The Gregory Legacy, Chapter 8

Hello again from The Gregory Legacy! Last chapter, Tessa's anguish over being a spare increased exponentially but then began to resolve after a Spare Intervention, Henry grew into a supposedly self-assured little guy who hardly ever becomes confident, Aaron made some creepy faces, and the Gregorys got a pool. Let's check in with them now. Read on for more Gregory madness . . .

Aaron and Henry decide to pull an all-nighter. Aaron is working on the Whiz Kid aspiration, his second one, and Henry is still working on Rambunctious Scamp, but they've come to be pretty good friends, so Henry's going to keep Aaron company as he tries to power through several stages of this aspiration. I learned that moodlet solvers like the ones they're drinking here are the best from my Wonder Child Challenge, The Silvas Succeed. Even though I'm not pushing Aaron as hard as I pushed Sawyer, I thought it'd be neat if he completed two or three aspirations as a child, so I decided to try for it.

And so they spent all night playing chess and making better friends with each other.

The next day after school, with Aaron feeling a little sleepy since I didn't buy him another moodlet solver, he gets his dad to read to him. That's some pretty cocky listening, though, judging by the pose. Aaron's an interesting one. His main defining characteristics right now are making faces and getting mad. He'll have to develop some other interests as he gets older, but I have no doubt he will.

"Corinne, we've got to get out of here!"
"What?! Why?"
"The controller is giving us a chance and it might be our last one, especially since you're due to become an elder in 4 days. I painted enough masterpieces for Marjorie to reach her aspiration, so the controller should hold up her end of the bargain and let us go."
"Hmm. You have a point. Let's make a run for it."

At a house I built entirely out of stock gallery rooms and named "The Home for Wayward Spares" (lol), Corinne and Dorian settle into their new digs before inviting over their sweethearts for a little romance.

 Proposals were made and accepted.

Elopements were had. Corinne and Dorian are now set, with a husband and wife respectively, and ready to live out the rest of their immortal lives away from the main Gregory household.

Thus, at the main house, it is just these guys, out in parade formation early the next morning when I came back from The House for Wayward Spares. By the way, Henry and Tessa will be moving into there with their eventual spouses when they're old enough, and then I'll have to start a new one for the next generation.

By selling Dorian's last few paintings, Marjorie reaches her aspiration finally. It is a very satisfying moment for me. Her new aspiration is Mansion Baron. Since I'm trying to do that before Tessa grows up, I thought Marjorie might as well benefit from it at the same time. Unfortunately, Dorian and Corinne moved out right before actual portraits were a thing. Otherwise, I would have had Dorian paint some official paintings for the family. Now, Nathan, who is around 6 in the skill, will have to improve before he does the portraits so they look nice. Or I might have someone develop some photography skill. I haven't decided yet, but I'd like to get Marjorie and Nathan before they become elders.

In the meantime, however, Nathan was busy collecting the decorative eggs (I am so behind in writing) so we could get the bunny. It took him three days of gardening and collecting from rocks and plants in the immediate neighborhood. There's quite a few spawns around Oakenstead, the lot that became Gregory Manor, so it wasn't too difficult except he couldn't quite find the last one. I think the last day and a half were spent trying to get that because he kept getting duplicates of the others. I also left the UI capture option on after getting Marjorie's aspiration. Oops! Anyway, we finally earned the bunny and I apparently took no pictures of it.

Oh, geez, I was so relieved to see this angry guy right here. After that one patch, I had heard of people losing their ghosts because the culling had gotten more aggressive. I was really worried that I wouldn't be seeing these guys again because I had loaded up the game once or twice before getting the mod that can prevent that, but obviously that was an unfounded fear, as evidenced by Jaron's appearance. I just hoped that Natalie was still hanging around too. I guess one positive to how slowly I play is that I didn't have many ghosts to potentially lose.

"I am the most awesome of all chess players!"
"What are you talking about? I'm beating you!"
"Yeah, but I'm losing with style!"

Aaron's doing that thing again. I think this may come from him feeling confident, in which case it's funny that he's getting it so often when it's supposed to be Henry that's the self-assured one. On another note, he never did get Whiz Kid before his birthday because, while he reached 10 mental skill, he already had an A when that requirement came up. TeeVee/Heather, a simmer whose story is in my links, helpfully told me that it doesn't count if you already have an A, but by that point Aaron was two days away from teen, and he wouldn't have been able to get down to a B and back up to an A in time. Sadface. (I'm so slow writing this that now a later patch fixed that apparently. Still sadface.)

Marjorie continues to be an astoundingly good mom for a gloomy, insane child-hater. The only downside where her children are concerned is that she often turns conversations awkward, so sometimes they get embarrassment moodlets from conversing with her for long periods of time.

 

Pool party! . . . that I had to initiate. None of my sims seemed inclined to take advantage of the awesome pool in their backyard while on freewill (they would much rather play video games and talk to each other), so I forced them out there so they would experience it at least once. The pools are so beautiful. I really like the way they implemented them.

After a little swimming around, the parents ended up chatting with their sons, but where did Tessa go?

Oh, well, she's just being a teenager. Ignoring her family in favor of tweeting about how bored she is, probably. Story time: I would never do this, because I was traumatized by once dropping a phone in the pool. It was a cordless landline, not a cell phone, but still. Technically, I dropped it on the cement beside the pool, but the damn thing bounced into the pool. It took a long while to live that one down.

Well, Marjorie, what do you think?
"Eh. It was fun."
That's all?
"Yeah. It was just okay."
They didn't seem nearly as excited about it as I was. I actually took quite a few more pictures, but no one needs to see 10 shots of my sims in the pool doing essentially nothing.

"Oh my god, Corinne! I haven't seen you in forever!"
"I know! It's so good to see you again, little brother!"

But . . . you live together. Both of them came calling around the same time, and they were very excited to see each other, apparently.

They joined simRoxy, who was also visiting - she's always visiting - in an exciting round of dancing and moping in the living room. No idea what simRoxy's deal is.

Here's the little nursery that I promised a picture of last chapter. It isn't anything special, but it'll be nice to have a dedicated room for babies in the future.

"So, Aaron, your birthday is coming up. I've left you big shoes to fill as a character. Any thoughts on what you might want to do in your life as heir?"
"Um . . . no."
"Oh, come on, son. There must be something that excites you."
"I don't really know. I like getting mad."
"Anything else?"
"I like playing with my siblings?"
"Hmm."

I'm very curious to see what aspiration and trait Aaron will get, partially because it'll help me figure out what he's like beyond the anger. Also, now I finally know where Aaron learned that hands-on-the-hips posture from.

Yay! Natalie! Now both ghosts are accounted for, though I don't know why they're so angry all the time. I'm so glad my ghosts are safe!

Sigh. Oh, yes. I'm so glad my ghosts are safe.

Nathan is continuing his quest to upgrade everything in the house. He also paints occasionally to try to raise money for our two Mansion Barons. We don't currently have enough money to fulfill the final tier of the aspiration. Unfortunately, his paintings don't sell for nearly as much as Dorian's did. He does have 10 handiness, though, so his upgrades are going well.

Tessa's portrait background turned a weird dusky purple while she was at school, so I clicked on it and saw she was dazed from illness. Thanks, GTW! There was nothing I could do about it until she came home, but one dose of medicine ordered from the computer cleared it right up. The only other sim in my game who gets sick is a doctor in another save that I don't document and a family in a joint legacy I'm playing with a friend. The doctor regularly brings home diseases from the hospital, so she practically lives on a diet of medicine. The nice thing is, they get a 'good drink' moodlet from it. That's some yummy medicine, I guess.

Realizing that he wouldn't be able to finish Whiz Kid at that point in time, I let Aaron goof off for the day or so before his birthday. Henry actually needs to play on the monkey bars or something similar for his aspiration, so they get to hang out together . . . right in front of the mausoleum. That's totally a healthy backdrop for a kids' playground, right?

The kids spend a very little sibling time together. Tessa doesn't have much time for her brothers any more, what with needing to earn money all the time so we can afford more house upgrades. I don't have anything particularly interesting to say for this picture, but I just loved the combo of facial expressions. Just what is going on in that conversation?!

Tessa gets a job in retail, just like Marjorie did as a teen, since it is the best-paying one with the most days. She looks pretty pleased with herself to be heading off to work. Let's hope she feels that way when she comes home too!

Marjorie *finally* earns a promotion out of that horrible outfit into an okay one as an eSports competitor, according to my notes. This means she has reached the split and committed to gaming over programming in the tech guru career. My sims progress so slowly in their careers. I really am the worst at it, and I fear what that will mean for my eventual Apocalypse family when I get to them.

Nathan is going to miss having sweet kid time with his son. Meanwhile, Marjorie, who is photobombing, can barely even look at someone having affection for a kid without a scowl on her face. You'd think she hadn't been caught hugging a kid herself at the beginning of this chapter!

Once she gets over that, it's time to make a very important phone call.

"Hello, friends, who I am apparently calling all at once! The time has come. Yes, that's right. It's a walk off party. So get over here!"

That's right! It's finally time for Aaron's birthday and the first party in Gregory history, but oh no! We have reached the end of the chapter! That means you will have to check back for the next chapter, which will hopefully be released soon, but . . . y'know, life and stuff, so we'll see. In the meantime, check in with me at SiMania or Boolprop. Thanks for reading! <3