02-15. New Parents

Here's an update on the Faraz family, taking place before and during the visits to new Lost Cove settlers.

Emad was first to Faith's crib that morning. They're beginning to show Faith more attention now.

Bizarre! And yes, she's potty trained. But maybe not in a good way!

I don't know about you, but I always like to watch TV with a companion.

Faith has learned to talk, and Bebhinn wanted to chat with her. I thought they were cute together.

The family doing their "duties."

Both Bebhinn and Emad spent time with Fiend the Dragon and so lost the need for sleep. They were wandering around all night looking for things to do.

Most of those "things" were--you guessed it--flirting with each other. Amazing massages, smooches, embraces ...

I got a kicky bag from an in-game friend gift, so I told Emad and Bebhinn to try that. Bring out a little Rebel in them.

Bebhinn wanted to go riding in her nightie. Honestly! What's with the sleepwear obsession.

This is the teen babysitter who showed up when Bebhinn visited a new household. I always check service sims' traits before they work for my households. This girl had terrible traits! The one good babysitter trait she had was Family Oriented. The other three were Loser, Slob, and Kleptomaniac.

No way! I changed those last three to: Childish, Neat, and Nurturing. NOW she's a babysitter!

I looked in on Faith a few times, and she was doing fine.

Playpen time. Works for me. Faith could practice her abacus skill.

The Childish babysitter was nearby playing with Faith's toys.

During this time, Luna and Shade were at the fishing park socializing with the wild horses.

Even Shade managed to control his Aggressive tendencies long enough to let another horse do some sniffing.

After the newcomer visits, Emad and Bebhinn fed Faith and put her to bed. Bebhinn went straight to her work planning while Emad started getting other ideas.

02-14. Making Ghosts and Training Toddlers

The Ghastly Manor Community Center Graveyard needed ghosts. Lost Cove only had one--poor old Antwon May who was killed by the Kraken (Emad). So unless Emad started ensorcelling paparazzi for fatal boating accidents, I needed to come up with a quick way to make more ghosts. Buydebug was the answer.

In the Ghastly Center dungeon, I cleared out one jail cell and placed the large display case inside. Then I went into buydebug and grabbed several canisters of trapped spirits. Emad got to work creating three haunting ghosts.

Fill the case with canisters. Pay 2,500 simoleons. Push the display button.

Grab the urn and either place it indoors or outside.

I left two urns in the cellar. These two created ghosts were Egyptian elderly men who had died of starvation.

The last ghost was a French adult female who had also died of starvation, but I changed her fate later.

Emad stopped the process at three ghosts. He'll make more in the future.

Here are the two Egyptians: Hahmi Ra and Nawwaf Nahas. Don't ask me; I didn't name them!

Emad's first interaction with these guys was to slap Hahmi. I don't know why. Emad is just Evil like that. Afterwards, he was friendlier though. I guess he just wanted to make it clear who was in charge.

Nawwaf managed to escape and find food upstairs. I wonder what these two talked about?

Here is Antwon with the new French ghost, Celina Rufus. After calling Celina out of her tombstone, I used NRaas to change her type of death.

Ok, ok! I had to resurrect her first, then "force kill" her again. But it was quick, and the game was paused the whole time. She didn't feel a thing!

Funny that Emad didn't want to smack Celina in the face. Maybe he just used Hahmi as an object lesson for all three ghosts. Then again, he does have that Flirty trait.

Only in Sims can a ghost, a mermaid, and a genie play darts together in a haunted, foggy dungeon!

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Meanwhile back home, Bebhinn was taking care of Faith and working on the computer. Faith had already learned to walk. Now she was potty trained.

Faith also gained two music skill points (guitar).

When daddy came home, he started teaching Faith to talk. As these things go, it was an interesting conversation.

Emad: Before you were born, Mommy and Daddy got a divorce. But not to worry, we had another wedding and now we're a family again.

Emad: See, Mommy likes Daddy's cooking.
Faith: Cookie!
Emad: Sure thing princess. Cookie. ... Some day, I'll teach you how to cook the way genies do.
Faith: Cookie!
Emad: All you want, sweetie. Lots of 'em.

Emad: Genies love tidy houses too. I'll show you how to make the home sparkly clean.
Faith: Sparky housey!
Emad: Now don't tell Mommy ... but we'll play with fire sparkies too.
Faith: Sparkies! Sparkies in housey!

Emad: And I'll teach you fighting skills, how to throw a solid punch and knock your enemy out cold!
Faith: Punch! Punch!
Emad: That's it, genie girl! Punch, punch!

02-13. Roof Work and More

So after having my sims test the new playroom, I discovered that the roof edges protruding into the room blocked access to everything. There were even some "invisible" roof pieces causing trouble. But after MANY hours, I have the roofs fixed. And it was a learning experience!

What I Learned
1) You have to have a proper roof above any floors/rooms when other roofs are placed on levels below. If you don't, those other roofs will protrude through walls into rooms. That's because without an upper roof, the rooms are not considered closed off. They aren't real rooms.

2) Sometimes these interfering roof pieces aren't seen if you just have the walls down looking into the room. But if you close the room up and look into the room through a window (from the outside of the house), you will see those parts of the roof that were "invisible" before.

3) You can use a flat roof on the top floor to insure that rooms are recognized, but the flat roofs cannot be recolored as far as I know. Yes, you can use floor tiles instead, but then the roof isn't recognized as genuine and you end up with other roof edges sticking through lower room walls.

4) If you have a house with a complex multi-roof structure, I suggest putting up the walls, but then place the top roof first and work your way down.

Not sure any of this makes sense. It's difficult to explain. But after all the roof struggles I've been through in Sims 3, I did find a solution to getting rid of roof sections sticking into upper rooms.

Here's a picture of how the Faraz home first looked. Notice the top tower with only colored floor tile and a fence as a substitute roof. THAT is what was causing problems in the rooms below. Also notice all the different roof sections on the house.

After much suffering trying to replace those roof sections, I finally put a regular roof on the very top.

Most of the issues with the roofs below ended right then.

It was just a matter of matching up edges and moving objects out of the way to successfully replace all the roofs.

While I was redoing rooms and roofs on the upper levels, I decided I might as well make the rooms bigger. So the second floor was expanded to meet up with the front tower, making it easier to access that little tower via a door.

I also covered the grey brick walls with wallpaper and carpeted the grey wood floors to match the tower room. The extra bath is also larger. I put a potty chair in there, but I still need to add a sink.

The playroom has lots more space now and everything is clear for access.

There's enough extra space for socializing with family members and visitors too.

Faith can play with all her toys now without any roof interference.

And even the room on the top floor was expanded a little making it more usable for the future.

The only thing I did to the first floor was recolor the grey brick walls, fireplace, and floors to a warmer gold shade. I used the same flooring in the kitchen instead of the tiling that was originally in there.

__________

While I was working on the house, between saves, Emad taught Faith how to walk. Bebhinn helped with breastfeeding and potty training too.

Then we had a late-night visitor: a miniature alien!

Ok, so it was only a trick-or-treating child. He must have walked a long way to get his candy. Luckily for him, my evil sims didn't steal any of his treats.

And speak of the devil ... Emad usually starts his flirting interactions with Bebhinn by scaring her.

I think those evil frights really light both their fires! Emad loves fire on any occasion.

The final big event in my game last night was Emad's reaching level 10 in his acrobat career. He earned his Lifetime Wish, and I received an Achievement badge. Emad was my first sim to master acrobatics!