Chapter 22: Alba's Birthday

The years days fly by for Alba and Levi. Their days are filled with homework, levelling up their skills, completing aspirations and just plain having fun!

(Levi completed his first aspiration of being a Social Butterfly and now wants to be a Rambunctious Scamp!)

Sri and CeeCee are equally hard at work:

CeeCee tackles the few venues left for the her to play for tips at

While Sri hugs random strangers and pickpockets them!

At work, Sri is slowly climbing his way up the ladder. He now has enough prestige to dress up and look cool x)

At home, Sri helps the children with their homework. Here he is becoming friends with Levi!

Unfortunately, things still aren't resolved between Sri and CeeCee. Is the flame gone? Are they only staying together for the children? It seems like even they don't know.

Before long, it's time for Alba to age up into a teenager. When the time came around, I was very upset about two things:

1) I HATE that children can't throw parties!!!! Levi & Alba have probably 15 good acquaintances between the two of them (mostly the same people) but CeeCee had to throw the party for Alba and CeeCee only knew like 5 of Alba's friends (and not even her closest ones). I had to get Alba to invite her friends over, get CeeCee to introduce herself to them, ask them to leave and then invite them again via the social event planning. It was a huge pain! Hahaha

Anyway, maybe only 5 guests would have been for the best because the house is actually tiny and it was packed full!!!!

This, would have been the perfect number of guests...

...this was not!

(there are others in the living room too ... oh, woe is me x_x)

(and, yes CeeCee is playing the violin in the crammed kitchen with her back to everyone haha. One of the requirements was that someone had to play an instrument for an hour and CeeCee felt like that was the spot to do that. Not she's like in anyone's way or anything).

As you can see, all of Levi and Alba's friends have already aged up. I used the DYI Story Progression  method to create friends for Levi and Alba since all the townies were getting pretty ancient. Unfortunately, I didn't think about the aging problem (I rarely do) and created all the kids at at the same time. Oops. I'll have to remember timing for the next gen.

Anyway, the house was packed but everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. Everyone especially seemed to be enjoying CeeCee's home-cooked meals too. They absolutely cleaned out the fridge, which was particularly pleasing for them but particularly annoying for CeeCee & myself!

Or, well, maybe just myself. Look how ridiculously happy CeeCee is cleaning up after the guests.

Weirdo, haha.

2) I wished I'd taken pictures of all Levi and Alba's friends as children so it would be less confusing for everyone as to who is who (they have many friends). Also some of their transformations were just phenomenal and I wish I had taken close-ups of them as children to compare. Boo. I shall remember this for the next generation :p

I did take a couple pictures of some teens that I thought were particularly good-looking!

Marisa Gillespie (do you remember her? She was that cute hot-head I had Levi chat up on the jungle gym ages ago!)

And Alexa May-Rose, CeeCee's niece.

I just found her to be stunning. I'm actually quite upset that she's Levi's cousin, hahaha, boo :p

Soon it came time for me to turn the camera away from Alba's guests and onto the cake!

Make a wish, Alba!

I present to you, Alba the teen!

Alba's aging up rolls were very very interesting.

First off, she rolled the trait of Loner.

Alba's a creative soul who spent her childhood on monkey bars and jungle gyms. She was always around one friend or another and she barely had time to play the violin or paint a picture. I think this trait is her way of telling me that she needs a rest. She had a fun, bustling childhood but now she needs to reconnect with her artistic self!

And yet, she'll never regret or forget her childhood spent in the sunshine because she rolled the aspiration Freelance Botanist. I don't know about you but I totally OMFG'D when I saw this. I'm so happy because that was Candice's aspiration! Alba may not have known her grandmother, but there's a garderner in everyone of these legacy children, I tell you, just lurking and waiting for their moment to shine. I just love how Alba reconnects with her grandmother after CeeCee tried to cut the cord hehe ^^

The party was fun but ended with a silver medal – my last task was to compliment the birthday sim 4 times but none of my “compliment outfit” or “flatter” interactions seemed to count. Oh well.

After the guests left I gave Alba a quick little makeover

(that the default outfit she aged up with. Isn't it gorgeous? I feel like it matches her perfectly!)

That's the end of this chapter! Next time, Alba will start seeking out a potential boyfriend (2 strong candidates she'll have to choose from) and gathering plants to start her garden. Meanwhile, Levi will have to find other ways to amuse himself now that none of his friends can play on the jungle gym with him (I suppose they could be monsters, but they have more important flirting things to do now that they're all grown up!).  

Chapter 21: All-Nighter

Today, Levi and Alba are planning on staying up all night! It's a school night but I decided to indulge and bought them each a Sleepless Potion! They begin by getting their homework out of the way. Nothing kills fun like work hanging over your head!

Sri even gives them a hand before having to head out to work

(Yes, unless Sri has to venture out to the sidewalk to be mean or mischievous, he basically does just hang around the house in his bathrobe all day...)

Alba finishes her homework (and her extra credit) first so she tests out her brand new violin while waiting for Levi to finish. I suppose watching her mother play all the time rubbed off on her!

“Man, this music doesn't sound like the way Mommy plays at all.”

When she gets home from work, CeeCee decides to prepare a fancy meal for her two little daredevils. I tried to take pictures of her really fancy knife tricks, but they're super hard to get at just the right moment. Needless to say, gone are the days when she dropped the entire pepper shaker in the pot!

The chili is delicious!

CeeCee heads off to bed immediately after dinner and it's time to get these two little rascals working on their aspirations. Alba needs to play video games for 10 hours and Levi needs to make a BFF. I already knew the BFF was going to be Alba, but I didn't know how to juggle having Alba play video games and socialize at the same time. I thought I would have to have her play a while, cancel the action, talk with Levi for a while and get back to gaming. But then the most extraordinary thing happened...This:

Levi picked up this really creepy doll-toy-like thing that was on the edge of the desk kneeled by the desk and started talking to Alba while playing his creepy toy (which curiously gets him creative skill points, don't ask me why/how).

I EFFING FRICKEN LOVE THIS GAME!!!

During the night, Levi keeps getting up and moving around all over the place, but he keeps playing his doll and socializing with Alba. It is the perfect set up. Not only are they both making progress in their respective aspirations but they are both also leveling up in unrelated skills (Social skill for Alba and Creative skill for Levi). I was really a happy Simmer :)

Oh and it turnned out to be hilarious watching Levi play with his doll! He kept hitting himself in the face with it, hahaha. Failed attempt at a picture:

By the end of the night, Alba reached her next milestone and so had Levi – they became BBFs!!

So adorable <3

**

I confess one of the reasons for the all-nighter was that I realized that I hadn't given Levi a bed. I let them have an all-nighter to give me a chance to decide if I wanted to create a whole new room so that Levi could have his own bedroom, or if I would just stick him in Alba's bed room.

I decided on the latter option. They are BBFs and if I added another desk to the room they could talk while they worked! I had to make Alba's room a little bigger so CeeCee's musical studio shrunk as a result, but I don't think she minds :)

Chapter 20: Levi Ages Up

Nothing much happened for the next few days, so I begin this chapter with Levi's birthday! I laughed when I saw his outfit because he really does look like a born heart-breaker.

I don't know how many of you reading this blog have checked out the “Objectives and Points” page, but in it you'll see that an optional objective is to have the lover's child be adopted as heir. I know that my heir law is red hair > other hair and girl > boy (in that order), but I try to complete both mandatory and optional objectives, and therefore Levi will, exceptionally, be heir over Alba. Gen 3 objectives have to do with breaking hearts, a lot of them. Hence why I was so delighted to see Levi already embracing the role haha.

I rolled for his aspiration and trait. He wants to be a Social Butterfly which was exactly what I had been hoping for, yay! However he rolled the Gloomy trait which is not my favorite of the bunch. Although, I suppose considering his position in the family (legitimate but bastard son of his mother and her lover) I suppose his depressed nature is justifiable...

Thankfully, Sri doesn't seem to discriminate against Levi one bit! It's nice to see that, though Sri and CeeCee's friendship and romance bar have decreased significantly, Sri doesn't hold a grudge against the innocent.

Levi ages up on a Monday but he doesn't have to go to school, so CeeCee takes him to the park. Levi immediately throws himself into his first aspiration goal - meeting 10 sims

He meets a lot of people, but they aren't all very nice...He gets yelled at by this older lady whose name I can't remember.

(later Levi rolls the wish to be friends with her! A Gloomy Social Butterfly who wants to befriend mean people? Man, this little boy is all about challenges)

And he also gets yelled at by his uncle Cedric! I was so stunned that I forgot to take a screenshot. Here's Cedric still seething though

Poor Levi :( Cedric was already Angry when he entered the conversation so I know it's not something Levi said. I can't believe he took his anger out on his nephew like that :( I suppose I must remember that Cedric is insane.

At lunchtime CeeCee makes the kids some super yummy hotdogs on the grill.

Levi wants to befriend the boy, Farhan Rinhart and Elizabeth just happened to be at the park too. I can't get over how cute she is. I want Levi and her to become friends in anticipation of Levi's teenage objectives. I will remember my lesson from Chapter 17 though, so I'll try to not become too attached to Eli!

As Levi's friends are leaving, CeeCee breaks down in tears though. Poor CeeCee :(

I guess she's having trouble coping with what she's done. I don't think she was planning on telling Levi, but it must just have gotten bottled up and, well ... repressed feelings are the most liable to resurface.

“What do you mean Dad's not my dad?”

Levi recovers pretty quickly from this revelation. Or maybe he just doesn't understand it just quite yet. In any case, he sees a group of new kids and rushes over to greet them.

The two boys are Evil and the one girl is a Hot-Head and the conversation soon takes a turn for the worse. Levi becomes angry, tense and feels awkward. I was just about to send him home when I saw that it was 3pm and Alba had returned from school. I immediately get her to come over to the park to try and calm her brother down. She's such a trooper.

Success!

The jungle gym is one of my favorite activities – not only can you play and get your motor skills up, but you can have the kids talk and get relationship points and level up their social skill!

Here Levi is talking to the girl trying to become friends (got to lay the foundations down for his teenage years. Levi needs options, haha) and Alba is having a discussion from above with the red-head boy. She rolled a wish to become friends with him and he is. Just. The. Cutest.

(I know I got carried away with the screenshots, but I couldn't help myself! He's adorable! And so expressive. I'm going to be keeping an eye on him).

For good measure he's a picture of Alba, I don't think I have a good close-up of her yet

Chapter 19: Ordinary Day

Alba scrambles to finish her homework the next morning. She neglected it in order to go to the park, but we'll forgive her this one time. She only just aged up, after all. She gets 50% done before she has to run out to catch the bus, so she didn't do too bad.

CeeCee's pregnancy isn't going so well this time around. She can feel the baby kicking around all the time

And she keeps having to make trips to the bathroom :(

(wow they use a lot TP LOL!)

While CeeCee alternates between practising and throwing up, Sri keeps on working on his mischief skill. Poor guy seems to be getting in over his head, though!

(watch out, Sri. I don't think your lvl 2 fitness will protect you this time!
Do you guys recognize him? He's Cassandra's husband, James Red. Anyway, funny thing is that he and Sri actually hang out autonomously all the time now haha)

Man, pulling pranks must be hard work!

Oh, I also bought the household a new desk and computer. Alba's next milestone requires her to be on the computer a lot (typing and video games, lucky brat) so I figured I may as well cave in now – I held out long enough as it is, hehee. As you'll notice, I didn't put the computer in her room. Wouldn't want her spending sleepless nights playing video games and going to school exhausted now would we? Hehe

Here's Alba testing the computer out for the first time.

She's a natural!

She still has to make time for homework though. She's gone to school energized and reached lvl 4 of the motor skill. Only one more skill to go (social) and she'll be getting a B. You go girl ^^

That evening the household got two unexpected visitors:

First, the Lovely Elizabeth

(who got a little creepy when she tried to use the treadmill, but hey, I still love her!)

2. And Cedric! He's never stopped by on his own before, so it was a really sweet surprise. He and CeeCee got to do some much needed catching up.

“We should get our kids together sometime.”

Aww, Cedric! You should have rolled the Family Oriented trait hehe :)
(yeah, this totally never happened, oops!!!)

That night after everyone had gone home, CeeCee went into labour. Really painful labor. She was all alone too :(

(sorry for the darkness. I have the lights on auto, but I guess the bulbs need replacing or something)

Say hello to Levi Rose, the latest and last addition to the Gen 2 household!

Alba went over immediately to say hello to her new brother. She didn't get a sad or angry moodlet like so many of the other Sims children I've played so far get. She seems genuienly happy to be an older sister! I hope these two will get along in the future ^^

Another person who seems to be happy to introduce the new family member is Sri! Look how adorable he is freaking out over his “pre-parental status” (although Levi was already born) and how he tiptoes around the house hahaha.

Despite his Hidden Mean trait and his criminal career, Sri is really growing on me!