Chronicles of Crayola Island

[MelanieScribbles]

February 17th​

Well, 'short but sweet' is definitely is an accurate phrase to describe today. I'm feeling slightly short on energy lately: I haven't got as much done in-game, I've been trying to find the time to draw gijinka's of some villagers (Milestone moment: I finally almost spelled that right on the first go!), and I've frankly been struggling with the dailies already. I don't really want to miss a day of posting, so I'll keep going, but I fear that sooner or later, I might have to skip a post. Well, today is not that day!

So Isabelle started off with a big announcement: I had been waiting on something in-game for the really long-term, and the good news had finally arrived.

I've finally unlocked the second and (hopefully) final Nook's Cranny upgrade! Some of my wishlist items can only be bought from an upgraded version of the shop, so huzzah! It's going to be a bit of a struggle to not be able to sell anything for a day, as I sort of visit the Nooklings multiple times a day. So tomorrow, I might just stick to the dailies, possibly do some Nookazon trades since I got some offers on stuff I was selling there, and maybe finally sit down to draw for the rest of the day. I mean, this is the best opportunity to get behind a sketchbook for a change, right? I'd probably just be doing some basic thumbnailing, as I'd have to come up with human-looking designs for all the villagers I want to draw. But hey, as long as I get something done, right?

Well, my morning routine has become a bit hectic with all there is to do in the game on a daily basis, but I somehow made it manageable. I usually start my day off with a reading from Katrina, go over to the archipelago from there, skim the place for cute villagers, and then head on back to Crayola to hunt for fossils, find the Bell Rock, find the money tree planting spot, pick up some shells, and just generally earn Bells. After that, I do the daily Nook Mile missions that give double rewards, and see if I have any ideas on how the island should look.

So Katrina was my first stop: I got the good health luck again. I haven't gotten a bad luck prediction so far yet, but I honestly keep getting the health thing lately.

After that, I hopped by the archipelago, and who do I find at the entrance?

Leif! Turns out he was invited by Lottie to talk about flowers at the School. So I decided to see what this is all about: my character shows him where that building is, I get a little cutscene, and he basically asks a question about hybrid flowers. It was a really easy one: he wanted to know what colour a red and white flower would produce. I mean, the answer was obvious: pink! I think it was even about Mums, and those flowers have practically taken over my island at this point.

He talks about how they won't always produce a hybrid flower, so I've just been darned lucky with getting a few, I guess? Getting more hybrid flowers is really easy if you have two of the same colour, though. Like, the chance of two purple Mums producing two purple Mums is disproportionately high compared to trying to get one out of normal, common flowers. The flower genetics in this game do jumble things up a bit compared to the hybrid flower mechanics in New Leaf, though.

An after this bit of dialogue, I actually unlocked the ability to decorate vacation homes with hybrid flowers! Good thing, since I have done a few exteriors where I really wanted to use them in the yard. So I guess I'll have some remodeling to do!

It was actually quite the day on the archipelago, as I had also unlocked the ability to make villagers roommates! Petri was actually the one who walked in on this little tutorial on how to do that, so this was a good opportunity to remodel that mess of a house of hers. I found it a funny idea to have her room together with Chadder: two mice, and there's a joke about a cheese in there somewhere. Also, a quick look at the wiki later showed that Chadder is Smug and Petri is Snooty, so good thing that their personalities wouldn't clash.

Well, I'm still not 100% happy with how this turned out: I somehow can't help but mess up when it comes to Petri. Oh well, was not planning on keeping her around anyways: I was planning to replace her with either a dream villager, a villager I want a photo of, or a special character. Same with Chadder, and this house does look better then before. So this is not a complete disaster, I guess?

Man, I love partition walls, since they do help you plan the vacation homes of these villagers better. I mean, it's nice that not everything has to be an open plan. But those partition walls sure have their flaws... I mean, why won't Nintendo either let me put doors in them in any capacity? I dunno, it just feels so weird to have bathrooms not have a door at all, for example. Same on bedrooms: where's the privacy for the villagers? I know that I'd personally feel uncomfortable in a bathroom with no door. Especially with a roommate that could walk in on me at any given moment! I dunno, I could just imagine a villager feeling lowkey a bit uncomfortable with something like that.

Oh well, at least Chadder seems to approve of the sink... I might come back to this house again, though: I feel like the two bedrooms that him and Petri would need takes more then one floor, as I felt I was really short on space here while using only one floor. I haven't unlocked that function yet, so might give this house a 3rd remodel once I do.

I mean, these bedrooms are absolutely tiny for my standards! Like, how would you even move around in here after waking up in the morning? If I had a second floor here already, then I'd probably place Chadder's bedroom upstairs, and just have Petri's on the ground floor. And I would've 100% made a separate kitchen room for Chadder to practice his little cheese-making hobby. And if I had space left, then Petri would've gotten her own laboratory as well.

I did also unlock soundscapes, though, so only one more house until I get a second floor to play with. Because when I got back, my favorite character was missing from the shop... Lottie said he was taking a break, and had been rambling on about how hard I work. Hmm, Wardell in a chatty mood? That doesn't sound like my homeboy's usual MO, I had better go check up on him.

Ah, so this is what he does on a break! Well, Wardell, I don't blame you: I have to admit that the rushing of the ocean here is pretty relaxing... And the ocean view here is really nice. I frankly prefer the view from the spot on the cliff, but each to their own, man.

It seems that he did open up a little to me, because the shop also had a new feature. I think that today marks the most that Wardell has ever said to anyone!

Duely noted, my dude. I have more Poki then I know what to do with, though. I've just been checking back here daily to see if there's anything in the shop that I want. For example: the chandelier in the background (on the far upper left in the screenshot) might not be the colour that I want, but it's a new catalog entry, and I can always try to trade it for the colour that I do want on Nookazon later.

So for the rest, I flew back to Crayola, and designed a vacation home for Monique before I went about my dailies.

Well, she's a Snooty villager, so I have my work cut out for me. She seemed to absolutely love some of my furniture choices: she's especially a fan of some flowers and plants that I chose. Like, she legit had a little heart over her head when I placed those flowers on the far right in the first screenshot of the finished room.

She also loved this little powder booth vanity in her bedroom.

Looking back, I might add an effect to the bathtub in her bathroom later. I can get so caught up in decorating in the moment, and I'm usually more focused on whether the villager can actually reach their furniture or not while I'm busy. So I tend to completely forget about polishing effects most of the time.

Well, Monique wasn't exactly complaining about the 50 inch tv that I gave her either. I really didn't know what to do with the little nook behind it, so I just put a little hall table with cute stuff on it, put the phonograph on there for audio purposes, and called it a day. She absolutely loved that big flower thing I put in the corner, though.

After this, it was time to go back home to Crayola, as the villager offerings over at the archipelago were absolutely horrible: I got nothing but weird-looking villagers there. Nothing interesting on the beach, nothing interesting in the café, nothing interesting in the restaurant, it was crappy all around. Lobo really was the only highlight today, and things went downhill from there. So it was about time to head on back.

I did get darned lucky this morning: Leif had finally sent me the DIY for a veggie basket!

I do need some produce for it that I'm haven't gotten my hands on yet, but I was looking to get more different produce to begin with. So this is only spurring me on to go get that done. I am already growing some sugarcane and potatoes, and I did plant some pumpkins recently. So let's hope those turn out to be orange, because those are the ones I need for the recipe.

I did want to open up Leif's shop on Harvey's island, so I guess that's going to be my next goal. I could frankly knock it out in one go at this point, but I also want to save up to pay off my million-Bell Nook debt. So I guess we're still keeping it at 20k IGB a day on this one.

Well, the highlights for today ended at Flick visiting today. So I got a few extra Bells on selling insects today, and commissioned him for a model. Gotta support a fellow artist, right? I tend to keep 3 of each bug or fish that I want a model of in my storage, so I was just glad to have 3 extra storage spaces again.

Flick is actually one of the special characters that I want an amiibo of to invite him to my archipelago, since I just like him more then C.J. I dunno, the bug talk is sometimes a little creepy, but I just generally vibe with this character more. Which reminds me: I should really find the time to catch more bugs and more fish after tomorrow, since I want to complete my critterpedia someday. On fish, I'm still missing the Tuna, Blue Marlin, Coelacanth, Ranchu Goldfish, and Koi. And on bugs, I'm still missing the Mole Cricket, Ant, Fly, Snail, and Tarantula.

I am looking forward to the new critterpedia entries in March, though: I especially want an orchid mantis, because they're just so pretty. I'd probably use the model for decorating my island if I can get my hands on it: tell me that it wouldn't look amazing in the bamboo forest! Those mantises might be really rare, but if I'd want multiple models, then I'd have until November to catch enough. So if I keep at the bug hunt, then I should be good. I am struggling a bit with what to place the actual mantis model on, as the bamboo furniture series left me hanging on that one. I do have some promising options for that already, but I still have plenty of time to figure that out.

Thank you for reading and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 18th​

Arachnophobia Warning: There will be a screenshot of a tarantula, talk of them, and talk of general spiders at the end of today's post. If any these things either upsets you or causes panic attacks for you, then please stop reading and/or scrolling at the section with Redd's Treasure Trawler in it. I'll also put a warning at this specific section to not just spring that screenshot on you. Also, absolutely no judgement: I have light arachnophobia myself, so I won't be offended if you decide to skip the post entirely.

Now without further ado, please enjoy today's post!

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So today, Nook's Cranny was under construction, so anything that I'd usually sell (bugs and fish that I've already donated to the Museum, fossils I've already donated, furniture made out of shells found on the beach, etc.) went into my storage.
Also, a Campsite villager showed up today, and you know what that means... A villager is getting cycled out today! I haven't actively decided on one yet, so I used the wheel of names site to decide who would be going: I added all of the names of the villagers that I eventually want to cycle out, and spun it. The wheel landed on Caroline.

The villager in the Campsite was Puck, who isn't much to look at either. But I prefer to keep the cycle going until I land on a dream villager, so I decided to just keep spamming him until he'd replace Caroline.

It took me all day, but I got him to move in! Before Caroline left, though, she taught me a new Reaction: Sadness.

I did hop by Katrina in the meantime: I got good belongings luck today, so that means that I would find more rare items then usual.

After this, I headed off to do my dailies. The orchard was ready to be harvested as well, so any fruit from there went into storage to sell later. After this, I set off to the archipelago to give the place a once-over for cute villagers. And boy, was it ever eventful!
First of all, Niko wanted me to meet him at the School.

Turns out that I've unlocked pillars and counters for both vacation home decorating and crafting, and those are sure going to come in handy! I've been short on counter space back home on Crayola, and I've been mucking about with ideas for kitchens in the vacation homes for a while now. And it's always nice to have more options, right?

There also were a lot of cool-looking villagers around the archipelago today: Gayle was there, and I felt that she'd make a good roommate for Lucy. I had unlocked second floors, so guess where her bedroom ended up being... Cephalobot was also there, and I'm pretty proud of how his house turned out.

Well, he's giving me a lot of leeway here. And we've seen before that giving me too much freedom is highly irresponsible... And the first thing that came to mind was something with a sci-fi theme.

I kind of went for 'laboratory / home taken over by the robot after his creator died of old age' sort of vibes for the place. I'm not sure if robots like him even need bathrooms, but I included one anyways. I mean, it adds to the idea that once upon a time, a villager of flesh and blood lived here.

We'll just imagine there's oil in that bathtub now. I did change the audio on the speaker into another song adding to the space soundscape I did in here, changed the lighting, and generally gave the place more space/ sci-fi sort of vibes once I was done decorating. I wanted people to have the feeling that they were walking into some sort of dilapidated laboratory, and then they'd run into Cephalobot somewhere.

I wanted his bedroom to look like he just walked out of his recharging pod, and that the button would be there in the case of an emergency. Not sure what it would do, just thought it looked cool.

Gotta wonder what's in his fridge, though... Maybe nuts and bolts? Would a robot even need a kitchen? I dunno, it just looks cool.

Whitney was also there, and I'm also lowkey proud of how her house turned out. But for the sake of the screenshot limit here: you'll have to check that out on my HHN profile. My ID is RA-4073-0316-7483 .

Back home, I got yet another new pattern from Sable: she's been giving me new ones for the past few days. I have been using a few so far in vacation homes, but I usually just make a new design on the spot if these premade patterns don't exactly cut it for the look I want to achieve.

The pastel purple one with the triangles was actually a lifesaver on Lucy's house on the archipelago, because none of the basic covering variants for a ranch lowtable that I used for hallway table matched the kawaii overload theme that I was going for well enough.
Phoebe also came up with a better nickname for me then Biff had: Motor.

She knows me well, it seems: I'm always doing something around the island! I always just keep going and going, so it's oddly appropriate. O'Hare even copied it later.

Also, my old nemesis had arrived on the island yet again...

My mom was in the room when we saw that Redd had the gall to put a fake of 'the Night Watch' by Rembrandt van Rijn in his store today. She was just shocked as I was to see it, and well.. I explained to her that he stole art from other ancient Dutch masters like Vermeer and Van Gogh. This really stings extra for us as we're both Dutch, and I can understand Tom's deep hatred for him! Now that's just a deep insult to any Dutch artist or art aficionado. But we already knew that Redd was a philistine, and that he has no right to pretend we're like family. The only real piece he had was the famous 'Mona Lisa' by Leonardo Da Vinci, so I snapped it up.

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Tarantula section starts here
(Last chance to turn back, folks.)​

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Also, today marks the first time I've ever seen a Tarantula! I saw it in the bamboo forest, and it only just crept away from the edge of my screen. I swear I saw a big, brown shape just shoot away, and I've heard about how to hunt them before. So with me being generally unafraid of giant spiders in videogames, I bravely decided to go catch it. So I bravely approached the fearsome beast with a net in hand, ready to strike. And very courageously...
Got bitten.

I was about to do a slow approach when it jumped. It actually caught me in the middle of my character's net swing animation! So when my character woke back up at her house, I took the chance to empty my inventory, and regroup.

Needless to say, I wanted revenge! This spider just made it personal! Ask any videogame boss: making me respawn is cause for bloody vengeance. Now instead of your usual garden variety anger, I'm one of those people who only gets more focused and precise when they're angry. So this spider is darned lucky that I'm only midly annoyed. Because it just made the mistake owaking up my inner hardcore gamer: Que the Doom soundtrack in the background, because war has now been declared on these Tarantula's.

So I spent the rest of the evening hunting the tarantula: I was catching every other bug in hopes of it spawning again. I did get a second spawn right in front of my character's house this way: It was behind the fence and about to attack, but the fence between me and it saved me from a second bite. Sadly, no dice yet, at it despawned right after. But nobody gives me a game over and gets away with it! Or the closest that this game has to it... Needless to say: I'm hunting the beast tomorrow again. I will have my vengeance! Now if you remember: only the small spiders scare me. The tarantula is big enough to summon imagery of giant spiders in videogames for me, so my arachnophobia didn't get in the way. I usually don't time travel, but I'm willing to make an exception for this, as this just lowkey became a Captain Ahab story.

So tomorrow, the general lighting in screenshots will probably change in strange ways, and arachnophobes might want to skip reading tomorrow's post. So if you have heavier arachnophobia then me, and this might upset you? Then I won't judge you for skipping past the next one: you might want to sit it out, as the tarantula hunt will be a big focus of the post. I will put a warning at the start of that one just in case, but I'll also post one here for good measure.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 19th​

Arachnophobia Warning: In today's post, there will be a lot of talk about Tarantula's, general spiders, and it will be a big focus of the content. Spiders of any kind will also be pictured in screenshots. There is still spider-free content at the start of the post, though: I will also post a warning at the start of the spider section. If any of the mentioned spider-related content upsets you in any way, please just sit this one out. Also, absolutely no judgement: I have light arachnophobia myself, so I won't be offended if you skip the post entirely.

Well, without further ado, please enjoy today's post!

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Well, the hunt was on today.... And I was back with a vengeance: I had a net, a bad attitude, and an entire day to burn. But I didn't go in without a plan today: this hunt would take preparation.

First, I did some dailies. And good thing too, because when I visited Katrina, she actually gave me my first bad luck prediction ever today! I was actually stuck with some bad money luck this time: weirdly enough, she didn't offer me her purification service...

Good thing that I actually did most of the money-related dailies before I visited her, then! I had actually already hit the bell rock, planted some Bells in the money tree digging spot, and harvested my fully grown money trees before going to Katrina, and I had cleaned out everything in my storage that I had wanted to sell yesterday. So since I got the full amount of profit out of all of that, the financial hit was really limited to selling fossils since I hadn't dug those up yet. And since cleaning out my storage made me a cool 100k IGB in one go, that could've frankly been a disaster if that bad money luck today had affected that activity in particular! So while there was a small financial setback today, still no love lost.

And boy, you do not want to know how many Damselflies I still had in my storage from yesterday! I had enough to have Flick make a model like 4 times over, and that's an insect model that I already have.

It's all bugs that are already donated to the Museum, so I could safely sell them off. I also took yesterday's already donated fossils out as well, plus a few Nook Shopping furniture items obtained from balloon presents that I did not want to keep. Selling off everything totaled around 100k, so I decided to do a bit of shopping while there. They had some new tools, and more importantly: a straight-up purple net! You know I needed a net that matches my outfit.

After cleaning that mess in my storage up, I decided to celebrate the opening of Nook's Cranny. I might move the shopping area to somewhere else, since this just doesn't screenshot well, and it was sometimes hard to find the door of Nook's Cranny before the upgrade due to the Able sisters standing there for space saving reasons.

But moving that area is still very much in the planning phase: it would maybe take swapping some houses around, and I'm not even sure where the area should even go instead of here. I kind of want to keep the market stall area and an outdoor café/restaurant sort of area that I'm working on to the south of the Able Sisters, so I'd need an area with tons of space to fit all of that in. And with every idea that I'm already working on, that kind of space is hard to come by at the moment.

Speaking of the Able Sisters: Sable must be on a creative binge, because she yet again had a new pattern for me.

I was also lucky enough to have a Beach Towel drop from a balloon present recently: I had been looking for 2 for my little beach lounge area. So I ordered a second which arrived today, customized both of them the way I wanted, and placed them there today. My furniture wishlist is slowly becoming a reality, and I'm living for it!

I had to move the Sea Globe for a minute to properly place this, but that's going on a Cancer Table once I obtain the latter anyways. I love how this little area is starting to come together, though. The Sandcastle in the background wasn't planned, but I still think it matches the theme nicely. Though if things get to cramped, I can always either move the towels to the beach around this area, or I can just move the Mermaid Sofa a bit to the back to keep things actually accessible. I'm still glad that I didn't go for 'just a Lighthouse' and call it a day when it comes to this part of my island.

Also, I got to harvest my new pumpkins today: it turns out that they were mainly the orange ones that I needed to craft my Veggie Basket! I was already hoping for that, so yay! I must have had some good karma saved up.

I put a full stack of orange pumpkins in my storage for that Veggie Basket purpose, even though I'd only need one for this. But full stacks are just easier. Still needed for the recipe: some Carrot Starts, Tomato Starts, and some Wheat Starts. I think I'm prioritizing the Wheat, as a lot of my current cooking recipes need that in addition to the Sugarcane that I already have growing here.

And lastly, before the hunt, I dropped by the Roost for a Nook Mile mission.

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Arachnophobia warning: Spider-related section starts here
Last chance to turn back, folks​

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Well, after the dailies and all of this, I set to the preparations for the Tarantula hunt. I crafted some spare nets...

...and I ended up with like 10 spares or so. Tiansheng even came by to wish me good luck before I left on my hunt!

And after thanking him for his support and saying our goodbyes, I set to time travelling. The real time was around 13:00, but I set it to 19:00, the start of the Tarantula's activity hours. I put most of my other usual tools in storage to have a bit more inventory space to work with, and decided to move out from the Plaza. I did hop by K.K. Slider for a request to pump myself up further, as it was a Saturday. I was already pretty hyped, but not quite in the mood yet.

I requested K. K. Jongara this time: It always makes me feel like I'm fighting some boss fight with a Yakuza member in some videogame. And well, I am hunting a pretty dangerous bug today, so I could frankly use the hype to get me good and focused to actually catch the dread beast.

Well, I had some pretty, customized nets matching my outfit ready to go, a Pipe to quickly grab more spares if the two nets on me should break, I was feeling pretty badass, and I was ready to roar!

The hunting routine went like this: I start from the Plaza, go west first as there's a lot of bare ground there, move through the shopping area as there's an area that could serve as a Tarantula trap solely through the way it's built, move in front of the Villager houses from the still-empty café area there, move back north after Phoebe's house, and check the 4 trees in the park: people often mind the Wharf Roaches if they're hunting Tarantula's on a Kapp'n island, but forget to check their trees if they're hunting Tarantula's back home. I mean: the game can only spawn like 4 bugs. And if 4 trees are filled with insects, there's simply no room in the spawn queue for a rare bug like the Tarantula!

For example: the tree Spider and Bag Worm. Well, that is a spider, but not the spider. Also, you might want to stay sharp because of Wasps while doing this: remember, they do count as insects! The best way to catch them is to run north at full running speed to create distance between you and the wasps, quickly open your Tool Ring (the Wasps will freeze in place while it's open) and time your swing properly to catch the suckers. After this, go back to pick up the nest once it's safe.

Or if you're in a low-visibility area like the woods around my stargazing area: you might want to leave it lying there to block off that spawning spot for a Tarantula. They need bare ground to spawn, so they can't appear in a space with either an item or a hole you dug on it. But then again: you'll probably maintain focus and a sharp eye, as approaching the Tarantula to go and catch it is no joke. So Wasps should not be a challenge for you to catch if you maintain focus. I actually got the achievement for catching 5 in a row today! Didn't get stung once: good thing too, as I foolishly had left my Medicine at home to save inventory space... Please don't repeat my mistake here, and pack one stack of it before you go Tarantula hunting.

Also, you see part of the hunting routine here: from the park, I'll head west through a bare-ground area, but go towards the south entrance of the bamboo forest instead of the east entrance. This allows me to cover all ground on this 3rd of the island, and hit a rock for bugs along the way. Centipedes and Pill Bugs also clog up the insect spawn queue, so if you don't see any air bugs, then be sure to check both these and the trees.

Like, you wouldn't believe how many Centipedes I pulled from rocks alone! Also, if you have any decorative tree stumps on your island like me, then please do remember that these can spawn bugs as well. If you have any, please be sure to check them. You don't want Citrus Beetles clogging up your spawn queue either.

And of course, do take that old advice from the articles about hunting Tarantula's, and mind those darned Wharf Roaches. They've been the bane of many a player's hunt for the Tarantula on the Kapp'n Islands. You'll want to comb your beaches every now and then anyways, as Tarantula's can actually spawn on beaches! Be sure to swing your net at any Wharf Roaches you spot.

Well, lather, rinse, repeat until a Tarantula spawns for you! Five broken nets and four full emptied inventories at Nook's Cranny later... my hunt proved unsuccessful today. Not a single Tarantula spotted, and I was hunting during its peak hours after 11 PM in-game!

But that doesn't mean that I'm giving up: Tomorrow, I'll just try again. I still have like 5 spare nets left in my storage, and I now enough resources to spare to craft an almost infinite amount... Both tree branches kept falling as I was checking trees for bugs, and I got some extra iron from hitting rocks to check them for bugs. On the plus side: despite the bad money luck, I did earn a small fortune in selling bugs today. So even if you don't end up finding a Tarantula, no love lost with this method: at least you're still working towards paying off your next home loan. I must've earned like another 100k looking for this darned spider.

I'm lowkey hoping that Flick visits tomorrow, because that would be absolutely perfect. But we'll see what happens: here's hoping that I'll at least find the danged spider tomorrow.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 20th​

Arachnophobia warning: In today's post, there will be a lot of talk about Tarantula's, general spiders, and it will be a big focus of the content. Spiders of any kind will also be pictured in screenshots. There is still spider-free content at the start of the post, though. Just like yesterday, I will also post a warning at the start of the spider section. If any of the mentioned spider-related content upsets you in any way, please just sit this one out. Also, absolutely no judgement: I have light arachnophobia myself, so I won't be offended if you skip the post entirely.

Well, without further ado, please enjoy today's post!

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Well, since we didn't see a Tarantula yesterday, the hunt was still on today! But before that, there was still dailies to do, and I still had a bone to pick with a certain fortune teller... Katrina, I know you can help me avoid that bad luck! I don't know what I did to anger you, but I'm sorry, okay?

Well, good friendship luck today, I guess I'm still on good terms with her. Also, when finding fossils, I really lucked out: I tripped over two of them on my way to the airport for Harvey's island, and two of them were buried right next to each other in the bamboo forest! And I even found some gyroids along the way, even though I hadn't buried any fragments.

After this, I dropped by the Museum to get those fossils identified: nothing but fossils I've already donated. So I went by Nook's Cranny to sell off both those and some leftover bugs from yesterday, and bought the daily Festivale-exclusive item. Since it's in little over a week, I'm slowly getting into the spirit here: I've already bought two Festivale-exclusive furniture items, and I'm going to customize them to match my island colours (Red, orange and yellow) tomorrow.

I also found something there that would frankly be perfect for my marketplace area: I'm making a little veggie stall there, which I need that Veggie Basket for. But they had a Shopping Bag that would also look super-cute on that little stall!

Like, tell me that wouldn't sort of look like a packed up order when placed on a stall. Well, after that, it was time to get to the daily double Nook Mile missions. One of them involved spending 500 Nook Miles, but I had more on me then that. So I decided to just print our a Nook Mile Ticket: if the game wants you to spend those miles anyways, then you might as well spend it on something useful, right?

Also, Monique had a ping today: turns out that she had a pretty useful gift for me!

It was even in my favorite colour: black! Phoebe also had a thought bubble today: she had a really pretty Robed Coat for me, in red. It sort of looked as cute as my Labelle Coat, so into my storage for later use both of these items went.

I've also redone my orchard again today: I had been struggling to see where the fruit dropped to due to the trees being too close together. But fanning them out further then one space apart on the south square of the tree required expansion.

So I cut down some trees north of the orchard, mapped out an area, and divided it up in two halves. This allowed me to dedicate the bottom half to my current trees, and leave enough space for the future fruit trees of the two fruit types that I don't have yet on the new north half of the orchard. I've also had to move the money trees there, and they're actually a good example of how I've increased the space between trees.

There's still one space between them horizontally, but I've added an extra space on the south square of each tree, to increase visibility as I'm either harvesting them, or shaking them for either bugs or other goodies.

And speaking of bugs: 7PM was about to hit in a few minutes in real life, so I had a Tarantula hunt to prepare for!

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Arachnophobia warning: Spider-related section starts here
(Last chance to turn back, folks)​

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Now I had some low-visibility areas on my island where it could've easily snuck up on me last time, so I decided to drop some items in all squares there to prevent it from spawning in those areas in the first place. I mean, for example: I didn't want it sneaking up on me in my orchard, going into attack mode where I couldn't see it...

I had more Tree Branches then I knew what to do with, so I filled up some spaces with those. And when they ran out, I just dug some holes like Tarantula hunters all around the world. The Tarantula would have no choice but to spawn where I could see it. And with 4 spare nets left in the storage, one spare on my person at all times, the Tarantula traps set and armed with knowledge about its peak hours... I was ready to go on the hunt. I wasn't really expecting anything to come from it, but the extra Bells from selling full inventories of bugs sure would be nice.

So I do my little rounds around the island as usual: just yesterday's routine of running aroun, hitting rocks, and shaking trees, nothing special. Caught a few butterflies and Damselflies beforehand to free up the bug spawn queue, but I was barely through my inventory, and I was settling in for a long evening here. I had skipped out on buying Turnips for the week, as I would be time travelling backwards a few hours to sell off any other bugs then the Tarantula, after all. I didn't really want them to rot. Anyhow, I was just casually wondering what the first insect haul would end up bringing in when I walked past my character's house for the second time.

But wouldn't you know it: My produce area had, umm... produced something else this evening. I had an uninvited guest in there, and it sure as heck wasn't Olaf this time!

The dread beast had arrived, and thirsted for my blood once more... But I was ready this time! So I steeled myself, readied my trusty net, and crept closer... It did notice me, and raised itself on its hind legs. But each time it did, I froze for a minute, to see if it would go back into a dormant state. It did, and I moved closer every time it went back to that state. But as I came closer, it was walking towards the trees in the orchard, where I'd have a way more difficult time seeing it. As luck would have it, though, the Tarantula turned around, and was walking towards me.

I noticed that it was within net range at a certain point, but here's the thing: I have an eye defect which makes me struggle with estimating precise distances: one of the muscles in my right eye is too short, causing that. Like, I'll know whether something is close or far: not like I''ll actually walk into a lamp post due to it or anything. But in this game, I can't tell two tiles from one and a half tile. And that eye defect had been acting up this evening. So if I would swing my net, I could've easily missed by half a space or so. And thus, be attacked again, with the Tarantula de-spawning upon me trying again.

This was it: either vengeance would be mine, or the beast would claim yet another evening. But I wasn't about to let this opportunity slip me by: I took the chance. I released the A button, and there was no going back now.

With great bravery, my character, the in-game representation of myself, took a mighty swing with her net: And thank all that is holy, she turned around to victoriously hold the Tarantula up!

...You can understand: this required the silliest of victory dances before I handed this sucker off to Blathers.

I feel you on this one, Blathers: a wretched thing indeed... But it must be imprisoned for its misdeeds: not only against me, but against players all over the world! Some of them work the graveyard shift, and have no other choice but to face the risk of meeting this monstrosity. And we can't have it going after the villagers. Sacrifices must be made, my friend... So take a deep breath, and chuck this eight-legged terror into a display case!

And with that, the Tarantula who had terrorized Crayola for two nights now had been sentenced to a life of imprisonment for its crimes against the Animal Crossing community. Now you think about what you did!

Its vile brethren will be sold off to the Nooklings upon capture. We already didn't take kindly to this kind of behavior from Olaf, so we won't take this kind of behavior from anything on this island.
I did still have a Nook Mile mission to visit the Roost today, so I decided it was time for a victory drink. Brewster, time to bust out the good cups, because I've got something to celebrate today! Cheers, man.

Well, this is where I called it a day. I still can't believe I finally caught the sucker today! I'm frankly over the moon that I caught my first Tarantula ever. I know they go for like 8k IGB each at Nook's Cranny, but I just had to have it in my Museum. I still have an island to clean up now, but I'm too much on cloud nine here to bother with that this evening. That's a task for tomorrow, because tonight, we celebrate a hard-earned victory! I honestly expected to miss and get bitten, but today turned out to be the day. Another island menace brought to justice, I guess? Talk about ending another week with a bang.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 21st​

Well, despite a successful Tarantula hunt, I still had an island to clean up... And since I was doing a Nookazon trade today, I couldn't have the mess of those spider traps still out and about. Come on, I can't have company over like this!

I know that most traders won't go beyond your island entrance, but the cutscene for a flight over to someone else's island shows a good bit of the island you're visiting. I was glad that the holes I dug for the Tarantula traps somehow filled up overnight, so all I had to do was pick up the branches. And after picking them all up, my orchard was also so much easier to harvest this way: only one tree drops fruit in an inconvenient place, but I can live with that.

So after that, it was time to hop over to Harvey's island for my daily fortune. And fortune it would be, as Katrina decided that I would have some good money luck today!

Label was visiting the Plaza today, which means she had a style challenge for me. Well, 'challenge' is a strong term, since she chose the theme 'comfy'... General comfort and good food has always been important to my family, both from my mother and father's side. So needless to say: I dusted off the good sweatpants, and absolutely crushed this challenge.

Tailors ticket, here I come! Speaking off the Able Sisters: I did drop by the shop to see what they had in stock today, and boy, was it a good batch of clothing today! They actually had several items off my wishlist. The skirt I'm wearing in the screenshot already was on there, but that cute leather jacket got added to it on the spot.

Also, they had my dream dress in stock, the absolute crown on my ever-growing wardrobe... The Visual-Punk Dress! This really was my 'maybe one day, when I've finally made it in the game' entry to the wishlist: it's basically my favorite article of clothing in the entire game. I honestly would've paid my life savings for it over on Nookazon to get my hands on this dress. But there it was, just chilling in the Able Sisters today.
You can understand: There never was a greater 'shut up and take my money' moment then this.

Needless to say, I had to put it on straight away. This is really my biggest find in the Able Sisters so far, and I think that I have found a new daily look. I'll be putting on something else for Festivale, but until then, I'm probably rocking this outfit. I legit feel like royalty in this: now I feel like I truly run this island! I still love my black and purple sweater to death, though, and I got it in both the black and red and the black and white variants when they were available in the Able Sisters. But the lovely purple variant has basically been bumped to second place now that my dream dress is actually present in both my wardrobe and catalog. I think that something this is just going to be my default look now. Might mix it up with matching different colours to the black dress every now and then (black and green, black and purple, etc.), but that's about it.

I actually got compliments on my new look from a few villagers today, and not just from Monique this time! Sure, she was the first to comment, but we know that she's always sucking up to me when it comes to that subject. Tough you know you look darned good in something if even Peanut says you're rocking it.

Well, I still had some time left before my scheduled trade, so I decided to craft some furniture out of those branches that I picked up. I already had like two full stacks in my storage for if I need to craft tools, so 210 extra Tree Branches in addition to that is just overkill! It comparatively didn't increase their value by a lot: A Tree Branch itself would've sold for 5 IGB a piece, while a Campfire made out of them sold for 250 IGB per piece. While crafting with shells truly makes a difference between the vale of the raw materials versus the crafted furniture item. But still: every little bit helps on that Nook debt... So I got to crafting!

It must've taken me like 10 minutes or so to get through all of the branches I picked up around the island, and the payoff was comparatively low. But by doing both this and some trading online, I am slowly getting through this immense financial goal. And I'd consider it a feat to even get to one million in-game Bells at least once, even if I'm only a bell-ionare for a moment.

Well, after the trade, I decided to hop by the archipelago real quick. Lottie told me that my homeboy Wardell had a favor to ask: Well, since he's a favorite character of mine here and he's the one who has a higher chance of stocking the rare items on my wishlist... Whatever you need, man! Just say the word, and I'll get it for you.

Aww, on a friend's behalf, even? You truly have a heart of gold, Wardell. Turns out that Niko needed Tree Branches and some normal Wood: two materials I had too much of, as I did harvest about every tree on my island for wood. I was getting a bit short on Softwood in particular, so I really hit every single hardwood tree with a Stone Axe three times, and also the palm trees on my beaches. I am good on both my needed material and Hardwood now, but I just had too much normal Wood sitting in my storage after that! So off to Niko it went.

So after that, I hopped back to Crayola real quick to hit a Kapp'n island. I haven't done that in a while, so let's see where the journey takes me. Also, unpopular opinion: I genuinely like his sea shanties! I don't really skip them, never really did in New Leaf either (apart from just once, only to see what would happen) and I frankly think that people who skip Kappn's sea shanties are missing out. Isabelle has the right idea if you ask me: just sit and enjoy them.

I dunno, it just makes the loading screen less boring if you ask me. I have discovered Reactions on Kapp'n ship a while ago. So now I just like to respond sometimes while he's singing. And I give him a bit of applause in the few seconds between when he finishes both of them, and when you actually arrive at the mystery island.

So the island itself wasn't too interesting: just some Vines to loot. And some white plumeria bushes, as I had an overkill on the ones with the pink flowers, but a shortage on the ones with the white flowers. Also, found a pretty iinteresting DIY: it's not the exact furniture piece from this series that I wanted, but things are at least going in the right direction!

Here's all of the loot from that island. I pretty much got what I wanted, what I thought was valuable, and filled up the rest of my inventory by fishing.

I made like 15k IGB from this, and fanned out the bushes across the island.

After this, I continued trying to make the island pretty. I felt that the little area towards the east entrance of the bamboo forest needed some pathing: there's some stepping stones directly to the west of my island entrance that lead into that forest, so you'd be at the east entrance of the forest. But there was no indication leading towards there yet, so since it leads to a more natural and 'wild' area of the island, I just put a dirt path there.

And after I was done laying down the last little square of that path, I saw that Spike was slowly getting into the Festivale spirit as well! He actually hung around the area a bit after watering the nearby flowers to interact with the items: I'm in the process of slowly decorating things for the holiday.

He just moseyed over to that little stage himself, and this was just too adorable not to screenshot. He also took out his phone to snap a photo of the flag in the background and post about it. I am going to customize the Festivale items pictured here to match the red and yellow of my island entrance later, though: I will need Feathers to do that, so I fear that's going to have to wait until Festivale itself.

Also, before this, he just sat with Rhonda for a bit. Good to see that both of the island's rhino's aren't exactly clashing here! I only caught it once he just got up from his chair, but that was just adorable as well.

After this, I still had a bit too much Iron and normal Wood leftover. So since there was a customized variant of the Iron Chair and Iron table that was literally coffee brown, I finally decided on a look for my little outdoor cafe area. So I got to both crafting and customizing the neccesary items, dusted off some old coffee-related items that Brewster gave me, and set things up.

I'm not exactly happy with the shade of brown on the stand itself yet, and might add either a coffee cup or a bean to the striped pattern that's already on there. But I'll see: somehow, getting that coffee sort of shade right is a real challenge in this game for me. Dang the lack of a colour wheel here! Sometimes, given the colour sliders in the custom designs, it's hard to tell if you're like one or two squares off when you're making shading and highlight colours. I also feel that whenever I'm trying to make something look 3-dimensional in a custom design, my shading always either looks too harsh or too subtle, there's nothing in between 'heavy enough to hit it with a hammer' and 'almost invisible'. Sometimes while doing that, I wish I had a happy medium between those two that I could make with the colour sliders. But no such luck, I'm just stuck working with harsh shading and highlights.

Anyhow, despite the island definitely still needing a few small tweaks, my efforts were still rewarded: I decided to go check my island rating, and expected the same old thing that I've been hearing for a few days straight now. But I had actually gone up a star today!

Well, I wasn't really minding the rating all that much, and I was more working on getting the island to just look pretty. But Crayola might actually become a 5-star island by the time I finish all of the little areas I'm still working on. I know there's a reward in it, but not like I was actually going for it: kind of funny how things can work out like that. I am going to have to get to 5 stars before I finish my bamboo forest, though, because that's definitely going to push me into 'overabundance of trees' territory once I've completed it. Might consider storing the bamboo shoots that I harvest from there at the moment, because that's really the only thing that could prevent me from ever getting 5 stars at some point. I'm definitely not planning to maintain that kind of rating forever, but I need to get there at least once for the golden tool.

For the rest of the day, I just went fishing. When it comes to sheer earnings: If you don't feel like diving, then this is the next best thing. You're more likely to catch a rare fish then you are to catch a rare bug, so when it comes to return on time invested, this just nets you more Bells at the end of the day (pun very much intended).

Especially when C.J. visits: he pays just a tad more for each fish then the Nooklings would pay for it. It's like a 1.5 payout instead of just 1 or something. Also, having a streak of not letting fish get away does earn you Nook Miles up to a certain point. After this, I pretty much called it a day.

Well, after I decided to take a moment, and take stock of where I am on the goals that I'm currently working towards. Enough lollygagging around, it's time for me to get back to work! And I'm frankly doing better at progressing towards them then I originally thought, so that definitely motivated me to get back into the saddle. I've also found out that at 23 houses decorated in Happy Home Paradise, you unlock the ability to convert Poki into Bells. In my case, Poki seems to give me a more steady cashflow then Bells somehow. So despite the 15k a day conversion limit, that would frankly be a big help at this point. I mean, if I would be able to convert the 280k or so that I have earned up until now, then I would've already hit 1 million IGB and paid off my Nook debt the next day.

So about my current goals: I'm trying to pay off my Nook debt, I want to finally build the first Zen Bridge towards the bamboo forest since it's been under construction for a while now, and I want to build Leif's shop on Harvey's island for permanent access to cute plants. Given the sheer height of the Nook debt, though, the first Zen Bridge towards the bamboo forest is pretty much on the backburner for now. But donations to Harvey's island have now been resumed with 20k IGB per day, and will be going into Leif's shop for now. I'm currently at 910k / 1248k IGB on my Nook debt, and Leif's shop is at 23k / 100k IGB.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 22nd​

Well, today was yet again a day of great luck, and great loss. And again, Celeste was involved: what's it with me and meteor showers? At least she did actually arrive today, despite another special character visiting. But I'm getting ahead of myself: let's start this story at the beginning.

So I actually did manage to show some restraint and visit Katrina today without doing anything else: I did get a bad money luck prediction again. But this time, she did offer me her purification services! That might be because I packed up 11k IGB today instead of just 1k, but regardless of how it happened, I took the opportunity. So Katrina did her best to help me avoid this horrible fate.

After that, I set to the dailies. They actually didn't take me that long. But as I was on my way to my starting point to go and comb the beaches for shells to craft with, I came across a certain someone on the beach! But wait a second... That isn't Gulliver!

Ahoy, who be this scallywag that washed upon me shores? Yup, Gullivarrr was visiting the island today! I do have the black variation of the Pirate Dress on my wishlist, so I was glad to see this scurvy sea dog! Turns out you have to actually dive to get him his communicator back, so I slipped into my wetsuit and went about it. I had a daily double Nook Mile task to catch 3 deep sea diving creatures today, so I thought I'd kill two seagulls with one stone here. I think I got the communicator on the 3rd dive, so it definitely didn't go far.

So since this didn't count for the nook miles, I finished my Nook Mile task, and swam back to hand this pirate back his phone. He sure was grateful: he promised never loot Crayola, and he would send me a reward in the mail.

After completing my other daily double tasks, I decided to hop by the archipelago. I was first greeted by Niko, who had a DIY recipe for me!

The simple pillars and counters do work better with a more modern sort of look compared to the basic wooden versions, so I'm glad to have them around. He believed that it was Wardell who put the materials in the box, and I wanted my homeboy to get the credit he deserved for being a good bro and asking me for help with this. So I didn't bother to correct Niko on this one.

But when I walked into the office after spotting none other then Judy on the beach, Lottie was all of a sudden feeling unwell! She was complaining of stomach aches, and everyone was worried. I mean, I've never seen Wardell this shocked!

We had to haul her over to Wilbur to get her to a hospital, and I wouldn't trust any other bird with racing Lottie to a doctor in time. Niko took over for her to cater to a client walking in: a particularly ugly villager appeared, so I'm not going to bother to show the home I did for them. I banished them to one of the winter islands, elegantly crammed the required items outside since the request required a park theme, did a basic cabin thing with the interior, and called it a day. I kind of raced through it, and set myself a reminder to remove this villager's face from the map at the very least.

Lottie turned out to be fine, though: it was hinted to be a case of food poisoning from the 20 home party she threw for me. She described it as something she ate not agreeing with her. I was expecting more of a really bad stress reaction, as she works so hard. But I was relieved to hear it wasn't anything serious, though. After this, I set to nabbing Judy for the archipelago, my oh my!

I'm planning to have her be roommates with Sasha eventually, so I gave her a house with two floors, and the biggest room sizes that the game would let me do. Of course, I threw as much kawaii at this as I could. This is actually the first house where I switched outfits for the Happy Home Network picture: I even put on a sort of lolita-ish outfit myself! Real sweet lolita's would probably say that this isn't actual lolita, but I tried to get as close to their fashion aesthetic as I possibly could.

Apologies to any real-life lolita's: I'm definitely open to critique on my coord. Also, any unicorns I use in home decorating in this game have to sparkle, and nobody can tell me otherwise. What's a proper unicorn without glitter? And well, an idol's gotta eat, so I included a kitchen as well.

Also pictured: a little dressing room sort of area next to her little stage room. And on the second floor, Judy legit has sort of a walk-in closet idea going on in her bedroom: I pulled out anything remotely kawaii in the clothing category, and slapped some cute items on the wall.

Next to that, we have Sasha's future bedroom: I don't remember who it was, but they decorated their Sasha's island home or vacation home as sort of a kawaii gamer lair, since they headcanoned him as secretly being a hardcore gamer. I really liked that idea, so het got a good setup here as well.

Next to that, I had a little nook to fill, so I made a bit of a 'sit and chat' area for if him and Judy run into each other. I mean: Sasha has to talk about fashion with someone, and I can 100% picture those two gabbing away about the latest trends in there.
And of course, both would need a place to get ready for the day, so I had to include a common bathroom.

And after that, who do I see replacing Judy on the beach?

The man, the myth, the bunny himself: Sasha! I couldn't believe my luck. I accidentally put him in a different home, but I'll get him to room with Judy later.

After this, I got to decorate a Hospital: I named it Sacred Heart, after the one in Scrubs. Things started off with decorating a waiting room. I've had to visit a doctor a few times myself recently: nothing serious, just some particularly stubborn skin issues. Which are actually recovering pretty nicely, and I feel blessed that they're recovering without any scars despite their persistence. So while I have no clue what a hospital waiting room looks like and haven't had this many doctor's visits in my life so far, I definitely know what a waiting room at a doctor's office looks like by now. So I sort of just went off of that, and general waiting room stuff.

Somehow, in doctor's offices in particular: the chairs are only barely comfortable, there's always magazines and nothing but magazines. Like, if you want something of actual substance to read while you're waiting, bring a book. Because it's always either some general gossip magazine, teen magazine, or something about nature. There's also usually a separate kids table with basic toys and children's books or other media about the basics about health, put in simple language so they can understand the subject matter. I also don't know who picks the art hanging in those waiting rooms, but it's the most mediocre stuff I've ever seen in my life. Like, most artists online have more talent in their pinky finger then the hacks that make waiting room paintings! Those paintings are always either really basic landscapes painted from the same dang perspective, or this weird abstract art where even I can't make any sense of the symbolism, there's no in between. Like, the horizon on the landscapes is always the exact same. And you can tell me that the meaning of life is pictured in that other one all you want, but all I see is a red stripe next to a blue stripe.

After that, it was time for the doctor's office and patient wards.

I had to replace the bed here with a Reception Chair, but doctor's offices over in the Netherlands always have this examination table sort of thing, covered with these little paper thingies that they replace for each patient. For examinations, you're often asked to sit down on one. You know, it's where you sit when the doctor do their little stethoscope thing or whatever else is needed to diagnose your issue: they often have curtains hung around them here for privacy reasons. There's probably an English word for it, but I would have no clue what it's called.
Anyhow, I used the rest of the space for patient beds.

I was kind of joking to myself on how silly it would be if Sasha was the doctor, but the game actually picked him as the receptionist! It picked Whitney as the doctor, which I'm not mad at. She frankly looks really good in the coat.

So back on Crayola, I'm just mulling about, doing some last Nook Mile tasks, and considering calling it a day here. But I was absolutely thrilled to all of a sudden run into Celeste along the way! I guess Katrina put in a little extra effort on purifying the bad luck today...

It was actually my first meteor shower, so I was hyped! I knew I could get a maximum of 20 wishes in, so I of course kept my eyes on the sky! She actually gave me the DIY for a Star Wand: I had wanted a wand for a long time now, as I've just been running back and forth to my house to switch into something that would look half-decent with my wetsuit, or switch into a new outfit whenever Label was visiting. I had considered buying one, but I decided to wait for Celeste instead, as I knew she would give me one upon meeting her. I honestly didn't expect to even meet her this winter: spring is about to hit on the 27th, so I expected this next year at the earliest. So I am super-happy to have even seen her today!

I did open my gates and post about this, as I saw other people sharing the love on meteor showers. So hey, since she was here anyways, I just wanted to do the same. But connectivity issues put a stop to it... It was a massive bummer and really put a damper on things for me, as I was just hoping to hang out with some people, and possibly make new friends in the community. So the meteor shower was lowkey a bit ruined for me in the moment by that. I was so embarrassed: if the ground could've swallowed me up...

I have no clue what the issue could've been, since my internet should've been fine: I had an issue like this before as my wifi had the wrong NAT type last time this happened to me. So naturally, that was the first thing I checked. Rule out the stupid stuff first, right? Connection to a wifi with Nat type B was the solution last time, but I was still connected to a wifi of that type. And I actually did a trade on that same connection yesterday! The other person had recently traded with someone as well, so the issue must've not been on their side either. So I have absolutely no clue what could've gone wrong here. But I guess that identifying that issue has to wait until tomorrow: I didn't want to risk losing the event in the moment.

Well, at least the person themselves didn't openly get mad at me, and they left no negative feedback over it. So since they were such a good sport over this, my anxiety at actually getting hate over this was really the worst part of this whole situation. I'm pretty much used to way less wholesome communities like this who sic an entire hate train on you for no reason, and I tend to catastrophize to begin with. So needless to say: my autism-related anxiety did not handle this well.

But hey, at least I got my 20 wishes in that night! I wasn't expecting to hit the limit that evening because of all of the troubleshooting, but I somehow did. It's nog a big comfort, but it's at least something.

I am still looking forward to the star fragments washing up on my beaches the next day, but nothing could truly cheer me up for the day after that massive damper on things. I know I should've been way more hyped for an actual meteor shower right before the end of winter, but this happening just really cast a shadow over it all. I did smile for a few seconds at Celeste actually meandering through my little café area on the right of the screenshot, though. This was actually taken right before she wandered over to the nearby beach. New headcanon: she needs her coffee on nights like this, and she sometimes gets bored with the Roost, so she chooses to support local businesses.

I still had some Nook Mile missions that I had started on, though, so I decided to do a few of those before calling it a day. One of them was fishing, and there had spawned a fish in my star pond. Well, I only needed one more, and there would be no more appropriate night to go fishing in that star pond, right?

I kind of called it a day after that. I did still sulk for a bit until I went to bed, since everything was both heartbreaking and deeply embarrassing at the same time. But at least I'm a little more at peace about what happened.

Well, I'm still slowly getting there on the Nook debt: I'm at 1035k / 1248k IGB, so I did hit 1 million Bells in the in-game ABD today! The Zen Bridge is at 21k / 228k IGB. I actually forgot to do my daily donation to Harvey's island due to Celeste's visit, as I usually do that near the end of my play session. So tomorrow, I'll be donating 40k to make up for the difference.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 23rd​

Well, 'it has been a day' is the appropriate phrase for today. Not a particularly good day, not a particularly bad day, just... a day. On the plus side, there was some good news, though, I just somehow couldn't get too hyped for it, no matter how much I tried.

The day started off pretty chill with some beachcombing, and oof, I must still metaphorically be seeing stars from yesterday... No, wait a minute, those are the Star Fragments which were supposed to wash up the next day!

So I got to thoroughly sweeping my beaches here. Turns out that I even got one star sign fragment for this month, of which there's only a 15% chance of spawning upon a star wish. It was Pisces this time, but having extras of those star sign fragments sure can't hurt. And along the way, Tiansheng had a ping. He taught me a new Reaction: Distress.

Well, could've definitely used that one yesterday! Well, after picking up all Star Fragments for now, my inventory was slowly getting full. There was one Large Star Fragment in there that I'd need to craft the wand that Celeste gave me the DIY for: So when I decided to go store my loot so far, I got to crafting first.

I did already try registering some outfits, but found a bit of lost potential in this wand system: if I want to use an item in more then one outfit, then I'm going to need more then one in my storage. Because if you use, for example: a pair of tights in one outfit, then you can't use it again when registering a second outfit that would use them. That's unnecessarily limiting if you ask me: if the wand is supposed to give you access to the clothing in your storage, then why won't it function similar to a dresser and show you all of your options? This means I'm going to have to order more then one pair of my character's glasses: I wear glasses in real life that I legit need to see. So if she's the in-game representation of me, then she needs them as well! So over the course of the upcoming couple of days, I'll be ordering extra copies of some basic items that I tend to use in multiple outfits through Nook Shopping. I usually check it daily for limited-time event items anyways, so I might as well use the time spent on that efficiently.

Well, after crafting the wand and registering some outfits in advance, all I had left to do was wait for the rest of the Star Fragments: not all of the 20 that I should get had washed up on the island's beaches yet. But if they work similar to shells, then it should take a bit for them to actually show up: shells often show up on your island's beach every so often. Well, save for your secret beach: I've never seen any shells appear on mine. I haven't really recorded exact times in between shell spawns yet, but I can safely say that you'd definitely have time to do something else while you wait for new shells will show up. Like, you definitely would have enough time to visit Katrina or do other daily tasks like finding fossils, and you wouldn't even have to hurry while doing so.

So since I had some time to kill here, I headed over to Katrina before I went about a few of my dailies.

Ooh, good money luck, I'll definitely make use of that! I hadn't found the Bell rock or harvested any fully grown money trees yet, nor had I sold any items at Nook's Cranny. So lucky me!
Also, while on my way to look for fossils: Kicks was visiting the plaza today, and he had a few interesting items in stock. So I quickly stopped by his shop.

Not sure why he's giving me some serious side-eye in the screenshot: maybe he's camera shy? Found Tiansheng playing the Festivale drum that I put near there as well.

I dunno, whenever I see villagers actually using the furniture that I decorated the island with, I can't help but smile a little. I mostly just place that stuff down for aesthetic's sake, but it's nice to see them actually being interacted with. I dunno, I just love anything that's both aesthetically pleasing and functional at the same time. Who said that you have to choose between pretty and practical in the first place? To be honest: whatever he was playing didn't even sound half bad. He's definitely better at this then I am!

After the dailes, it was time to hop by the archipelago. It had been a while since I had thoroughly combed the beach there for new vacation home villagers, and I hadn't been into the café and restaurant in a bit either to check those. Of course, Niko had a DIY recipe for me, but there was something else going on as well...

Ooh boy, it's never good news if your boss asks for you by name... Well, before I went to see what kind of trouble I'm in this time, I decided to give the areas with villagers in it a quick once-over to see if there was anything good in there. And ooh boy, would I ever be in for a surprise there as well!

There's a dream villager in the café, there's a dream villager in the café, this is not a drill! I don't have Quinn on my island yet, but it's definitely going to be nice to at least have her on my archipelago as well. Even if she were on Crayola, she'd be getting a vacation home in addition to that anyways, so I'm seeing this as a chance to cross that off the list before I even meet her on a Mystery Island. I've been saving up the really pretty vacation home spots for an occasion like this, so needless to say: she got the full celebrity treatment later.

For now, I decided to go face the music over at the office, so i could actually get to Quinn's vacation home afterwards.

Oh phew, it's good news! Turns out I had unlocked that ABD that lets you convert Poki into Bells: it's limited to 15k Poki a day, but every little bit helps on a bigger Nook debt like my current one. And 15k Poki is exactly what I earn on one vacation home at the moment, so I should be able to convert my character's full salary on days where the game dumps every ugly villager in the book on me. I have my days where I really get only one vacation home done, so while it should take me a bit to convert all of my earnings so far, I should be able to do that eventually. Needless to say: the exchange rate was 200 Bells for each 100 Poki, so I started immediately. Easiest 30k IGB I've made ever. I put 200k Poki in the new savings account that was unlocked, and I'll be converting all of that over time. I still had a good bit left after that, so I kept that for shopping here. Any future earnings will be split in half: half will be kept for future purchases at Wardell's shop, and half will be put in the conversion account.

And after this, it was time to net myself a dreamie, so I took to decorating Quinn's house.

Hmm, never knew she was into photography... A personal studio in the mega-mansion that she's getting it is, then! She seemed really fond of the Cool series of furniture while I was busy decorating the interior, so it seemed appropriate to give it a modern sort of look. Igave her house two floors: I decided to put the neccesary stuff like the bathroom and kitchen on the 1st floor, and her bedroom, 2nd bathroom and personal photo studio on the 2nd floor. Both were done in full-sized room of 10x10 to fit everything, and I usually section off different rooms from there with partition walls.

I did see this sort of 'false partition wall' thing done with furniture partitions instead of actual partition walls in someone else's build before, though: Not sure what the username was, but it was in a vacation home for Pavé. But it seemed appropriate to use an idea like that here as well, so I decided to try it for myself. The difference is that the other person only used one pillar to close it off, I think? Anyhow, not my own original idea, but it looked like darned pretty way to section off the kitchen from the living room, but not entirely.

You often do see sort of an open concept sort of kitchen in modern-styled interiors like this, so I felt like there shouldn't be a full wall in between them. But a counter seemed like not enough to show it as being two different areas, so this was the best midway between the two that I could place.
The bathroom is completely sectioned of for obvious reasons, though. After this, I moved on to the second floor, and it was a bit of a struggle. It somehow sort of became more of a mixture between classic and modern interiors once I was done: I'm really lacking on nice modern sort of wallpapers. Since it actually needed an accent wall to save it due to my only pretty option being a really basic painted brick wallpaper, I might end up remodeling this whole floor later when I have more options at my disposal.

Oh well, at least the bedroom looks half-decent. I still need more purple rugs to work with as well. This floor's problem really lies in the small details like this and accent walls, not the basic-looking flooring and main wallpaper that I've chosen for it.

I'm pretty okay with how the photo studio ended up looking, though: I might just leave that area alone during the later remodel. I've also included an extra bathroom on this floor as well, so Quinn doesn't have to go down an entire flight of stairs just to get ready for the day.

Well, after unlocking some new soundscapes with Wardell, moving Sasha in with Judy, and locking in one other villager, I was done on the archipelago. Since I started playing pretty late in the day. It was pretty ddarned adorable that Wardell actually told me that he enjoys our time chilling on the beach together. Same here, my friend, same here. Us quiet people have to stick together: bro's for life!

Believe it or not: I don't talk much in real life. People often describe me as quiet, but if I got nothing to say, then I just don't talk for the sake of talking! I really only open my mouth if I have something of substance to say. I dunno, something like 'Things falling quiet for like 3 seconds is not exactly a disaster, you know... ' I swear, a certain type of extravert acts like it's the end of the world if there's as much as a small, tiny lull in the conversation! Like 3 seconds of quiet, and they just start talking over everyone else in the group: and I mean that nobody else can get word in edgewise! It's called listening, and it's a natural part of a conversation. Wish these people would understand the concept someday, and it's quite sad if an autistic person like myself can read that part of social interaction better then these people.

Anyhow, I returned to Crayola after that, and sold off some last items at Nook's Cranny. I actually ran into Spike there!

I did also decide to gather some materials from the rocks on my island. Along my way through the bamboo forest, which has like 3 rocks in it at the moment, I ran into a Tarantula again! I knew how to handle it this time, but missed the net swing by like half a square, and got sent back to my character's house.

All right, spider, you just turned my grudge against your kind into a feud! I can understand why the entire community hates these suckers.
But in all seriousness: I was gathering those materials right when I was about to call it a day, so it's not like the Tarantula was really interfering with much or rudely interrupting something important. I do understand why they annoy people to the point of making memes about them, though.

Anyhow, so I usually hop by Harvey's island near the end of my play session if I'm making progress on opening a shop, and the Zen Bridge back home to take screenshots of exact amounts to record in the progress sections of my posts. When I saw where I was at on Leif's store, the gap between building it and stuill having to donate was tiny after donating that 40k IGB to it. Like, I only had 35k left to go or something. Now I could've easily waited until tomorrow to close the gap, but with a new extra income source from converting Poki for now, getting this goal completed today was now a possibility without taking too big of a financial hit. So I decided: 'screw it, we're getting this done!'

So now, I'll have access to cute plants whenever I want! I was looking to buy the starts for produce I need to craft a Veggie Basket as well: having the plants instead of just buying the produce itself off someone else is also a new, consistent source of Bells if I have a recipe that uses that same produce. Not to mention that I found that the bamboo forest is a little short on the pink camelia bushes that I had planned for it. So when it comes to my playstyle, Leif's store is really going to be helpful in more area then one. All I have to do now is wait until his shop stocks what I need for my island plans.

I'm currently at 1072k / 1248k IGB on my Nook debt, the Zen Bridge to the bamboo forest is at 23k / 228k IGB, and Leif's store has been completely paid off. I'm focusing my sights on Cyrus' trailer next, as he can change the basic colour of items.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 24th​

Well, not a lot of content today, as I got on the game really late than usual: I usually start it up in the early afternoon after finishing the post of the previous day, but today, I couldn't do so until the late afternoon! I pretty much had to rush through my dailies. But things were more short and sweet... and the day was definitely eventful!

So first things first: I dropped by Katrina. I guess she wants that Nook debt gone as badly as I do, because she gave me good money luck again today!

Thank you Katrina: with you having my back, I'm sure to get that tanuki off my case for a while. And while I was here anyways, I decided to visit Leif's new store!

Turns out he remembered me: And he may or may not have been reading this journal, because he had some starts in stock that I needed for the Veggie Basket! He had some Tomatoes and Wheat today, which I promptly planted in my produce area back home. And he had the pink camelia's I needed for the bamboo forest. Well, Leif, thank you for your constant support in the efforts of making Crayola pretty.

And since Harriet had her chair open again, it was also time to see what kind of hair torture she had in store for me.

Wow, she truly made me look like a Karen today! Needless to say: I had her revert it... I'm not going to look like I'm on my way to verbally abuse some poor, unfortunate service worker. And I didn't want to scare any managers back home on Crayola. Well, despite her actually teaching me this hairstyle, this is one I'm never using...

So after that, I rushed through my dailies: lucky for me, most fossils were near each other. The two that I found in the bamboo forest were legit almost next to each other! I nearly forgot to plant a money tree today, but I still managed to catch the digging spot for it right before I ended my play session. And while I was combing the beach for shells to craft with, Monique had a ping. She taught me a new Reaction: Sigh.

Well, I have definitely wanted to use that one a few times! Some people really make you want to do the deepest, most exasperated sigh that you can muster... People like Olaf are the first that come to mind.

I hopped by the archipelago after getting everything done: the entire place held no interesting villagers to make vacation houses for, so I just went there to collect my daily message bottle over there, and hop by the office to convert some Poki and see what Wardell had in stock. He had a few new catalog items on sale, and turns out that the 'anything you need, bro' vibe in this friendship goes two ways.

Turns out that I unlocked his ordering service, which means that I can now order any furniture item that I've unlocked on the archipelago. Wardell, you really saved the day, because there were a good few items from my wishlist in there! Amongst which are items from the Elegant and Antique series, so needless to say: I blew a lot of Poki in one go here. I definitely owe Wardell one!

Well, there's a bit of a lull in the story from here: Flick was visiting today, so since I had 3 of a few different bugs sitting in my storage, I commissioned a piece from him. Also, I got a great price on selling bugs today.

Did catch him scoping out the flowers in my front yard for butterflies: hope he likes the place. Also, I had a Nook Mile task for group stretching, and he actually joined in today!

A lot of my favorite characters were here, actually: Brewster is the OG quiet bro of the squad, my bestie Rhonda showed up, my fangirl Monique seems to have followed me there, I'm always cool with Blathers being around, gotta love Tiansheng, and Wilbur is really my favorite out of the two dodo's at the airport. My dad is in the Dutch militairy, so I actually learnt to speka slang and jargon pretty well from an early age. And this way, I knew that he actually uses the NATO phonetic alphabet before reading it on the wiki: Me and my mom use it as well to spell out letters in a wifi password or something, because it's sometimes just way clearer then just sounding out letters. Like, the words that Wilbur spells with it are actually words relative to the rest of the dialogue as wel, and I love that kind of attention to detail! Nintendo could've just used it as pure jabber, spelled gibberish with the alphabet, and called it a day. But they really went the extra mile here.

Also stopped by the Roost today: Brewster had a gift for me that I was hoping for: the cup and saucer!

I needed that for my little outdoor café area, so glad to see that Leif isn't the only one supporting the 'make Crayola pretty' efforts. I think I'm slowly building an underground social network to rival Tom Nook's. I mean, Katrina already has my back, Wardell does as well, and Brewster has been a bro of mine ever since New Leaf. We'll run this place in that tanuki's stead someday, lads...

After that, I put all of my earned Bells into my ABD as usual... and noticed that I was incredibly close to paying off my Nook debt. Like, close enough that I could smell victory. I didn't really have any leftover items to sell to close the gap this time, but I had a lot of Nook Miles on me, and Nook's Cranny was still open. So the solution was clear: it was time to trade those in for Bell Vouchers. And after running things down back to about 10k Nook Miles for emergencies...

I finally paid off that 1248k IGB Nook Debt! That's right: the first Nook debt over 1 million Bells just got taken out in one fell swoop. Tom even was a good enough sport to congratulate me on actually being able to do it.

Well, an entrepreneur I am indeed, Tom. Those Bells sure didn't come easy! I decided to not jump right in to the next debt: I kind of want to map out how many debts I have left to go first, my funds were drained to a measly 30k IGB after paying this off, and I just want to build Cyrus' trailer on Harvey's island at the moment. Now that Leif's shop is built, Cyrus and Reese are next on my priority list. Wish that Reese had a more active role in this game like she had in New Leaf, but we can always hope for that in the next mainline Animal Crossing game, right?

Anyhow, Cyrus is my next priority because he can change the base colour of items. And I was never happy about the colours of a few items that I can get my hands on: my Street Lamps, for example. The ones on my plaza are black, while the rest is stark white. And I kind of want both to match. So I'll definitely need to recruit Cyrus for the 'make Crayola pretty' effort. The thing is: my finds are currently not in any state to be making regular donations to Harvey's island. So I'm going to need at least a few days both recover my funds, and get regular donations to Harvey's island going again. Because at the moment, it's just not an option yet.

Well, this is where I called it a day. This time around, I'm especially happy to say that I currently have no ongoing Nook debts, sad to say that donations to Harvey's island are temporarily paused, and the Zen Bridge back at Crayola is still on my backburner at the moment since it's stuck at 23k / 228k IGB for now. I'm currently just letting the villagers chip away at that one while I turn my sights to more important matters. So far, they've definitely taken a good chunk out of it: I think I only threw like 15k IGB at it so far. I'm so proud of my villagers here: they've also been helping me with a few shops at Harvey's island so far as well.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 25th​

Ooh boy, has it ever been an eventful day! So first of all: today was the first day since starting my island that I didn't see any snow on the ground there!

You know how Mabel from Gravity Falls goes 'yay, grass!' in the first few minutes that she's on-screen in the show? Well, exactly that. Spring had hit, and I'm here for it! I've kind of been trying to decorate my island to be pretty year-round, but the snow lying on top of some stuff (for example: fences, roofs, bushes and trees) made it hard to see whether something would work once the season would change. But especially the bamboo forest was more gorgeous then ever.

So after admiring the fruits of my labor so far, it was time for my daily visit to Katrina.

Well, once back home, some items that I had ordered from Wardell's shop had arrived this morning, so I decided to clean up all of the feng shui items that I had in my home just for the extra HHA points, and actually get to decorating my house the way I wanted to. So I set to unpacking all of that, digging everything out of storage that I had saved up for this moment, and got to decorating! Things aren't fully complete yet, but it already looks way better then it was. So first up was to make a little a sitting corner: the first room of my house is supposed to be sort of a living room.

I was originally going to go for an Elegant Sofa with a silver frame, but brown just fit the rest of the room better. And since I went for a covered counter, the gyroids got their own little corner. I later placed a tv above that Fireplace: I wasn't sure if my character could reach it to actually turn it on, but turns out that she could.

Not sure if I'm going to leave this area looking like this, though. I feel things might lowkey look messy since I placed a lot of furniture on the floor here, so I might place the gyroids on the counter on a shelf near my music player instead, and use the counter elsewhere in the house.

Anyhow, I've also been working hard on making a little kitchen. This is possibly the most planned-out area of the house, and I legit had the most items saved up for this one in advance.

I originally had this kitchen outdoors and near the produce area, but it messed with the flow of the island overall, so I just decided to put it inside, and place it a hop and a skip away from my DIY table for easy crafting access. All I really need is some cute chairs for that dining table, maybe some accessories and to make the room look like it's actually being used, and this room is good to go. If possible, I might get the kettle customized by Cyrus once I unlock him to make it match the rest of the room better. Not sure if this ne is even eligible for a Cyrus colour change, I should look that up on the wiki later.

And finally, I gave my bedroom, north of the living room, a good makeover.

I mean, the Harmonious Wallpaper I had before this wasn't ugly, but what's a goth's bedroom without any skulls? I actually got the Lacy Rug off of an archipelago villager, and I did not expect it to look this cute in the room. I'm plannign to replace the dresser with an Elegant Dresser later, to fit the general classic aesthetic in here better. Also, I need a better music player in here: preferably a Phonograph on a cute table or something.

I'm still working on a bathroom to the west of my living room and a sort of guest room on the second floor, but those are nowhere near finished yet. Also, Rhonda came by to check my new place out:

Nothing to see here, folks, just two goths watching the news.

But I ran into an issue while doing my dailies... Okay, so I have a few gameplay rules for myself, and one is 'no time travelling unless it's either an emergency, or there's no other way to solve an in-game problem'. For example: missing an in-game event due something like to family matters: in a case like that, it should be okay for me tot travel back to the date of the event once real life allows me to do so, and still be able to participate in it this way.

Well, today was one of the exceptions: turns out that the move-out thought bubble had appeared today, but it had gotten stuck on Angus: I only noticed it when I had been playing for way longer then the 3 minutes you get before the game autosaves and thus locks that thought bubble on a villager for that entire day. So there was no moving it around anymore through resetting. Now Angus had a bit of a temporary free pass as my mom kind of likes him, so I had to find a way to move the thought bubble to someone else. So after finishing my dailies, I had to set the system time to the next day first, and noticed that the thought bubble had disappeared entirely the next day. So then I set the time back to today to move the thought bubble around again. Luckily, that worked, and I managed to cycle out a villager who was actually scheduled for it. So if you see some extra content and a sharper increase in today's in-game the bell numbers of today then usual, this is why: I've done the dailies for this day twice.

I usually spin a wheel to decided who in the cycle-out crew is actually going to be my target for the thought bubble that round: If I haven't prepared a cycle target in advance like on Olaf? Then I just go to the wheel of names site, put the names of the villagers that I want to cycle out on there, and give it a spin. And it landed on Peanut this time. By the time I post this, she's sadly already voided.

I am actually currently trying to slowly cycle out villagers that I don't want to keep around for longer, so my move-in queue can fully drain. I know it exists and that mine got no room since my Campsite had been packed lately, so I'm just not sure how many villagers are still in there. But by emptying it, I can be sure that none of my dream villagers are hiding in my move-in queue without me knowing. I'll need to rule that out first before I go Mystery Island hopping to find them: if a villager is in your move-in queue, they won't appear on any Mystery Islands. And I'd rather not waste tickets on accident. Hey, I've gotten insanely lucky in this game a few times before, so you never know... I mean, Rhonda was one of the first 3 villagers of Crayola. I do seem to have some seriously good karma saved up, so fingers crossed that any of my 9 remaining dreamies is in that queue.

Also, I'm giving Crayola a semi-big makeover: I'm lining out some villager houses a little better then I originally did, and I'm generally straightening out some beginner mistakes that I made while laying out the paths. I'm playing with some other small ideas for the shopping area and Museum, but nothing is set in stone yet. Either way: this is going to cost me an arm and a leg in moving fees alone, since most houses would only need to be moved like one or two tiles.

Which means that each house is going to cost me 20k IGB at the least, and I want to move like 4 houses (possibly 5, I'm partially still planning this out and up to 8 houses could be moved around). I still need to check if the game would let me move houses in one area a tiny bit towards the beach near there, as I remember the game not letting me place an empty plot exactly where I wanted it at the beginning of my island. But I'm focusing on the area near the Plaza for now, as that's where placing things is going to be the most difficult. Like, this is going to come down to like one or two tiles, but aesthetically speaking, it's going to be a world of difference.

Well, speaking of aesthetics: after that, I hopped over to the archipelago to build up my Poki reserves again. I did see some interesting villagers there: Walt was there, and funny story: he was in my New Leaf town back in the day. I originally didn't want him there, but he sort of grew on me over time. Like, I wouldn't be mad if I found his amiibo in a card pack. So it was sort of nice to see him again since the last game, and I decided he would make a good neighbor for Genji and Kabuki once I get both of them on Crayola and hand them some Souvenir Chocolates. I'm thinking of just placing those two in the same house since I headcanon them as best friends (the 'like brothers' kind of friendship), but we'll see. But for now, I set to giving Walt a decent-looking house.

Well, it goes without saying that traditional Japanese is the way to go for this one.

I kind of went for this commoner's house sort of idea: to me, Walt seems like the kind of guy who enjoys the simpler things in life instead of overly expensive and luxury stuff. Also, in Japanese houses, you have this little area in a house right after the front door where you'd take off your shoes, and put on inside slippers before you go inside. There's actually a word for it: genkan. The game's entrances are based off of this kind of entryway, but the game doesn't really let us place items there for obvious reasons. So just plopping some shoes and slippers down near the entrance was the next best thing.

I also picked Freya off the beach: I don't know a lot about her, but I'm a sucker for aesthetic-looking wolf villagers for some reason. Look, I know the combo of my being goth and liking wolves is kind of cringe, but I just genuinely like any kind of villagers where the real-life animal could kill you, okay? Like, the alligators are pretty cool too, same with the rhino's, gotta love Rodeo the nightmare bull, and I'd probably like the bears more if they didn't look like teddy bears. I dunno, I just have a thing for scary-looking characters being big old softies once you actually talk to them, but maybe that's because I'm lowkey that kind of person myself. I only dress like a Disney villain. Anyhow, Freya seemed to really be into Ikea-looking furniture while I was working on her house, though, so I went for that kind of vibe.

Well, a luxury kitchen it is! I've actually gotten a little more liberal in my use of polishing effects: they really help bring a space to life when placed right.

And you can't have an awesome kitchen without an equally as awesome dining area.

I kind of did want to keep the kitchen sort of connected to the general sitting area, though, for dinner party reasons. If Freya's going to be cooking a lot, then she's going to definitely have people over. My grandpa from father's side of the family was famous for cooking, and his house was always jam-packed on special events. And if he had leftovers (and he always did), then his window legit looked like a take-out near the end of them! My mom always describes this one birthday of my grandfather like that, and despite being only like 4 or 5 at the time, I clearly remember it since I was standing in the kitchen with my parents back then. Like, they were literally helping hand out food.

I kind of went modern and clean on the bathroom, though: not every room needs to be high-detail. If you pour a lot of patterns and items into every room, then a vacation home can look hastily slapped together real fast.

I didn't know what to do on the exterior, though, so that kind of ended up looking sort of generic. Well, I'm at my screenshot limit anyways, and I sort of called it a day after this. Sorry for posting this a bit late: I feel I'm getting a bit behind lately.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 26th​

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Arachnophobia warning: Near the end of the post, there's going to be talk of general spiders, and a screenshot prominently showing a Tarantula. If this causes panic attacks for you or otherwise upsets you in any way, then no judgement if you want to sit this post out (I have selective arachnophobia for smaller spiders myself, I'm the last to judge ). There will be a warning at the start of the spider section as well.

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Phew, slowly catching up to the present here! So for the first time since I've started my island, it had started to rain instead of snow. Luckily, my character had both a stylish and functional solution to this: I knew that Bat Umbrella would come in handy someday...

But this did mean new critterpedia entries that are only available in this weather! I know that some bugs and fish can only be caught in the rain, so I, kept an eye out for them, of course. All I managed to nab was a Snail, though.

We usually leave snails alone, but no mercy on slugs in this house. We pretty much had a plague of slugs in the garden last year: my mom actually found a nest in there! Trust me, if you think slugs are gross already (like I do), then a nest is even more gross then the animal itself. For the most animal friendly way of getting rid of them, you pretty much have to set traps with beer in it to lure them: the alcohol will kill the slug painlessly and quickly. So we had cleared them out, and all that was left to do was get rid of the eggs before they hatched. Luckily, we had a drain out back, so my mom took it there, got the garden hose, and sent them to Davy Jones' Locker. Never spotted a snail in that garden ever since.

Well, after that, it was time to head off to Katrina before I went about my dailies. I got some good belongings luck from her today, which means you have more chance to find rare items, and tools will break way less easily.

Thank you, because Katrina, I'm always crafting new Shovels (and occasionally new Watering Cans) with this Beautiful Island ordinance. I needed more flowers to dress up the more natural parts of my island more, so I set that one up to speed up the process. But maintaining the flowers that are already in place has become a bit of a pain sometimes: if there's nothing around a flower border, then it's sort of a pain to keep digging up the flowers that kind of went beyond that little border area They do make some extra Bells if I don't need the product of flower breeding for anything else, but they really don't contribute anything significant to my total income a day. I've seen people place transparent custom design tiles before to control flower spawning a bit better, and I might consider actually doing that myself.

Well, I am noticing a difference in my gameplay since I opened up Katrina's shop, so that was a good investment. With that good luck, I did nab myself a new seasonal DIY during my dailies today.

Hey, with that bamboo forest around on my island, any bamboo-related DIY's are more then welcome. I don't really harvest every tree on my island every day, but when I do need materials from them, I do go through the entire area of trees. That way, I have a few spares in storage by the time I'm done crafting, and don't have to go waste like 2 hours every time.

Well, after the dailies, I hopped over to the archipelago: I kind of just sweep the beach, café and restaurant there to see if there's any villagers I want in there. There wasn't much going on with the villagers there, but there were a few highlights: Pietro was on the beach, and I definitely had a nice idea for a vacation home in mind for him.

I didn't have a lot of items unlocked to really make his vacation home look the way I wanted to, though: I kind of wanted to go for this 'inside of the big top' idea, but I didn't have a good wallpaper for it to make it look believable. So I kind of ended up with this slapped together carnival. I'm 100% remodeling this later with more options at my disposal.

I did have fun taking photos of this, though. Especially the little balloon stand ended up looking so darned adorable.

I definitely ended up looking more like a haunt worker with a creepy clown theme then an actual circus worker for this photoshoot, though. Why is the Jester Mask so creepy in general?

Also, what's a carnival without rigged game stands?

A magic show and popcorn concession stand was also very necessary.

It was just so cute to see Pietro actually spin that wheel. Like, he legit stayed there for a bit for the photo. I had actually spun it before myself, and my first try landed on the item symbol. And of course, a carnival isn't a proper carnival without a good ferris wheel.

Well, this sort of was my 30th house decorated, though, so Lottie threw me another milestone party. I always gt to pick whether we go to the Restaurant or Cafe, and I really prefer the Restaurant as it's just prettier.

It doesn't screenshot well for the commemorative screenshot moment, though, so I just tend to take pictures on other moments then just the 'cheers' part of the dialogue and cutscene. But really, if this were real life, I'd just be here because Wardell is here: I'm really not that much of a party type of person in real life anyways. Like, if I have something to celebrate, then I really only invite my actual friends and other loved ones over, have some extra good food, maybe decorate a little if it's a holiday, and just chill with the people who actually matter. Like, no random people or big fancy stuff, just spending time with the people I care about.

Anyhow, after moving in Cephalobot with Kevin (I thought the space nerd and robot would definitely get along), I headed back to Crayola. The Festivale decorations are slowly coming together: Nook's Cranny had the parasol on sale today, and I thought it would look cute near my outdoor café area.

You know, now that I look back on this screenshot: a parasol actually does look extremely nice in this area to begin with. I actually like it enough to consider permanently placing some other, more regular parasol item after Festivale.

In other news: Angus is surprisingly adorable in his little raincoat outfit. I mean: d'awww, just look at him!

Now this is how you do a complementary colour contrast right, people.

Werll, since it was a Saturday, K.K. Slider was playing that evening. I kind of let him decide what song it would be this time, and went for the 'I'm in a mood' option. I kind of like the angry mood songs since they tend to have just the right level of pep and melody speed in it for me, so I went for that. He chose Lucky K. K. this time, and I frankly like that one as well after hearing it.

Well, it definitely got everyone else on the island in a partying mood, as my villagers are interacting with the Festivale items more and more. I absolutely love that.

I'm slowly getting into the Festivale mood myself: I've been testing out a special outfit for the occasion myself, and I've found the perfect goth Festivale look in my storage. Despite wearing overly colourful stuff definitely not being my thing, I kind of still want to participate in the party spirit. But we'll have to wait until the actual day to see that one.


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Arachnophobia warning: Spider section starts here
(Last chance to turn back, folks)​

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However, while I was shopping and hauling the last few of my crafted shell items over to Nook's Cranny, we did have an island menace attempting to break out of the Museum at nightfall... And it wasn't Olaf returning to wreak havoc!

It must've snuck by a panicking Blathers to wreak havoc on the island's upper class district! However, the beast promptly got apprehended before it could do any harm. After checking on the unfortunate owl, he was okay: turned out not that he wasn't bitten, nor pierced by the beasts needle-like hairs. But this called for vengeance: the beast was sold off directly to the Nooklings this time. They offered me an 8k reward for bringing the 8-legged terror of the island in. Well, we all know that when a Nook says they'll take care of it, then they'll er...'take care of it'. I fear that we have not seen the last of the Tarantula army, though, so the local tanuki mobsters will prove valuable allies in defending the island from these abominations.

But in all seriousness here: I missed the last Tarantula I ran into by a hair, but I did manage to catch this one. I considered keeping it as a trophy, but I had nowhere to properly display it. I'll just start saving them up for a model next time.

Well, after selling off that Tarantula and the items I intended to, I called it a day.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 27th​

Well, the countdown to Festivale has really taken off here: it's tomorrow already!? Good thing I've been preparing, because sometimes, events in any game tend to sneak up on me. I really didn't boot up the game until really late today: I could only get on in the evening! So I kind of had to rush through the dailies: this did teach me that I can be really fast and thorough with the dailies at the same time if I put my mind to it, though: definitely a skill that'll help on an event day.

Well, the evening did start out kind of weird: it was nice to see a letter form Wardell on extra pretty paper, and he was sweet enough to send me a gift. He might not talk much, but he's a real bro.

But after that, I found a DIY message bottle with a letter from none other then Olaf in there! Naturally, I didn't bother to read what the former island menace had to say: I definitely headcanon my character as crumpling the piece of paper with the letter on it up, and after taking the recipe out, resolutely tossing it the heck back into the ocean over her shoulder without the bottle. NOPE.

He did send me an item that I wanted, though, so maybe he wants to atone for his misdeeds? Hate that he somehow tracked me down again, though.

Needless to say: I ran all the way to Katrina to ask her to purify me of this cringe before I absolutely ran through my dailies.

Phew, thanks for the good money luck today, Katrina! After making a good few extra Bells today, I rushed past the stores, and Nook's Cranny had a garland that ended up looking really cute on my island entrance.

Now if that won't get you in the Festivale spirit... I honestly can't wait to catch enough feathers tomorrow to both get the remaining furniture items and properly customize everything: I already like how things look so far, and it's going to look even better with the colours of the items actually matching the colours of my island entrance and the area around the Plaza. I guess both this year's and next year's Festivale are both going to be awesome! I've been struggling with actually getting properly hyped for the event, but the hype has now fully hit me!

I'm also incorporating Kapp'n islands into my daily routine: I've heard that you can unlock some rare islands over time, but some require you to go to one on every day of the week.

I actually got one of these rare islands today: there's an island that has constant rain going on, and you can dig up a full gyroid on there along with the usual fragment! For this one, you actually need to visit Kapp'n islands on 7 different days to even unlock the chance of getting to it: I've heard that from a video by a dataminer on the subject yesterday. And hilariously enough, I actually ended up on it today.

Sadly, no rare rain fish and bugs today, but a full gyroid is a good catch. and it had some flowers that I was a bit short on for the little forest area around my stargazing cliff. Here's all of the loot from this island:

After that, I headed off to the archipelago. And lucky me: the message bottle there actually had a DIY recipe for an item off of my wishlist... the Ruined Seat!

I actually need it for in my bamboo forest area: remember how I was looking for something to put the Orchid Mantis model on for if I do end up catching enough of them when the actual spring weather hits the game? Well, I looked at a lot of different options to actually put that model on, and this was truly the best one out of all of them. I also considered the Mush Log, but what essentially looks like a normal tree log that would end up looking kind of funny with only bamboo trees standing around it. The Ruined Seat kind of looks like a forest stone in that context in a certain customization of it, so that mantis model would look like you just saw the actual animal chilling on a rock. So this is really sort of going to be a standard item to place general insect models for that area on.

Also, speaking of the bamboo forest: once it was done, I was going to make a joke about it maaaaaaaybe being haunted, and actually considered making a separate character for it that sort of looked like a Japanese yurei and sort of acted like Casper the friendly ghost. So that if people visited the Dream Address for this, they could actually meet him if they found his house. But the game kind of beat me to it, because I did actually run into a ghost in that forest today! Luckily, it ended up being more scared of me then I was of it.

That's right, Wisp came to visit this evening, for the first time ever. Geez, Wisp, I know that goth people can be perceived as looking kind of scary, but this is ridiculous! I've actually read up on him beforehand: basically, what happens is that by talking to him, you pretty much startle him bad enough that 5 pieces of his spirit go flying. So once my character undoubtedly explained to him that she's a human, he claimed that he had never seen one on this island before, and told me to find those spirit pieces like he usually does. He promised me a reward, so off I went to find them!

I actually had to comb the island for the last one way too often: it ended up being on the beach near the market area. Not sure how it only suddenly ended up being there after walking past that area 3 times and not seeing it every time, but there it was. Anyhow, with the spirit pieces in hand, I returned to Wisp to receive a piece of furniture as a reward.

I chose to go for something not in my catalog yet, as I know that the 'something expensive' option can kind of be hit or miss: he actually gave me an Exit Sign. Not sure how to feel about that...

Anyhow, back on the archipelago, Lottie had one final assignment for me: the last facility had been unlocked... And boy would this be one for the ages! It was an apparel shop.

...Brb, throwing every remotely looking goth clothing item at this sucker. Don't expect any bad Hot Topic knock-offs from me, though: I'm going for an actual goth clothing store look on this one. I've been in plenty of those before, and even visited the Camden area in London once, so I definitely know what one is supposed to look like. The game has given me plenty of alternative-looking clothing options to decorate with, so it shouldn't be a problem to make that apparel store look believable... Regardless of what actually ends up being on the mannequins. Anyhow, both me and my mom agreed that letting me design a full apparel shop is an incredibly irresponsible decision on Nintendo's part, and that Lottie definitely should not have encouraged me on this.

Well, this is about where I had to call it a day for sleep reasons, so I fear that screenshots of the local archipelago goth store are going to have to wait until tomorrow. Whew, we finally caught up to the present! I hate to leave this post on a cliffhanger like this, but the place only really needs some last checks and it's good to go. It might have been a bit of a short post today, but tomorrow, there's going to be plenty of content to be posting about with Festivale just around the corner. I am actually looking forward to the event, and sharing my Festivale misadventures.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

February 28th​

Happy Festivale, everyone! Pavé had finally arrived, so the dance party has started! Even Isabelle got in a festive mood during the morning announcements.

Of course, I couldn't go meet the king of the dancefloor himself without wearing something appropriate for the occasion. Sorry, folks, this is about as colourful as it's going to get for a goth like me!

I still feel that it's festive enough, though.

Now for anyone new to Animal Crossing: Festivale works as follows. There are 5 different coloured feathers floating in the air throughout the day: Red, Purple, Blue, Green and Rainbow. Gather 3 of the first 4 colours that I mentioned, and hand them to Pavé. He's the NPC hosting this: he should be at the Plaza all day, you exactly can't miss him... In return, he'll give you a piece of Festivale-specific furniture. After a few times, he'll ask for 3 Rainbow Feathers: in return, he'll give you an item only obtained through him, the Festivale Float. These Rainbow Feathers can be found around the island, but are more easily obtained through crafting: with 1 of each coloured feather excluding rainbow, you can craft 1 Rainbow Feather. You can also trade feathers with villagers during the day: they'll ask for feathers matching the colour of their outfit. For example: if they're wearing blue, they'll ask for blue feathers. If you need the colour feather they're offering in return, then accept it: you don't need to accept the offer if you're short on the colour feather the villager is asking for, but you'll get friendship points for completing the trade.

Well, with the basics about the event out of the way, let's get into my Festivale misadventures! So I introduced myself to Pavé, he gave me a DIY for Rainbow Feathers as a thank you for hosting, and sent me out to go catch him some feathers!

He did clock my outfit, though Hey, this is as flamboyant as it's going to get for me, man. Anyhow, I wasn't sure that I got all of the furniture from Nook's Cranny beforehand, so off to catch some I went!

I actually caught a lot on my way to Katrina, but I did drop by her before doing the dailies.

Well, with my expensive taste, some good money luck never hurts. Speaking of: I hadn't donated to Harvey's island yesterday, so I was about to drop a cool 40k IGB on Cyrus' shop to get both yesterday's and today's donation out of the way at the same time while I was here anyways. But then I noticed that would land me like 5k off the final Bell goal. So as usual when a goal of mine is within an arm's reach, I decided: 'Oh come on, that's pennies!' and went for it.

Being able to change base item colours is just too useful for my play style, and is going to contribute to my plans for Crayola in a major way. So I just had to cross this one off the list.

After that, I went about my dailies, and more feather hunting. After obtaining a few furniture items from Pavé, he asked me to find him 3 Rainbow Feathers: I had read up on this, and knew what reward was coming... So ooh boy, I was on fire for that one! Since I didn't run into too many Rainbow Feathers floating around, I decided to go down the crafting route, and just collect 3 of each feather. I kind of kept getting the same coloured feathers, though, so I ended up with multiple stacks of 3 of the same colour. But I was horribly short on purple feathers, so I went full in on the trading here.

So with Rhonda saving the day on the purple feathers here, I hauled my materials off to the crafting bench. So with 3 Rainbow Feathers now in hand, I set off to claim my Festivale Float and make Pavé's day.

Now this item can't be customized at all, not even by Cyrus. But it can be interacted with once placed: Once done, it'll play a little Festivale tune and move around. After a long day of catching feathers and crafting the necessary Rainbow Feathers to customize everything that I wanted to decorate my island entrance with for the event, I placed my float there as well as a short of eyecatcher.

Now that's what Crayola's Festivale should look like! I did the drum and stall near the plaza, and the parasol at the café area as well. I'm probably going to just leave everything on my island at least for tomorrow, but it's definitely going to be cleared out around the 2nd of March.

Afterwards, I dropped by the archipelago, as I hadn't done that yet. I gave my apparel shop the last few checks, gave the place a slightly silly name, and Quinn was a surprisingly appropriate store manager for the setting.

Man, Lottie should've never let me run wild with a place like this. Let alone encourage it! But then again: what did she expect here? I mean, she's seen what I did to the other facilities... Not to mention the vacation homes involving villagers like Judy and Gayle. Hurricane Melanie has hit the apparel shop, and the damage is immeasurable.

My mom actually thought the skull flooring looked cool, and I agree: a goth clothing store is not a proper store without any skulls involved. But we still agreed that including an apparel shop to decorate was a completely irresponsible decision on Nintendo's part.

Anyhow, after wreaking havoc on that poor apparel shop, turns out there was a little afterparty to Festivale going on on the archipelago today: the event that Niko had been working on was today. Well, let's see what this is about...

So this platform slowly starts sailing up on-screen and...

Oh, you've gotta kidding me! Given the complete absence of Dr. Shrunk and his comedy club, I thought that DJ K.K. wasn't even in this game! The hype for this is definitely real over here, so drop the bass!

I'm not really a club kind of person, but at least the ones Animal Crossing play something decent, and at a manageable volume. Also, no annoying strobe lights to be dealing with! My autism hates those in particular, and it hates them with a passion. But Festivale definitely has me in a partying mood today! I was over there like 'play K.K. Dirge!', and he did actually end up playing it later: no better way to celebrate me promoting to a Famous Designer.

I even dragged some other characters onto the dancefloor later, like Wilbur. Come on, the guy is always flying me safely to both here and Harvey's island, so he deserved at least one night of the good life!

Go Wilbur, go Wilbur! I don't know how he was still able to properly fly a plane after partying like this. I dunno, my character was probably out like a light on the way home back to Crayola, and real-life me can usually not sleep on planes until I'm absolutely exhausted. Like, if I could sleep standing up, only then can I sleep in any kind of sitting position. I mean, I was pretty tired after my trip to Canada, and I somehow could not sleep on the 8-hour flight back home for the life of me. I just can't sleep in a sitting position, even if I tilt the airplane chair back. But then again, that might be genetic to a degree: my late grandmother from father's side dealt with jetlag by just going about her day once home, then getting a good night's sleep. Jetlag doesn't really affect me as much either, though: I won't be of much use the entire day after I get back, but I'll pretty much stay awake through it with no issue. The next day, after a good night's sleep, I'll be right as rain.

Anyhow, back home, I turned in my remaining feathers to Pavé...

...and kept the ones that didn't make a full stack as sort of a souvenir.

Well, I have been to the party today, been to the afterparty, and boy was it ever a ride today. I really had a lot of fun in the game today, and the events were definitely a blast. I had a great time decorating and participating, and next year's Festivale is going to be even more awesome. Not to mention that I'm already looking forward to other big ticket events and milestones in this game. But it was about time to call it a day.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 1st​

New month, new Critterpedia entries! But oof, while I might not drink alcohol, that hangover kind of feeling after Festivale is still real.

I dunno, to me, the day after a big party always feels so weird. It's like this weird, empty feeling after all of the hype. Well, first things first, I hopped by Katrina first before I went about the dailies.

Well, I'll definitely sign for that: an extra durable net and fishing rod definitely won't hurt today. And while I was there: Cyrus' customization service had opened up today, so I decided to go look around the plaza some more then usual this morning.

Oh Reese, it's been way to long if you don't even remember me after New Leaf! It's nice to see these two return, but I wish she had more to do here then just spew some dialogue and emote at whatever Cyrus is doing.

Also, this meant that Harriet had a new hairstyle to teach me: let's see what kind of hair-torture she has in store for me this time.

Okay, I only look like either a librarian or overly strict school principal this time... But hey, it's an upgrade from the usual Karen-ish haircut she tends to slap on me! I guess we're getting into the half-decent looking hairstyles now.

So with Katrina's blessing, I started to chase around the new monthly bugs I saw flying around.

After this, fossils, and all of the other Bell-related activities, I had a new villager from my move-in queue to properly welcome to Crayola: Clyde.

I looked him up on the wiki beforehand: Oof, he really is a highlighter shade of yellow, isn't he...? Please pray for my poor eyes, because your latest villager is not eligible to move out, whether it's through the Campsite or a thought bubble He's definitely on the list to be cycled out later, though. Also, might visit the island he's mentioning here via Dream Address later, just for fun. I'm kind of looking for people to play this game with anyways.

Also, Leif was visiting the plaza today, and he had the last produce item that I wanted in stock today: the carrot starts! So I went to plant them, but the produce area is now getting a little cramped...

Well, I was giving Crayola a semi-big makeover today, outlining villager houses a little more and all: might as well add 'move and expand the produce area' to my to-do list for that. I was thinking of putting my character's house and the Museum on a 1-level cliff as well, but I'm not sure about that. An idea like that does sound thematically appropriate for this sort of upper class neighborhood near the Museum, but it might look a little weird sitting right next to that forest area. My house is sort of supposed to be this Addams Family sort of deal in that whole neighborhood, only then without that one overly nasty neighbor roasting the one spooky person around for not being 'normal'. Like, in every story or cartoon about the Addams Family, everything is always going well for them until this one narrow-minded jerk shows up. But we all know that Crayola doesn't tolerate jerks in any capacity: No generally nasty behavior allowed!

Speaking of island plans: I have been crafting some Ruined Seats for my bamboo forest today. I pretty much had way too many Stones on hand, so I thought: why not craft something useful with it? A while ago, the game sent me to the vine island like twice, so I had a good few in stock. So since this definitely was within the realm of possibility now, I figured it would just be handy to have them in my storage before I actually run into enough Orchid Mantises to have Flick make a model out of.

I really didn't have a plan for Crayola as a whole, I'm really just winging it for the most part. But if I actually have a plan for an area of my island or house, then I usually just craft or buy stuff for it the moment I can, toss it into storage, and just get to decorating the area once I have everything I need.

Well, after that, there was a bit of a lull in the day. Phoebe taught me a new reaction: Cold Chill.

Also, Monique came by today, and I beat her in a game of higher or lower. I also did a bit of fishing, but I only caught one new entry, so I decided to go to a Kapp'n island to see if there was anything interesting. I got the rain island again this time:

...But still no new rain-specific fish. And on the insect end of that spectrum: the only thing remotely rain-related was a few Snails, and I already had those in my Critterpedia. Even the full gyroid I dug up was one that I already had! The loot was still reasonable, though.

I took the weeds with me because they're a bit of a rarity on my island: I still have the Beautiful Island ordinance on, and I tend to keep the place relatively weed-free for rating reasons. But I kind of still need them for crafting, so I usually just steal a few from Kapp'n islands. I didn't exactly make loads of Bells here, but every little bit helps.
I also found a nice DIY recipe in a message bottle on this island: not the exact garden rock from my wishlist, but extra outdoorsy item options never hurt anyone.

After emptying out my inventory, I decided to hop by the archipelago. And who do I find standing near the entrance?

None other then Nat himself! Boy, that's sure been a bit since New Leaf... But what's Flick's dad doing here? Turns out he was asked to speak at the school about bugs, so my character leads him there. He asks me about my favorite insect: that has to be butterflies.

Afterwards, I did unlock a new feature, though.

But since there weren't a lot of interesting villagers showing up on my archipelago yet again, I decided to get started on some remodels for some extra Poki. Lottie is letting me get away with a lot more when it comes to my uniform, it seems: a pair of Chain Pants and my dream bag (the Studded Backpack) were unlocked for it, so I gave myself a little makeover on that area before I went off to work.

Thank you, Lottie, for being so forgiving! Now which real-life boss would let you get away with wearing something like this to work? I definitely owe her one, but I think she's just happy that I bothered to actually put the uniform shirt on.

Back on Crayola, turned out there was a meteor shower today: I kind of wanted to invite people over again, but I want to thoroughly test whether I can permanently solve any connectivity issues on my end beforehand. I'm going to eventually need help for that, though, as the usual solutions just didn't help when I tried. Also, my internet should've been fast enough, so I guess I'm going to have to actually troubleshoot. Last time was just too embarrassing for words, even though it's probably something that I can't even help. But I do not want a repeat of that.

I hate that I had to spend yet another meter shower alone, as I just like sharing something like that with others. People always help newbies, so I want to pay it forward. I didn't get to troubleshooting yet, though, so I fear that regularly opening my gates for something like this will have to wait until I actually isolate this internet issue. I did get my wishes in regardless, though. And in between falling star waves, a Froggy Chair actually dropped from a balloon present! I had already gotten one from Wardell's shop, but what are the odds, right?

Also, turns out that two of my favorite villagers had gotten into a fight today while I was at the archipelago! I'm not sure who started it, but it was Phoebe with the thought bubble.

Oh no, we cannot have two beloved villagers of mine arguing here, time to go deliver that apology present! With the ability to adjust villager houses now, I did reset Rhonda's interior, because let's face it: she deserves way better then that barren mess that Tom originally set her up with.

I am planning to redecorate her house entirely, though, because this still doesn't exactly scream 'Rhonda' to me. Like, it's already nicer then what she had, but nothing but the best for my dream villagers. Like, if they're going to be here permanently, then they're darned well going to live in the lap of luxury. She's eventually getting the full celebrity treatment here: exterior completely re-did, lawn fully decked out, an interior fit for a queen, the works. Anyhow, I went back to Phoebe to tell her how it went, and called it a day after that.

I did yet again have way too many Nook Miles saved up: I had like 40k on me, and turned like 10 into Bell Vouchers and 10 into Nook Mile Tickets. I do need to have my ABD recover a bit after that last Nook Mile debt, and the only stuff in the Nook Mile store that I want is more for catalog reasons then anything else. But I only want to get to filling out my catalog with non-wishlist items more if I feel my island is truly finished. And until then, I'd rather pour them into something more useful for my longer-term goals like the dream villager hunt and paying off all my Nook loans. I'm really not sure where I'm headed next on my to-do list: I still have plenty to do on the island, but I should really take some time tomorrow to find a more precise task to work towards in the upcoming weeks.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 2nd​

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Arachnophobia warning: Near the end of the post, there will be a screenshot of a Tarantula and talk of general spiders. There is still spider-free content at the start of the post, though: I will also post a warning at the start of the spider section. If any of the mentioned spider-related content upsets you in any way, please just sit this one out. Also, absolutely no judgement: I have light arachnophobia myself, so I won't be offended if you skip the post entirely.

Well, without further ado, please enjoy today's post!

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Well, turns out that yesterday wasn't even a real meteor shower: turns out that it was a normal clear sky, and I was just insanely lucky on falling stars. Just how much good karma do I have saved up here!? I must really be in the universe's good books or something. Isabelle actually announced one today, though. Good thing I booted up the game in the mid-afternoon, so I both had plenty of time to do the dailies, some island decorating stuff, and get 20 wishes in.

But first things, first: it was time for my daily visit to Katrina. I did get a bad luck reading today, but I guess there had to be something to balance out all of that good luck lately.

Good thing I had enough on me for the purification service: I don't run around a lot and I wasn't planning on moving any trees or anything, but bad health luck is no joke in this game! I'm not going to be tripping while walking normally or something here: I do have the DIY for the King Tut Mask, but there's a reason why I never crafted it! The slightly funny slapstick element of negative movement effects just gets old real fast if you're just trying to get to your dailies here. Nope, let's not, get this bad luck off of me!

I don't really mess with any bad Katrina luck in general anyways: I always take at least 11k IGB over to Harvey's island when I go visit her, just in case. If you're yet to unlock her, highly recommend doing the same: if you get a bad luck reading from her, she won't offer the purification service if you only brought 1k with you. I've been ridiculously lucky on my Katrina readings before getting my first bad luck reading, but sooner or later, you'll get one as well. And you can't know in advance what kind of luck you're going to get from her, so it's better to just be prepared for when it does hit. I mean, Harvey places an ABD on his island later anyways, so in the case of a good luck reading, you can always just return the remaining 10k IGB to your savings afterwards.

Well, with that bad health luck crisis avoided, I decided to get to my dailies. I didn't really find any new fossils to donate to the Museum today, but I did catch a new bug to go and spook Blathers with along the way.

Good thing that bug didn't attack me while it was in the net, then! Also, I did a bit of shopping today: Kicks was visiting, and he had some good finds in his store today.

He had a pair of black Kimono Sandals and one of those black and white Japanese-looking bags that you sling over your shoulder: I thought that both those would look absolutely amazing with my black Butterfly-visiting Kimono, so I had to go for them. I did have another variaton of that bag, but that particular one that Kicks had matched especially well.

I also hopped by the Able Sisters: They had a Cow Skull on display, and you know I'm a sucker for skulls. They also had a tiara that lowkey gave me a blast from the past in New Leaf. I actually had this little expensive black hat with black lace on the front from Gracie's back in that game, which gave my character a similar hairstyle to this. Only the hair bun itself was set lower then this. I did actually buy this tiara in the end: not sure what I'll wear it with, or if I'll even end up wearing it.

I do legit like the hairstyle itself, though: wish there was a version without the tiara that we could get via the mirror, because while it is cute... I do feel a bit overly snooty with an actual crown of some sorts on. I dunno, maybe it'll look better combined with a regal gown or something. The gray version of the Princess Dress might look okay with this, but it's a bit... too simple when it comes to details to truly make you feel like royalty while wearing it. When I think 'regal', I think lots of lace, ruffles and other cool detailing: more along the lines of the Ruffled Dress or Lace-up Dress (only with a longer skirt), or the Fashionable Royal Dress. If only the last on that last one came in black... I dunno, might have to go work on a custom design to go with this, because this is just the Elegant Hat situation all over again! A lovely head accessory, but you can really only settle for second best on the default game options. And you know I can't just leave that be!

Speaking of custom designs: I finally cracked on the flower issue, and placed down some transparent tiles around my island.

Flowers just kept appearing on the dirt paths on Crayola, and flower borders never stopped at just being flower borders. So I made a transparent tile, gave it a silly name just for laughs, and decided to make things a little easier on myself when it came to Crayola's flower maintenance. It's a little hard to keep track of which tile I left off at while working, as it's fully transparent. But I managed to catch all of the flower borders on my island so far. I'm yet to get to the park, as that's regular offender. But that's basically the last area on the lis: everything else is set. Especially the wildflowers were really getting out of control.

And while I was at it anyways, I re-did the front yards of two villagers. I was thinking of moving the houses, so I had gathered up all their plants and basically reset the yards to begin with. But then I noticed that the game might not let me move them, so I decided to place everything back. Spike's yard was looking a tad barren, though, and I wasn't happy with where Monique's garden table was, so I decided to liven things up a little while I was at it.

Monique mainly uses her yard for yoga, but I often do catch her sitting at her little table: I've recently placed a cute-looking drink I got from a balloon present on my dreamie's garden table for decor's sake, so might do the same for Monique here. I'm really hpappy with how her yard turned out, though.

Spike's yard really only had flowers, but I had planned the neighborhood to be filled with white plumeria bushes. I ended up with a spare of that colour in particular, so I decided to just place it there. I also crafted him one of those swing benches: I'm usually not find of them, but it seemed like a cute idea in this neighborhood.

Also: oh, right... I had some Festivale stuff to clean up as well.

...Pray for my poor storage. But after the cleanup effort, Idecided to get to a project I had been meaning to do: customize the Streetlamps around the island. I mean: look at those stark white ones not matching the lamps next to the Resident Services on ones on the Plaza!

Eww, we can't just let this be. So I gathered them all up, counted them, made an estimate of how many in-game Bells this would run me, and got to a rough estimate of 60k IGB. Well, that definitely sounds affordable for what I have in my ABD at the moment: Cyrus, we're in dire need of your help!

And while I was busy having like over 10 Streetlamps customized all in one go (I counted around 15 in my inventory), I noticed how darned adorable that loading screen was. Like, I can't even be mad at this! Also, the little tune that plays on this screen is so cute as well: like, it just didn't get old after a few times. I don't really go "d'aww" over this game as much as others do, I must just have a high cute tolerance or something. But... d'awww!

But then again: we all know that Reese and Cyrus are just pure gold to begin with. Like, we need Re-Tail back in the next game, no ifs or buts about it. Would be cool to just be able to shop for furniture at two stores: just have both this and Nook's Cranny, and have like exclusive furniture sets for Re-Tail in particular for gameplay reasons. Like, the exclusive furniture would motivate the player to actually go and unlock them after getting Nook's Cranny. Then you'd have Nook's Cranny, Re-Tail and the Able Sisters and boom: there's an option for a fully functional shopping district in the game.

Well,the sun was about to set in-game around this time, so I headed back to Crayola for the meteor shower. Not fun to yet again hve to spend one alone, but my mom pointed out to me how nice the actual view in-game was. And I noticed she was right: the bamboo forest isn't even done yet, but just look at this screenshot!

That did cheer me up a little: I am lowkey kind of proud here, since I did plan it all. The Blossom Lanterns near the south forest entrance are only temporary, though: I want to replace them with Tall Lanterns, customized to the Mossy variation. Might consider placing like two Blossom Lanterns somewhere in this little crossing / clearing area, though: they do look kind of cute around this area. But just you wait until I actually plant all f the bamboo trees needed on this half of the forest! And the fence of the yard was placed in preparation of the day that Genji actually moves in: the fence is sort of customized to his house's basic exterior in advance. When the time finally comes, I don't care whether I'll have to move villager houses around to actually get him to live in this bamboo forest: I don't mind spending 20k on that day. Nothing but the best for my dream villagers.

Also, the park isn't exactly bad for stargazing either!

The Museum is nearby on the horizon here: I was considering putting both that and my character's house on a 1-level cliff. It's going to take moving some stuff around, but I've decided to go through with this plan eventually, as it's just going to look cool both on the horizon, and once you get to that area. I'm keeping the Museum's plaza area and my little front yard with the fountain, and I'll have to move both my flower breeding area and produce area to actually get this cliff thing done. But that produce area needed more space anyways, so I guess that motivates me to find a new spot for it. Since it's sort of a huge change for the island, things are still in the planning phase for now. And while those are a pain in the rear, they're definitely a necessary evil: in my case, things rarely go well without a basic plan in mind. But once I do have the details hammered out, things are going to look amazing.

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Arachnophobia warning: Spider section starts here
(Last chance to turn back, folks)​

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Along the way of catching those fallen stars, though, I ran into a Tarantula! What's the deal with the bamboo forest and spawning those? This is like the 2nd or 3rd one I found in there so far: the first one that got me was spotted there. I guess Wisp isn't the only thing stalking this neck of the woods.. But at least the ghost is friendly!

We may or may not have found the stronghold of the Tarantula army over on Crayola. It did manage to get me, though: I did get within net range, but I missed the net swing by like a quarter of a square yet again. The feud rages on...



Well, I did struggle a bit about what goal to set for myself lately, but I have a few clear ones in mind now. The first is to catch 3 Orchid Mantises. Well, I somehow made 4 Tarantula's spawn so far, and I actually got two of those to spawn by actively cheesing the insect spawn system of the game. So I should be able to catch enough Orchid Mantises this way over time. The great Tarantula hunt might be over, but the great Mantis hunt has only just started!
Also, I have a plan in mind for the houses of my dream villagers, and had a list of furniture set up to obtain for that purpose... And being able to order the stuff not in my catalog yet through Wardell via the DLC has made the furniture I need more accessible then ever. Well, since Rhonda is already here, about time I get to gathering all of the stuff needed for her house. Her house is frankly going to be the most expensive so far, so I had best get to it. Here's hoping that the extra funds obtained from a rare bug hunt is going to take a good chunk out of the total Bells needed for that, because the bed I have planned for her house is worth 54k IGB on its own. And that's not factoring in the customizations that furniture item might take. Please pray for my poor ABD... That's two longer term goals set, though, so I have my work cut out for me.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 3rd​

Ooh boy, is today ever a tale of incredible luck! If anything I can definitely say that I'm in the universe's good books, because that was some incredibly good karma coming my way! Because what could've been a saga of a few days was over within one day. But let's start from the beginning: the preparations for the grand mantis hunt had started today.

Hey, hold up a minute before we set out! Am I just imagining things, or is that grass green all of a sudden?

Yup, no more awkward slush brown: spring has finally fully hit the game! But before the hunt for the Orchid Mantis could properly start, there were still dailies to be done. So first on the agenda was to visit Katrina.

Well, good money luck definitely won't hurt today with all of the spare, non-Orchid mantis bugs that I'll be selling today: thank you, Katrina! So with no further ado, I went about my daily tasks.

Good thing the 4th fossil didn't give me any trouble today. I got through everything relatively quick today.

Also, adding a task of shaking all the trees on my island to the routine paid off, as the good money luck caused more non-money trees to drop Bells (they sometimes drop like 100 Bells). Also, since the risks of Wasps is real with this, I'm going to teach you all you a little trick that I picked up from a video recently, which lets you catch the Wasps every time. Like, no more stings or wasp-face, you'll get them every time. Okay, so first, you want to have your net out in advance. Like, just keep it out when you walk around, you never know which tree holds a nest. Then, go stand directly in front of the tree like so before you shake it.

This way, when a nest falls out, your character will turn towards the nest, and all you need to do after they finish emoting is mash the A button like crazy. Your net won't be blocked by the tree due to where you're standing, and you'll instantly swing when you regain control over your character. Hope this helped, now go show these darned Wasps who's boss! You'll avenge many new and unsuspecting players in the process: we all got stung at least once.


Well, with all of my daily tasks out of the way, the grand Orchid Mantis hunt could begin! I started at 1 PM, as it lowkey took me all morning. But hey, I still had a good 4 hours to catch at least one, so I figured I could at least make some headway on this goal.
Okay, so let's go over everything! My goal is to catch 4 Orchid Mantises: 1 for the Museum, and 3 to have Flick make a model out of it for in the bamboo forest. The bug itself is only slightly less rare then the Tarantula: the spider gets 5 rarity stars on the wiki, and the mantis gets 4. It's active between 8 AM and 5 PM, so it's very much a day insect. It only appears on white flowers, but is easy to spot on them due to its yellow-ish colour in this game. And by that, the game means any white flower: the Orchid Mantis is not exactly picky here. It can be Hyacinths, Lilies, Mums, whatever. The Orchid Mantis is one of those easily spooked bugs: if it sits up on its hind legs, stop moving or else it'll run. Really, hold the A button on this one, and approach it as you would that darned spider: time when you actually move towards it, and pause when it sits up on its hind legs.

Also, the game can only spawn 4 insects at any given time, so it's important that I catch as many as I can so new ones can spawn: a rare insect like this can't spawn if there's like 4 Common Butterflies on my island already. So I'll only want to take essential tools to maximize my inventory space: I usually carry all tools on me, but I put most of mine in storage for something like this. Like, I only take what I'd need for bug catching: I usually only take my Net, a spare Net, a Slingshot (because of balloon presents), and a Vaulting Pole. If you have a lot of cliffs on your island, though, you might want to add a Ladder to this loadout. My island is relatively flat at the moment, so I don't really need one.

Now I have more then enough of those white flowers the Orchid Mantis spawns on across Crayola: the biggest clusters of them are in the woods around the stargazing area, at the stargazing area, in the bamboo forest, near the south entrances of said forest, in a few villager's yards around the plaza, and in the park behind the Resident Services. But I had dug up a few white flowers that resulted from flower breeding, I suddenly remembered that a common method of hunting Tarantula's was to dig a lot of holes to limit their spawn spots, and create sort of a spot with a higher spawn rate. They're named Tarantula traps. So I decided to place a bunch of those white flowers together and set sort of a 'mantis trap': an area where the spawn chance for one would possibly be higher.

And since I didn't want to risk my beloved new Star Net breaking along the way, I also crafted a bunch of regular nets to use just for this hunt. I sort of keep customizing the Star Net to keep it in one piece, as customizing resets an item's uses before breaking. And I didn't want to risk losing it just because I wasn't paying attention.

So I'm on my way to my character's house t go craft these Nets, but what do I see along the way...?

We've got a live one boys! This is not a drill, let's go! Now I hadn't kept track of whether it was time to customize my trusty net yet, but this was definitely worth risking a broken Star Net over. So I approached the beast like it was a Tarantula: slowing down by holding the A button, and freezing when it sat up. I got within net range, said a little prayer that I wouldn't be just half a square off from catching it, and swung that net!

Heck yeah, the first Orchid Mantis is caught! The hunt has barely started, or it's already a success. New Critterpedia entries like this of course go to Blathers: I absolutely love how this insect looks in the game, and it's actually prettier then its real-life equivalent. But the Museum display for this bug is also gorgeous.

But I had no time to admire it any further, as there was still 3 more to catch! And I still needed spare nets for this.

So with my Star Net safely in storage and two of these crafted Nets on me, I set out to continue my hunt.

So my rounds went as follows: I'd start over here, go past Monique and Spike's houses behind the Museum, move over to the forested area near the stargazing cliff from there, go to the bamboo forest, go through that entire area, check some white lilies near my island entrance, check villager yards around the plaza, check the park, and go back to this bunch of white flowers to repeat the loop. That basically sends me past every white flower on my island multiple times, so as long as I keep catching every bug on my path? I'm bound to run into an Orchid Mantis eventually.

And as luck would have it, one was actually sitting right in the bamboo forest! It was actually in an area that was still in progress, and I did actually end up catching this one: this is the first one out of the 3 that I needed. One down, two left to go!

Well, now that I'm looking back on this screenshot: they lowkey do actually look like they belong in this kind of environment... That's kind of a relief, given that I'm catching them to have Flick make a model out of them. Also, remind me to break that rock sitting right in the middle of that path later. I had actually broken a rock previously while planting bamboo shoots: while they make the forest look more believable, the trees would've just blocked the view of said rock. So I decided to break it and plant some more trees there to fill up the space. But then, here is where the new rock chose to spawn! Ugh, after this hunt is over, I'm grabbing a Pear from my storage, and I'm fixing this mess.

Around my 3rd round around the island or something, I actually found my second Orchid Mantis near the stargazing cliff! I was on my way to go grab a new spare, as I was like one broken Net in. I was seriously expecting to have this mantis get away, as it was in a slightly low-visibiliy area. But luckily, I could still see its movements to a degree, so I could safely get within net range of it: I actually managed to catch it. Two down, and one more to go: Almost there.

I was just praising my lucky stars to have been able to nab two in one day, when I actually spotted the third and last Orchid mantis in Spike's yard! An even more low visibility area then the stargazing cliffs, and it was on the white Roses right behind his swinging seat. I couldn't see its movements, so I was just hoping and praying that I wouldn't chase it off.

But boom, goal complete! The three Orchid Mantises caught in one day: I did not expect to actually cross this goal off the list today. Like, I was expecting this to at least take a few days. Now all I have left to do is wait for Flick to visit.

Sadly, C.J. was visiting today instead, so no Orchid Mantis Model for me yet.

I did have some more expensive fish in storage to sell to him, though: earned a good 10k by selling fish to him today. It actually pays off to just put the fish and insects that net you more Bells in storage until either C.J. or Flick visits, and sell them for a bigger profit then at Nook's Cranny. Just set yourself a bit of a Bell limit that a catch needs to sell for it to go into storage: if something I caught and already donated to the Museum is worth over 1k, then I'll put it in my storage until one of these two special characters visits. Because once they'll come to visit, that one fish will net me 1500 IGB instead of just 1k, and it'll add up.

Well, with my goal completed a little earlier then expected, I had some extra time left on my hands. So I decided to hop by the archipelago to see if there were any interesting villagers around there. And wouldn't you know it: I actually found another one of my dream villagers at the café there! Cherry was actually there today, so you can understand: I had to go for it.

Man, at this rate, I'll have all of my dream villagers here on the archipelago before I actually have them on my island!

But before I got to decorating Cherry's vacation home, Niko said that Lottie wanted to see me. Turns out that I had unlocked the room sketch app, which pretty much saves me a lot of work when it comes to these vacation homes. I actually designed the entire 1st floor of Cherry's house in it. I'll actually post more screenshots of the second floor later, as I'm still kind of working on that one. It is nice to be able to make a design in advance, though: I used to spend way too long coming up with something on the spot.

I actually checked the wiki entry on her while I was busy to see what kind of themes she likes and what's her favorite song, and I legit had no clue that she actually has this skull flooring in her house as a villager! I just thought it would fit her.

Lucky was also on the beach: I figured he'd make a good roommate for Coco, so I netted myself some extra Poki by just putting him on a random plot first, put some placeholder items in his house, and have him move in with Coco after that. If you make them a placeholder vacation home first and then remodel it as a Famous Designer, you'll earn the 15k for a new vacation home first, and an additional 7k for remodeling it. I also netted myself a few other pretty villagers where I'll remodel their homes later, so I might end up posting about those later.

And back on Crayola, I noticed that my storage was getting a little full... So since I needed more space: I started a new Nook Debt against my better judgement.

...Tom, I know that you donate to charity and all, but these loan prices are just getting ridiculous at this point! Good thing I got a 500k IGB head start on this one. I really need to start trading on Nookazon more often, because the stuff that's actually clogging up my storage is furniture that I want to sell.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 4th​

Another day, another Nook debt. But in all seriousness, today was mostly about working towards paying this one off. Dailies have gotten a bit hectic with me doing all of them every day, but it has been paying off: I'm earning about 100k IGB a day now. So I'm still slowly chipping away at this 2 million Bell debt, but at a faster pace then usual.

First thing on the agenda as always: Katrina. I got some good friendship luck today.

Well, I usually sell off any villager gifts that I don't intend to use for any purpose. So hey, this might net me a bit extra if I play my cards right. Like, sorry not sorry, but as a goth (one who tends to dress in tradgoth inspired fashion in real life, no less), I have absolutely no use for something like a pink bodysuit. But that might be some player's dream outfit, or they might have some other use for it like decorating an area of their island. So I at least try to make someone else's day with it. One man's trash is another man's treasure, right?

Before I went about my dailies, though, O'Hare came by for surprise visit.

Well, rabbits are actually my favorite animal in real life, so no complaints here. Katrina wasn't joking about that friendship thing today, though: once I did go about my dailies, Tiansheng had a gift for me, and he actually had an item for me that I was looking for. It wasn't the right colour, but it's nothing that Cyrus can't fix.

Thanks for contributing to my little outdoor café area, Tiansheng
Also, during the announcements, Isabelle had warned me that my old nemesis had arrived yet again...

Lol, with that net, I lowkey look a little more ominous then usual. Like Tom sent me to 'say hi'. Sad to say the fox didn't actually get clobbered with it: he had better count his blessings that the game doesn't let me get tools out when indoors. He did have a genuine 'Starry Night' by Van Gogh on sale, but that's one of the paintings that's always genuine once it appears. There's only a few, but this was one of them. So the scammer got scammed yet again!

Also, he had a Garden Bunny and Dreamy Bunny Plush on sale. Given that Redd is a fox, a natural predator to rabbits, that was... worrisome to see, to say the least. Needless to say: the hostage fees for the bunnies were paid, and they were promptly rescued from his clutches. Redd, you had better not pull this on me again! You don't even want to know what happens to those harming rabbits around here: Isabelle has 'connections', you know. And last time I checked, I was still on good enough terms with her to ask for a favor.

But one of the rabbits has already found a safe haven in the clearing at the bamboo forest, but the other is still looking for a forever home.

After that, I hopped by Nook's Cranny (pun very much intended). They had some Star Nets in stock today, so I decided to get some spares, just in case I accidentally end up breaking my current one. I just really like how this net looks: the Colourful Net is nice and all, but the stripes on it just bug me a little. So the Star Net is really the only cute net out there.

After that, the only dailies left were scoping the archipelago for new villagers, and hit a Kapp'n island. I had unlocked the second floor of some facilities, so I started off with the Restaurant's private room. I kind of wanted to keep it 'on brand 'with the rest of the place: same chairs and a similar table, only slightly fancier.

After that, I did some remodels: the Room Sketch app is really a lifesaver. I just slap down any obligatory items in the house itself, memorize those, make the actual room in it, and then get to work. I actually made Naomi a vacation home today, and I'm kind of proud of it.

I kind of went for sleek and modern, only make it sort of retro. I really went for a 60's feel with lowkey pop art vibes. I mean, Naomi definitely looks like she could've had her face on an Andy Warhol print at some point, so this kind of vibe felt right for her. She absolutely loved some items in here as well, so I'd consider this remodel a success. I think I was still working on some small details here, like the custom design on the couch, and the exterior. So it's definitely sort of still a work in progress. But I'd definitely feel comfortable posting this on my HHN once it's done. I really do only post stuff there I'm proud of, so that's really saying something.

It did net me a promotion, though.

DJ K.K. was visiting as well, so this called for a celebration! Ironically Rex, one of my past villagers, was there. I actually kicked him out at the time because the name wheel landed on his name... Er, long time no see, dude?

Well, after that, it was time to get back home, and get to that Kapp'n Island. Heave-ho, onwards we go!

Er, Kapp'n... Am I just seeing things here, or are there Bells on that tree?

Nope, I wasn't wrong, there were several money trees on this island! So I was basically guaranteed to make some Bells on this trip. There were also Tulips, but I had already bought some from Leif, and there were no hybrid flowers around to take home.

Here's all of the loot from this island:

The Barred Knifejaw was actually a new Critterpedia entry, so one went straight to the Museum. As they'd be worth 5k IGB each when sold at Nook's Cranny, they've more then have broken the 1k Bell minimum to be put into storage. So the rest of them went in there along with the Red Snapper until C.J.'s next visit. Like, he pays a healthy 7500 IGB for each Barred Knifejaw, and for the Snapper: 4500 instead of the 3k that Nook's Cranny would pay. For the high-ticket fish, that difference really matters, especially since you'll end up saving a few of them up before C.J. actually arrives on your island. I tend to be lenient with fish like the Bitterling that just fall short of the minimum, though, as they would hit the minimum if sold to C.J. instead.

After that, I did a little diving to chip away at that Nook Debt a little more. I actually did run into Pascal after a while, and he actully had something new to say.

So after I was done, I went to check what he had given me in return for my Scallop, and it turned out to be a DIY that I had been after for a while!

Yay, thanks, Pascal, you made my day! I actually need these for my little beach lounge area: I'm not planning to place them until I get the Cancer Table, as the Sea Globe would be in the way of actually accessing all of the seating and Beach Towels there at the moment. But now all that's left to gather for that area is a Cancer Table DIY, and an Anchor Statue. I'm really happy with how the island is progressing: I love it when a plan comes together. Or at least, is starting to come together...

I have also been watching some Youtube video's on the side while typing these posts, though, and one really inspired me to start planning an overlooked part of my own island. I saw this one dream island named Qwerty by Lilac Moonshine (hope I spelled that correctly), and noticed that they put white Azalea shrubs next to bamboo trees. Those kind of end up actually being this really pretty light pink when in bloom, and it looked so cute that I lowkey want to replace my pink Camelia's in my bamboo forest with that now. Like, the shape of the Azalea's flowers just matches the Lilies there better then the round-shaped flowers of the Camelia to begin with. And the leaves of that new shrub would just match the leaves of the bamboo trees whenever it's not in bloom.

I really need to plan out the bushes on my island anyways: I've kind of only placed my leftover ones from Kapp'n Islands around Crayola at the moment They were new to me once I took them with, but my current setup is just not working. Now any pink-flowered shrub would frankly still work when not in bloom in the bamboo forest in particular, because bushes in a forest just generally makes sense. Like, you wouldn't even question why one would be there, it's just believable regardless of whether it has flowers or not. I do like the red Camelia's around my island entrance and plaza area, but that's about it. The rest just looks weird, and kind of haphazardly placed (in a negative way, not in a forested area kind of way).

I'm thinking of placing some Hydrangea's around my little stargazing cliff: I'm thinking of the pink-flowering one, since the Hyacinths around there are mostly warm colours like red, orange and pink with some white mixed in. But I really wish those shrubs came in white Too many different colours is definitely going to look messy. I do want to place some yellow Hibiscus shrubs near the beaches, though: I've already placed a cute hammock and some beach chairs around the beaches to dress them up a little. And if anything completes the 'tropical vacation' and 'beach episode' sort of feel, it's those Hibiscus shrubs. Well, that sure is going to take me a while... I guess I have a new longer-term goal!

I've also been taking a minute to screenshot some of my other goals, but I'm really focusing on that Nook debt at the moment due to the sheer numbers on it. So donations to Harvey's island are paused for a bit. And despite me really wanting to complete that first Zen Bridge to the bamboo forest, we're still letting the villagers chip away at that one for now. It's still not quite at a number yet that I'm comfortable with spending on it at the moment: ideally, I'd be chasing both of those goals right now. But f I don't want my progress to slow down to a crawl, it's just not in the cards yet. On this Nook debt, I'm currently at 765k / 2498k IGB, so I'm starting to make some headway on it here.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 5th​

Well, I spent most of the day on the archipelago today: I had a lot of new villagers that I put in temporary vacation homes, so I had a lot of remodels to do. But I didn't spend all day there: let's start at the beginning... My daily Katrina visit.

Well, with me owing Tom Nook about 2 and a half million, a little good money luck sure couldn't hurt. With her blessing, I set out to go and do my dailies.
Along the way, Biff had a ping, and taught me a Reaction: Flourish.

Now another new part of my dailies is to visit villagers indoors at least twice a day: I just go past my little neighborhoods, and check where the curtains are open. You can tell if a villager is home that way, and the chimney should also have smoke coming out of it: the might be either DIY'ing or cooking, so you might get a new recipe out of it.

And good thing I added this to my routine, because it turned out that Clyde was ill and needed medicine! Nobody around mentioned it, but other villagers outside usually do when someone on the island is sick. Maybe they didn't know because he's new or something? He is the newest addition to Crayola at the moment.

Anyhow, I managed to still catch on to the quest this way. I always carry some Medicine on me just in case, so he was in luck: Something like this nets you extra friendship points with the villager in question, so you'll want to check in with them every now and then to not miss out on stuff like this either.

Well, after that, I decided to go check out the archipelago for new villagers. Pinky was there, and she was the only decent villager there today. But her home is still in progress, so I decided to do a little extra work on Cobb's house, as he was next on the remodel list. I decided to move Ribbot in with him: they live next to Kevin and Cephalobot, so that part of the archipelago is slowly becoming this sort of sci-fi island.

I basically went for the freeform option here, so no obligatory items needed (although I did look them up while working on this to see if there was anything interesting in there). Cobb mentioned some kind of secret research in his request before I went for that option, so I took that and absolutely ran with it: we're talking full mad scientist vibes over here.

I kind of wanted to include Ribbot to function as a sort of the 'result' of that research: he never said what kind of research it was... So who's to say that it couldn't have been about robotics? I am actually starting to enjoy dressing the part for these screenshots: I was playing with this sort of 'person who happened to wander in' look, but I decided to dress up as a research assistant instead today.

Don't get caught in the chair, though! Not even sure what this thing does... Let's keep it at 'it's a maintenance area for Ribbot'? Tat's the HHN cover picture right there, though.

Well, science never rests, but it sure does take bathroom breaks.

I did add a second floor to this with Ribbot around, though. Cobb needed a bedroom, and I decided to give Ribbot's room this charging station sort of vibe.

I dunno, I'd just think a mad scientist wouldn't care much about their private quarters: I'd just picture Cobb quickly grabbing a lab coat and getting to work once he has a scientific breakthrough. Ribbot's charging station is right next to it, though, with a little monitoring station so Cobb can keep an eye on him.

The emergency button is there for, well... emergencies! I mean, you never know when a bug in a routine software update can make a robot go full 'kill all humans' mode, right?

And Cobb needed a second bathroom so he can get ready for a long day of super-secret research.

I still have to work on the exterior: it's got these creepy laboratory vibes there as well, and I'm almost done with it. I'm only still looking for a DIY for the Plain Wooden Shop Sign, to make at least 2 sort of warning signs to place around. I've actually been working on some custom designs for it: one is already done.

Well, after his vacation home and a bit of work on Pinky's, I was creatively tapped for the day, so I headed back to Crayola. I did remember that I had some items to be customized, so I headed over to my storage to collect them all, grabbed some Bells from my ABD... and set off to Harvey's Island to ask Cyrus to help pretty these items up.

The colour of the cup that Tiansheng gave me turned out to be 'royal': flattering that he thinks so highly of me, of course. But one blue cup and one white cup in the outdoor café area of my island is just going to look weird instead of actually rustic. So I had ot match the other cup that was already there. I also found an item off my wishlist at Nook's Cranny: a Double-Door Refrigerator, but it was in the wrong colour. Nothing that these two alpaca's couldn't fix, of course, so I snapped it up anyways! Usually, I save up items like this that need a colour change that you can't do at a DIY table, and do a bit of a 'Cyrus run': I just get them all customized at the same time, and then place the items where I want them.

Well, this is about where I called it a day. Donations to both Harvey's island and the Zen Bridge on Crayola are still paused, and I'm at 785k / 2498k IGB on my Nook debt. Still slowly, but steadily chipping away at this one: with my current MO in the game, I think it's going to only be a matter of time until I pay this one off. I've actually looked up how many debts I still have to go, and it looks like Tom is actually going to go easier on me after this one... And that only motivates me more to get this one paid off. I mean, some lower numbers to deal with would definitely be nice after this.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 6th​

Ooh boy, what a day! Well, the Nookazon trades are really picking up for me lately: I've been getting more decent offers then usual, so I've really had to start planning them out more actively. Glad that people are actually buying my stuff: I pretty much listed everything clogging up my storage, and the Bells earned from this definitely help for that Nook debt.

Speaking of: I went to Katrina to start off my day, and actually got some bad money luck this time!

Oh no, we are not powering through that one at the moment! Especially not with a debt of over 2 million bells breathing down my neck. Good thing I had some extra Turnip money on me in advance, in addition to the usual purification fees I tend take with me... So Katrina tried her best here to keep my funds trickling in at their usual speed.

Ater that, I went off to find Daisy Mae, as it was a Sunday. I had kind of logged on at 11 AM, so I had to hurry if I wanted to get my Turnips in for the week.

I wasn't sure how many I would buy today, so I just took a lot of money with me just in case. But I just ended up going for my usual 100 again. I usually just drop and keep them around my produce area, since they're technically a vegetable. But that's getting a little full because I also tend to bury gyroid fragments there. One of these days, I really need to go and plan where that area is going to go.

Also, the Able Sisters actually had some armor-looking clothing item in black! Gives a whole new meaning to 'looking fierce'.

All this needs to look fully believable is a good pair of pants, those older-looking boots in black, and a decent helmet-looking item. The Tarantula's had better fear you while wearing something like this!

Also, I decided to screenshot some of my current beach decorations: they're a bit basic, but I think they look cute.

I kind of want to place a cute drink on the little table here. I've spread a few of these chairs out around the beach so far, so not sure if it's going to be the same drink everywhere, or different ones per chair set. I've actually gotten these off Wardell's orderables: Really, those Poki-orderable items are a livesaver, else I'd would've had to pay through the nose for the variants that I want over on Nookazon.

I've also placed a Hammock on my beaches somewhere: I really like the look of it now that Wardell helped me actually place this thing. I definitely owe him one, he helped decorate like half my island's beach so far.

Not to mention helping contribute to the outdoor onsen area in the bamboo forest as well: he had the towel basket I needed for it.

Wardell did rat me out to Niko on who's been sneaking him those DIY materials, though.

In the manatee's defense, though: Niko was grateful. I'm going to miss sharing my extra materials with him, though: it kept my storage nice and clean without me needing to spend like 10 minutes crafting stuff from it instead. Wish this DLC had more exclusive DIY recipes, but I'll have to settle for the daily message bottles on the archipelago for now.

Speaking of my archipelago misadventures: turns out I made it to 40 homes decorated today. I usually choose the Restaurant for a venue, but I decided to try out the Café for a change: I'm not really proud of how it turned out and I lowkey want to remodel it at some point. But I do have to say that it screenshots a lot better.

Also, I do tend to exhaust the dialogue before I call it on these things, and I've learned that Wardell used to be in the music biz himself! No wonder he knows DJ K.K. then... Also explains why he's so into the sounds around the island, and why we unlock new soundscapes through him.

Well, Niko, I'll see what I can do to convince him: he does trust me. Also, Wardell you are 100% forgiven for that whole Niko business, I know you just wanted me to get some credit for it. No hard feelings, bro.

Also, before I left for Crayola again, I had finally treated myself to a furniture item for my character's bathroom that I had been saving up for: the Fancy Bathroom Vanity. I dunno, I just really like this thing, and my taste in these games tends to be a tad expensive to begin with. I've always been a fan of the Elegant and Antique sets, and I tend to like anything in the HHA Expensive theme that doesn't look completely gaudy. Like, keep the ugly, Trumpian stuff dipped in gold, and just give me the rest of that list of furniture, kthnxsbye. I do have some of that old money class, you know: keep your nouveau riche, 'flaunting my wealth' kind of furniture, I'll just go for the pretty, Victorian mansion-looking stuff.

Harmonious-themed and Heritage-themed furniture items tend to be nice as well at times, though. Good thing that Japonism was pretty popular around Victorian times, and that a general interest in the culture of Asian countries was growing at the time. Around that time period is sort of what I tend to theme my in-game interior around, so I sort of have an excuse to sneak at least a few of those items in.

Anyhow, my ramblings about in-game furniture aside... I did a few remodels while I was still there on the archipelago, but my misadventures on Crayola weren't over just yet. I decided to go take a coffee break after all of that hard work, as I had a Nook Mile task for it anyways. I needed to And wouldn't you know it: I ran into Daisy Mae again!

Turns out she was treating herself to one of Brewster's famous cookies after a long work day as well.

Also, a few bamboo trees had produced shoots today, but the area near where the new trees were growing was already stating to fill out nicely. It's looking less like an overgrown bamboo nursery, and more like the majestic forest I was planning.

Okay, so the forest is sort of divided in two halves by the river springing from the waterfall in there. The other side of the forest's dividing river seemed a little... naked, save for a few flowers and like one Ruined Seat. So I decided to start planting he harvested shoots near the outdoor onsen area there instead. The half of the river where I dug the shoots up is almost done anyways, so it was a matter of time before I started on that completely naked half anyways.

O' Hare also had a ping today, for the first time ever. He taught me a new Reaction: Resignation.

Well, some extra Reactions never hurt. Also returned a lost item to Tiansheng today: he gave me a Baby Panda in return.

Also, it began to rain somewhere in the day, and I didn't know that Phoebe had such good taste in umbrella's! Turns out that her default one is the Spider Umbrella: I had no idea. I actually have one as well, and it had been a wishlist item of mine before I got it.

Looking sharp, girl! Don't get me wrong, I love my red Chic Umbrella and my Bat Umbrella to death, and I 100% want the purple Chic Umbrella as well. But the Spider Umbrella is frankly a solid goth umbrella as well.

Well, for the rest, it was a fairly uneventful day. Most of my activities were about taking down that massive Nook Debt: I'm at 1002k / 2498k IGB on it, so I'm almost halfway there! I honestly didn't expect to get this far on it yet, but I'm definitely not complaining. Can't wait until they go back to like 100k IGB again: maxed-out storage, here I come!

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 7th​

Well, the effort to pretty up Crayola continues today! But before that, Isabelle had a warning for me this morning...

Ah, I see my old nemesis had arrived yet again! Well, Redd, I sure do have a bone to pick with you after last time.

And yet again, he only irritated me more, as he had the gall to place another traced fake from an ancient Dutch master artist in his store: today's stolen art was 'the Milkmaid' by Johannes Vermeer. Now this painting is frankly a hard fake to tell over at Redd's store, and I'll admit that even I, a Dutch girl, had to look this one up on the wiki to check. But you know it's a fake if there's tons of milk coming from her pitcher instead of just a little bit. Most of the rest was all fakes as well, but Redd did have one always authentic painting in his store: 'The Gleaners' by Jean-François Millet. So the scammer has been scammed himself yet again! One more step in trying to ruin his business by limiting the amount of real art he can trace. No art theft on my watch, Redd!

I might have even gotten it off of him at a cheaper price then usual, as Katrina had blessed me with good money luck beforehand this morning.

Oof, she wasn't kidding when she said she was sending me a lucky item after yesterday's purification ceremony! Well, a few extra Bells never hurt anyone.

And my luck would last, as Leif had one of the shrubs in his store that I wanted: the Yellow Hibiscus. I kind of want a few growing near the beaches of my island for the sake of a more tropical sort of aesthetic around there. And red, orange and yellow are sort of common colours used in the general, public areas on Crayola.

I stocked up on about 15 of them while I was here, as my island just has a lot of coasts. I specifically didn't go for the Red Hibiscus as the Red Camelia's near the Plaza already cover that, but the island was definitely lacking in cute yellow bushes.

And back home, I set to planting them around. Given on how the shape of the shrub's flowers will look, I think that these Hibiscuses look okay near the pink Mums near the exits of the bamboo forest as well.

I'm always at a bit of a loss as what to do with these little in-between areas separating the more clearly planned areas of my island, but I hope this will end up looking decent. Might place some more wildflowers nearby for pretty's sake once the bushes are fully grown.

Well, since my dailies went particularly fast today, I decided to really take my time on the archipelago. Like, most of the time, my dailies take me a few hours, especially when the 4th fossil is a pain to find. But I was fully done in like one hour or so today. I had some remodels still to do, so I decided to knock those out real quick.

First up was Fuschia: I kind of let her do her own request, and the combination of the mandatory items and the kind of music coming from the jukebox gave me major bar vibes.

So I sort of went for her running her own, personal bar.

I haven't been to many in my life, maybe like a nightclub or two whenever my school would organize a dance in one. I'm just not that much of a nightlife kind of person in general. But I'm still proud of how this one turned out.

And hey, Fuchsia seemed happy with it.

I did post this one on my Happy Home Network: if you want to check out any of the properties today, my ID there is RA-4073-0316-7483 . Fuchsia's vacation home is there, and the next one that I remodelled today is as well: Rodeo's vacation home.

I originally mistook his Graduation Gown for a judge's gown, and he lowkey sort of looks like one in it anyways. So I made his vacation house look like a courtroom. I swear that I'm innocent, your honor! I know I'm under oath: you know I wouldn't lie, right?
...Right?

I kind of had the first floor done in advance, so most of my remodeling work took place on the second floor. I wasn't sure what to do with it, as I had made that decision on accident. But I thought it would be fun to have sort of a holding cell going on, where the worst offenders are being held in custody until their court date.

Oh no, I have been found guilty of making aesthetically pleasing vacation homes! I want to talk to my lawyer...

Once doing my time and getting back to Crayola, I decided to get to some daily tasks. One was to catch a Sturgeon, and one was to catch 5 fish. So off to fishing I went! I wasn't expecting to catch one in the first place, but I managed to reel in something even more unexpected... I was frankly so shocked at this fish appearing at all, that I almost forgot to screenshot this!

Coelacanth!

I know these almost never appear, so you can imagine my surprise. There was a thunderstorm outside, and I'd learn later that this increases their spawn rate. But I still couldn't believe my luck here: Needless to say, this had to be in my Museum. And it'll definitely be the prize of my collection there.

The real-life equivalent of this fish is nocturnal as well, and a predatory fish: they're not apex predators like sharks, but still eat other fish. So no wonder that Blathers put this one in the big fish tank... The real-life coelacanth was thought to have extinct long ago, until some f them were re-discovered in 1938.They have ancestors from over 400 million years back, so the coelacanth is quite the awesome fish in real life as well.

But since that thunderstorm had been raging on all day, I hit a Kapp'n island to get away from the rain for a moment.

My fishing rod did break along the way, but good thing I had gathered enough materials to make a new one on the spot. And funnily enough, I actually did end up catching my Sturgeon here!

I looked up how much this thing goes for, and I honestly didn't know that they were worth 10k IGB on their own! You're going into storage for later, buddy, we're getting 15k IGB from C.J. for this one! Here's all of the loot of that island:

The Man-Faced Stink Bug in there is actually a new Critterpedia entry as well. As usual, anything worth over 1k IGB went into storage for a later special character visit. A few of these were actually worth precisely that, so into storage they went: we don't do this lowkey 'you have to be at least 1 Bell over' kind of thing around here.

For the rest, I did some work on a custom dress matching the Tiara Hair that I've mentioned before. I decided to make a sort of regal-looking coat as well: I know the game has one, but yet again... It's kind of meh, and I think I can do better. This is also a nice look into my design process: what you see here is sort of a mockup of a design. I kind of use some of the colours in the basic palette to map out where everything I want to include goes. It always looks a bit messy, but definitely see this as sort of a 'sketch phase' of the final product.

It's definitely not where I want it to be yet: I kind of want to place the medallion on it lower, and maybe make it a bit bigger then it is now. Also, I want hide the seam of the Pro Design's coat model a little better, because it's really bugging me now that I'm looking at this screenshot. Either I'm going to use it as the seam for the vest underneath the medallion, or I'm hiding it once everything is actually coloured.

The orange is where a sort of faux-mink lapels of the robes themselves are going to go: you know, that dotted white edge that a king's cape always has? My designs would definitely only use fake fur, though.

The blue is just where a nice trim on the robes is going to be: possibly a golden-coloured one.

Well, I called it a day after working on this. I'm currently at 1200k / 2498k IGB on my Nook Debt, donations to Harvey's island are still paused, and donations to the Zen Bridge back on Crayola are also paused at the moment. I am planning to build all of the bridges that I want on the island, but we know that I tend to have expensive tastes by now Both Zen Bridges and Stone Bridges both sure aren't the cheapest ones out there. But they'll definitely be worth it once they're actually placed.

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed!

 

[MelanieScribbles]

March 8th​

Well, my day started off profitable... I went to go check the Turnip Prices, and the site I use to predict future selling prices: Turnip Prophet. And today seemed the best day to sell at 124 Bells per Turnip.

I actually did forget to mention yesterday that I did run into Joan herself that day, and she gave me 5 free Turnips. I saw her in the Hospital, but her memory definitely seemed to still be fine: she actually seemed to remember me as well!

No wonder that she did: I've been in the Turnip game since New Leaf, and they were basically my main source of income there. Turns out that she was in here for her aching back: no surprises there either, since she's been hauling Turnips around for longer then I've been playing Animal Crossing games. She's actually only retired on the doctor's orders: I think that if she had any say in it, then she'd be selling those Turnips until the bitter end. Well, don't worry, Joan, your granddaughter is doing great at taking over the family business. The kid definitely has potential as a businesswoman, you should be proud of her.

Anyhow, this matters, because that actually helped me double my Turnip profits today. I pretty much register buy and sell amounts for Turnips in my Animal Crossing Spreadsheets, so I had to make a note for this so I wouldn't get confused as to why the numbers don't fully add up when reading it back later. Anyhow, after trying Turnip Prophet for myself, with my profit doubled and my risk of losses minimized, I can safely say: the site is very much worth the effort with how little info it needs about your game, highly recommend it if you want to use it yourself. It's also quite beginner-friendly: This was actually my first time using the site. So even if you're only just getting into selling Turnips, you'll definitely get some use out of it. And hey, every source of income counts with those later-game Nook debts, right?
All the site really needs to know is what kind of price pattern you were in, and you can easily check if you have an online subscription via your island newspaper in NookLink if you haven't been keeping up with them. It also needs to know whether you're a new buyer, and what prices have appeared that week so far. And based on that, it'll calculate which pattern you are probably in that week, and give you the best times to sell based on that.

Anyhow, there were still dailies to be done today! So first up on the list was my daily visit to Katrina. Sorry, I've kind of forgot to screenshot it this time, but I got some good money luck today.

Also, Label was visiting today, so I was prepared to bring my a-game when it comes to personal aesthetic. The style challenge this time was theatrical... Well, I'll take that as 'the gaudier the better'! Usually, that's what the game means with that theme anyways.

Well, it doesn't get any gaudier then this. I've actually worn the bodysuit at Festivale before, but my Festivale look was a lot more stylish then this. Oof, that neon leopard-print is hurting my eyes! I'm just going to consider selling off that backpack, because I'm starting to regret ever buying that thing in the first place... I love the shades, though, I've actually been looking for an excuse to wear them. In real life, you can actually get perscription shades, so I'm going to have the headcanon that my character can actually see through these. Also in real life, there are actually glasses where the actual eyeglasses turn into sunglasses, and I actually have glasses that do that. I honestly just went for that option because didn't want to have to go digging in my purse for a separate pair of shades every summer.

And with this outfit, it was time to return to Label! Well, some toxic people I used to know in real life have called me theatrical right after calling me unexpressive before, so I should definitely be able to do this.

But in all seriousness: I honestly wasn't sure about this style challenge, though. I know I'm good at most activities involving aesthetics (drawing, character customization in games, etc), but I really thought this might be the one I'd end up losing. I mean, as a goth, dramatic-looking outfits are pretty much my usual: what most people think is a little over the top is my normal. But theatrical is a whole different ballgame. It was a relief to get my usual outfit back on after that, though.

After this, I took to placing some stuff that I ordered from Wardell: it arrived today, so it was time to pretty up Crayola even further. I needed some cute-looking drinks for on the little tables next to my beach chairs. It's really all in those little details when it comes to something like that: you really want to make an area look like it's actually being used by people other then just you.

I've also placed one near the Hammock: I really need more of those around the beach. Hey, I had an extra Rattan End Table leftover, so why not have a drink around here too, right?

Also, when I paused at the Roost for a bit due to a Nook Mile task, guess who I ran into...

Resetti, my favorite angry mole! I almost didn't recognize him without his hard hat. I've honestly always found his rants hilarious, and I absolutely love them: they actually make me giggle a little sometimes. I'm actually kind of sad they toned him down in this one: in New Leaf, he legit made me laugh a little the first time I ran into him. And not like an uncomfortable laugh: I actually cracked up.

He really made me laugh more then Shrunk did. Don't get me wrong, Shrunk is still funny, but Resetti is absolutely hilarious. His rants are just pure gold. I'd sometimes purposely reset just to hear him rant! Like, I often did time travel in that game, and I actually looked forward to them at some point. And for the record, he did say the thing while I was talking to him...
No resettin'!
No joke: I actually have the Resetti model sitting right outside my character's home for memory's sake. Man, I miss that mole being generally angry, I hope that Nintendo lets him yell again next game.

After this, I decided to hop by the Able Sisters. Remember that one in-game coat which looks like a king's robe that I mentioned when talking about my custom design for a similar one? I actually found it in the shop today, so I decided to screenshot it for context's sake. I didn't actually buy it, though.

I still think my design is going to turn out cuter then this. I dunno, this default version just lowkey feels like a Halloween costume if it's not worn in the context of a full-on goldcore island: the Youtuber Crossing Minute has an island with that aesthetic, and it's basically about making stuff generally look and be really freaking expensive. So since he must know how to make that kind of money fast, I kind of watch him for in-game financial advice, since he sometimes sprinkles that in when making his video's. He has like 83 million in his ABD, so the numbers sure don't lie on that one! His channel is where I learned about Turnip Prophet in the first place. But Crossing Minute would really the only person that I can picture using this default coat in a stylish way: I really don't know how he manages to make all of that gold stuff not look like an ugly, Trumpian mess.

Also, the Able Sisters had some wishlist items of mine in stock: the Long Denim Skirt and some black Denim Cutoffs.

Hey, summer is coming up after this, and goths like me are just generally not good at that whole season. The whole subculture is often just trying not to turn into a puddle of sweat until the autumn weather comes around again. Really, if you're new to the subculture, then long, flowy skirts, big sunhats and some pretty open-toed shoes that also come in black will be absolute lifesavers. Like, don't even think about wearing boots or any other closed-off footwear. I actually bought my first maxi skirt last season, and it was a lifesaver during that sweltering summer. It was like 35C during the night back then (95F in the imperial system)! Really, thin fabrics and clothing like that is the only way to go with heatwaves like that.

After that, I headed over to the archipelago. There actually was quite the interesting villager there today: Blanche. She's one of those villagers that might not get a permanent spot on my island, but I'd definitely want their photo and I wouldn't mind having their amiibo.

I kind of let villagers like this choose their own theme. Well, I guess she meant that whole looming thing literally... Can do, though.

I dunno, I just see villagers like Blanche, Genji and Kabuki, and instantly thought of a traditional Japanese interior. Same with Walt a few posts back.

I don't know why, but I just picture her running a small little, homemade kimono business. It's like luxury kimono's, but I'd imagine she makes them herself and then sells them. Kind of like an ancient fashion designer. Like, I'd picture her sitting down with clients at that little table near her kitchen, brewing them some tea, and then she'd discuss making them something customized.

And then she'd have her little workshop here: the Elaborate Kimono and Loom were actually mandatory items, but I think I made them look like they were more of an intentional placement.

Blanche did need a place to wind down from a long workday, though: she really seemed to like the cherry blossom rug, so I sort of worked around that. I've also improved a custom design for a cherry blossom pattern that I've also used in Tiansheng's house: might end up posting that one to my design thread later. The game really doesn't have anything default matching either this kind of theme or the Peach Chairs in Tiansheng's vacation home well, so I decided to just take matters into my own hands... again.

I've also decided to finally give the Café a makeover: the way it looks had really been bugging me for a while now, since I really didn't really have any proper café sort of furniture to work with back then. But I have had absolutely no clue on what to do with it until now. I kind of considered giving it an overly cute sort of makeover since I replaced the staff with Merengue and Judy, but I decided to stick with the theme of only using coffee-like colours.

I had added in a second floor on Lotties insistence, so I decided to go ahead with giving the ground floor of this place a glow-up anyways. But I'm nearing the screenshot limit for posts here, so I fear that you'll have to check that second floor out via my Happy Home Network. My ID there is RA-4073-0316-7483 .
Anyhow, the Diner furniture series and Cool furniture series really saved my butt here: I'm so grateful that the Cool Chairs come with a decent-looking brown colour shade in its default options.

I wish the wallpaper I used didn't require so many wall decorations to look good, though: it's a perfect colour for the context of a café, and it's great for dark academia sort of settings as well since it also saved my butt on decorating the school. I just wish it had an option for windows. I had to strategically place a few appropriate paintings, tapestries and other wall decor items around to make it look decent.

Well, after all of that hard work, it was time to head home to Crayola. There wasn't a meteor shower today, but there were shooting stars. Speaking of: I did find out why I had connectivity issues despite having fast enough internet to connect with other people. Turns out that something might be blocking the signal that my router is emitting.

Okay, I don't live alone, so I share the internet around here with others: I do have a personal router in my room, though. I've been talking to a roommate of mine about this for a while now, who's more tech-savvy then me. And they've frankly been troubleshooting this from the start: they've been racking their brain over this for a week or so, and I think they've finally isolated the problem. Like, they were talking to me about what they think it might be, and they might just be onto something here. We're going to try a solution they suggested and we'll see if that helps. Given that it takes moving the actual router around, though... I might have to either skip a post entirely, or heavily delay it. But I'll cross that bridge when I get there. I mean, in the worst case scenario, we can rule this method out as a solution. But in the best case scenario, this might actually permanently fix the problem, so fingers crossed!

Thank you for reading, and hope you enjoyed.