Silentsparrow Month! Day 24 - Limey

The other day at the Rookery, we were discussing the colours we wear least. A few people, Achariya, Persephone, said perhaps green for them. And I thought to myself "Hah! How silly! I would never wear green not-much, green is my favourite colour!" (as, it is). But then I realized, I actually wear surprisingly little in the way of Lime Green. And lime green is the green hya does most! My taste in green is more a dark, hunter green sort of shade. That's not to say I don't like lime green! I do. Just whenever I put it on, it contrasts too much with the black it's paired with, and I go "ouch, that's too bright". Which somewhat goes to show, that gothwear isn't all black, indeed, it has a lot of bright colours, like sunlight coming through a stained glass window. And what's more gothic than stained glass? Ooh, ooh, stained glass bats! I want those now. Stained glass bats.

Given my relative lack of bright green-wearing, I'm wearing something I'm not sure I've actually worn before since buying it. Also because I'm not much of a long-shirt person. But today, I felt like wearing a long shirt! And so I am! This is the Skullyrock shirt, which I'm thinking might not be available anymore, but, I might be mistaken. It's a yummy western style shirt, brimming over with details, lacing at the front and the back, pointed breast pockets, and a light mayan-like skull detailing over the top part. I enjoy the way that there's a tiny bit of belly showing at the opening at the bottom, given that my pants are tastefully low-riding. My pants are the Lime Gloomy pants, which have lime green stitching down the side, and the gorgeous swirly Gloomy pattern creeping up to mid-calf. It's a very simple outfit, but I think that paired with my Sentou Yousai cowboy boots, it all works very well. I'm also wearing another one of my beloved Ellabella piercings. This one is Gemmed Bites: Steamed, and as the name might suggest, it's happily steampunk themed, with a little verdigris cog hanging from it, and a cog and spike verdigris chin piercing thingy. It's really very nice, and the lip piercing parts are studded with little tiny black gems. So, a horribly simple, short post today, but I think it's good and nice and I'm lovely and a bit sleepy now.

Outfit Credits:

Skin: Curio - Moonbeam Frex [Dark] - Cupid - Crush 2
Hair: Magika - Flow II - Red C
Shirt: silentsparrow - Skullyrock - Sage
Pants: silentsparrow - Gloomy Pants - Lime
Boots: Sentou Yousai - Black Cowboy Boots
Piercing: Ellabella - Gemmed Bits:Steamed

Silentsparrow Month! Day 17 - The Great Olympio!

I should start this post by saying that I have not been watching the Winter Olympics. Neither did I watch the Summer Olympics. Ever. All too much like sport, for my tastes. Although, Curling is ridiculous enough to be mildly fun to look at for a few minutes. I'm sure my stance won't change when the Olympics hit my fair shores in a couple of years, either. Here is what I know about this year's Winter Olympics. They're in Canada, some guy tragically died, and Canada finally won a medal of some sort for something. I also know they involve doing cold sporty things like skiing, ice hockey, sledding, team snowball fights, shivering marathons, that sort of thing. Oh and ice skating! And the only thing I know about figure skaters are that Torvill and Dean existed some time before I was born, and still slide around grinning on occasion for national entertainment, and there was that girl with the knee-smashing that one time. And that I went ice skating once and fell down much much less than expected. Then I went a second time and made up for it by making a whole chain of people fall down, so that was okay. I'm graceful! Regardless of all my ignorance, today, I am an accidental ice skater, and rather proud I am of the look, too!

While colours can be found in abundance at silentsparrow, slapping in the face those who claim goths only wear black, there is one colour that's rather *ha ha* thin on the ground. Other than yellow, that is. And that colour is White. (which is why I...ha'd...because the snow outside...is...white and and...on the...ground? :D? Eh, fine.) Anyway, there are very few white silentsparrow outfits, only one truly white one that I can think of, and, I am not wearing any part of that one! So, onto what I am wearing. The tutu skirt and upper, wide highwaist belt of my outfit is from the wonderfully springlike Fleur dress, with white highlights and patterning, which I discovered by happy coincidence when I was looking for something blue to wear with what I had originally intended to blog today. The funny thing is, I had just before been talking to hya about texture belts, a few minutes previously, and had completely forgotten Fleur had such a thing. But as you can see, it does. Yay! Underneath that, I am wearing the bodice from the Lottie Ballgown Suite, in Sterling, which is also pretty white, but I consider it more a silver colour. It has gorgeous fleur-de-lis type patterning on it, and a nice lace detail at the bustline. Underneath THAT, I am wearing the undershirt from How We Quit the Forest, which, see, I said was totally useful in all sorts of situations. My piercings are another set from Ellabella, I can't stress enough how awesome and original and simply beautiful Ellantha Larsson's work is, this set has, among other things, a teeeeny tiiiiiiiiiny little rose hanging off it. My necklace is another case of my boring adage of "good primwork etc etc", it's an early Schadenfreude piece, and still looks all sorts of fantastic. And my marvellously elegant skates are by Bax Coen, which have the same glorious styling as her super sexy ankle boots, but in a skate! Hooray!

Outfit Credits:

Skin: Curio - Cupid - Moonbeam Frex [dark] - Bouquet 1
Hair: Calico - Hannah - Blood
Big Wide Belt, tutu skirt: silentsparrow - Fleur - Ash
Bodice: silentsparrow - Lottie Ballgown Suite - Sterling
Undershirt: silentsparrow - How We Quit the Forest - Ash
Necklace: Schadenfreude - Alcmund
Piercing: ellabella - A Rose By Any Other Name (silver)
Skates: Bax Coen - BAX Ice Skate White Patent
Ears: Balderdash&Schadenfreude - Etherial Fey Ears

Silentsparrow Month! Day 13 - Like a Balloon and - something bad happens!

At first glance, you might think I dressed in the dark today, maybe at a rave. I wouldn't go so far as to say you'd be forgiven for thinking that, because really, that's quite a rude thing to say. On the other hand, I'm a pretty forgiving person, so you might be in luck. But rather than take that chance, you should first hear my inspiration. My muse, my motivation, my REASON. It's an excuse, you'll find, but a decent enough one. I just watched the Pixar movie Up. Now, first things first, Pixar movies always leave me an emotional wreck, and Up was, oh my, no exception, I was bawling in the first few minutes, and at several later points, although, I am admittedly a huge softie. But they don't normally get to me that quickly! Which is the first part of my excuse. Heartstrings tugged all out of shape. The reason this has any relevance, though (not that most of my babble is even remotely relevant, I know) is because BALLOONS. Millions and billions of beautiful colourful ballooooons. When my husband first visited me, for some reason, he had got it into his head that he was going to buy me a balloon. I don't know why, probably something to do with me being adorable, or maybe because of the balloons we picked up in Second Life when we were new. But he was determined to get me a balloon. He didn't, in the end, but it's still a nice, gently romantic thought. One of the reasons for this is, unless it's for some sort of stunt, you never see big big bunches of helium-filled regular balloons these days, only the foil ones, and that's sad because there's little so cheering to see as a big huge bunch of coloured balloons, all translucent and bright and jostling with each other up in the sky. I only do bright colours in one of two ways - Offset by a lot of black, or alllll the colours, mashed up together in a kind of rainbow mess. And that, in a long-winded, rambley way, is my excuse for how I am dressed today.

Inspired as I was by a rainbow of balloons, my outfit was built around the most difficult-to-find colour in the world of silentsparrow. That colour is yellow (it also barely exists in the world of Schadenfreude). My favourite thing in the tiny tiny range of yellow silentsparrow things is the Hedgies Ribbed Tank Top. These tanks were released to go with the Pajammies II sets of....wait for it? Jammies! all of which feature supercute hyadrawn artwork of various favourite creatures. Each pack of the tank includes two variations, the Ribbed Tank, which has just the one large image in the middle, and the regular version, which is patterned with them, and closet yellow fans, this is the yellowest thing you ever did see! With it I'm wearing the Gloomy Kilt in Lust. I adore the dual lengths of this skirt, as well as the Burtonesque swirlies at the hem. Looking to my rear, you'll see the Sparkle Sparkle Bum Bow, a relic of last year's Starlust Unicorn Wars, which is still available to buy in the Starlust Motel lobby, sitting on a rather fetching rainbow unicorn table. Also at the back, the gorgeously delicate Lysander wings, made of wire and glass and light, they can be got in a single colour from buying the Lysander Suit (my husband lived in it for months) or with a very lovely colour change HUD on their own. The HUD allows you to change the metal of the frames, and the wings themselves. My armwarmers aren't available anymore, they were part of Stumblebum Brigade in December, however, you can still get them in zillions of colourways with cute artwork on them, they are the Knitty Armwarmers. And hello Sailor! My delightfully retro Birdie tattoos come in packs of two colourways, and adorn the torso, arms, hands and hips. My piercings, by the way, are another set from Ellabella, and are awesomepretty and feed my craving for rainbowy stuff. So, see, it sort of makes more sense now, right?

Outfit Credits:

Skin: Curio - Cupid 2 - Moonbeam Frex [Dark] - Flirt 1
Hair: Calico - Luna - Dark Blood
Top: silentsparrow - Tank Top - Hedgies (ribbed)
Skirt: silentsparrow - Gloomy Kilt - Lust
Wings: silentsparrow - Lysander Wings
Bum Bow: silentsparrow - Sparkle Sparkle Bum Bow
Tattoos: silentsparrow - Birdie Tattoos - Berry
Armwarmers: silentsparrow - Ellies Armwarmers
Shoes: Baby Monkey - Ultimate - Rainbow for Haiti
Piercings: ellabella - No Rain Here (full)

Silentsparrow Month! Day 12 - Bundled Up

In a country that doesn't know what to do with snow, my warm, coastal little corner of it had about a foot of the stuff dumped on it overnight a couple of days ago. It was rather fun at first, no-one was out, I got new boots (my footwear collection consists mainly of maryjanes and eccentrically designed suede sneakers), saw my first real icicles (I lead a sheltered life) and built a little tiny snowman on my windowsill. South East England being a temperate, salty sort of place, though, it couldn't last, and by the time I ventured to the supermarket last night, in my new boots, all the knee-high fluffy white snow had compacted and the entire town centre resembled a very big, lumpy ice rink. Also, my little tiny snowman had gone off to become clouds. Given that the denizens of my town have little knowledge of this white cold stuff, when people got brave and came out today, it was very comical. I was woken by the sound of industrious Nepalese men (who DO know what to do with snow) breaking up the ice with shovels, around the Oriental Buffet I live across the street from. And a big delivery truck jack-knifed on the narrow cobbled street outside for three hours because he couldn't get his tyres to stick to the road. Good times. I much prefer the eternal pristine whiteness of snow in Second Life, I have decided, and even more so, the choice of outerwear I get to enjoy it in. Those new boots hurt my feet.

To cheer myself up, I threw on the newly-retired silentsparrow Marzipan coat. I'm about a month late blogging this, it was one of the wonderful pieces in the (not-so) Secret Sale room, which are now gone FOREVER, making me feel a bit old, as most of them were new when I first stared shopping at silentsparrow. But still, here it is, it's my blog, my hoard of old things, enjoy the pretty pictures and work on time travel. The Marzipan coat really does make me happy. All stripey and bright and pretty. It puts me in mind of something a fictional Edwardian child with really cool parents who had access to magic fabric dyes might wear. It's at the top of my list of coats I want that don't really exist, along with the coat from the movie Penelope. That's pretty much the entire list, actually. But anyway! It comes with four different bottom options, I'm wearing the Open Front with Bows. Because, bows. And also, if I was wearing the closed version, I couldn't get you to gaze in wonder at my crotch, thusly: gaze in wonder at my crotch! It looks a little bit like a face, doesn't it? Either friendly or menacing, depending on how you look at it. These are the pants from the Ritual suit, a kind of fantasy medieval affair which matches the gorgeous Ritual gown. In a somewhat flowery worn leather, with brass rivets, and a lace-up front, I admit they'd make more sense if I had an extravagant crotch bulge, but I don't, and for that, I am truly sorry. They're wonderful pants though, rich in texture and colour and detailing, and while I'll spare you any more closeups of my nether-regions (in THIS post, at least) the butt shading is pretty sweet too.

Outfit Credits:

Skin: l.fauna - Lapine - Pale 1 - Fresh FR
Hair: Deviant Kitties - Music Kitty - Blood Red
Coat: silentsparrow - Marzipan - Berry
Pants: silentsparrow - Ritual Suit - Penny
Boots: Kookie - Pomski Boots - Ocean Blue
Gloves: Twosome - Gatcha Gloves - Dark Grey (20L from gatcha machine)
Scarf: Scribble - Warm Stripes Scarf - Big Buttons
Piercing (barely visible, but there!) - Ellabella - Shadow of the Day

Silentsparrow Month! Day 11 - It'll be on your desk by the end of the day

The other day I joined Avatars United. If you've not heard of it yet, it's sort of like Facebook, for people in online gamey things, and Linden Lab have recently acquired it, spurring a buttload of SL residents to join. I rather like this. I think it's especially nice for players of games such as Runescape (which I occasionally dabble in), where fraternization outside of the game is generally discouraged due to underagedness and so on, which is well and good for protecting the kiddies, but some of us are adults with pure intentions towards each other. It's odd though, mixing your worlds. Long ago, when I still worked in a club, a new player came in, and he had an oddly familiar and distinctive name, and it clicked, that I had met him in Runescape, before I'd started playing Second Life. We'd been acquaintances at best in Runescape, fished in the same place on the same world from time to time, sort of thing, and in IM, I confirmed that it was indeed him (I'm Nivaya there too), and we chuckled over the coincidence that in all the clubs in all the virtual worlds, he'd wander into mine. He got a bit clingy for a while and then said his mom wouldn't let him play SL anymore, so I'm guessing some underage ban went on there, and I started to idly worry about cross-world stalkers. But anyway, I've "united" with a nice wide range of people on AU, from close friends to people whose name I know, to people whose name I don't know, and linked my Runescape avatar to my SL one and feel strangely accomplished about it all. I'm still not sure of the point in the whole thing apart from to microblog without the bitchiness of Plurk, but on the slim chance that you're reading this from my Feed Reader on AU - HI!

So it looks like my accidental schoolgirl of yesterday graduated nicely and found herself a nice secretarial job of sorts. In a place with a cool dress-code, natch. The basis of the look formed from it being bloody cold here right now, and me wanting to wear one of the silentsparrow's aptly-named Snug cardigans. So I did. The Snug cardigan is the most incredibly cozy-looking thing, rich chunky knit, with sculpted puffy sleeves, with safety-pin fastenings at the front, and pinned on patches, a big one at the back, and a little one at the front. The patches are texture change, and filled with various black and silver artiness, and if you were lucky enough to get the version from last year's Starlust VD hunt, there's also heart-themed patches in there. Underneath it, my 'blouse', with its little sprocket buttons, is actually a vest, from the Twinstar lucky bird suite. If you missed it being in the chair, do not despair! In a move of great loveliness, hya has many many of her past lucky bird sets set out to buy, in the panels of glass next to the lucky bird cage. While you're there, say hello to Otterly and Gravity, parents of one of my bunnies! My skirt is from the semi-vintage Dreaded Sunny Day set, one of the older items in store, which has one of my favourite system skirts in the world. Because I don't fear the system skirt, it's called a skirtshape, yo. Make one right, and you'll have all the best curves in all the best places. Anyway, what I love about this skirt is the wraparound front, with its fishtail effect sexy bit at the front, and the excessive beltage. And the pattern. And the colour. Never, ever ignore classic pieces like this. Do remember to wear panties, though.
Oh! Earlier in the post I mentioned the Starlust VD hunt, the 2010 hunt started today, go do it, and bring your clue-solving head, my gorgeous lip piercing is the prize from Ellabella, and we all know how much I love my Ellabella piercings, this one has four little lip studs, and on a chain, a tiny little heart in a round cage. With some extra chains. It is Love. There are ridiculous amounts of wonderful prizes other than this, too, so go hunt!

Outfit Credits:

Skin: Curio - Cupid II - Moonbeam Frex [Dark] - Pure 4 (with dark brows, yay!)
Hair: Magika - Denise (back picture) & Saturday (front picture) - Red C
Cardi: silentsparrow - Snug Cardigan - Blood
Vest: silentsparrow - Twinstar Lucky Bird Suite - Orangecream Sprocket Vest
Skirt: silentsparrow - Dreaded Sunny Day - Fawn
Shoes: First Flower - Hemlock - Magenta
Glasses: Prim0ptic - Celeste Glasses
Lip piercing: Ellabella - Starlust is for Lovers
Necklace: Eolande - Heart's Devotion Necklace - Silver
Ears: Schadenfreude - Fey Ears - Ankh & Plug

The post ellantha Larsson doesn't want you to see! (due to modesty)

I can't in any good conscience claim to be a piercings afficionado. Having my ears pierced in RL triggered my having allergies to EVERYTHING, so I stopped there, and I'm not much better in SL. Although, that's for different reasons. When I started in SL, I had this freebie set of piercings that I thought was AWESOME. It was supersuper basic, just a bunch of little rings stuck to the face, but I wore the lip ring and eyebrow ring constantly with asymmetric pride. At some point I discovered that things like hats would knock them off, and then when I finally discovered prim eyelashes, and facelights, and all the other trappings of fashion (note: I don't wear facelights anymore), it was hasta la vista piercings, and I rarely looked back. Thing is, most piercings in Second Life are either too basic for me to want to forego my various facial attachments for, or too...well...too pointy. It doesn't really follow, to me, that if I want to put pixellated metal through my pixellated face, I should want to pixellated impale everyone within a 10 yard (pixellated) radius. Also named too technically. I'm a novice, I don't know what things are called! So, for the most part, I abstained from the piercings. As I have previously mentioned here, I have a creepy, almost stalkerish (if accidentally occasionally being at the same place at the same time as a person and then obsessively camming over and 'Inspecting' everything they're wearing counts as stalking, anyway) admiration for the personal style of Miss ellantha Larsson. Particularly intregued I was upon spotting her a few months ago by her piercings, which were delicate and original and at the same time hardcore and....piercingy. Upon inspection I discovered were self-made, and eagerly profile stalked in search of a store. Alas, there was none. That is until a month or so ago, when I spotted on the venerable Free*Style blog, a lip ring from a store named ::ellabella::. Could it be?! Ran there I did, and sure enough, ellantha had opened a store, and in it was the dollarbie Garnet Lovin' lip ring (on left in top left picture), a delicate jewelled double lip ring that looked almost like fangs, with a little triple-heart charm hanging down on one side, and a double chin piercing thingy (see, I told you I was no expert on what these things are called) which I snapped right up. Also to buy were the Skully Lip Chains (on the left in the second pic), an assortment of rings piercing the lower lip, linked together with a dainty chain, with a teeeny tiiiiny liiiiittle skull hanging from a chain on the one side. When I next visited the store to buy the Starry Lip Chains (top pic on the right), a less morbid version of the Skully ones, I spotted she'd set up a Subscribe-o-matic, and clicked it for all I was worth. A few days later a gift came through on it which made me SQUEAL! The Rainbow Ravin' set (second pic, right), which, as the notecard warned, required some adjusting to fit me properly, but is SO PRETTY! A single wide ring in the centre of the lip, dotted with four little brightly coloured, slightly glowing dots, and a rainbow star dangling from it, with fine diagonal double-rings on each side, plus a ring at the centre of the nose with a little blue ball captive, and then four little bindi-ish piercings between the eyes in matching colours to the ones on the lip ring. It only comes on the Nose attachment point, but this was easily something worth losing my eyelashes for! With it was a note of a new release, Cog Me, which is simple steampunky greatness, a triple lip ring set, with fine chains linking all three, and a little cog hanging from the middle, plus a plain nose ring. All ::ellabella:: piercing sets (apart from Rainbow Ravin') come on three attachment points, Chin, Mouth and Nose, which is epic win in itself, given my previous whines about my precious prim lashes. Out of the box, the metals are dark, but I've tinted mine a lighter colour apart from Cog Me. ::ellabella:: also has a shapes section, featuring some really beautiful, unique and quirky shapes. But I don't but shapes, so you'll have to take my word for it and go look. They're yummy.

Also for some reason I've been wearing this outfit for days, so I figured I should talk about it. Starting at the top with silentsparrow's Shruggie in Creme, which is the main thing I havn't taken off, I bought the uber pack, and want it melded onto my skin, plz. I'm a big fan of shrugs, in RL too, and this one just makes me happy in my pants. It's softly textured in a chenille sort of knit, and looks all soft and warm and yumcious, fastened at the front with dainty metal hooks and eyes, and with a nice chunky turtle-neck, and sculpted bell sleeves, striped in a way that reminds me delightfully of the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland. Underneath it is the cupcake tank from Elate!, an opening gift from her shiny new mainstore on the Cupcake sim (which I'm thoroughly in love with), which might just be up and running now, maybe, perhaps. Added to it, is Canimal's Lowrise Cargos, in the Boxer version cos I don't want everyone seeing my bottom, and Urban Bomb Unit's Pornstar Hi-Tops, which everyone should have.

::ellabella:: be's located at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Axis%20Mundi/207/116/23

Outfit Credits:

All pics:

Skin: Nomine - Sylvan - Ultralight - Vamp Brown
Eyes: Miriel - Marine (standard)
Lashes: Sin Skins - Tipped Fluff Lashes
Shrug: silentsparrow - Shruggie - Creme
Shirt: Elate! - Cupacke Tank
Pants: Canimal - Low Rise Cargos - Brown (boxers)
Shoes: Urban Bomb Unit - Pornstar Hi-Tops v2

Hairs, left to right:

ETD - Kiley - Fire (tinted)
/artilleri/ - Sabina II - Cinnamon
Gritty Kitty - Bubblegum - Red
Hiccup - Amelieish - Burgundy
Kin - Shai - Red