Tara's Turn

Have I mentioned yet that Tara makes obscene amounts of money? In one day she brought home over 3,800 Simoleons.

There has been one question burning in everyone's minds ever since I split the Sullivan Sims up. Does Tara have a boyfriend? The first thing that I did was check her relationships for a boyfriend, and lo! She had not yet made the jump with Christopher Steel, but he was definitely a romantic interest. Huzzah! In my eagerness to get Tara some booty, I had her call him up as soon as she got home from work. He told her that he was busy, but invited her to call him back in 7 hours.

To kill some time, Tara played with her new telescope while I took pictures of her house.

The view from Tara's deck

Around 9:00, Tara called up Christopher and invited him over. He came straight over from work, still dressed in his work clothes. Tara could see right away that he was tired, so she invited him to stay the night. He agreed, stating that it would be "fun." Oh, how right he was.

First Kiss!

"Want to be my boyfriend?" "If I say yes, can I go to sleep?"

"Not yet..."

Aaaawwww!!!

Doris Meets a Guy

Doris had two days off, so she went on an extensive guy hunt. I had her go to the beach, the pool, and the park, but she met no one who seemed like a good prospect. The next day, I sent her to the art museum to see if she would fare any better with the intellectuals.

It was there that she met Jack Bunch.

Besides having one of the most awesome names ever, Jack is Creative, a Genius, and a Bookworm. He was with his family, and Doris joined them for a bit to get to know Jack. It didn't take her long to start hitting on him.

Unfortunately, she found out that he's involved with Fiona McIrish. I'm not going to let that deter Doris, though, because at this point in Doris's game, Fiona is old and I think Doris is totally capable of convincing Jack to leave Fiona for her.

The flirting didn't go exceptionally well, so Doris switched tracks and started being really friendly. They talked about everything under the sun: books, art, fine cuisine, TV shows. By the time they separated for the night, they were established as friends and had enjoyed that universal sign of affection:

A Day in the Life

Doris doesn't work until 3pm, so she has a lot of time to kill in the mornings. She usually does the same thing.

She gets up and makes breakfast.

Then she heads out to her garden to weed, water, and harvest her plants.

Then, because gardening is dirty work, the cruel deity above commands her to face the horrific ordeal of a shower.

"I have to WHAT???"

I know. How could I be so cruel?

On this particular day, Doris had even more time than usual on her hands, so when she finished being melodramatic about her shower, she headed to a beach to hang out. She met local heiress and legendary Sim crankypants, Agnes Crumplebottom (Yes, that is her real name. No, I did not name her or create her).

Agnes is known for being a bit of a grouch, but Doris is friendly, and most Sims respond well to her. Look, she can even make a good impression while talking about toilets.

Then she and Agnes really hit it off when they discovered that they were both hopeless romantics. They talked for a while about their common trait and shared their hope of meeting their perfect match.

Before their connection could blossom into friendship, Doris dashed off for work. I hope they see more of each other. I get the feeling Agnes could really use a friend.

Doris

Doris does not live in the same neighborhood as the Sullivan Sims, but I thought she deserved a spot in the rotation anyway. At least it means I would play her from time to time. Originally, she had her hair in a bun, but since RealDoris pretty much never wears her hair in a bun now, I decided to let SimDoris's hair out.

Doris is a Couch Potato, a Natural Cook, Hydrophobic, a Hopeless Romantic, and Friendly. When I started (Saturday Sim time) she was an Ingredient Taster at the restaurant.

Doris lives in a tiny little house. The living room reminds me of tropical fruit. She also has pink flamingoes in her lawn, which is too awesome for words.

For a hydrophobe, Doris had to deal with a lot of random water in her life for the first couple of days. First she had to endure the horrifying experience of showering - always reduces her to blubbery tears.

Then her sink sprang a leak and she had to fix it herself because she's too poor to call in a repair technician.

By Monday she had been promoted to Line Cook, but she still wore the same outfit to work.

Parenting

Helena has the Easily Impressed and Friendly traits. I think the Friendly trait makes her more likely to get lonely if left to herself for long periods of time. She can barely get through a night by herself.

Zelda was granted a few days' maternity leave, so the two of them devoted their time helping Helena learn some necessary skills.

They potty-trained her.

I am proud to report that Helena didn't have an accident the whole time. Zelda and Noah were scrupulous about taking her to the potty as soon as she needed to go.

They taught her to talk.

"Repeat after me: 'Music is life.'"

I guess it's never too early for "that" talk.

They taught her to walk.

Noah reads books to her before she goes to sleep. If they read enough, Helena will have a head start on the Painting skill.

Zelda supervised her when she played on her xylophone.

Uh-oh! Do you see what I see? Yup, at some point during the days following Helena's first birthday, Zelda had changed into maternity clothes. And sure enough, a few days later (I played this game one day longer so I could name the baby) David Bergman was born. He was born Good, and he Loves the Outdoors.

This time, Noah had the presence of mind to call a babysitter while he and Zelda went to the hospital.

Welcome to the world, David!

And that ends Noah and Zelda's week. Next up: Doris!

Helena Grows Up

Helena had a birthday party. It was time for her to grow from a baby to a toddler, presenting new challenges for her parents. Noah bought a cake and Zelda blew some noisemakers to celebrate.

Adorably, Noah blew the candle out for her before setting her down on the floor behind the bar to glow and then magically turn into a toddler with dark brown eyes and her mother's hair - right down to the black roots.

I thought the roots were funny, so I left them. I also don't like messing around with what genetics give the Sims anyway. It's fun to see how much of Mommy or Daddy they get. When she gets older, we'll be able to look for resemblances in other facial features too.

New Pursuits

Noah quit his job. He's been wanting to do so for a while now, but I think it's mostly because he just doesn't like going to work. Every other day, he would get a wish to stay home from work. That's the Couch Potato in him. Anyway, when the phone call was over he was so excited that he clapped his hands and cheered for himself.

I don't know what he was so excited about. After all, quitting a job before retirement age means you don't get to collect pension when you're an Elder. At least he can still hold autograph sessions, though. He should do that soon, huh?

To help Zelda bring in the bacon, Noah started working on his easel. He had enough Lifetime Points to buy an Extra Creative reward, so he gets little gold sparkles coming from his paintbrush when he paints. So far, his stuff isn't that impressive:

But so far he's only at Painting Skill level 3. He should get better. His most recent painting was valued at over 100 Simoleons.

Zelda has found a few other things, besides taking care of Helena, to keep her busy. She gardens:

...and plays with her daughter's toys. Gotta love the Childish Sims.

"Vroooom! Hahaha!"

Old and New Faces

Zelda has a Green Thumb. That means, obviously, that she will learn the Gardening skill faster than other Sims. She really, really wanted to garden, so I had her buy some fruits and vegetables to plant. Right now, her garden consists of an apple tree, a lime tree, a tomato plant, a lettuce plant, a grape plant, a watermelon plant, a potato plant, and an onion plant. I'm not sure how much time she'll have to take care of the garden with her job and the baby, but we'll see.

Noah had a wish to hang out with Joe, so when Noah got home from work he gave Joe a call. Joe showed up and they talked for a while about cake before engaging in the time-honored Sullivan Sim tradition of making faces at each other. Neither Joe nor Noah is Childish, so I don't know why they do this.

Zelda prepared her best mac and cheese for them, and they sat down to eat together. For some reason, Joe chose to eat at the formal dining table instead of at the island with his hosts.

Hilariously, they still managed to hold a conversation despite being so far away from one another.

Zelda was washing the dishes when she went into labor. She gasped and moaned for a while before heading off to the hospital, but for some reason I was not treated to a display of the panic and helplessness that gripped Peter and Joe on a similar occasion. I'm not sure where Joe had wandered off to, but Noah was asleep.

Somehow, he telepathically sensed the moment Zelda stepped into the hospital to have the baby, and he woke up. (Really!) He dressed and zoomed off in his insanely fast car to be with Zelda while she delivered.

Later that morning, Helena Bergman was born. You can see Noah coming out of the hospital behind Zelda. When they got home, Noah headed straight to bed to catch some shut-eye before going to work, while Zelda took her daughter to the nursery. They played a quick game of airplane before bed.