The Buslingthorpes: A Life States Dynasty (Complete)

[Beks]

That's clever and lucky! After being pretty stupid...(I'm sure you'd admit it too) I've never had genie babies in this game either due to challenges or not feeling inspired enough to change their faces. Do their purple genie motives only show at a certain age then?

Here's me being dumb again: I actually didn't see whether my genie toddler's motives were purple. I'm assuming not, because I think I would have noticed! The heir is grown up in-game now, so I can't check, but I'm pretty sure they were green like a normal Sim's.

[peach]

Long time no read!! It's great to see you've kept up with the Bustlingthorpes, Beks!

There were so many moments during my catch-up that I laughed out loud. Your writing is always just so funny. The unfortunately-placed jellybean sent me over the edge.

I've learned so many things about the game through this dynasty, too--I'm more of a "realism"-oriented player, so I haven't really played with the supernatural states much at all, and it's been so cool to see all the little details that you highlight. I feel like I've said this before on one of your threads, but it's crazy how much is left to discover about a game that hasn't released a new expansion pack in nearly 10 years.

Anyways, good luck during your final push, and I can't wait to see how it all wraps up! Good luck little Albertha!

[Beks]

Long time no read!! It's great to see you've kept up with the Bustlingthorpes, Beks!

There were so many moments during my catch-up that I laughed out loud. Your writing is always just so funny. The unfortunately-placed jellybean sent me over the edge.

I've learned so many things about the game through this dynasty, too--I'm more of a "realism"-oriented player, so I haven't really played with the supernatural states much at all, and it's been so cool to see all the little details that you highlight. I feel like I've said this before on one of your threads, but it's crazy how much is left to discover about a game that hasn't released a new expansion pack in nearly 10 years.

Anyways, good luck during your final push, and I can't wait to see how it all wraps up! Good luck little Albertha!

It's lovely to see you, peach! Thank you so much for your kind comment. I'm thrilled that you laughed while reading this story. I laugh a lot while writing it. This game is just so ridiculous that it's impossible not to!

Yeah, exploring the different supernatural states has been really interesting and educational. I actually think there's quite a bit of depth to each life state that I didn't even get into. There is always more to learn and discover, and that's why this game has endless replay value (for me at least, and for many others).

Thank you for the luck! (You'll see in the next post that I sabotaged my own luck a little bit, but ah well...) I am this close to finishing and hope to have the story caught up and posted really soon.

[Beks]

A quick update before the next chapter: At this point in the game (shortly after the birth of Albertha) (that’s a mouthful), I looked back over Lavinia’s completed requirements and realized that I’d made a mistake. One of her opportunities, A Fishy Science Project, was actually a school opportunity - and those do not qualify for the requirements of this dynasty. I think at the time I thought it was just a fishing opportunity that teens could get; I didn’t realize that it was school-specific. I think I also just forgot about the rule. And since I don’t remember Lavinia completing any other opportunities after the three I counted…welp, here we are. This dynasty (as far as I can tell) is no longer eligible for the Hall of Fame. I am kicking myself over such a dumb error, but since I’m so close to the end, I intend to finish out and continue following the rules in the spirit of the challenge. We’ll still have a finished dynasty soon - just an imperfect one. The Buslingthorpes shall live on!

Chapter 43 - Rockin' Rider

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“...so once it was clear that Orville was just a regular human, he was able to grow up and move out. There’s a spot in the household for you now. You can come back and help raise Albertha, who is hopefully the heir after all.”

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“This sounds like a very normal progression of events, and also an example of quality parenting. I would be happy to return and resume my place as father figure to one of our three children.”

What can I say? It’s The Sims 3. We know we’re all mad here.

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So Jermaine rejoined the family and took up caring for Albertha. The little girl was already best friends with her mother, so Jermaine got to hang out with his daughter full-time for a while.

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He taught her the rest of her toddler skills, gave her many cuddles and tickles, and took her to the library to read skill books (with much enthusiasm on both sides).

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Meanwhile, the rest of the family became frighteningly obsessed with karaoke. And with the rocking chairs that I finally thought to purchase. (Those things are indispensable for wrangling useless family members. I can’t believe I lived without them for six generations.)

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Soon, Albertha was ready for a birthday.

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Was she really a genie? I crossed every limb and finger I was able to cross.

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She was! Albertha quickly revealed that she possessed her father’s magical powers. We finally had a confirmed generation seven heir. Albertha had the honor of sitting down with her many illustrious ancestors - the final member of a rather special club.

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Albertha added the Never Nude trait to her Loner and Brave traits. Not particularly helpful. I hope it doesn’t mean she was embarrassed of that beautiful, bright blue skin tone.

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Cornelius got to reprise his role as Dynasty Tutor. Apparently I forgot to send them to Crumplebottom Park, the site of past tutoring sessions. Instead they camped out near one of the glitchy ovals near the trampoline.

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Albertha rolled lots of wishes to utilize her genie powers and executed them very seriously.

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She also summoned lots of her favorite food, Firecracker Tofu.

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...It was still too spicy.

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But her favorite activity, by far, was riding the rockin’ rider. Her first wish as a child was to buy one of these, and playing on it was pretty much all she did. I don’t know if this was a sign or what, but I had kind of decided NOT to use the jockey skill for this dynasty...

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I think she would’ve ridden the rockin’ rider all the way to school, if that were possible.

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We’d been seeing a lot of spouse deaths recently, and it wasn’t over yet. Mildred received a call about Peanut and immediately invited him over for one last romantic day together.

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They spent the afternoon up in Mildred’s bedroom, where Peanut had lived as a ghost after all those years in the library basement.

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"I love you, Peanut."
"Ahhh...that still sounds so sexy when you say it, Mildred."

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The timing worked out well. Grandpa Peanut got to be in the house (albeit in his pajamas) to see his granddaughter’s next birthday.

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Albertha got another completely unhelpful trait for her birthday: Disciplined. Sorry, hon', the martial arts garden is locked and will remain as such indefinitely. It’s nice that you want to take after your mother, though.

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With no clear skill or career path in sight yet (I’d narrowed it down to two or three options but hadn’t decided), Albertha went off to the graveyard to sign up as the family’s last Burial Specialist.

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While she was gone, Peanut bit the dust in the middle of a chat with Barty.

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“But I spent almost my whole LIFE as a ghost! Can’t I be human for just a little longer?!”
“Absolutely not, Mr. Bahl. You of all people should know how this works.”

Rest in peace, Peanut Bahl Buslingthorpe.

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Mildred kept her husband's urn and placed it back in her bedroom, just like she had after meeting him years ago. Peanut proceeded to haunt within hours of his death. Mildred, as always, was thrilled to see him again.

[Beks]

Chapter 44 - Shimmer & Clay

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Albertha didn’t have a very long teenhood, but for that very reason, she made the most of it. Who else was going to put shower dye in all the showerheads? Certainly not any of the technically-super-old people she had to live with.

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Great-Great-Great-Great-Grandfather Cornelius took her to Crumplebottom Park for one last dynasty tutoring session. Amongst the flowers and faded paths, Cornelius mostly thought about his descendant’s homework questions, but he also remembered Belinda, probably. They’d met for the first time almost on this very spot.

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But that was centuries ago. Today, there was a cute cat to meet instead!

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Albertha made rapid progress in her career at the cemetery - possibly faster than anyone since Macavoy, who had the Workaholic trait to help him out. In her spare time she started learning the ropes of one of her potential skills.

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Everything was coming together quickly and neatly. All that was left, after her final promotion, was to find a romantic interest. Luckily, she’d just met a boy at school she liked named Trinity Edmondson. She visited his house at night and he responded well to her flirts.

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Of course, midway through the previous interaction, the full moon rose and he turned into a zombie. Because, um, that happens sometimes, apparently?

I panicked a little bit. The only other teen Albertha knew was this guy’s twin sister Marian, who had soundly rejected all of Albertha’s flirts on an earlier occasion. How was she supposed to kiss a zombie that was trying to eat her?!

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How fortunate that Albertha had six ancestors with inventories that were the equivalent of cluttered attics. Blanche (still at the Isolation Cabin with Macavoy due to relentless flirting with her great-grandson-in-law) had a stray Cure Elixir, which was promptly and magically zoomed over to Albertha’s inventory.

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Problem solved! Kiss achieved!

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“Dude, I JUST became a zombie and you had to cure me?! I didn’t even get to do anything cool!”

Ugh. Pudding faces.

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Albertha took a cab home, where a cake was waiting for her in the eerie green glow. It was time for the final trait reveal of the dynasty!

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Well, I have to hand it to her. I had Albertha’s life all planned out - she was going to be a gardener, and possibly a nectar maker, because we still had chests full of Belinda’s high-quality produce that would make those skills super easy. But Albertha had a different plan. Her final trait was Savvy Sculptor. Yes, sculpting, the one other skill I had debated choosing for her but ultimately discarded. Never mind then! I take it back!

Albertha’s other traits, as a reminder, were Brave, Loner, Never Nude, and Disciplined. She chose Descendant of Da Vinci as her LTW. She won’t be achieving it, thank you very much, but she can at least get 33% of the way there.

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And so the final tasks for our final heir began. Albertha got her own cute little sculpting hut on the corner of the lot, because the main manor was getting seriously crowded and I was tired of adding floors.

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After registering at City Hall as a self-employed sculptor, she got her hands dirty - well, clay-ey- and started sculpting.

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The next day was graduation. I’d been skipping most graduations in this dynasty because I find them a little annoying, but this was the last one, and the family was dying for an excuse to get out of the house. So off everybody went (minus Blanche and Macavoy, again, still in isolation) to celebrate the youngest Buslingthorpe and her achievements.

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And achievements they were! Unsurprisingly, Albertha was Valedictorian, and her classmates (mostly or entirely consisting of the Edmondson twins) voted her Most Likely to Never Leave the House. Which was pretty prophetic, I suppose.

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Back to work she went. Albertha got opportunities lickety-split, faster and in more abundance than any heir before her. (This lady refused to visit the house to pose for the sculpture she'd commissioned, so a sculpting station had to be installed at Crumplebottom Park.)

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Albertha transitioned from clay into other mediums, knocking out skill challenge after skill challenge. When she got tired, she used her Moodlet Manager or took a quick drive in Van Helsing (actually, driving back and forth to the elixir store to sell her sculptures was often more than enough to keep her happy). When she got hungry, she summoned perfect food, scarfed it down, then headed right back out to the hut.

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Between sculpting sessions, Albertha also picked up with Belinda’s garden, which had been sitting in stasis for quite a long time now. She refreshed the money trees, retrieved some produce from an old travel chest, and brought the garden back to life with the help and companionship of the family’s ancient Lounge Lizard gnome. (And also with the help of the SwiftGro gardening station from the store, which I will never ever garden without again, thank you.)

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Only once did Albertha light herself on fire, when making her second metal sculpture. And not for one moment did she show any sign of panic.

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“Nothing to see here.”

She just genie-shimmered her way inside to the shower, and that was that.

Yes, it was that kinda-boring-but-also-oddly-relaxing stage of a dynasty where you’re almost done but not quite. Albertha calmly worked away at her requirements, and the rest of the family…well, they were more weird than calm.

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Lavinia was still very young by dynasty standards, but she seemed to be losing it more rapidly than anyone else. I kept finding her either naked and pixely or just wearing a towel (I think someone stole her clothes from the hot tub), and she developed a strange fondness for rummaging in her own family’s garbage can. What are you expecting to find in there, exactly?

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“Lavinia, dear, I know it’s almost the end of the dynasty and we’re all a little bored, but it would really help maintain the stability of this family if you’d…remain clothed.”

Cornelius was definitely the sanest of all the Buslingthorpes. Always has been. And that’s why I love him.

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Mildred took to hunting as a werewolf at times, even though I’d never let her do it previously. (I know we’re, like, done with skill challenges, but I’m still paranoid that she’s going to accidentally collect a bunch of things and negate somebody’s.) She also continued to hang out with Peanut whenever he haunted, which was often.

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Mildred also visited the site of Peanut’s grave from time to time, mostly because there was a LLAMA box down there so it was easy to get to. She painted for long hours in the candlelight, reminiscing about her early days falling in love with a ghost.

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But mostly, the family just hung out and did whatever. As Albertha was nearing the end of her tasks, I even let Macavoy and Blanche return to the manor. It was nice to have the whole gang together again. I still had to stop Macavoy from casting pestilence curses and Blanche from flirting with the nearest moving object...but overall they behaved themselves somewhat well.

[peach]

Oh no. I'm so sorry to hear that your dynasty is no longer HoF eligible. Those little stipulations to the rules can be so tough to keep in mind when playing and twice as tricky when the game throws you a sneaky opportunity title like that. It must be especially frustrating to have had that realization that so deep into the challenge. But even if the Buslingthorpes don't end up in the HoF, it doesn't change how hard you've clearly worked on this dynasty and how much of a pleasure it's been to read . (And, hey--if you decide to go for the HoF again, you've already got one very long, very thorough practice attempt under your belt!)

I'm glad you've decided to see it through to the end. Sculpting has a lot of great skill challenges; I hope Albertha breezes through her requirements and the finish line!

[CeresIn]

Good thing Orville wasn't a genie and it worked for you!

I haven't played with genies in a long time, but if I'm not mistaken, one way to know if they are or not is to see what color their needs bars are, if they are blue they are genies. I think it's like that from birth.

Edit: after posting this I realized I still had a page to read, I thought Orville leaving the house was the last update.  I'm sorry that you failed so close to the end, but it's good that you continue because I like this story.

[Beks]

Oh no. I'm so sorry to hear that your dynasty is no longer HoF eligible. Those little stipulations to the rules can be so tough to keep in mind when playing and twice as tricky when the game throws you a sneaky opportunity title like that. It must be especially frustrating to have had that realization that so deep into the challenge. But even if the Buslingthorpes don't end up in the HoF, it doesn't change how hard you've clearly worked on this dynasty and how much of a pleasure it's been to read . (And, hey--if you decide to go for the HoF again, you've already got one very long, very thorough practice attempt under your belt!)

I'm glad you've decided to see it through to the end. Sculpting has a lot of great skill challenges; I hope Albertha breezes through her requirements and the finish line!

Thanks, peach! I'm over the disappointment now, and I'm happy to be finishing up the Buslingthorpes regardless of HoF status. I don't know if I have another Life States Dynasty in me at this point...but never say never! (And I'm already working on a totally different dynasty, heh heh)

Good thing Orville wasn't a genie and it worked for you!

I haven't played with genies in a long time, but if I'm not mistaken, one way to know if they are or not is to see what color their needs bars are, if they are blue they are genies. I think it's like that from birth.

Edit: after posting this I realized I still had a page to read, I thought Orville leaving the house was the last update.  I'm sorry that you failed so close to the end, but it's good that you continue because I like this story.

Thanks for continuing to read, CeresIn! I feel so stupid for not noticing the color of Orville's needs bar when he was a toddler (or Albertha's, for that matter). I really hope I would have noticed if they were purple but I just can't be sure. Oh well! I'll pay attention if I ever have a genie toddler again in the future.

[Beks]

Author's Note: My apologies for the delay in posting the end of this dynasty. After completing the dynasty around the beginning of March, I took a break for a couple weeks, came back to finish writing the story, and realized that after six generations of meticulous note-taking, I had forgotten to write down all of Albertha's completed requirements anywhere outside of the game itself. I had kept track of them in her in-game biography tab, but for some reason I never added them to my spreadsheet. Gah! I would have to load up the game again in order to write them down for the story, and loading the game had taken so long during the last generation that I just couldn't get myself to do it right away. So I procrastinated. For a while. Just this morning, my motivation to finish up the Buslingthorpes finally kicked in after weeks of lying dormant. I pulled up the game, clicked on my last Buslingthorpes save, and wandered off to do other things while waiting for it to load.

Can you guess how long it took to load this time? FIVE MINUTES. I had procrastinated on a task that took five minutes. Is this a pattern in every area of my life? Why would you even ask me that??

Anyway, I extracted the necessary details about Albertha's completed requirements, said one final farewell to the Buslingthorpes, and sat down to finish putting the story together. So here it is. Will I learn anything from this stupid situation? Stop asking me questions!

Chapter 45 - Seeds

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The last days in Moonlight Falls were peaceful ones. While her family socialized and vegetated, Albertha worked in her garden, coaxing her plants to perfection.

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She was still only a level 6 gardener - and this turned out to be the problem. She’d planted everything she could plant thus far, and she still needed just a couple more plant types to complete her last skill challenge. When tending the garden didn’t get her there at anything more than a glacial pace, some good old-fashioned library book skilling took over. (Side note: Look at the state of this library! People have been throwing books around for centuries and not putting them back! Moonlight Falls desperately needs a librarian. Or even just a page.)

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Albertha was a slow reader, for some reason, but after a loooong day spent sitting at that well-worn wooden table, she finally reached level 7. She poked around in Belinda’s old gardening chest until she found some rare mushrooms and vegetables she hadn’t planted. She wasn’t sure how long it would take for the challenge to register, but…oh, there it went! Seeds were in the ground. Skill challenge achieved.

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Now for her best friend. The woman she’d sculpted a few days prior was working as a stylist at the salon. Albertha ambushed her during a particularly busy work day and chatted her up for the rest of her shift. (The salon vanished when I took the screenshot. But they’re in the salon. I promise.)

The sun was long set by the time Candace and Albertha became best friends. And look who else was kicking around the salon!

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“Guess what, Percival? I did it. I’m finished. I haven’t told anybody at home yet.”
“I’m so glad it was you and not me, Albertha.”

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Albertha returned home, swelling with a feeling of accomplishment. It was over! Their requirements were complete! Now, who to tell first?

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“Great-Great-Great-Great Grandpa Cornelius? Do you have a moment?”
“Well…I suppose I could take a break from working towards my next promotion.”
“Haven’t you been a World Renowned Surgeon for, like, hundreds of years or something?”
“That isn’t the point, but…well, yes.”

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“I just wanted to let you know that I finished. The dynasty is complete. I don’t know what happens now, but I figured you’d want to be the first to know.”

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“I’m so proud of you, Albertha. This has been a long time coming. Thank you for bringing us to the end.”

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“So what do we do now, Grandpa?”
“Whatever we want. How about a game of foosball?”

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“Haha! I bet you never saw THAT move coming!”
“Oh, Albertha, it was genius. Or should I say…GENIE-us.”
“I think that might be your worst joke yet, Grandpa.”


Generation 7 - Albertha Buslingthorpe
Life State: Genie
Traits: Loner, Brave, Never Nude, Disciplined, Savvy Sculptor
Favorites: Pop, Firecracker Tofu, Pink
LTW: Descendant of Da Vinci
Spouse: N/A
Toddler Requirements: Level 3 in two skills (logic books, xylophone), best friends with both parents
Child Requirements: Honor Roll, one opportunity (Pile of Permission Slips)
Teen Requirements: Honor Roll, romantic interest (Trinity Edmondson), level 3 of cemetery part-time job
1 Best Friend: Candace Flaherty
2 Career Rewards: Successful Sculptor’s Medal, Sculpting Skill Certificate
3 BlackOps: The Banquet Centerpiece, Personal Sculpting, Grape-Aid
4 Lifetime Rewards: Super Nanny, Super Green Thumb, Professional Slacker, The Hustler
5 Regular Wishes: Own 7 Venues, Make a Masterpiece Sculpture, Master the Sculpting Skill, Sculpt something worth at least 1k simoleons, Earn 10k Simoleons Sculpting
6 Skill Challenges: Chiselmaster, Prolific Sculptor, Master Sculptor, Ice Personality, Master Planter, Botanical Boss
7 Items for Museum: Fab Fabled Filly stone sculptures

Dynasty finished at week 49, day 3, with Albertha 23 days to adult.

[Beks]

The Museum

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The Buslingthorpe Museum follows the trend in contemporary buildings in which everything is bland and boring, with no ornate details or intricate scrollwork whatsoever. But hey! When it’s underground and no Sims ever go there anyway (I never even built a ladder), what’s the point in going all out? That’s a philosophical discussion for another day.

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Cornelius’s section

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Macavoy’s section

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Blanche’s section

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Bartholomew’s section

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Mildred’s section

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Lavinia’s section

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Albertha’s section

[Beks]

Buslingthorpe Manor, The Isolation Cabin, & Crumplebottom Park

Buslingthorpe Manor is not my favorite house I’ve ever built. I found quite a few mistakes and oversights while taking these screenshots, demonstrating that I really wasn’t concentrating on building throughout this dynasty. And that’s okay! Sometimes simplicity is best. And who cares if you never copied over the wallpaper to the side of the stairs, anyway? (Probably a lot of you, which is why I’m not showing that screenshot. Heh heh.)

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Here’s the lot overall. I chose a 40x40 lot for this challenge, which was pretty much just the right size, but by the end I wouldn’t have minded a bit more space.

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The foyer. It looks super empty from this angle. This was primarily the nursery a lot of the time, so it used to be a bit more cluttered, especially when there were multiple babies in the house at once.

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The living room. The TV was replaced a few generations in by the karaoke machine. Certain people kept getting unauthorized athletic skill points. *coughmildredcough*

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The library/study, where Cornelius spent 99% of his time.

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The kitchen. I never figured out why the lighting in here was so blindingly bright that it made the countertops look like they were screaming.

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Overhead of the ground floor. I am only realizing now, looong after the fact, that all of the beds are unmade in these screenshots. Welcome to my actual life and I am very sorry.

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Overhead of the middle floor, with three bedrooms, a bathroom, and some arcade games.

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Overhead of the top floor, with four bedrooms, a locked computer area, another bathroom, and some random skilling objects.

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The second floor landing. Mildred did all of these drawings and took that magnificent photo of her grandfather, Ayden.

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Cornelius’s bedroom. (Once I unlocked all the doors at the end of the dynasty, everybody just wanted to pillow fight in other people’s bedrooms.)

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Macavoy’s bedroom on the left, and Blanche’s on the right. Macavoy, I am sorry that I never gave you decent wallpaper. In my defense, I usually played viewing the house from the front, so I kind of didn’t even see this wallpaper after building until…right now.

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Top floor writing area for Barty. Blanche also sat here often, projecting her Aura of Creativity for Barty's benefit.

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The sort of catch-all area of the top floor. This is where later-generation pregnant mamas sat to watch kids’ TV (I had to stick a gate in the hallway around the corner to prevent others from barging in to change the channel). The photograph above the pancake chair is of Edgar, one of Blanche and Ayden’s sons.

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Lavinia’s bedroom on the left, and Albertha’s on the right.

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Barty’s top-floor dungeon bedroom.

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Mildred’s bedroom, which evidently was my favorite because I put the most effort into decorating it. Although Mildred being an artist and photographer helped. Peanut’s urn still sits on the table in the corner.

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This is most of the yard. Hot tub, trampoline, garden (which was moved during the last couple weeks of the challenge because I was sick of it drifting around weirdly in the middle of the lot), and a couple of dog hunting sculptures from the old days.

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Albertha’s sculpting studio. This was built where the wedding arch and seating area used to be.

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Next up: the Isolation Cabin. Macavoy spent most of the dynasty here, as we know, and Blanche joined him in later generations. (I added more fun activities once Blanche arrived so that they could actually bond a little bit. Which they did, when Macavoy wasn’t cursing his daughter with pestilence curses.)

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As you can see, Macavoy made an absolute mess of this place. As a Slob, he didn’t care a smidge about the tall stacks of dirty plates, unmade beds, reeking fridge, and half-flooded bathroom. I did make him clean up periodically when I popped over to make sure he was alive. Once Blanche joined him at the cabin, it started looking slightly better.

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And finally, here’s Crumplebottom Park. This was an empty lot just down the street from Buslingthorpe Manor that I purchased and designated as a Big Park early on. It was named Crumplebottom Park after Belinda, of course, whom Cornelius met on this very spot on day one of the challenge. Gradually, throughout the dynasty, I added to the park and tried to make it look realistic and interesting. This was the first time I’d ever tried to make a park from scratch and I think it turned out pretty well!

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Lots of activities and paths through the trees.

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One of my favorite details, the moondial garden. (Another example of slapping down some colorful flowers and suddenly everything looks amazing.)

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A lot of tutoring sessions, first dates, family outings, friend acquisitions, and magic happened here. I'll miss you, Crumplebottom Park!

[Beks]

Stats & Facts

Are you guys ready for some STATS?? It’s time to get nerdy!

At the end of the dynasty, the Buslingthorpe family had accumulated over 5.8 million simoleons in wealth. I was not aiming for wealth at all, and I'm pretty sure a lot of other dynasty players in the past have gone waaaay beyond this amount. I also checked the museum value, just out of curiosity. All the created items in the museum (minus the career rewards) added up to $53,419. Cornelius’s potions were worth nothing, and Barty’s books, although they brought in plenty of royalties, had next to no value in buy mode. Mildred contributed the most value; her photographs were worth a total of $28,791, with her top value photo (of Abu Simbel) being worth over 8,000 simoleons. Albertha’s sculptures came in second, being worth $21,283 altogether.

Now for some Sim stats!

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Cornelius, our esteemed founder, maxed the logic and bass skills. He also had the highest cooking skill in the dynasty, at one-tick-below-level-8. He spent 88 hours tutoring children. Phew! He also achieved level 10 in the hidden trampoline and broom riding skills, plus level 7 arcade skill.

Cornelius was really raking in the cash as a World Renowned Surgeon over the centuries. By the end of the dynasty, he was making $4,576 per hour at his job, which amounted to almost $23k per shift! He also earned a grand total of…um…25 simoleons playing bass. LOL.

Cornelius acquired 505,725 Lifetime Happiness points, over 100k more than anyone else in the family. Notable things in his inventory included a rainbow beetle (I have no idea where he got that - Blanche was the family beetle collector) and Belinda’s wand, which I never knew he kept all these years. And according to his skill journal, he also managed to collect 86 mushrooms. He did not collect 86 mushrooms. This was a glitch. He collected 8.

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Macavoy maxed the inventing skill, of course. Hilariously, he only reached level 9 and ¾ of the handiness skill. That was an oversight on my part. Sorry, buddy! He collected 1,770 scrap, built 263 widgets and 8 toys, and made 145 big inventions, earning a total of $37,068. For hidden skills, he got to level 10 broom riding, Gnubb, and spellcasting, plus level 8 arcade. Macavoy was also a victim of the mushroom collecting glitch: he apparently collected 46 without ever touching one.

Macavoy acquired 370,796 LTH points. He had some delightful stuff in his inventory, including 1,665 conjured apples (!!!), 46 of which were poisoned. He also had a jar of fairy dust from Aubrey (awww) and…can you believe it? The very same perfect-quality fried peanut butter and banana sandwich that Belinda made, which was stuck to Macavoy’s hand back in the day. Apparently the sandwich made its way into his inventory and stayed there for all eternity.

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Blanche reached level 10 of the athletic, charisma, and handiness skills. She also somehow got to painting level 3, even though she never picked up a paintbrush in her life. She did 486 hours of cardio, jogged 4,559 km, and was acquainted with 202 Sims, 44 of whom she was friends with. (With all of this, she managed never to cancel out anyone else's designated best friends.) She had an impressive array of hidden skills: arcade level 8, plus level 10 broom riding, fairy magic, Gnubb, and trampoline. She collected 49 beetles in her life, plus 6 mushrooms. Except she never collected any mushrooms. The pattern continues.

Blanche had the Immune to Fire hidden trait, I assume from being a firefighter. I don’t know what she was making as a firefighter because she quit the job once her requirements were complete (I couldn’t stand her driving the firetruck everywhere).

Blanche acquired 367,411 LTH points, almost as much as her dad. The only really interesting thing in her inventory was the key to the Landgraab Library in France. She’d started that adventure on one of her trips but there wasn’t time to finish it. Ah, well.

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Bartholomew maxed the writing and alchemy skills. He wrote 29 books (amounting to 13,968 pages), including 13 hits, 7 bestsellers, and zero flops. He also made 182 elixirs and threw 58 of them. His hidden skills were as impressive as his mother’s: he achieved level 10 in arcade, broom riding, foosball, and snake charming, plus level 6 in video games.

Barty inherited the Immune to Fire trait from Blanche. He earned a total of $319,384 as a writer and was earning over 12k simoleons in weekly royalties. He achieved 311,773 LTH points as well.

Barty’s inventory was both weird and gross. He had 2 anchovies in there for God knows what reason, plus a pile of dirty clothes. Aha! I think we know who was stealing Lavinia’s clothes from the side of the hot tub. For shame, Barty!

One other fun fact about Barty: according to Master Controller, he had a reasonable-sounding age of 196 days…with how many days to his next birthday? -2,147,483,648. Yes, that is negative 2 billion and something. I’m not even going to try and guess what that means.

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Mildred achieved level 10 of painting and photography. She also, somehow, made it to level 6 of the athletic skill and did 7 hours of strength training. I’m pretty sure that’s a glitch - she definitely snuck in some workouts when I wasn’t looking, but there’s no way she legitimately made it to level 6. Mildred created 106 paintings (including 46 brilliants and 19 masterpieces); her most valuable painting was worth $3,661. She took 218 photographs and was pretty close to completing the Supernatural, Still Life, Travel, and Around Town photo collections. She also collected 16 gems. Her hidden skills included level 9 arcade, level 10 trampoline, level 7 broom riding, level 5 lycanthropy (I didn’t let her hunt very much), and level 5 snake charming. (I’m surprised she only had level 5 snake charming - it was one of her favorite activities. Barty had level 10 and I hardly ever saw him pick up the basket.)

Mildred earned a total of $65,700 from painting and only $2,550 from photography (she spent over 11k simoleons on film, though). HOWEVER, when I checked her camera roll at the very end, she had over 70k simoleons in unsold photos on there. Whoops! So maybe just ignore that first number.

Mildred also had the Immune to Fire trait, and she earned 305,132 LTH points. She had nothing interesting in her inventory except all those photos…but even those weren’t particularly exciting. Believe me, I was on the hunt for some funny shots of people's butts or something. There was nothing.

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Lavinia maxed out the athletic, martial arts, and fishing skills. She caught 371 fish, with the heaviest being a 140 kg dragonfish. She didn’t have much in the way of hidden skills: just broom riding level 4, lycanthropy level 3, trampoline level 3, and child gardening level 3 (no clue how she got that one).

Lavinia was Immune to Fire like so many of her predecessors. She earned over 85k simoleons fishing but didn’t quite make it to level 10 of the career. She earned 235,172 LTH points and had nothing of note in her inventory.

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Albertha maxed the sculpting skill and reached level 7 gardening. She made a total of 57 sculptures, including 6 brilliants and only 1 masterpiece. Her hidden skills were a little odd. She reached level 3 of child gardening (maybe because she read a gardening book as a teen?), level 4 trampoline, and…level 10 of the magician career?? What?!? I think the game was actually falling apart at this point.

Another weird thing about Albertha: she had the Immune to Fire trait and the Pyromaniac trait. Again, no idea where she picked that up. Maybe Jermaine had it? Albertha earned 111,613 LTH points, which is pretty impressive considering she was so young and never completed her Lifetime Wish.

[Beks]

Epilogue

And so we come to the end of the Buslingthorpe Life States Dynasty! We failed in generation six due to an invalid opportunity, but we still made it to the end. The Buslingthorpes were proud of the long years they’d spent in Moonlight Falls, working through skills and careers and wishes and challenges individually and as a family.

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Left to right: Cornelius (Gen 1, human); Macavoy (Gen 2, witch); Blanche (Gen 3, fairy); Bartholomew (Gen 4, vampire); Mildred (Gen 5, werewolf); Lavinia (Gen 6, jelly bean ghost); Albertha (Gen 7, genie)

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Once the challenge was complete, I left everybody on free will for a little while to see what they would do. At this point it was becoming increasingly obvious that the game was reaching its breaking point. The lag was wild, the floors and ceilings kept disappearing, and let’s not even talk about the load time for opening the game. Wait a second, who’s that ghost floating in the distance back there?

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Aubrey?!? Yeah, the game was going a little haywire. Well, nice to see you again, I guess.

There was one more thing I wanted to do before closing up shop. I wanted to throw a party, and invite over all the remaining Buslingthorpes so we could see them one last time. After installing Master Controller, I did some digging and learned that there were 12 Buslingthorpes still living in Moonlight Falls. Could we get them all to join us at Buslingthorpe Manor for one last hurrah?

Nope. We could not. I tried, y’all. I tried multiple times. I took the time to make a nice outdoor party area with lots of activities. I used MC to throw a party with only Buslingthorpe guests. And every single time I tried…the game crashed.

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This is one of the only screenshots I got, of Jermaine expressing concerns about my furniture choices. Valid concerns, it would appear.

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The only other screenshot I got was this one. Ayden’s almost-forgotten first children, Emilie and Tristan Van Gould, had somehow survived the centuries alongside their father, even though the game sent me almost daily notifications that they were about to bite the dust. They were the only guests who managed to show up at the party before the game crashed for a final time. And after several tries…I just didn’t have the heart to keep trying.

I did manage to collect some data from Master Controller, though. Other remaining original residents who were alive at the end of the dynasty included Navita Singh and Waylon Wolff (still a teen, and forever locked in unrequited crushes on multiple generations of Buslingthorpes). Janet Pok, the Van Gould siblings (seen above), Dwayne Wolff, and Wilhelmina Wolff also showed up in MC, though not as residents.

Ayden was the only remaining spouse at the end of the dynasty, aside from the still-young Jermaine. MC listed Ayden’s age as 261 days old, although I learned not to put much weight into the ages because they were all over the place. Waylon Wolff, for instance, was apparently 360 days old. Ayden should have been older than him, right?

The other remaining Buslingthorpes included vampire Dorcas and fairy Matilda (Barty’s triplet sisters, gen 4); fairy triplets Edgar, Seymour, and Leopold (gen 4); Mildred’s vampire twin sister Zelma (gen 5); werewolf twins Esther and Harriet (gen 6); Lavinia’s werewolf twin brother Duncan (gen 6); and Albertha’s blue human brothers, Percival and Orville (gen 7). I’m sad that I didn’t get final screenshots of them, but you can see them growing up throughout the story. We love you, Buslingthorpes!

And y’all, that’s it. The Buslingthorpe Life States Dynasty is finally at an end. This challenge was hard, chaotic, frustrating, hilarious, and rewarding - as all Sims 3 dynasties are. Thank you all so much for following along with this silly little story to the end!

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Goodbye, Moonlight Falls. I’m sure I'll see you again someday.

[deedee_828]

Congrats on completing it and thanks for sharing all those moments with us! It was a fun journey that I always read with a smile.

Looking forward to your next Sims 3 adventure!

[Beks]

Congrats on completing it and thanks for sharing all those moments with us! It was a fun journey that I always read with a smile.

Looking forward to your next Sims 3 adventure!

Thanks so much, deedee! Another Sims 3 adventure is not far in the future (As in I've already written a bunch of it and I need to start posting it already...)