Aloha!

I’ve always dreamed of traveling the world. London, Paris, Rome… somewhere tropical. Most of those will most likely never become a reality, but what I fail to be able to do in my real life, Second Life can sometimes make up for. Hawaii has always been on my ‘to visit’ list, and with the help of Nickki Romano and Island Style Designs, I can feel a little more like I am actually visiting the islands!

Isn’t the hula skirt simply adorable? And, you have to love the coconut bra! I’m not so sure that I would feel as confident wearing it in real life as I am in Second Life. It is most definitely easier to hold up a bra made of coconuts when you don’t have gravity pulling it down! Nickki has a wide selection of hula skirts available in her shop all priced between L$250 and L$350. The package also came with a lei, but unfortunately I just could not get my hair to cooperate with it! A hair with an attached lei is also included in the package if you do not have any long styles of your own.

While I was wandering around Island Style Designs, I came upon this cute little freebie. I really love it when designers appreciate their customers enough to set out something that isn’t for sale! Just a little thank you for visiting their place. I really love how vivid the colors are in the bikini! The item also comes with a little wrap that I forgot to attach to myself before I snapped the pic. Oops. Lol Snag this freebie before it disappears!

What would a great island style be without a cute pair of shoes? As soon as I saw these adorable sculpted flip flops by My Pretty Pixels, I was in love! I’m not sure where I would be in my real life without my sandals to run around in all summer! An easy to use resizer is included as well as a hud to help with skin tone adjustments and nail color. I personally love the manicured look that is available in these shoes! I wish more designers would offer this instead of all polishes because the real life me rarely wears polish! The toe ring and anklets are optional and controlled via a hud. Twelve colors are available at L$340 each or L$1,630 for the color change pair. This is a definite great addition to your inventory for the summer months!

I just have to mention the poses I used in the second and third pictures because…. Well, you know me… I love poses! Fluke is a newish store offering poses for both men and women. Guys, I know that it is really difficult to find poses for men sometimes; so, it’s always good when a new store pops up on the grid that provides for the demand! The poses used here are from the Casual Girl set. These poses are really cute and fun. If you are a pose hoarder like I am, you should definitely teleport over to Fluke on the LeeZu SIM!


Credits
Clothing: [1] *Deluxe Grass Skirt with Plumeria, Coconut Bra, Lei and Hair and [2] Green and White Bikini (Freebie) by Island Style Designs
Jewelry: [2] Knotted Pearls Set by Diamond Dreams Jewelry
Shoes: *Womens FlipFlop in Black by My Pretty Pixels
Hair: [1] Serena in Mocha by TRUTH and [2] Tatum.2 in Thoughtful Brown by fri.day
Skin: [1] *Ana (Tan) – Tropics and [2 and 3] *Ana (Pale) – Tropics by Filthy Skins
Poses: [1] Long Hair 6 by Glitterati, [2] *Casual Girl 3 and [3] *Casual Girl 6 by Fluke

* Denotes item provided by designer for review.

Liquify Me: Pieces of My Closet #2

The word insomnia is virtually foreign to me; most of the time I can practically sleep at will. However, when insomnia does like to poke its evil little head around the corner, it hits me and it hits me hard. Bulldozer hard. Ferd f-teenthousand hard (see video here). Since I obviously wasn’t going to fall asleep anytime soon, I grabbed my iPod and started flipping through blogs. I landed on one of my favorite blogger’s site; Luna Jubilee is so friendly and talented… You really have no other option but to love her. She had posted about one of the things that make her happy, and in that post was a link to YouTube tutorials by Katey Coppola. They are absolutely amazing, and I urge you to go check them out. Never again will my ava have crinkly wrists, elbows and ankles. I knew that it was possible to smooth these out in PhotoShop, but I always just assumed that it would be very difficult…. I thought it would be something you had to draw, and I cannot draw on a computer. Thank you, Katey, for showing me how amazingly simple this is and encouraging me to not be afraid of PhotoShop!  Now, if I could just get shadows to work!

Before

After

Amazing, right? If you don’t have PhotoShop, GIMP is a free program which has most of the features of PhotoShop. There is not a liquify filter, but to my understanding, the IWarp filter works in a similar fashion. Just a side note, if you happen to be a student or a teacher (I’m both :-/), you may be eligible to purchase PhotoShop CS5 Extended at a hugely discounted price of L$199. Please, please, please contact Adobe to see if you are eligible if you are thinking about purchasing this. If it works for you, that is fantastic! This is the full version of the software; Adobe simply has a soft heart toward educators and students!  Or, maybe they just want to make more money!  Haha!

Since this is a “Pieces of My Closet” post, I suppose that I should talk a little bit about what is actually in my photo. Since my bestest had already hit the hay and there were no more sales for me to check out, I started sorting inventory. Fun, right? It honestly feels like a never ending project! I came across this adorable little bodysuit by Royal Blue. I’m pretty sure that I first discovered this store when it was featured at The Dressing Room. I’m not sure when I got the bodysuit, however; I certainly don’t remember purchasing it. I didn’t see it in the store when I visited yesterday; so, I’m thinking that it was probably a hunt prize. Royal Blue does have a wide variety bodysuits for purchase which are all very pretty. If you need a bodysuit, this is definitely a place where you may find what you are looking for!

Check out that hair! Talk about old… I purchased that hair when I was practically a baby in Second Life. I actually bought it from the ETD Outlet which may mean that the hairstyle predates my ava! Bahaha! For its age, it actually doesn’t look too bad though. Elika Tiramisu is truly talented and honestly one of my favorite designers in Second Life… If you couldn’t already tell. Speaking of [elikatira], there is a new VIP gift of a style that has not been released yet. There is a L$250 fee to join the group, but it is honestly so worth it! Your fee will more than be made up for with the gifts that she sends. Don’t forget, the gift will disappear from previous notices in two weeks; so, grab it while you can!

Aren’t my shoes adorable? They are actually not old at all since I just got them yesterday. I will mention that they are by My Pretty Pixels, but I have a longer, more detailed post for the shoes that will probably pop up tomorrow! I took a closeup as well! Haha! Keep an eye out.

One of my goals for this summer is to start putting the environments for my photos together myself since I can’t seem to find a lot of photo sets already done for me to purchase. Besides, I have a tendency to buy a lot of home items; so, they might as well get some use… right? The skybox that I am using is the Spring Skybox by Magic Nook available for the next week and a bit at The Dressing Room. It is small, but it is really adorable and only twenty prims. If you are looking for small and cozy, you may want to snag this; it’s only L$70! The bed is the Country Patchwork Bed by Little Boxes; I picked this up a few weeks ago when the designer was having a 50% off sale. I seriously couldn’t have matched the blanket and the curtains up better if I had purchased them to actually go together. The bed is nineteen prims and available for L$130.

I do have to mention the pose I used for this picture because the poses by the designer are honestly very unique. When I first started taking pictures in Second Life, I came across DeePosed via flickr and fell in love with her photos. They were so dramatic and emotional. So, I visited her store, bought a few poses and actually won forty free poses. Little did I know then that dramatic poses aren’t necessarily the poses you are going to use most often; they simply aren’t practical for most of my shots. I do still love them, however. They can most certainly give an amazing effect when needed. The pose I used is titled Sweet Surrender 1.


Credits
Clothing: House Lounge Bodysuit in Hearts on Fire (Blue) by Royal Blue – No longer available
Hair: Bonita II in Tawny by ETD – No longer available
Shoes: *Women’s FlipFlops in Black by My Pretty Pixels
Skin: *Ana – Ice (Pale) by Filthy Skins
Pose: Sweet Surrender 1 by DeePosed

* Denotes item provided by designer for review.