Week One Part Four: Whitfill Ranch

When Larita Whitfill went on an outing with her neighbor Rivka Dejackome, she never figured that she'd get a big ugly statue as a present from Elwood Riedmayer. But she did. It was worth 3000 Simoleons, just enough of a nest egg to impress a social worker, which suited Larita just fine.








The very first thing Larita did after she sold the statue was get on the phone with Sim City Social Services. Before too long she was all set to get an adoptive placement.











Larita used her own money to build an outhouse with a shower and buy an art easel. She figured that since she was going to adopt children it'd be better to have a stay-at-home career. She started on her first painting while she waited for the kids to come up from Sim City.









Blake was the oldest. He had dark skin, brown eyes, and red hair. Larita thought that was a funny combination, but she kept her opinion to herself. The boy was only nine, but he was already a little odd; insisted on going about all the time in an orange dragon suit and blue nightcap. Larita soon managed to convince him to wear clothes that were a little more normal.








Next oldest was Donte. He had brown hair, light brown skin, and the brightest blue eyes you ever saw. He was eight, and had already started wearing odd clothes like Blake. Fortunately in his case it was only the nightcap, and it was easy to tell him he ought to only wear that at night.








Jihoon was next. He was seven, with brown hair, light skin, and blue eyes, and seemed to not have the same weird dressing habits as the older boys. Larita would never admit it, but she took a particular liking to Jihoon the minute he stepped out of that van. He looked like a little farm boy in his flannel shirt and blue jeans. He did have a mighty unusual name, but Larita figured they'd all get used to it quick.







The twins were five. They were sisters to Blake; all three had been dumped at an orphanage when the twins were just babies. Veronica, who had gray eyes, said she was the older twin.










Rishell, the other twin, had brown eyes, which made it a little bit easier to tell them apart. It still wasn't easy; they moved fast and you couldn't see a kid's eyes when she was all the way on the other side of the yard.











Things were a little rough at first. Larita didn't have enough beds put together for everybody, so she became nocturnal--she'd sleep while the kids were at school, and then they'd take turns sleeping.











Although Larita didn't have the means to send her kids to private school, she made sure they got the best education she could give them. She was determined to put as many of them through college as possible. (Larita's lifetime want was "Graduate 3 Children From College.")








Eventually, Larita spent her nest egg making a very rough shelter for herself and the kids. From the front it looked pretty normal, but from the back it looked downright odd. None of them minded, though.









There was an enclosed bedroom and bathroom; then in the alcove they had two more beds, a mini-fridge, and a bookcase. When the weather got colder, they took turns sleeping in the enclosed bedroom so nobody got frostbite.









The Whitfills were (and are) one of my favorite families. Everything went even better than I could have expected with the adoptions. Going in, I was thinking I might have Larita adopt 7 children (the most she could have adopted, since you can only have 8 Sims on the lot), but after 5 it was just too exhausting to keep things going on the tiny bit of money she had, so I spent the nest egg. It felt like Larita was "done," anyway. Three boys were plenty to carry on the family name, and then the two girls had each other as playmates. (They did later become red hand buddies. Blake and Donte were each other's buddies, and Larita was Jihoon's.)

By the way, I made that stuff up about the kids all arriving at the same time and some of them being biologically related, because it suited the story. I adopted all 5 of them one day apart like one normally does in the Sims.

That's all for now. I'm actually about halfway through Week Four in gameplay, so look for more updates soon.

EDITED TO ADD: I felt I should note, just for statistics' sake, that Blake Whitfill is arguably the first member of Generation Two in Prosperity Plains. (The other contender is Millie Landgraab, whose birth will feature in my next blog post.)