nik, necklace – Pink Fuel, pose – Lazy Places

Sepia: skin – Imabee, eyes – Sn@tch, hair – Curious Kitties, monocle – E&D Engineering, orchid – Orquidea, collar – Steam Powered Nuts, Inc., dress – Frick, pose – Estetica

Yellow: skin – Pink Fuel, eyes – Glam Affair, hair – Fatal Error, dress – Dilly Dolls, tattoo – Curious Kitties, cyber arm implants – Fatal Error, pose – Melancholia Lilliehook

Cerise was one of those ‘This is a colour? Yegads, it’s dark pink!’ moments. I did a search for ‘pink’ and tried everything on and much to my surprise found this vintage lingerie -and- shoes in exact colour sample tone! Who knew~ Miss Green and Miss Silver got to wear lingerie just to match lil Miss Cerise. You can’t really see the shoes on Miss Green and Miss Silver that well, but all three are wearing Grim Bros’s fantastic curlique filled wonders. There’s just something so delicate, decadent and debaucherous in those details. And other d-words.

Cerise: skin – Frick, eyes – Kosh, hair – BettiePage Voyager, lingerie – Dominion Fashon District (creator: pisi Ruby), shoes – Grim Bros, stockings – Lapointe, gloves – Sn@tch, pose – Natasha Martov

Green: skin – Heartsick, eyes – Plastik, hair – Sky Everett, jewelry – Ganked, lingerie – Style by Kira, stockings – Dilly Dolls, gloves – The Black Canary, pose – Niqotine Poses

Silver: skin – Frick, eyes – Kosh, hair – lamb, nightie – A&A Fashion, shoes – Grim Bros, jewelry – Mandala, pose – CnS E-motion

Two browns in one picture! I divided them in order and when I realized that I’d have two separate browns in this one, I just knew it’d be steampunk. I mean… my inventory is sort of black, black, black, red, black, blue, black, green, lots of browns in the steampunk folder! black. I am so miffed I couldn’t use hya-blue (Silent Sparrow) for the middle girl, but I just could not match it to the colour sample with good conscience. Fortunately I had Sparrow in sienna!

Sienna: skin – Frick, eyes – Plastik, hair – Waka & Yuki, dress – Silent Sparrow, goggles – Belle Belle, steampunk headset – Londinium Gearworks, hat – Illusions, pose – Olive Juice

Indigo: skin – Frick, hair – Waka & Yuki, eyes – Mynerva, hat – Perturb/ation, gloves – Atsuki Kayo, necklace – Mariposa, dress – Evie’s Closet, pose – Niqotine Poses

Taupe: skin – Sn@tch, make-up – Frick, eyes – Plastik, hair – Waka & Yuki, gloves, skirt & stockings – League, top & necklace – Sn@tch, pose – LAP

When I realized my last picture had emerald, black and red I more or less squeed. …and then I couldn’t decide if I wanted to make a fantasy picture or a ballet picture. So I made both! It’s like a joke: ‘A dryad, a drow and a demon walk into a ballet class…’ Obviously the demon is more interested in inviting others to dance and the drow claims she can’t dance without daggers, it’s apparently a part of her cultural heritage. The dryad was at least somewhat happy~

Emerald: skin – Sn@tch, eyes – Plastik, hair – Curious Kitties, dress – DV8, necklace – Fallen Gods Inc, pose – EverGlow

Black: skin – Ho Wear, eyes – Kosh, hair – Exxess Designs, dress – Mocha, ears – Illusions, necklace – Deviance, lip spider – EarthStones, knives – ODB, pose – Niqotine Poses

Red: skin – Red Queen, hair – Deviant Kitties, eyes – Plastik, tattoos – Fallen Gods Inc, dress – Evie’s Closet, horns – Trap, jewelry – Mandala, lip piercing – Nightshade, pose – Niqotine Poses

Whew. Next week I’ll start blogging colours one per week like everyone else… guess I have to come up with something else for extra challenge… maybe to match furniture or other props, too…

The First 30 Days…

…are surprisingly important. In the life of your avatar, that is. During that first month you can pick up a lot of good freebies that won’t be available to you later on. They’re there just to help the newbies become less so. The ones that I’d absolutely recommend as must-haves are the ones from Sn@tch, Silent Sparrow and Evie’s Closet. The latter two are more Victorian and fantasy in style, but you never know when you’ll need a steampunk outfit or a fairy gown. If you are still under one month in SL age and haven’t picked up their newbie packets: shoo!

I began plotting this post for two reasons. One: a friend of a friend got into SL and I felt I’d end up rambling all of this to her anyway, so might as well make it into something more public and potentially helpful. Two: I also realized I hadn’t really made a proper newbie help post yet. Obviously every SL blog has to have one, right?

So, I started a new account, picked the default rocker girl as my avatar and loaded in. Cringed at the duck walk, admitted that the default avatars have gotten better from when I first started, but… yeah. Still plenty of work to do. One evening and zero lindens later, here’s the change:

I still wanted to keep a sort of rocker vibe and after I found this skin, the avatar shaping took a distinct turn to more Asian. I wanted to add more colour despite my immediate instinct to dress her in black, so I conjured another look, just because.

I’ll differ from my usual blogging habits and give full credits and SLURLs lower, just for this post. But before we get there, I want to mention a bunch of resources to help in the possible newbie cluelessness.

First of all: SL for Nowt. The link leads you to a wonderful page full of helpful articles about various things a newbie should learn, starting from how to get stuff out of boxes to lucky chair explanations to hunt etiquette. Read, learn, enjoy~

Then I want to draw your attention to one of the most important things you can do yourself to make your avatar look good: editing the shape. Yes, a good skin will make your character come to life, but without a fitting and realistic (if that’s what you’re aiming for) shape underneath it, the skin won’t do anything. Here’s a couple of excellent articles about shapes and anatomically realistic measurements in What the Fug? — Shaping Up 1 & Shaping Up 2. Don’t be a stick with t-rex short arms and balloons attached to your chest, it’s not difficult to edit the shape to look exactly like you want that avatar to look like!

On the subject of What the Fug? blog, I can spare you the horror of browsing and list the main no-nos: bling, slider-abuse, badly tinted prim feet, bad (or no) textures and most importantly: badly fitted prims. If you don’t yet know how to make a certain hairdo fit your head or how to stop your earring from floating near your shoulder: don’t wear them until you do. Simple as that.

Speaking of bad textures: stay away from (most) freebie places. Usually they are full of old, old things and going there is like being an alien fresh arrived on Earth and going shopping in a place called The Joy of Neon Eighties. It’s not the alien’s fault, nor your newbie self’s. Neither of you know any better yet.

Instead start reading freebie blogs and window shop good stuff from them, then log on and teleport over to yoink the said freebie. This kind of freebies are usually group-gifts of a store or a limited offer and represent the designer’s actual present-day awesome skills. My main bread and butter for checking what is new and must-have freebie and sales-wise is Fabulously Free in SL. I recommend them warmly~

My last advice to newbies is this: do not buy anything expensive until you’re at least a month old and have been going out and about in SL plenty during that time. You will just end up spending lindens on things you could find equivalent (or better) for free easily if you only knew where to look. The only exception to this is AO. It is very very difficult to find good AOs for free. (AO = animation overrider, it controls how you walk and move.) The only reasonable ones I know of are the 30-days-or-younger AO in Long Awkward Pose and a basic freebie AO for group members in VISTA, so you can get started for free, at least.

/stop rambling, cue credits

Shape: Heartsick (I edited it a lot, but used one of their freebie shapes as a basis. They also have adorable freebie skins and tons of cute dollarbie skins upstairs.)

Skin: !Imabee – group-gift

Red hair: Truth – freebie, fatpack of colours

Purple Hair: Exile – freebie, fatpack of colours, they have six freebie hairs for girls and three for boys

Eyes: Umedama Holic

Lashes & Eyebrows: !Imabee – a part of the same group gift as the skin

Make-up: BOOM in Kozmetika

Nails: Sn@tch – a part of the newbie avatar

Tummy tattoo: Silent Sparrow – a part of newbie gifts

Black outfit (picture 1): COCO – group gifts

Colourful outfit (picture 2): erratic – group gift

Boots: COCO – group gift

Bangles: Mariposa – freebie in MALT Village’s freebie corner

Earrings: Sn@tch – a part of the newbie avatar

Skybox & Furniture: PoP (Paper or Plastic) – hunt gift in Sideshow Freaks Hunt