Otherworldly

A new round of the Secret Affair has opened and it is full of wintry goodness and guaranteed to be cruelty-free furs. Among other things, you will find new releases from deviousMind, the Plastik and Noble Creations.

I had an unwanted visitor this week in the shape of a cold, so I have spent a few frustrated days getting nothing at all done and seeing various things build up, including the number of review copies in my inventory. I’ll be playing catch-up for a while, I can tell, so I might as well dive in right away to give you some new releases from Zaara, Aisling, Fallen Gods & Faida and Jian.

Another taste of ROMP, with some furniture from Roawenwood, props by Artisan Fantasy, jewellery by the Plastik and a special set of appliers from Luxuria.

ROMP is back with another round of elegant kink and I must say this is quite a spectacular edition with some very nice (and naughty) things on offer. Among those, new lingerie from Luxuria, a cosy rug and fireplace from Jian and some sultry eye makeups from Hekate. Also featured is a new mainstore release from Magika.

Terribly cheesy title, but I couldn’t resist it. Jian will be releasing the adorable White Tail Deer Family for The Seasons Story which opens its Winter round on the 10th. The family consists of an adult male, an adult female and a fawn. Each animal comes in four versions; standing animated, standing static and sleeping static, curled to the left or the right. They make a lovely addition to any forest, no matter the season, and will be sold for L$450.

Noble Creations has two new releases out for Cosmopolitan. I am featuring one of those, together with an update of an earlier release. I am also giving you another look at the latest version of alaskametro’s skinline as well as the latest hair from Wasabi Pills.

Despite all the landscaping I have done lately, I thought I would start off the new blogging year with a shot with less focus on my surroundings, in order to highlight one of my favourite things in Second Life: jewellery. And as it happened, the Plastik just released two gorgeous new earrings at their mainstore. An excellent excuse for a couple of profile photos, which also illustrate why mesh heads have not been a hit with me; try finding one that has a profile even vaguely in this direction and you will find its pretty much all cute button noses and rather flat faces. So, that’s my mini-rant for the new year, but now onto the goodies!

As I had guessed, the holidays were not conducive to blogging. But that’s alright, they were conducive to lots of good food and lots of reading. Now, however, I need to distract myself from the upcoming end (of the year, that is), so I have been doing a bit of landscaping on the sim again. With the help of the fatpack of Fanatik‘s Lofoten cliffs, red mountains and rocky islands have started cropping up on the sim. Our new desert area isn’t quite the way I’d like it yet (I need better sand textures and I need play around a bit more with the placement of the land forms set from Studio Skye), but its good enough to serve as the backdrop for these shots.

Botanical has released a really cool weather system that handles both snow and rain. After checking it out, Ran agreed with me that it would make a lovely addition to the sim, so now we have it setup for rain in one section and snow across our little northern island. That seemed like the perfect place to show off one of the Chyll skins by the Plastik as well as some of their latest jewellery.

We just finished putting up our RL tree, which put me in the mood for a tree in SL as well. I brought out the fantastic Christmas tree from Libertine from 2014 which has an amazing scripted system for decorating it with ornaments that you can obtain from various sources. There’s a new version out this year at the Midwinter Fair and new ornaments in a gacha there; you will need the 2015 version of the tree to use both 2014 and 2015 ornaments.

My second visit to the Midwinter Fair takes a look at another lovely gown, this one from Figment, as well as at some mischievous squirrels from HEXtraordinary.

The 5th Midwinter Fair is almost upon us, opening at noon today. The fair will be offering new releases, sales, gachas and a blogger expo. After a day in town at Christmas markets, I am kicking off my coverage of the fair with a warm and elegant gown from Velvet Whip, here paired with a hair from Oblivion for Hairology and a skin from PXL for the Winter Gacha Festival.

Quite a few winter-themed events are opening this weekend, among them the Winter Gacha Festival and the Wayward Market December edition, from which I am featuring a few products (together with items from Hairology and Collabor88).

It feels a bit strange to be in modern clothing and on a modern-themed sim! I have fallen into doing almost entirely roleplay/fantasy looks (well, that and a lot fair bit of nudity), but in doing this shot I felt I’ve actually missed doing a bit of this and that. So, I am glad I was inspired to do this by the newest release from Zaara as well as a brand-new hair by Amacci.

I am in the middle of getting things ready for Christmas in RL, so it certainly seeps into my mood in SL as well. Our cottage from much-missed Alchemy Immortalis was picked as the perfect setting for a cosy scene featuring some new décor from Aisling and Paper Moon as well as a new alaskametro skin, a hair from Tableau Vivant and the last chance on a dress from The Muses.