Joshua Parker had... rather an odd childhood, he'd say. Now, as he raises his own children, he decides it is time to deal with his past. Can he balance therapy alongside a full-time job and raising four children, each of whom are very different?
***
Prologue
The weather had been atrocious all day; such was the reality of autumn in Henford-on-Bagley.
The dew collectors had been working overtime, in total contrast to the solar panels.
Clover the cow and Cloudy the llama remained firmly indoors, as did the human occupants of 2 Olde Mill Lane.
Inside the house, each of the four children were dealing with their boredom in various ways...
"Wheeeee! Flying to da MOOOOON!"
Hazel, one of the older pair of twins, had a vivid imagination, and playing in front of the dollhouse was her favourite pastime.
The stereo was constantly playing in the living room, and Lydia, Hazel's tomboyish twin, was often to be found dancing to the music.
Meanwhile, Katie - who was best described as Little Miss Independent - was sat on the landing upstairs, happily playing games on her tablet.
Over in the kitchen, Clara - who had inherited her mother's outgoing nature and her father's bad eyesight - needed to ask her daddy a question.
"Dada! I very stinky!"
"Ooh, yes," Joshua replied. "Let's go and run you a nice warm bath."
As he bent down next to the tub, Joshua got thinking about the future. Hazel and Lydia were soon going to be growing up and heading to school. He remembered holding each of his girls for the first time and vowing that each of them would be allowed to pursue whichever career they wanted, without any sort of parental interference. Hazel's imagination didn't just mean she'd become an author, neither did Lydia's wild streak mean she was destined for life as a sports star.
Life is pretty sweet, Joshua thought as he climbed into bed next to his darling wife Emily. I have a loving wife, four adorable daughters and my dream job.
Yet he couldn't help but feel like something was missing...
There's a story thread in Challenges, Stories and Legacies too.
There's a story thread in Challenges, Stories and Legacies too.
Hey! Cute toddlers you got there. "Clover the cow and Cloudy the llama" ... love those names!
Special request if I may. If you do continue to also post the story here, could you put it in a spoiler tag to help with the long screen scrolling?
There's a story thread in Challenges, Stories and Legacies too.
Hey! Cute toddlers you got there. "Clover the cow and Cloudy the llama" ... love those names!
Special request if I may. If you do continue to also post the story here, could you put it in a spoiler tag to help with the long screen scrolling?
first congrats . second joseph has apoint because longer posts can sometimes break the thread. i know that cause thats why cathtea likes spoiler tags.
i get to play again and write. finally got the mod fixed i need to continue.
I miss playing Reese right now, but life is busy that I get no play time as of yet. Hopefully at the end of the month or at least beginning of next. Reese just got himself a girlfriend. We need to see where that goes. I'm curious and I know @Kellogg_J_Kellogg is as well.
i get to play again and write. finally got the mod fixed i need to continue.
I miss playing Reese right now, but life is busy that I get no play time as of yet. Hopefully at the end of the month or at least beginning of next. Reese just got himself a girlfriend. We need to see where that goes. I'm curious and I know @Kellogg_J_Kellogg is as well.
i probably will spend more time writing my regular ils person had a family emerergency and her replacement can't hear that well so instead of talking she points which is very confusing.
you were on tonight btw so isn't that a contradictoy statement. lol
All the Parker girls having a chat... except for Katie, who's like "nah imma get started on learning". I wouldn't call it "homework" as she'd never actually been to school before!
All the Parker girls having a chat... except for Katie, who's like "nah imma get started on learning". I wouldn't call it "homework" as she'd never actually been to school before!
Can anyone give me some ideas? Doing a farming family living in the 64 x 64 lot in country living area. Mother is a gardener, father looks after cow/chickens and is a fisherman, blue heeler dog, no plots with kids yet...my plan is to run a retail lot selling their produce, milk and eggs etc as the only semi grocery shop my sims can go to. But I think I'm lacking inspiration for the actual characters themselves... I need something to make them interesting. 😩 I did think they could run an orphanage as the house has lots of beds but I don't know if they will have time for lots of kids. I'm not sure what I'm missing but I want something to make me love these characters a bit more
Perhaps give them a back story even if it's in your head. How did they meet. Did they build the farm together. Did one of them inherit it and they took over working it. Why do they want to open a grocery store. Those kinds of questions.
Watch their whims and what they do autonomously too and it'll sometimes give you a story inspiration.
The actress Belinda Parker has died age 76, her agent has confirmed.
Although she never made the leap to films, she was a popular star in shows such as Growing Up Crumplebottom and The Urbz. In her spare time she enjoyed meditating and yoga, often making posts on Simstagram about her latest routines, which also earned her fame.
She leaves behind former actor-turned-politician husband Adam and a son, although the son's current age and whereabouts are unknown.
Rest under spoiler:
***
"How was school?" Lydia asked; the twins were in separate classes.
"It was alright," Hazel replied. "Loads of people were talking about this actress who died. Someone even said I look like her."
"Who are you talking about?"
"Belinda Parker. I've never heard of her. But we do have the same surname. And we don't know anything about Dad's parents."
"Well," Lydia said, leaning forward to make a move on the chessboard, "you do a bit. But brown hair and brown eyes are very common. And Parker's not exactly an uncommon surname."
As Hazel went upstairs to start on her homework, she couldn't help thinking about the comments. She'd never heard of any of the TV shows Belinda had been in. More importantly, having quickly checked her phone on the bus home from school, she'd discovered that Belinda had had a son, who'd been unnamed in the Wikipedia article. Her dad had never mentioned his parents.
Later, she found her father tinkering at his robotics table.
"Hey dad," she said. "Some girl at school was talking about seeing her grandparents for Winterfest. How come we never see ours?"
"Well," Joshua replied, "my parents have always been... very busy people. We simply never got the opportunity to meet up."
"That's a shame," Hazel said. "I bet they would've been nice."
That evening, Joshua sighed as he sat down at his computer. It'd been easy to avoid mentioning his parents when the girls were small, but now they were at school and could ask proper questions. He'd seen the news articles about Belinda's death on his phone, and guessed that some of the children at the girls' school would have talked about it. Hazel had never mentioned her grandparents before, and he wondered if people had mentioned her resemblance to his mother, framing her enquiry as a more general one about grandparents. He wouldn't have had a problem confirming that she was indeed related to Belinda, but the real issue was why he'd never mentioned them.
"This does it," he muttered. "I need to find a counsellor."
Thousands of results popped up; counsellors specialising in all sorts of issues. Anxiety, depression, PTSD, personality disorders... all those and more were covered. Who to choose? NHS waiting lists were notoriously long, and he had the money to pay for private sessions.
Meanwhile, now that Clara and Katie had grown up, Emily had decided to take them to the Magic Realm.
"Wow! What is this place?" Lydia wondered in awe. Everything around them seemed to be glowing, and the sky looked not unlike Hazel's t-shirt.
"This is the Magic Realm," Emily explained. "This is the spiritual home of spellcasting."
"Wow! Does that mean we're Spellcasters?" Lydia asked excitedly.
"It does," Emily smiled. "My parents are Spellcasters, and I was born one too."
"COOL! I can't wait to cast some spells!"
"Not so fast," Emily replied. "I'm afraid you can't do magic yet. Spellcasting is a difficult and sometimes dangerous art, and magical law says you can't practice until you're a teenager."
"Boo," Lydia pouted.
"I know how you feel," Emily laughed. "But it won't be too long until you're old enough. Maybe when we get home I'll show you a spell."
"How cool that we're Spellcasters," Lydia said.
"Yeah, it is," Hazel replied. "At least we know a bit about Mum's family."
"Yeah. Try not to worry too much about Dad. I'm sure he'll give us answers at some point."
"Fair enough," Hazel smiled. "Hey, look at Katie doing schoolwork!"
"She's smart like Dad," Lydia grinned. "Getting ahead on learning makes sense. What do you fancy doing when you grow up?"
"I haven't thought about it yet," Hazel said.
Watch their whims and what they do autonomously too and it'll sometimes give you a story inspiration.
This!
when the benders do something atomus it usually involves getting naked. i was once moving what i affectionatley refer to as the orginal 6 out and i took a tiny break after alec. he and his wife found the sauna i hadn't found yet. so 2 bacame 3 in span of 5 minutes.
the orginal 6 is ayden alana alonzo alec anthony and adrien for those who might not know. i got rid of the other twins cause my game was acting up. well one died.
How does everyone get comments on their blogs?
Among many other things, I think I need to direct visitors to begin somewhere in the middle/at the end of my legacy posts instead of the beginning , or do some other non-story Sims posts. I'm not sure.
@haneul "How does everyone get comments on their blogs?"
There's no hard and fast method to getting people to comment. people are either motivated to, or they are not. I've found that people comment most when they are invested and this takes time. However, here are some tips to increase reader investment that I picked up along the way:
- Create a forum thread, if you don't have one (I can't find it, if you do). Link it in your signature. A thread can help to get discussion going, increase the amount of people who can comment and pull lurkers into the daylight.
- Is it easy to comment on your blog? Do you need an account or to put in loads of data? That can put people off.
- When you get comments always try and reply to them. Engage your readers. Tempt them with snippets, encourage their rants speculation etc.
- What would/does make you comment on something? Try and think like a reader.
- On that note, read and comment on others' stories. Don't underestimate the power of mutual commenting; you'll make great friends and broaden your readership in the process.
- Bonus posts and side projects don't hurt.
- keep going. Comments are not a gauge of success. Some of the most amazing stories I read hardly have any. Sometimes there just aren't words, y'know?
Source: I am owner of a blog where I'm often told that the comment section is the only reason they read. 😆
@haneul TBH there isn’t a way to get comments, some people will and some people won’t for various reasons. People will come and go, and unfortunately it doesn’t help that the Creative Corner is rather dead these days. Seems that most of the reason people sometimes comment on my stories is because I sometimes offer them comments on their own (when I have time). However these days I don’t have time or energy for comments save for one person I follow.
@haneul It can be a big mouthful to have to start with the beginning of a story if it has been running for several years. It is an art to write a gripping beginning. Unfortunately I do not know the secure recipe
Some fix points in the middle or later may not be a bad idea.
Can you see how many people read your story? Are you just missing the comments?
I think @SnuffyBucket has some constructive thoughts.
It may take courage to write a comment. It took maybe half a year or more before I wrote my first comment on a story and it was simply because I was so gripped that I just had to get it out.
Until then, I guess I really didn’t think I had anything wise to add.
Since then, I have had a different view on comments. One of the methods I have used to find new stories is to see who is commenting on the stories I like and follow the link associated with their signature.
A lot of writers and readers are on hiatus after all the covid-19 restrictions have been lifted. There is so much to catch up on.
It can suddenly turn around.
The most important thing is that you have fun and that you learn something from your own project
@haneul It can be a big mouthful to have to start with the beginning of a story if it has been running for several years. It is an art to write a gripping beginning. Unfortunately I do not know the secure recipe
Some fix points in the middle or later may not be a bad idea.
Can you see how many people read your story? Are you just missing the comments?
I think @SnuffyBucket has some constructive thoughts.
It may take courage to write a comment. It took maybe half a year or more before I wrote my first comment on a story and it was simply because I was so gripped that I just had to get it out.
Until then, I guess I really didn’t think I had anything wise to add.
Since then, I have had a different view on comments. One of the methods I have used to find new stories is to see who is commenting on the stories I like and follow the link associated with their signature.
A lot of writers and readers are on hiatus after all the covid-19 restrictions have been lifted. There is so much to catch up on.
It can suddenly turn around.
The most important thing is that you have fun and that you learn something from your own project
i had to fix my mod issues, think i'm done now but i keep mod shopping.
How does everyone get comments on their blogs?
Among many other things, I think I need to direct visitors to begin somewhere in the middle/at the end of my legacy posts instead of the beginning , or do some other non-story Sims posts. I'm not sure.
I don't aim to get comments. That's a recipe for me to be disappointed in my story because not enough people are commenting.
You'll always have more silent readers than ones who comment. So don't take no comments as no readers.
If your story is too linear you risk readers being confused if they start in the middle. But if your story has a few arcs in it you can definitely provide readers with options. You can do this by setting a single page as your home page rather that your blog posts.
You can point to the beginning and then to the beginning of each arc.
One good way to get comments is to leave meaningful comments on other player's blogs. I'm more likely to give a story of someone who left me a comment on my story than someone who didn't.
And like others say, there's no sure fire way to get comments.
You could do polls for things like having readers guess spouse or next career as an easier way to gauge readership. A poll is quick, easy, and anonymous. A comment isn't anonymous and may not be quick and/or easy.
Comments
Joshua Parker had... rather an odd childhood, he'd say. Now, as he raises his own children, he decides it is time to deal with his past. Can he balance therapy alongside a full-time job and raising four children, each of whom are very different?
***
The weather had been atrocious all day; such was the reality of autumn in Henford-on-Bagley.
The dew collectors had been working overtime, in total contrast to the solar panels.
Clover the cow and Cloudy the llama remained firmly indoors, as did the human occupants of 2 Olde Mill Lane.
Inside the house, each of the four children were dealing with their boredom in various ways...
"Wheeeee! Flying to da MOOOOON!"
Hazel, one of the older pair of twins, had a vivid imagination, and playing in front of the dollhouse was her favourite pastime.
The stereo was constantly playing in the living room, and Lydia, Hazel's tomboyish twin, was often to be found dancing to the music.
Meanwhile, Katie - who was best described as Little Miss Independent - was sat on the landing upstairs, happily playing games on her tablet.
Over in the kitchen, Clara - who had inherited her mother's outgoing nature and her father's bad eyesight - needed to ask her daddy a question.
"Dada! I very stinky!"
"Ooh, yes," Joshua replied. "Let's go and run you a nice warm bath."
As he bent down next to the tub, Joshua got thinking about the future. Hazel and Lydia were soon going to be growing up and heading to school. He remembered holding each of his girls for the first time and vowing that each of them would be allowed to pursue whichever career they wanted, without any sort of parental interference. Hazel's imagination didn't just mean she'd become an author, neither did Lydia's wild streak mean she was destined for life as a sports star.
Life is pretty sweet, Joshua thought as he climbed into bed next to his darling wife Emily. I have a loving wife, four adorable daughters and my dream job.
Yet he couldn't help but feel like something was missing...
There's a story thread in Challenges, Stories and Legacies too.
Hey! Cute toddlers you got there. "Clover the cow and Cloudy the llama" ... love those names!
Special request if I may. If you do continue to also post the story here, could you put it in a spoiler tag to help with the long screen scrolling?
first congrats . second joseph has apoint because longer posts can sometimes break the thread. i know that cause thats why cathtea likes spoiler tags.
I miss playing Reese right now, but life is busy that I get no play time as of yet. Hopefully at the end of the month or at least beginning of next. Reese just got himself a girlfriend. We need to see where that goes. I'm curious and I know @Kellogg_J_Kellogg is as well.
Joshua just got abducted by aliens! That’s never happened to me before. I’ve had Get to Work for ages, too.
i probably will spend more time writing my regular ils person had a family emerergency and her replacement can't hear that well so instead of talking she points which is very confusing.
you were on tonight btw so isn't that a contradictoy statement. lol
Read Sim 66 here:https://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/978195/sim-66/p1
https://kelloggjkellogg.blogspot.com/2020/10/sim-66-prologue.html
All the Parker girls having a chat... except for Katie, who's like "nah imma get started on learning". I wouldn't call it "homework" as she'd never actually been to school before!
Always good to get a head start on your education
Part One(Complete 9/24/16) /Part Two(on hold)/Short Stories(on hold)/Twinbrook 1996(on hold)/Ten Crystal Hearts (on hold)
I own the TS3 Store as of 12/11/16 (sort of. It's complicated)
[url="httpshttps://museurania462371994.wordpress.com/2021/10/18/peters-4-16-life-and-death/://museurania462371994.wordpress.com/2021/10/22/peters-4-17-a-day-with-the-grandparents/"]4.16 Life and Death[/url]
[url="httphttps://museurania462371994.wordpress.com/2021/10/22/peters-4-17-a-day-with-the-grandparents/://"]4.18 A Day with the Grandparents[/url]
Watch their whims and what they do autonomously too and it'll sometimes give you a story inspiration.
Year Long Community Challenge
The actress Belinda Parker has died age 76, her agent has confirmed.
Although she never made the leap to films, she was a popular star in shows such as Growing Up Crumplebottom and The Urbz. In her spare time she enjoyed meditating and yoga, often making posts on Simstagram about her latest routines, which also earned her fame.
She leaves behind former actor-turned-politician husband Adam and a son, although the son's current age and whereabouts are unknown.
Rest under spoiler:
***
"How was school?" Lydia asked; the twins were in separate classes.
"It was alright," Hazel replied. "Loads of people were talking about this actress who died. Someone even said I look like her."
"Who are you talking about?"
"Belinda Parker. I've never heard of her. But we do have the same surname. And we don't know anything about Dad's parents."
"Well," Lydia said, leaning forward to make a move on the chessboard, "you do a bit. But brown hair and brown eyes are very common. And Parker's not exactly an uncommon surname."
As Hazel went upstairs to start on her homework, she couldn't help thinking about the comments. She'd never heard of any of the TV shows Belinda had been in. More importantly, having quickly checked her phone on the bus home from school, she'd discovered that Belinda had had a son, who'd been unnamed in the Wikipedia article. Her dad had never mentioned his parents.
Later, she found her father tinkering at his robotics table.
"Hey dad," she said. "Some girl at school was talking about seeing her grandparents for Winterfest. How come we never see ours?"
"Well," Joshua replied, "my parents have always been... very busy people. We simply never got the opportunity to meet up."
"That's a shame," Hazel said. "I bet they would've been nice."
That evening, Joshua sighed as he sat down at his computer. It'd been easy to avoid mentioning his parents when the girls were small, but now they were at school and could ask proper questions. He'd seen the news articles about Belinda's death on his phone, and guessed that some of the children at the girls' school would have talked about it. Hazel had never mentioned her grandparents before, and he wondered if people had mentioned her resemblance to his mother, framing her enquiry as a more general one about grandparents. He wouldn't have had a problem confirming that she was indeed related to Belinda, but the real issue was why he'd never mentioned them.
"This does it," he muttered. "I need to find a counsellor."
Thousands of results popped up; counsellors specialising in all sorts of issues. Anxiety, depression, PTSD, personality disorders... all those and more were covered. Who to choose? NHS waiting lists were notoriously long, and he had the money to pay for private sessions.
Meanwhile, now that Clara and Katie had grown up, Emily had decided to take them to the Magic Realm.
"Wow! What is this place?" Lydia wondered in awe. Everything around them seemed to be glowing, and the sky looked not unlike Hazel's t-shirt.
"This is the Magic Realm," Emily explained. "This is the spiritual home of spellcasting."
"Wow! Does that mean we're Spellcasters?" Lydia asked excitedly.
"It does," Emily smiled. "My parents are Spellcasters, and I was born one too."
"COOL! I can't wait to cast some spells!"
"Not so fast," Emily replied. "I'm afraid you can't do magic yet. Spellcasting is a difficult and sometimes dangerous art, and magical law says you can't practice until you're a teenager."
"Boo," Lydia pouted.
"I know how you feel," Emily laughed. "But it won't be too long until you're old enough. Maybe when we get home I'll show you a spell."
"How cool that we're Spellcasters," Lydia said.
"Yeah, it is," Hazel replied. "At least we know a bit about Mum's family."
"Yeah. Try not to worry too much about Dad. I'm sure he'll give us answers at some point."
"Fair enough," Hazel smiled. "Hey, look at Katie doing schoolwork!"
"She's smart like Dad," Lydia grinned. "Getting ahead on learning makes sense. What do you fancy doing when you grow up?"
"I haven't thought about it yet," Hazel said.
This!
when the benders do something atomus it usually involves getting naked. i was once moving what i affectionatley refer to as the orginal 6 out and i took a tiny break after alec. he and his wife found the sauna i hadn't found yet. so 2 bacame 3 in span of 5 minutes.
the orginal 6 is ayden alana alonzo alec anthony and adrien for those who might not know. i got rid of the other twins cause my game was acting up. well one died.
but i agree. witth them they will lead you probably not where you expect. i used to be known for comedy now the things i write are dramatic.
4.18 Harvest Gnomes
I've just started a 100 baby challenge on my tumblr, as that felt more suitable to me for short updates on the challenge. You can see all the chapters as they appear here: https://jamessims.tumblr.com/tagged/100+baby+challenge/
WordPress Site
Among many other things, I think I need to direct visitors to begin somewhere in the middle/at the end of my legacy posts instead of the beginning
There's no hard and fast method to getting people to comment. people are either motivated to, or they are not. I've found that people comment most when they are invested and this takes time. However, here are some tips to increase reader investment that I picked up along the way:
- Create a forum thread, if you don't have one (I can't find it, if you do). Link it in your signature. A thread can help to get discussion going, increase the amount of people who can comment and pull lurkers into the daylight.
- Is it easy to comment on your blog? Do you need an account or to put in loads of data? That can put people off.
- When you get comments always try and reply to them. Engage your readers. Tempt them with snippets, encourage their rants speculation etc.
- What would/does make you comment on something? Try and think like a reader.
- On that note, read and comment on others' stories. Don't underestimate the power of mutual commenting; you'll make great friends and broaden your readership in the process.
- Bonus posts and side projects don't hurt.
- keep going. Comments are not a gauge of success. Some of the most amazing stories I read hardly have any. Sometimes there just aren't words, y'know?
Source: I am owner of a blog where I'm often told that the comment section is the only reason they read. 😆
Some fix points in the middle or later may not be a bad idea.
Can you see how many people read your story? Are you just missing the comments?
I think @SnuffyBucket has some constructive thoughts.
It may take courage to write a comment. It took maybe half a year or more before I wrote my first comment on a story and it was simply because I was so gripped that I just had to get it out.
Until then, I guess I really didn’t think I had anything wise to add.
Since then, I have had a different view on comments. One of the methods I have used to find new stories is to see who is commenting on the stories I like and follow the link associated with their signature.
A lot of writers and readers are on hiatus after all the covid-19 restrictions have been lifted. There is so much to catch up on.
It can suddenly turn around.
The most important thing is that you have fun and that you learn something from your own project
i had to fix my mod issues, think i'm done now but i keep mod shopping.
I don't aim to get comments. That's a recipe for me to be disappointed in my story because not enough people are commenting.
You'll always have more silent readers than ones who comment. So don't take no comments as no readers.
If your story is too linear you risk readers being confused if they start in the middle. But if your story has a few arcs in it you can definitely provide readers with options. You can do this by setting a single page as your home page rather that your blog posts.
Here's one of my blogs as an example: https://randombranchesditft.wordpress.com/
You can point to the beginning and then to the beginning of each arc.
One good way to get comments is to leave meaningful comments on other player's blogs. I'm more likely to give a story of someone who left me a comment on my story than someone who didn't.
And like others say, there's no sure fire way to get comments.
You could do polls for things like having readers guess spouse or next career as an easier way to gauge readership. A poll is quick, easy, and anonymous. A comment isn't anonymous and may not be quick and/or easy.