Testing, testing... The Fox family

Elsewhere in town, City Hall is receiving a major overhaul. A floor has been added and th
ings are being shuffled around.

The Fox family, who have nothing special to do this round, will be acting as guinea pigs. To make sure the rabbithole rugs in the attic are functional, they were already forced to attend charisma and handiness classes they didn't really want...

The next day the offices were decorated, so they were needed to test the routing. Bryan goes in first - he only works from noon to about 3.00 p.m. so he has plenty of time.

Bryan is the CEO of a games company, and for those three hours he gets about 2,500 Simoleons. Which goes a long way towards explaining the prices for video games...

The first thing Bryan wants to do is to view the world from the mayor's chair.

Hmm... This office is really dark. No wonder the mayor is so often accused of having no vision!!

From the other side of the office things don't look that much better, actually.

On his way to the conference room he notices that some of the employees left a LOT of mess on their desks.

The next thing he does is practice his speech - something about cutting back expenses by firing a whole subdivision of engineers, probably.

He's not quite happy with his delivery yet, but it's time to go to work.

A few hours later Susannah arrives at the new city hall. She immediately takes the desk of the mayor's secretary (near the door to his office) to play chess.

The Fox kids are both teenagers now. They have a lot of homework, which they do at the conference table (after testing each and every chair individually, of course).

Carlton, the eldest, looks a lot like his grandfather (Jonathan Thao). In his case, genes seem to have been passed from mother to son and father to daughter. Jonathan looked like Samantha, Susannah looks like Jonathan, and Carlton again looks like his mother...

Alexandra, on the other hand isn't exactly the most attractive girl in town. She looks like a blend of both parents, though. So it could have been worse!



She herself thinks she's certainly not as unattractive as her brother's girlfriend, Lynsay Mendez.

Alexandra actually doesn't like Lynsay, for some reason. Neither do her parents. Maybe they have heard the rumours about Lynsay's parents? Her father Pablo caused the death of his first wife, and then was most likely murdered in his bed by his second wife - although nobody's been able to prove it. Poor Lynsay, the child of two suspected murderers!!

Lynsay herself seems fairly harmless, though. The worst that can be said about her is that she's a bit fanatical about cats, and she really, really dislikes video games - or any technology, really.

They seem to like the refurbished wedding venue. Aww, young love!!


So far the most pressing problem seems to be the lack of light in the mayor's office, so he's going to need a desk lamp. And maybe he could use a few pens, too.

That's slightly better... Now let's hope the mayor's vision improves, too...

By the time the downstairs 'reception area' was done, though, they had all gone to bed. So they're missing out on juicing themselves up...

* * *

The Fox family didn't accomplish anything this round, but their testing was useful for the town planning committee.
City Hall is now the first fully functional, furnished community lot in town.

Shuffling pets - and another foreign bride

In their efforts to make Gina an Ark Builder, the Bernard/McGovern family ended up with a total of four horses, four cats and three dogs and four each of every single minor pet.

Gina sold most of her minor pets - she kept one of each, but even then it's a struggle to fit it all into their house. They use the money from selling the pets to build a stable and redecorate the house somewhat.

The garage door is restored to its proper place, and the animals are all kept in the garage for now. They're not done yet, but they're broke.

* * *

Meanwhile the older two generations of Bernard are adjusting quite well to living together. It's not ideal, the house is very small and they actually have more than enough income to buy a much bigger house. If there was one on the market, that is...

They do have just enough room on the lot to add two very small extensions. With a bit of rearranging, they now actually have larger bedrooms, two separate bathrooms and a half bath/laundry room.

It may not appear very extensive, but this extra addition does give them enough room, to take in two of Gina and Raphael's cats.

Stacia doesn't really have room for cats in her new house - so dumps the cat she took with her on her brother Trevor and his family, who live next door to Gina and Raphael. Now she has two horses and a dog, but she's confident she can make room for them, so she keeps them.

Somehow I can't bring myself to delete animals once they're adopted. Which leaves me with a LOT more pets in town than I'd planned after three attempts to do the Ark Builder wish.

* * *

In the meantime I played Christopher Somers for a while. He was single for a long time, while his sister Melanie is a grandmother by now.

In Champ-les-Sims he met Francois Lambert and his adorable daughter Jeanienne, who really seemed to like him. So Christopher decided to invite both of them over to Winchester. And once she got there, she agreed to marry him.

Francois decided to move in with them for the time being - there was nothing for him in Champ-les-Sims, so he preferred to be near his daughter.

He actually ended up dating Stacia McGovern for  a while, but that didn't last. And although Jeanienne dislikes children, he knows it's likely that they will have at least one baby - which would mean that there's no room for him at his daughter's house, either.

And sure enough, Jeanine does get pregnant. And has twins.

So poor Francois has to look for another place to live. For now, it has to be the retirement center.

* * *

And just a random picture of a community lot. This is the new spa in town.

And this is the ground floor of the local hospital.

(Both have rabbithole rugs stashed away.)

Adams, Bernard - and some McGovern

Back to the regular alphabetical rotation. I'll update each family as I play them.

There's nothing much happening at the Adams household. Everyone is secure in their careers, and working on their lifetime goals.

Lori has her own police car now.

* * *

The Bernard family are doing well. Since we saw them last, Gina Bernard has become engaged to Raphael McGovern. She had his son long before he agreed to become engaged, though. (He actually turned her down twice!)
They live with their son, Pascal Bernard, and Raphael's mother Stacia.

They also live with a lot of animals, because Gina wants to be an Ark Builder.

Raphael has a bit of a problem with his boots - but I'm not sure he appreciates Sheba's input...

Stacia recently switched careers again. She's been in politcs, and in sports, and now she's going to be a journalist. Her current boyfriend is Francois Lambert, but she switches boyfriends even more often than she changes careers...

Raphael wants to be an actor (I assume a character actor, with his looks) so he applied at the studio, and much to his surprise he got hired, too. (In spite of the weird boots...)

Gina tries very hard to balance her need to stuff her house with animals with the demands of parenting...

Since his parents aren't married, Pascal's last name is Bernard, so the name will continue. I think Yves is secretly glad of this, even though he doesn't approve of his granddaughter's other life choices... It's probably better for Pascal, too, since the McGoverns don't have a good reputation. And with good

* * *

Yves and Harmony Bernard moved in with their son Julien and his wife Ginny when both girls had left home. Harmony loves her siblings, but she would prefer not to live with them at the Retirement Home if she can help it.

Yves continues to work on his LTW of becoming a Master of the Arts. He bought himself a new guitar and an easel. He and Harmony are both enjoying their retirement in their own different ways - he's rocking the guitar, she's rocking the chair...

Ginny is still working in Education:

She's now the District Superintendent, but since the district is really small, that still means she puts in a lot of hours telling kids to use their brains.



Julien, in the meantime, got to the top level of his career and is now a Hit Movie Composer. Something that Victor Adams did before him, so he doesn't get any kind of credit for it... Still, he does manage to get his music skill and his charisma up to top level, though.

* * *

In the meantime I found out that the Ark Builder LTW is probably broken. Gina does have two horses, two cats, two dogs, two of each minor pet, two bugs and two butterflies, but the wish doesn't fulfill. 
I even had Stacia move out with the pets they had, so she could make a fresh start, but she's still not getting the credit for it.
From what I've read on the official forum it appears to have been broken in a patch.

Since she did fill the requirements, I'm going to call it a 'pass'. Unless and until I read something that can convince me I made a mistake...

So this time around, they add another accomplished LTW to the list:

Julien Bernard: Golden Tongue, Golden Fingers.

The Arc Builder goes into the list of "impossible" LTWs.

The rest of the town...

The Harrell family are the descendants of Kelsey Harrell and her husband Wesley.

They had three children: Daniel, Nathan, and Lucia (now Lucia Thao).

Daniel has two daughters. Bianca is married to Huan Chao Kim - so more about her later. Her elder sister Rosanna recently married Constance McGovern.

Rosanna is a criminal mastermind, working her way up to Empress of Evil.

Here she is after getting her final promotion:

She sometimes emits this evil red glow... Not like she's trying to hide her evil nature, then?

Nathan Harrell had one son, Leonard. Leonard worked very hard to become a master magician. He got to a level high enough to be allowed to work with the 'box of danger'.

Unfortunately he made an error when performing the 'watery grave' illusion - and all of a sudden, the illusion became all too real.

So Janelle is a widow now. She continues to live in the same house as her in-laws, and so does her son Donovan.

And here is Kelsey herself - meeting up with her gold digger husband after he got killed off by his gold digger wife... If you ask me, she's looking more than a little smug about it. What goes around comes around, and all that!!

"So, you got killed by your golddigger spouse, did you? I think I know how THAT feels!!"

This is what the Harrell family accomplished so far:

Kelsey Harrell: Super Popular.
Daniel Harrell: Visionary and level 10 Photographer profession.
Sofia Harrell: Private Museum.
Rosanna Harrell: The Emperor of Evil, level 10 Criminal/Evil.
Janelle Harrell: Blog Artist.
Leonard Harrell: Master Magician, level 10 Magican profession.

Nathan Harrell managed to complete the part-time Bookstore Clerk career as a teenager.

* * *

Jerome and Malika McGovern had four kids in total. Stacia, Janelle, Constance and Trevor. Only Trevor stayed in the same house as his parents.
He married Gillian Kim and they have two children: Buddy and Margaret. He's working on becoming a Rock Star.

Jerome got himself killed when he froze to death building snowmen on the beach.

Malika died of old age soon after. She's quite "zen" about the idea of death, though.

* * *

The Kim family came over when Sun Young Adams (formerly Kim) invited her brother Ho Sung and his wife Hui Young  to move in with them. They had four kids in total:

Yi Quan was born in Shang Simla, and went back there to find a wife, Wu Xio. Their daughter Gillian married Trevor McGovern and has two children.
Yue Xiulan married Dexter Adams.
Xiu Ying completed her Tinkerer LTW, but then died of eating a bad jellybean. Ho Sung died of old age while mourning at her grave. He was a Superstar Athlete at the time of his death.
Huan Chao went on to marry Bianca. Their children are Alexander and the twins (again) Bernadette and Christal.

Hui Young Kim completed her LTW of becoming the CEO of a Mega Corporation, and now that she's a widow, she lives with Huan Chao and his family.

Here is their list of LTWs and careers accomplished:

Ho Sung Kim: Become a Superstar Athlete and he actually completed the Sports career to level 10.
Hui Young Kim: CEO of a Mega Corporation and level 10 in Business.
Yi Quan Kim: Private Aquarium and level 10 in the Angler profession.
Wu Kim: One Sim Band.
Xiu Ying Kim: The Tinkerer
Huan Chao Kim: Paranormal Profiteer, level 10 in the Ghost Hunter profession.
Bianca Kim: The Zoologist.
Gillian McGovern (born Kim): Alchemy Artisan.

* * *

And then there's Mena Mendez (born Lufti), who still lives with her daughter Lynsay. The Mendez family don't feel she's one of theirs, but her sisters Layla and Aisha aren't keen to have her around either.

Like her half-brother Raphael, Lynsay looks like Pablo. Her lifetime wish is to be a cat herder. She has two cats already, and is hoping to be able to adopt some more.

* * *

So that's about everyone... Give or take a few stragglers who may or may not become permanent residents.
I've already played all the Adams family households, so I'll be going through the families in alphabetical order again, and I'll update them as I go...