The Avery's of Sunset Valley (a Dynasty)

[Twinmum]

Introduction.
I’m not sure I gave Jackson's traits last time.
Workaholic, Handy, Green Thumb, Schmoozer and an Angler. His LTW is Renaissance Sim.

Part 1
Jackson again chose to move into Sunset Valley. He spent his first few days gaining some skill points in gardening and fishing. He salvaged some furniture from the junkyard and more or less lived at the fire station. He managed to pick up a cheap camera at the consignment store. On Thursday he got a job in the science career.
Saturday arrived and he decided to see just where things would lead with Holly Alto. He really didn’t want to invite her to his empty block with all it’s junkyard furniture, so he donned his best suit and headed to the park behind  the fire station and invited her to come over. Holly arrived in that wonderful little car and Jackson wasted no time in romancing her and quickly felt confident enough to pop the question. She seemed very excited about it!



Not wanting her to drive home and have her parents talk her into leaving the car with them, Jackson suggested a private ceremony there and then although there were a few people in the park to witness the happy event.



Once Holly moved in, she got to work on her cooking and improving her painting skill. She has painted a portrait of Jackson but is working on being able to do a better one. She has tryed her hand at sculpting, but will focus mainly on cooking and painting. Jackson meanwhile has a lovely garden and is keeping ahead of job requirements in his skills. He hopes to get to the top of his career and retire early so he can pursue other things.



Norma

[wildredchild]

Very nice Norma!  Great start and looking forward to more.

[Saltypaws]

Very nice.  Good start.  I really like Holly, she is easy to work with like Christopher Steele is.  Keep up the good work.

[Happytime]

Norma, Holly looks super-happy. Great picture.

  -- Happytime

[Twinmum]

Part 2
Week 6 Day 1: Jackson and Holly have been busy. Jackson has achieved his life time wish, thus maxing out fishing, gardening and handiness. He is just waiting for the right opportunities to plant special plants and he will have completed all the challenges for gardening. He is so close to reaching level 10 in his career, he should do that on his next work day. He will retire early when it happens to concentrate on other things, mainly improving the friendships he has to best friend status. He is still a week away from becoming an elder. 
Holly has mastered painting and has painted a masterpiece of Jackson as an adult, it’s a pity the one of him as a young adult wasn’t a masterpiece. She has also mastered ice sculptures to the point where they will no longer melt and has one of Jackson ready for the museum. She has also managed to get photos of him as a young adult and an adult. She’s not comfortable with the camera, even the expensive one he brought home from the consignment store last week, so she thinks that after taking a photo of him as an elder, she will hand the camera back to him, he seems to be quite adept at taking photos.
She has really worked hard with her cooking and has even learned the recipe for ambrosia.
After all the hard work, she now has time to relax and both she and Jackson decided it was time for an heir.



Money hasn’t been an issue and they have bought Hogan’s Deep Fried Diner and the park across the street. The park needs some work done on it, but that will come in the next week along with extensions to the house and the building of the museum.

Norma

[Twinmum]

Part 3

Holly continued to refine her painting skills throughout her pregnancy and it was while at the easel that she went into labour.



Jackson came to give her support, but seemed a bit frazzled by the whole ordeal, even though Holly seemed to be having a blast!



Although Holly had planned on a home birth, she decided that a trip to the hospital might be in order, if only to calm Jackson. She soon delivered a healthy baby girl who they named Daphne.



Just before Daphne’s birth, Jackson reached the top of the science career and decided to take an early retirement. He was still a few days off becoming an elder. He used the time to add the upper level to the house in readiness for their growing family. He also commenced work on the Hall of Immortals and upgraded the park across the street.




This is Jackson’s adult portion of the museum.



Jackson and Daphne both had a birthday in the space of 2 days. Jackson is happy to have finished work as it allows him to spend time with his daughter. While Holly works on portraits of them both, he has been busy teaching Daphne the must have skills for life.



Jackson has now fulfilled almost all the requirements for eating ambrosia. He is awaiting the completion of his elder portrait and just needs to improve a few relationships to best friend.

[Schipperke]

Daphne has the same odd-coloured hair that Holly's daughter Wimsey has in my Dynasty!  Well, Wimsey's hair is black and white, while Daphne's appears dark brown, but those light coloured ends are the same.  Must be part of their Alto heritage.

Great re-start.

[Twinmum]

You could be right about the Alto hair. In my first attempt, when Michael aged to toddler, he had the same two toned hair colour.

[samoht04]

Lol, everyone else is rich by the time the second gen is born and here my founder is sleeping in a rusty bed eating of the toilet!  With only $45 to spare. Great re-start as well! 

[Schipperke]

Lol, everyone else is rich by the time the second gen is born and here my founder is sleeping in a rusty bed eating of the toilet!  With only $45 to spare. Great re-start as well! 

Mine were far from rich at that stage.  They lived on the lawn right up until Gen 2 was born.  For a long time after that, the household's main source of income was what James could salvage at the junkyard and his proceeds from criminal activities.  Take heart, Samoht!

[Twinmum]

Part 4
With Jackson already an elder he started to get a little concerned about the fact that he still did not have 6 best friends, so to try and change that, he decided to throw Holly a birthday party.



The party went wonderfully, in fact, after it was finished it was touted as being awesome verging on epic and that Sims would talk about it for years. However, the reason they will be talking about it for years, could be because it was while Holly was blowing out her candles that Agnes Crumplebottom was visited by Grim!



The party was a success for Jackson though, he ended the day needing only 1 more best friend.
After her birthday, Holly got straight back into working on museum pieces, although she still has trouble with sculptures at times. Here she is attempting one of Daphne.



Time waits for no one and before long, Daphne was off to school for the first time.



Jackson continues to spend time helping Daphne, even getting down on the floor to help her with her homework.



It wasn’t long before Daphne was having another birthday. My how time flies. Jackson threw Daphne a party which was a great success. See the young man behind Daphne? That’s Darren Richter who Daphne met when she first went to school. He’s a little bit older than her but they are great friends and it wouldn’t be a big surprise if they become sweethearts.



After socializing at the party, Jackson found himself with 6 best friends (it’s been a hard slog getting them lol) and finally eligible to eat ambrosia. Holly had made some in anticipation of this day and had stored it in the food replicator.



Just to recap Jackson’s stats:
Career: Science
LTW: Renaisance sim – Gardening, Fishing and Handiness
Supermax Skill: Gardening
3 LTR: Super green thumb, no bills ever, food replicator.
Property:  Summer Hill Springs
Building: Hogan’s Deep Fried Diner
Best friends: Tim Shultz, Darlene Bunch, Daphne Avery, Hank Goddard, Kenya Hsu and Judy Shultz
Black Ops: Jackson did several opportunities all related to the science career and gardening. He never accepted any that related to fishing or handiness, leaving those open to future generations.

Plans for future generations:
I have plans for what all the immortals will do, starting with Daphne, who will be a sculptor. As it takes so long to get to the no melt ice sculptures, it makes sense for an immortal to take on that job.  We may not get an ice sculpture of her as an elder or adult, depending on how long Holly lives, but future generations will have one done at each life stage.
For LTR’s each generation will have those that are specific to their career or skill and the others will be filled with either one off rewards that will benefit the household or ones that I consider  ‘useless’ rewards – rewards that don’t really do a lot and I don’t usually take. This will leave things like steel bladder, prepared traveller, MTS (all the good ones) open to be taken by anyone.

Norma

[AriaGirl77]

Great re-start Norma!  So sad for Agnes... *sob*  I think I'll get over it.  lol

[Twinmum]

Well they say third time's a charm. Let's see if it's true. I made a major flaw in my planning as far as LTW's was concerned and I really don't like my chances of continuing, so it's back to the drawing board. I won't bother doing the full story here until my second generation is at young adult, then I'll pick up the story again.
There will be one big difference though, I've already got Jackson and Holly married but she didn't come to the park in the car and only brought 2,000 to the household. So they will be roughing it for some time with junkyard furniture and living under the stars 

Norma

[Schipperke]

There will be one big difference though, I've already got Jackson and Holly married but she didn't come to the park in the car and only brought 2,000 to the household. So they will be roughing it for some time with junkyard furniture and living under the stars 

Yes, that's all Holly brought with her in my game.  But now they've got so much money they don't know what to do with it.  You can get a lot of money if you salvage at the junk yard every couple of days and get stuff repaired.  James still goes there when he's out on his rounds, even though they certainly don't need the money at this point - the other day he picked up two of the $3500 televisions!  And the fortune cookie machines are a good deal also.  I look forward to seeing more of your story.

[Twinmum]

The Avery’s Take Three
I hardly took any pics for the start of my third attempt, but here is the story so far:
Jackson had the slightly different traits this time round – Charismatic, Handy, Green Thumb, Friendly and an Angler.  His LTW was creature robot cross breeder.
He still entered the science career and he still married Holly Alto. The big difference this time was that Holly only brought 2,000 to the household and no car lol. They have been roughing it without the cash from the car.
This time, Holly didn’t wait till she could sculpt unmelting ice sculptures before falling pregnant. She had a boy, who was named Nicholas.
We catch up with them a day before Nicholas ages up to a young adult.
So far his traits are friendly, artistic, ambitious and kleptomaniac. He has registered as a self employed sculptor and is at level 6 in his career and level 7 for the skill. He still has to do another 20 ice sculptures before they don’t melt any more. As well as sculpting, he has managed to do 2 school based opportunities, so hopefully there won’t be too much drama with him getting the rest of his BlackOps. He has also managed to get and stay on the honour roll in both primary and secondary school. He has a number of friends his own age and will spend the next few days getting to know the female friends a bit better.
Jackson, meanwhile has reached level 10 of the science career (and so completed his LTW) and retired. He has maxed out gardening and just needs to plant an omni plant to have completed all the challenges. He has bought Hogan’s Diner and Stoney Falls. Stoney Falls still needs a bit of work to completely bring it up to scratch. Again, he has done several opportunities, all related to either gardening or the science career, leaving other skill opportunities for future generations.
For unique LTR’s he has taken no bills ever, super green thumb and the food replicator. He also has attractive, opportunistic, eye candy and observant.
The family are in the habit of throwing a party every Saturday and Sunday and together with Jackson’s new traits and rewards, he has established quite a few good friends and best friends. He currently just need to bring two of his good friends up to best friend status.
Holly will age up to elder in 2 days time and has so far completed portraits of Jackson and Nicholas at each life stage. She has also managed an ice sculpture of them both at each stage except for Jackson’s young adult stage. Both she and Jackson have a camera and between them there are photos of everyone at each stage.
The Hall of the Immortals has been partially built to accommodate the artwork so far and will have an Annex of Mortals where there will also be portraits, ice sculptures and photos of all the spouses.



Norma

[Pam]

I made a major flaw in my planning as far as LTW's was concerned and I really don't like my chances of continuing, so it's back to the drawing board. I won't bother doing the full story here until my second generation is at young adult, then I'll pick up the story again.

How was your plan majorly flawed?  You were very early in the Dynasty and Jackson had successfully made it to immortal?  Where was the snag?  I'm just curious and wondering if I can help somehow. 

[Twinmum]

How was your plan majorly flawed?  You were very early in the Dynasty and Jackson had successfully made it to immortal?  Where was the snag?  I'm just curious and wondering if I can help somehow. 

My problem wasn't with Jackson, but with his daughter Daphne, and it probably comes down to the way I play - other players could have the same choices and be quite happy. My plan involved her being a sculptor both for career and supermax skill. However, when she aged up, with the traits I had given her, she only had a choice of two LTW's that didn't involve maxing out skills that would interfere with future generations. She could have the Fashion Phenomenon LTW or the Home Design Hotshot LTW. Both would require a change of career, but Design Hotshot is reportedly not really attainable in a normal lifespan, so that just left Fashion Phenomenon. I really wasn't comfortable with this choice for her to take on as it's not a field I like - I tried to have all the careers and skills ones that I was fairly confident in achieving. These challenges are after all, about enjoying the experience and I didn't want something that was going to be a chore from the start.
This time, I have done a bit more planning with traits and hopefully, Nicholas will get a LTW that i can do. I certainly hope so anyway, because I do want to get to generation 8.

Norma

[Pam]

Ok, I see.  I don't have mine mapped out like some others have.  I'm basically just winging it with each generation, but I know which Lifetime Wishes to avoid.  I hope I don't run into a wall further down the line!

Daphne has the same odd-coloured hair that Holly's daughter Wimsey has in my Dynasty!  Well, Wimsey's hair is black and white, while Daphne's appears dark brown, but those light coloured ends are the same.  Must be part of their Alto heritage.

Great re-start.

This really made me laugh when I got a good look at Corinne Alto in my Dynasty game.  She's the daughter of Holly and Mortimer (Goth) Alto.  I think the two-toned hair comes from Nick Alto.  At the moment I captured this picture, she was distressed because my insane Indigo Dreamweaver was swimming in her pool, which is apparently inappropriate behavior. 

[Twinmum]

Nicholas has been trying to get to know some of the girls at school. On Friday, Sasha Locke came to visit and they chatted before celebrating Nicholas’s birthday. She seems nice enough and is quite pretty, but Nicholas can’t keep thinking on how a lot of the girls he has met are slobs. He supposes that he could change their ways, but he’s not sure.



As a graduation present, Jackson and Holly sent Nicholas on a holiday to Egypt. All they asked of him was to bring back a good camera and some recipe books for Holly. Jackson also told Nicholas that if he could find some exotic gems or metals, he might be able to help him on his way to achieving his life time wish of living in the life of luxury.



Nicholas had plans on buying the things for his parents, then go off and do some exploring and adventuring. He managed to get the camera his father wanted and was lucky enough to pick up three pieces of mummitorium at the relic shop. He wandered over to the bookshop to get the recipe books for his mother and that was when he saw her. He had to get to know this beauty behind the counter.



Her name was Tahiya and while she did not want to tell him her age, Nicholas found that she is artistic, a genius and good. Nicholas managed to do some exploring and picked up several gems for his father, but for the most part, he was content to spend time in the bookshop talking to Tahiya.
When he got home he couldn’t wait to tell his parents about this Egyptian beauty and invite her for a visit.
Meanwhile it was Holly’s birthday and Jackson threw a party for her. Nicholas used the opportunity to check out the local girls one last time before Tahiya arrived, but he was sure none of them could compare to her.
Sunday, Tahiya arrived and Nicholas wasted no time in romancing her some more and proposing to her. She too was smitten and said yes. Jackson decided that their Sunday party should be a wedding party and so the couple married in front of all the family friends.



Once they were married, Tahiya achieved her life time wish, thanks to Jackson’s wonderful garden and revealed to Nicholas that she was in fact already an adult. This didn’t worry him too much, but they decided that they would not waste any time in having a child. Tahiya also admitted to being a vegetarian like Holly.
Holly finally reached level 10 in her cooking and learnt the recipe for ambrosia. Jackson checked all his requirements and suddenly realised he was missing a burger plant. He had to race into town and buy some patties to plant. He was also down a best friend, but a quick call to Janel Guinn and that was all sorted.
So at 79 days Jackson was able to eat his first serving of ambrosia.



Norma

[Joria]

Norma, love it.  Too sleepy to say more.  G'night all.

[Twinmum]

Boy, is this update overdue. I haven't had the greatest week. In a household of 5, I've had one teen home from school off and on because of a knee problem, one home with some horrible lurgy, hubby is laid up with an arthritic problem and a bad ear infection and I have had a rough few days with an ongoing back problem. Needles to say, I haven't been able to concentrate much on anything for too long, but today I managed to get into my game and remember what I was up to!

So the story continues.

Tahiya gave birth to a healthy baby boy who they named Andrew. Jackson has become very attached to the child, often running to be the one to pick him up and tend to his needs.



The family found that their monetary situation was improving, so Jackson decided it was time finish the upper level of the house, well the shell at least. There is a lot of work to be done on the individual rooms, but they can be finished as needed by future family members. He also built himself a greenhouse for his garden, had a pond dug out that he will eventually stock with fish and built a gazebo which both Holly and Tahiya like to use when painting.




Andrew aged up to a toddler and has his mother’s dark hair.



Then one day... tragedy!
Nicholas was teaching Andrew to talk, Tahiya was painting and Jackson was in town attending to some business. Nobody heard Holly’s screams till it was too late. She had been sculpting in metal, a medium she rarely used, and somehow managed to set herself on fire. She tried to get herself to the shower, but left it too late.
Jackson arrived home just as Grim was leaving. Of course he was devastated.



He moved her headstone into his greenhouse so he will be near her often.



With Holly’s demise, the family have had to rethink the way they live. Fortunately, she had made several serves of ambrosia and stored it in the replicator and Nicholas is at level 7 in painting so he can do Andrew’s toddler portrait. Tahiya should be at a level 7 by the time his child portrait needs to be done as well as Nicholas’s adult and elder portraits. Nicholas is now busy trying to get 10 ice sculptures done before Andrew’s next birthday so they will have an ice sculpture of him. Tahiya will work on ice sculptures too so that she can do Nicholas’s later ones, but more importantly, she will need to improve her cooking skill and learn to make ambrosia so that when the supply runs low, she can make more.




Norma

[Anushka]

What an update! I love this greenhouse and gazebo! And I'm so sorry for this early loss in a family, but it seems as they are a strong dynasty that can survive anything! Great job!

[Saltypaws]

Sorry to hear about everything and hope all is better.  Great update and too bad about Holly, but, yes, they do seem strong, good luck.

[Pam]

Very glad to see you back to writing the story.  The greenhouse is stunning!  How did you get the glass on the roof?  And Andrew made me squee! 

[Twinmum]

@ Pam
The greenhouse is a CC set. The roof pieces can be placed on the ground or flooring. I could have put some flooring down and then the roof, but it didn't look right, so because we can use the moveobjects cheat, I did it that way. It looks more realistic.
I love greenhouses and have always had CC greenhouse kits, until they introduced them in Open for Business (I think that was the EP)

Norma