Weathered Fixer Upper

I made a trio of homes and Pru from N99 mentioned that they would be better on seperate residential lots, so I worked on the fixer upper one.






It's a 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath home with lovely fixtures and walls left by the original owners, who helped you out by starting the renovation, then stopping one they opened up the dry wall in some areas. Great for that family that needs more space, but has little money and is willing to put some work into restoring the home to it's former glory.

http://www.mediafire.com/...0Fixer%20Upper.Sims2Pack

It's clean except for the nekid wood wall recolor I made-which is the exterior wall.        

When the Bell Rings, 2011

Hapar, spring, 2011
Principal: Ilila Peterson; Secondary Teacher: Simlish & History: Jesse Kent; Secondary Teacher: Math & Science: Krissy Thorn

Secondary Students: Elphy Mendenhall is in the 12th grade; Myra Shazad, Naraj Shazad,  Bryant Grey, and Annie Grey are in 10th grade; Rex Mendenhall, Abel Wilsonoff, Amanda Wilsonoff and Serendipity Herendez are in 9th grade; Ashlee Dawson, Veronika Kent and Laci McMillian are in the 8th grade; Aaron Sweeny and Simora Sweeny are in the 7th grade

Half Naked, 2011

Hapar, spring, 2011
Benjamin Endeavor and Rashid Cunningham are 25, Verde Herendez is 24

It was one of Benjamin’s rare days off and he was determined to enjoy it before the evening arrived.

New Poll: Promoting a non-playable NPC family

It's time for a new poll!

Which non-playable NPC family would you be interested in seeing made a playable?

Issue 26: 2010

Issue 26: 2010

Contents

Warwick for Mayor
New Housing
Upgrades
Art Prodigy Studies Aboard
Culinary Corner

Announcements

Advertisements

Simply Held, 2010

Peacar, winter, 2010


Jorge and Jolie are 43, Grace Elise is 15, Ashlee is 12, Esther is 8, Chase and Amyra are 7

Optional Soundtrack: Heaven is the Face-Steven Curtis Chapman

"Hold still, the light is still blinking."

Follower Series: Nonikk63

I've always found interesting new blogs by looking through the lists of followers and commenters, not only on my own site, but the sites of others. I thought that I would do a monthly profile of the followers of Apple Valley so that others can see some of the other great blogs that are out there. I only chose the sim related blogs of followers (no personal or non-sim blogs) and of course there are many followers that do not have a personal blog.

This month, I'm profiling

Nonikk63

Nonikk63 has a sim's related blog called, Nonikk's take on Riverblossom Hills.

Riverblossom Hills is a pre-made neighbourhood in the game Sims 2. Pre-made means that it is already inhabited, but then of course you are free to change just about everything: their appearances, their homes and last but not least - their fates.

Nonikk63 starts the blog off with a series of makeovers of the Riverblossom Hills families. After then, the blog begins with chapters of the families and their stories.

Nonikk63's Riverblossom Hill is a finished story and for those simmers that love maxis premades, Nonikk63 has started another blog, Nonikk's take on Pleasantview which will follow the Pleasantview sims.

Glitter in my Bra, 2010

Givar, winter, 2010
S'Ahmisa Warwick and Lainey Lorde are 23, Ming Wuu is 24, Krissy Thorn is 26, Tyisha Masters is 19
Optional soundtrack: Last Friday Night (TGIF)-Katy Perry

"Let me see it again," S'Ahmisa asked grabbing Lainey's hands to stare at the new ring.

Popular Downloads

I like to see what you guys enjoy, so besides the lovely comments, I often consult my downloads and figure out which downloads are most popular.


Accordingly I discovered that most of you guys download my apartments much more than the other objects that I upload, but then again I upload twice as many lots as other things :)

1. Most of you have downloaded the 25e Avenue Au Sud de Bélanger lot and in particular the residential version.
   This is very surprising to me as I don't consider it one of my better creations. But you guys can't seem to get enough of it, which is enough for me to take another stab at improving it, especially in terms of that blank open "party room" on the main level.
2. Grayson Hill Brownstones is the next most downloaded item from this blog.
   
   They were originally inspired by Awesim's Historic Brownstones for TS3 and I love playing them in my hood and apparently you do as well
3. Another personal favorite and one of yours as well are the 18th Street Apartments.
   
   These were modeled after those gritty apartments in big urban cities that sit on top of great community venues such as video stores, coffee shops and greasy diners. I'm still interesting in building a set of apartments above some "main street" community venues that would be right at home in your rural areas as well.
4. The next most popular lot is the Apple Valley Academy which means that there are some hoods out there with a new school
   
   A bit bare box, but it serves its purpose in my hood and I hope in yours as well.
5. Finally, LaPlace Street Rental HomesThis group of rental homes seems very popular and I've heard back from some fellow simmers how they've edited the homes to fit into their neighborhoods by adding small playgrounds and such. I love it when you adapt the lots to fit your needs.

That's it for now, we'll see what's popular as time goes on and if any of the top five get knocked out by the newer kids on the block.

Powers Were, 2010

Givar, winter, 2010
Anthony is 29, Susie is 24, Robin is 3, Starling is 1 and Palila is 3 simlonic months

Anthony had quickly fallen into a routine caring for his three daughters. He usually woke up early, allowing Susie to get some additional rest.

Poll Results: University

The results are in

Steal Quite a Few, 2010

Resar, fall, 2010
Tyisha Masters is a sophomore, Rojo Herendez and Si'Enya Warwick are freshmen
Optional soundtrack: Living A Lie-The Dream and Rihanna

Si'Enya's freshman year had finally started and it was a bit of a strange world. The dorm was so noisy and crowded and students studying, or dancing or chatting. It was a lot different than bedroom at home. Sometimes she wished she were at home in her bed, curled up with R2D2.

Long Hours and Missed Time, 2010

Resar, fall, 2010
Ray and Lydia Wilsonoff are 41, Alia Shae is 6, Ari and Ava are 2

Ray and Lydia were tired of moving. After the birth of the twins, they had packed up their now too small apartment and moved into a tiny starter home.

Bringing Home Baby Havar 2010

Havar, fall, 2010

Susie held herself as the pain shot through her body again. She was trying to keep it together until Nicole and Lyndon made it to the house to get the children.

Culling Downloads, Part 2

Thanks to a combination of Delphy's Download Organizer, DJ's Compressorizer and grunt work my downloads folder is a nice slim 2.01GB. I am not done culling downloads, there are still a few more files that I need to delete, mostly duplicates and things that I need to view in-game before deleting.

Now I'm on a mission for faster load times. In spite of culling my downloads, my load time has crept back up to almost 15 minutes. It may not seem like a lot, but when you only have an hour to play, you want every minute to count. Also, 15 minutes seems so long now since I've installed TS3 and can start playing within 5 minutes. Then again, I don't have any downloads for TS3 besides some store items :P

My Sims 2 Folder is 3.62GB, so over half of it is downloads. I have moved on to other ways of decreasing the load time.

1. Remove photos from the Storytelling folders periodically. Currently I move photos from the neighborhood storytelling folder to another folder on my computer after each simyear. I might start doing this after each playsession. I have never moved the photos from the overall storytelling
2. Remove the Testing Hood that I created. I have no need for this hood anymore since I use my building hood to test items now.
3. Remove items from my Saved Sims folder, especially my own recolors.
4. Remove unused terrains from the SC4Terrains folder from 47.2MB to 19.3MB
5. Remove unused lots from the lot catalog

This has lead to a slight decrease in loading time.

For comparision, my game, without the downloads folder, loads in 5 minutes from bootup to the neighborhood.

With the downloads folder included, the load time is 13 minutes from bootup to neighborhood splash screen.

Obviously my downloads folder needs to be whipped back into shape as 13 minutes is still a bit too long.

My ideal time would be somewhere about 7 minutes, which means that if my downloads adds an additional 8 minutes of load time, then my computer loads about 0.251GB every minute and that I still need to get rid of 1.5GB to get my ideal time. My bodyshop downloads alone are 1.0GB!

Yikes, back to the drawing board about decreasing my load times...I guess I could always try and revert to the barest of downloads and see how I enjoy that (I doubt I would enjoy it very much). Maybe a more realistic ideal load time is 10 minutes, which means cutting about 0.75GB of downloads.

My next plan of action is simply removing my clothing downloads folder (over half of the bodyshop downloads folder space) and then adding outfits-ONE AT A TIME-per sim preferences, not mine. Since for the most part my sims tend to wear the same things day after day :P

Ugh, it's either that or upgrade the computer...

Coloring Within the Lines, 2010

Havar, fall, 2010
Principal: Johan Shazad; Primary Teacher K-3: Jasmine Frankson; Primary Teacher 4-6: Ilila Peterson

Primary Students: Aaron Sweeny, and Simora Sweeny are in 6th grade; Breckin Grey and Esther Dawson are in 3rd grade; Chase Dawson, Amyra Dawson, Jennifer Kent, Jessica Kent, Lara Grey and Matt Sweeny are in 2nd grade; Lilly Ana McMillian, Alia Shae Wilsonoff, and Udar Shazad are in 1st grade; Ana Rayne Wilsonoff, Jeremy Kent, Lora McMillian, Indira Grey and Craig Smith are in kindergarten