Week Two Part Four: Whitfill Ranch

It seemed like only a few days had passed before Blake turned 13. He was a very outgoing young fellow and said he wanted to charm the ladies when he grew up. Larita discouraged such talk. She was happy that Blake didn't let his aspirations get in the way of his obligations to his family. He studied hard and helped out plenty around the house, especially with fixing the very unreliable plumbing.





The other kids weren't far behind Blake; next thing Larita knew it was time for the twins' 13th birthday. Larita couldn't afford a party, but the kids seemed to enjoy the occasion anyway; a lady who happened to be walking by heard them singing "Happy Birthday" to Rishell and came over to congratulate her.

I decided to teach myself to use Picasa.
My first lesson: Text over photos.

Of course, the kids weren't the only ones getting older. Larita was beginning to feel her age. Sometimes she worried whether she'd live to see her kids grow up. Could five teenagers take care of each other if she was gone?

Then one day a gypsy woman came and gave Larita a magic lamp. Of course, Larita didn't really believe it was magic, but she was never opposed to free stuff.

Naturally, she was struck dumb when she rubbed the lamp (just to polish it up, you understand) and a genie popped out! He offered her three wishes, and she wished for peace of mind, riches, and a long life. The genie said that her wishes were all granted and left in a puff of smoke, leaving sacks of money in his wake.

The kids didn't believe the story Larita told about a genie; they figured her friend Mr. Riedmayer had left her some money and she was just getting a little weird in her old age. At any rate, they suddenly had enough money to build a small but comfortable house--with a kitchen! Being hungry teenagers, the kids liked that part best. They cooked all sorts of food the first 24 hours in their new house, starting with spaghetti.





The next day, they had omelettes for breakfast.













Then they had hamburgers for lunch.













Last of all, they cooked a whole turkey for dinner.













Of course, they did still sometimes indulge in their old standby of pre-baked cookies.












This is what the house looked like at the end of the week. On the left, a bedroom with a ballet barre and two easels. Larita and Jihoon slept there. (Let's pretend my Sims live in a culture where a woman sharing a bed with her [adopted] teenage son is normal. Double beds are a lot more cost-effective than singles.) Behind that is a tiled area (the someday kitchen) with two more beds; one for Blake and Donte and one for Veronica and Rishell. On the right is the common area, with a small kitchen, a battered sofa, a bookcase, and a chess table. There are also two bathrooms; that felt indulgent but it really is necessary in a house with six Sims. (I find 2-3 Sims per bathroom works nicely, though I've definitely done 8 sims in a one-bathroom house before.)

Week Two Part Three: Riedmayer Cove

The house atop the hill was much roomier with Beata and her daughters gone. Elwood wasted no time trying for a male heir, and soon Jill was expecting.










Jack spent a little bit of time flirting with Denise Jacquet, who lived in the nearby Bluewater Village, but she was an uptight old lady. (Seriously, she rejected almost all of his advances.) The pickings were kind of slim in Prosperity Plains, though, so Jack focused on painting and working part-time in entertainment.








One day a young guy named Johnson Simpson invited himself home with Jack, and one thing led to another...

Jack was happier than he'd ever been in his life; at the age of 67 he finally admitted that the reason he'd never been in a deep relationship with a woman was because he was attracted to men. However, Jack kept his relationship with Johnson a secret from Elwood; his super-conservative brother would probably have a heart attack if Jack came out to him.


Meanwhile, Jill gave birth to a daughter, Agatha. Elwood quit his job so he could spend more time with Agatha--and with Jill. There was still hope for a male heir, after all.










Not very long after, Elwood and Jack were birdwatching at the edge of the lot when Elwood abruptly collapsed and died. His death was hardest on Jill. She had been aware when she married Elwood that she would probably end up a widow before too many years, but she didn't anticipate it happening while their daughter was still so young.






Jack stepped up to help take care of his niece. His brother's death reminded him that life was short and he didn't want any regrets, so he came out to Jill. Jill, being young and rather progressive herself (*cough* Romance Sim *cough*), was nothing but congratulations, and it was only a few weeks after Elwood's funeral that Johnson moved into the Riedmayer home.






It turned out that Johnson's job in entertainment, through which he met Jack, was just a side gig; he was actually employed as an All-Star athelete. His income certainly helped things; Jack had quit work entirely and Jill was only an EMT.









Just a few weeks after Elwood's death, Jill discovered that she was pregnant again. She was apprehensive but decided that being a single mother to two children really couldn't be that much harder than being a single mother to one.









Jacqueline Riedmayer was born about eight months after her father's death. Jill knew that Elwood would have been disappointed to not have a male heir, but she figured it was okay to be a little unconventional.









Both Jack and Jill benefited from Elwood's life insurance policy. The money enabled them to turn the tiny shelter into a larger, more well-appointed dwelling. Due to their hilly property, the house was kind of oddly shaped. The kitchen was very large, so Jack and Johnson slept there until there was money to build a second story. Jill shared her small bedroom with both her daughters, who were fortunately still in cribs.




This is what the outside of the house looked like at the end of the week. It's kind of ungainly now, but I promise it gets prettier later.

I kind of just let things play out as they would at the Riedmayer house this week. I definitely wasn't planning on having Jack get into a relationship at all, much less one with a man, but it's hard to keep a Romance Sim happy without a little...well, romance. I ended up liking Johnson a lot; I honestly like him better than Jill.

I was definitely disappointed first that Elwood only lived long enough to father two children, and second that neither was a boy. However, I've since gotten accustomed to it. Also, he gave me another platinum gravestone despite being a Fortune Sim who only made about $1000 in his entire life.

Yay!

I have to break my chronological recounting in order to make an announcement: The first member of Generation Three was born today!

Lauren Whitfill, daughter of Jihoon Whitfill and Francine Whitfill (nee Riedmayer) arrived a little after midnight on Saturday of Week 4 in Prosperity Plains, which was a little after 3:30 in the afternoon on Leap Day in Ohio. She has fair skin, brown hair, and blue eyes. Mama and baby are doing fine.

By the way: Francine is the youngest member of Generation One, having arrived in Prosperity Plains as a toddler. However, since Jihoon is Generation Two, all of their children are Generation Three. I am loving the fact that the youngest member of Generation One gave birth to the oldest member of Generation Three.

Week Two Part Two: Dejackome Place

Thanks to a generous gift from her friend Elwood Riedmayer, Rivka had a little extra money around. As soon as the check cleared the bank she was on the phone with the adoption service. Not long after she received an adoptive placement of four siblings--two sets of fraternal twins!

The older pair were named Gretchen and Jeannie. Gretchen had red hair and green eyes.












Jeannie had brown hair and green eyes. Rivka couldn't help but think Jeannie looked a little bit like herself as a child, except Rivka's eyes were brown.










The second pair were Gavin and Theresa. Gavin had red hair and green eyes like Gretchen.












Theresa shared red hair with two of her older siblings, but was unique in having brown eyes.












Rivka soon realized that, getting on in years as she was, she might not be around long enough to see her children safely to adulthood. So she invited over her good friend Melanie Tse and asked if she would like to move in. Shockingly, Melanie agreed. (Later, Rivka would learn that Melanie herself had been raised in the foster system and thus felt for children without families.) Melanie brought a little money with her and they were able to lay the foundations for a new house to replace the flimsy shelter Rivka had erected. Melanie got a job as a record store clerk to help pay the bills; Rivka quit her dead-end job to stay home with the children.

Rivka's predictions about her longevity proved sadly correct. She passed on while all of her children were still in elementary school--just collapsed in the yard one day while birdwatching. Melanie organized a simple funeral and did the best she could to console the children.








Melanie became the children's legal guardian but never actually adopted them herself. She also never encouraged them to call her "Mom," emphasizing that Rivka was their mother. So they called her "Auntie Melanie."

Despite this, Melanie essentially was a mother to the Dejackome children in the ensuing months and years. She helped them with homework...





...and she made them pancakes for breakfast sometimes.












Of course, the children did have to work through some trauma, considering they had barely left the orphanage when their kindly adoptive mother died. However, they were soon acting like happy, well-adjusted kids.









Melanie did occasionally let them get away with stuff she might not have otherwise, figuring that if they were happy it was okay to wear out the box springs a little bit.










Rivka had carried a fairly large insurance policy, so Melanie was able to pay for some improvements around the property. Of course, the first thing she did was put a protective fence around Rivka's grave and plant some flowers to pretty it up a bit.








Melanie was also able to improve the look of the interior of the house--three bedrooms, one bathroom, a well-appointed kitchen and dining room, and a living room with plenty of space for guests. (The Dejackome house is a rough model of a house in one of the novels I'm working on, so it's not necessarily well laid-out for Sim life. It works okay for the Dejackomes, though.)






Outside, Melanie planted some flowering shrubs to make the little gray house look more cheerful.

Altogether, it was a pretty good week for the Dejackomes. Much better than Week One. Though the pictures don't reflect it, Rivka was actually very close to all her children despite the short time she got to spend with them. The reason she died in platinum was that as each child was adopted she rolled a want to be friends with that child, so I made sure she became friends. Then she'd roll a want to be best friends and I'd try to fulfill that too. (In case you didn't figure it out, I made up the stuff about the kids all being siblings, just like I did with the Whitfill kids. They looked so much alike it was an easy imaginative leap.)

A nice side effect of this was that the kids got quite a lot of life insurance money when she died. Combined with Melanie's income, that money enabled them to live pretty comfortably.

Melanie will probably die a spinster. She's a knowledge Sim (with a lifetime want to reach the top of the Gaming career), so she probably won't mind.

Week Two Part One: Kules Korner

As they worked their way through high school, Darius Kules and Elise Kalson started spending more and more time together--some of it at Darius' house, some of it at clubs.










Brittanie didn't really care what her son did after school, as long as he pulled passing grades. His more frequent late nights out enabled her to make a few conquests of her own, such as bartender Ryan Cho. (At this point I think Brittanie was working as a convenience store clerk, hence the dual apron wearing.)







Brittanie was rather upset to discover that her dalliance with Ryan had some unexpected consequences. Darius was delighted at the prospect of being a big brother, but Brittanie preferred to ignore this new development as much as possible.








She avoided Ryan for the duration of her pregnancy, knowing he would ask uncomfortable questions. Instead, she had a fling with Abjiheet Depiesse, whose views on commitment were more in line with her own. (He's a Romance Sim too.)








Finally the baby was born and Brittanie could shed those awful, frumpy maternity clothes. The baby was a boy; she named him Jaden, bought him a cheap crib, and then promptly forgot that he existed.









Fortunately for Jaden, Darius picked up the slack in terms of baby care.












At the end of the week, the Kules family had two bedrooms (one for Brittanie and her lovers, one for Darius and Jaden). The common area and bathroom remain largely unchanged.

I love babies, both real and Sim, so I couldn't resist giving Brittanie a little surprise. Let's justify it on the grounds that it can't hurt to have a second Sim capable of carrying on the Kules family name. (Since Jaden is illegitimate, the game gave him his mother's last name.)

Week One Part Five: Riedmayer-Landgraab Estate

Immediately after their marriage, Beata and Malcolm moved to their own place. They bought a pre-built, partially furnished house rather than going to the trouble of building one themselves.

Just to the right of the entryway was a living room. Beata thought the cheap-looking futon and loveseat didn't fit very well with the ornate fireplace, but there would be plenty of time to upgrade later.










Behind the living room was the kitchen, which had basic appliances and a folding table with two chairs. Knowing how expensive kitchen remodels were, Beata figured she should get used to those cabinets.









The back door led from the kitchen to a porch, which was unfurnished...for the time being.












On the left side of the hallway was a good-sized bedroom, unfurnished, and two small, empty rooms which seemed like they were supposed to be bathrooms.











Beata and Malcolm immediately purchased a queen-sized bed and a crib for the soon-to-arrive baby. They also added fixtures to the master bathroom.











The upstairs was conveniently already furnished. At the end of the hall was a full bath; to the right was a room decorated princess-style that would be perfect for Francine; to the left was a Goth-looking room that would suit the twins. The room held a double bed; Beata offered to buy two single beds instead but the twins said they thought the bed was awesome and they could totally share it.





The first night in their new house, they did just that.












The family's daily routine remained largely unchanged; the twins went to school together and played Red Hands together when they got home.












One day Beata found herself having an afternoon snack with an unfamiliar teenage boy. He introduced himself as Greg Pons and said he'd come home on the bus with Joan and Edith.










Of course, the girls couldn't spend too much time socializing. The twins only had a few years left before they would be too old to attend college, so they worked very hard to get their grades up. Francine wasn't struggling too badly with school, but she liked studying alongside her older sisters.








Soon, it was time for the baby to be born! She was a girl and Malcolm chose the name Mildred, after his great-grandmother. (Malcolm's family tree actually doesn't go that far back; I made that part up. Also, does anyone find the Hobby people trooping into one's house at all hours unbearably weird?)









In what seemed like no time at all (though it was actually three years), Beata and Malcolm were welcoming a second child. This time the baby was a boy, and naturally he was named Malcolm Landgraab V. They usually called him Little Malcolm or Mal.










Edith had been asking to go to private school for years, but Beata told her there was no point since she'd be going to college soon. Joan didn't care one way or the other, but not long after Francine turned 13 she began adding her voice to the protest against public school. Finally Beata relented and invited over the headmaster. Francine took charge of the visit, giving the headmaster a tour and otherwise being as nice to him as possible.




The next semester, all three donned their private school uniforms and boarded the bus. Edith was the first one out the door, so eager was she to soak up a little exclusive private school ambiance before heading off to college.









Francine was next; she had heard that the academics at the private school were much more challenging than at the public school.











Joan was last. She was happy to go to private school too; the advantages would help her provide for her future family. She just wasn't quite as eager as her siblings. (I feel compelled to note that Joan was *not* working on her own homework as the bus pulled up; she was working on Francine's. Francine was too tired after schmoozing the headmaster half the night.)







Soon Millie outgrew her crib in Malcolm and Beata's room and they bought a new bed for the princess room. Francine didn't mind sharing her room, though she was glad she didn't have to share a bed like Joan and Edith.









Francine decided early in her teenage years that she wanted to be a world-class ballerina when she was older. So that she could look the part, Francine started wearing her pretty blond hair in a low bun.

Francine Riedmayer, CAS toddler,
daughter of Beata Riedmayer-Landgraab
Blond hair, brown eyes, S2 skin
Aspiration: Knowledge
Lifetime want: Become World-Class Ballet Dancer
Astrological sign: Virgo

This is what the downstairs of the Riedmayer-Landgraab house looked like at the end of the week. I kept the second crib because I was planning on them having a third child in fairly short order.









At some point the folding table and chairs were replaced by this cute little set. It's not big enough to fit a large family, but this family rarely sits down to eat all together anyway.










They also got new living room furniture that matched the fireplace better--a sofa, a loveseat, and a bookcase.











This is what the upstairs looked like. Not much changed; I think the addition of Millie's bed was the only thing. You can see Joan talking on the phone to, I think, Greg Pons. But more on that later.









There are two things I would have done differently with this family had I known then what I know now. First, I would have waited to move them out until the very beginning of Week Two at Riedmayer Cove, rather than the very end of Week One. As is, they're out of sync with the other families. Oh well. The other thing is that I would have moved them to an empty lot and built them a house. Not because I don't like this house, but because unbeknownst to me I broke the prosperity challenge rules. See, the updated Apartment Life rules state that Sims can only move to a new lot ONCE in their adult lives, and Beata and Malcolm moved twice. (Also, Joan and Edith moved twice as teens. It doesn't say anything about children, so I guess Francine is safe.) See, when Malcolm first moved in with the Riedmayers he brought a lot of money, so I bought some statues and stuck them in his inventory so he could keep that money. Then I moved them all out to a small empty lot and sold the statues so they'd have enough cash to buy the pre-built house. I'm figuring this is okay (you haven't noticed me forfeiting the challenge, have you?) because this family didn't actually gain any net worth by the move, but I feel terribly guilty about it. (After the moves their net worth was about 50,000 Simoleons; if they had sold the statues and stayed on the empty lot, their net worth still would have been 50,000 Simoloeons.) The only reason I did it the way I did was because I was sick of building houses from scratch. Master architect I am not.

Anyway.

On a lighter note: Millie Landgraab is arguably the first member of Generation Two. See, she was conceived before Blake Whitfill was adopted, but born after. So it kind of depends on whether conception qualifies a Sim as a member of the neighborhood.

This installment wraps up Week One in Prosperity Plains. Stay tuned next week for lots of babies, a few platinum tombstones, and the first batch of Sim State University students.