A horrible situation. Just HORRIBLE!

If, perchance, you feel like your SL is going to hell, take a look at the inventory in this photo and maybe it'll make you feel better.

In case you can't find your glasses, it says 102,154.

I did the math. If I work really hard, I should get it sorted and cleaned out by the time I'm 60.

Honestly, I blame the evolution of "the gridwide hunt" and how they once consumed my life. I don't do hunts anymore.

What kills me the most are those two folders called "Weapons" and "Vehicles." What's worse is if you open those folders, they each have about 200 things in them.

Two. Hundred. Weapons. Who's up for a fight?

And what's REALLY worse is that at one point I decided those folders were SO IMPORTANT that I had to put an "!" in front of them to move them to the top.

*winces and deletes both of those folders*

And how 'bout that folder called "Furniture I buy and like." Apparently, that one keeps the good furniture away from the "furniture I buy and don't like."

I think the solution is to choose about, um, 500 things I love and then delete everything else. Just cover my eyes, hit delete, try not to think about it, and pray to God that deleting more than 100,000 items doesn't crash the whole grid.

Ironically, there's a blogger challenge currently going around that asks something along the lines of "If you could only pick three things in your inventory to keep, what would they be?"

I'm bummed because in my "blog posts I started and then forgot about/gave up on/lost interest in" folder is half of a post called "The five things you need in your inventory" that asks a similar question. Damn, I could've been a BLOGGER CHALLENGER!!

It's still a good question though. So good in fact, that I'm not gonna ruin it by trying to answer it.

Plus, I probably couldn't find those three things if I wanted to.

Go ahead! Touch my Christmas monkey! Touch it!

MERRY CHRISTMAS! Here's a picture of my cleavage!

(ha ha!)

I can't log in right now. If I had a Plurk account, I'd probably be one of those people Plurking, "HEY I CAN'T LOG IN!"

But anyway . . .

Moxie Polano has created a gown that actually made me break out my skirt shape, and believe you me, that's a difficult task. I hate system skirts. I'd rather be flouncing -- YES, "flouncing" -- around in a floaty dress or wearing jeans.

But this Partridge in a Pear Tree gown (I think that's what it's called, but I can't check because I can't log in) is part of her 12 Days of Christmas Collection. And if you're a girl, you should go check that stuff out. I like it because it's not Christmas-centric. Many of the pieces can be worn after the holidays. AND UPDATE: All day on Dec. 24, everything in the collection is half off.


(Pose courtesy of just standing around.)

I don't know how the real fashion bloggers do it. If I want to get my whole body in the frame, the picture turns out SO SMALL and SKEENY like that!

I'm wearing hot pink kicks under that gown. But in my day we called them "tennis shoes." And actually I'm really wearing the black stilettos that are included with the gown. (I think it's 750L.)

Scroll back up there for another gander -- YES, "gander" -- at my cleavage, and while you're there, look at the exquisite detailing in the neckline and the headpiece.

That's a partridge! In a pear tree! (Even the partridge is checking out my rack!)

I love Moxie Polano not just because she's talented, but also because she was the first designer to ever speak to me. It was during a hunt and we were both hopelessly lost. She taught me that not all SL designers are scary. And even though we haven't spoken since, she STILL hasn't booted me off her friends list!

That makes me feel special.

Speaking of special, I got a couple of SL gifts from friends today that literally made me get teary. They made me wish that I could make something, instead of wandering around looking for nifty items with trans perms. ("Trans perms" -- oh, the secret language we speak here!)

But I can't. And to be honest, I am STRESSED THE HELL OUT RIGHT NOW with Christmas in BOTH lives. I haven't wrapped any gifts anywhere. I haven't finished RL Christmas shopping. I need to clean my part of my real house. I need to find something cute to wear to RL Christmas Eve Mass just in case the guy I've had a crush on since fourth grade happens to be there. (I hear he's still single. Yes Virginia, there IS a Santa Claus!)

But my God, trying to accomplish all that stuff feels impossible, kind of like getting on the LeLook sim this week!

[Dear Santa, all I want for Christmas is a segue RIGHT HERE.]

I love my SL friends. The only "homemade" gift I can give them is to write about how awesome they are in my goofy blog. I try to do that whenever I can. And in the meantime, I have to stop agonizing over SL gifts now and worry about my real ones. I have to stop my relentless gridwide quest to find the perfect SL gift for each beloved friend and make peace with one perfect universal choice instead.

So as a token of my affection this year, some of you will get . . .



CHRISTMAS MONKEY!

HEY, I've looked at dozens of monkeys today and this one is QUALITY. So if you get one, LOVE IT! And yeah, maybe it's a little creepy, but monkeys are supposed to be creepy. And if you don't get one, please don't take it personally. It's just because I ran out of lindens.

And um, cough, you might get it after Christmas too. The clock is ticking! I can only wrap so many pixelated boxes in one sitting! (actually in one slouching)

Speaking of scary . . .



I never know what delicious blingy horrors I'll find in my yard when I log in sometimes.

*screams and runs*

Actually, since this post is already long (shocker), can I close it with a quote from Santa in the 1994 remake of "Miracle on 34th Street"? Thanks!

"I'm not just a whimsical figure in a charming suit who affects a jolly demeanor. I'm a symbol. I'm a symbol of the human ability to suppress the selfish and hateful tendencies that rule the major part of our lives.

"And if you can't believe, if you can't accept anything on faith, then you're doomed to a life dominated by doubt."

I BELIEVE, SANTA! ♥
So does my army of Christmas monkeys!

PUT SOME PANTS ON!

You say "muddy photo" . . .



. .. I say "trapped in a snowglobe!"

Today's the only day IN OUR ENTIRE SLIVES that you can buy this posing snowglobe ($1000L) at Glitterati. (Skin: Snow Fae by L.Fauna. Snowflake Gown by Moxie Polano. GO check out her fabulous 12 Days of Christmas Collection. I'm being serious.)

It's fab. My only critique is that I wish it were snowing in there. It IS a snowglobe after all. Maybe I'm supposed to shake it.

See pose details and a much better photo of it over on the highly addictive SL Daily Deals site, which has sadly (in the grand scheme of things) become an ESSENTIAL PART OF MY DAILY ROUTINE: Get up, drink coffee, trudge to highly stressful agency job, deal with testy client, lunch with fellow drones-in-suits, take a Xanax break, type a report that no one will read, *allow mind to drift for a quick minute while I check the SL Daily Deals site and wish I were at home watching 'The Golden Girls' and messing around on my laptop*, meet with bitter disgruntled employees, Facebook break, stare out window at Mississippi River, bill somebody for something, TMZ.com break, call a journalist, watch the sun set, fantasize about the cute lawyer on Floor 11, try to psychically determine when he'll be taking the elevator to the parking garage, blow nose, bill someone for it, eventually trudge back home, eat something microwaved, possibly log in for a few minutes, pop a Lunesta, read something, turn on talk radio (Coast to Coast AM! You need it in your lives!), fall asleep, wake up, start it all over again, BLAH! THERE'S GOT TO BE MORE TO LIFE! THERE'S GOT TO BE MORE THAN THIS! THERE'S GOT TO . . .

Sorry.

I promised myself (and my shrink) that I'd quit doing that.

Um, back to the snowglobe. It's still for sale today, but the 100 that were available for half-price as today's SL Daily Deal are now gone.

In other news, I just have a bunch of random things to say today. I know you're shocked.

1. Chic Aeon wants everyone to stop blogging about the same thing.

So I'd better not see ANYONE blogging this Flava Flav giraffe on XStreet!



FLAVAA FLAAAAAAAAAV!

(It was a cough syrup-induced purchase. Only 50L!)

2. WHOOOOOOOPSY!



How is that ARC even possible? Laugh out loud!

(And WOOO! Check my rack! Hubba Hubba!)

I feel horrible because I went to the Musashi Do fashion show dressed like that yesterday (minus the wings though -- I'm not that big of a dork), not realizing that I had a five-digit ARC.

Maybe that's why this poor guy's pants fell off on the runway:



Now that I have this MacBook Pro, fashion shows are visible and bearable for me . . . EXCEPT for yesterday's, that is. Now maybe I know why. *looks around sheepishly*



I have never mentally willed something to rez so much in my SLife, but ALAS, all I got was a shadowy bulge show.

3. When I was a noob, I wanted to wear wings with everything. I had those monster boxes of freebie ones and I had them all labeled to match every outfit.

I haven't really done the wing thing in over a year though.

But then I saw these really cool ones by Material Squirrel at Winterstock and got all NOSTALGIC LIKE THAT.

So I bought them:



Imagine my absolute horror when I clicked on them and read,

[8:49] Sofiel Angel Wings 4.2.1 whispers: Emerald arches her wings in response to your erotic touch.

WHAT??????!!!!!!

[8:49] Sofiel Angel Wings 4.2.1 whispers: Emerald flutters her wings and releases an intoxicating scent.

NO!

No scents! No intoxication!!

That is just SO WRONG.

Angels don't have SLEX!!!!!

It's Christmas, for God's sake!!!!!

OMG, people will SLexify anything!

MORE exclamation points!!!!!

[8:49] Sofiel Angel Wings 4.2.1 whispers: Emerald flaps her wings in one last spasm of orgasmic ecstasy as she slowly BURNS IN HELL.

Speaking of being holy . . .

4. Seeing as how it's the holiest time of the year, I'm really trying hard not to trailer-park up my yard right now, but . . .



What?

I have no prim allowance left?

How could that be?

5. When I first heard of the 15L Winterville Bazaar, where everything is transferrable and 15L or less, I thought GHETTO!!!!!

But then I checked it out and realized it's full of cool little booths from cool stores like Sn@tch, Frop, Weird Designs, etc. So if you happen to be like me and enthusiastically signed up for something like 19 different Secret Santa exchanges, the place is perfect for grabbing cute affordable gifts for complete strangers. (Look, I learned how to highlight stuff!)



Like this whimsical Flower Box by Mar at the Sugar. Snap. Me. booth. It's 5L. YES! I said 5L!

Hey, I think I'm actually done running my mouth now.

NO WAIT!

6. There's a ZEBRA in the Neon Frog Midnight Mania board today. Remember the good ol' days when we used to rejoice over the animals in that board? And the board locked down so fast, we could hardly get there to slap it in time? Where did those days go???



sigh

SLanxiety! (and some fashion)

Drag queen alert!

Just kidding.

Sort of.

If there were an award for Bitchiest Person in the Universe, I'd win it this weekend.

I've got this crud that started as a flu and then went away for a while and then came back as strep throat and now is pretty much just permeating my whole body with an onslaught of aches and chills and phlegm.

PHLEGM!

I want to weep and feel sorry for myself, but I can't because it'll just make my nose run more.

Call me a late fashion bloomer or whatever, but I discovered Vita's Boudoir yesterday when I saw this gorgeous dress right HERE CLICK THIS CLICK THIS CLICK THIS on one of my favorite freebie blogs. (My God, I love your photos, Yurie Haalan!!!)

I ran like a rabid reindeer to grab it and then proceeded to buy almost every dress in the whole store.

Designer Vitabela Dubrovna is now on my Forever Win list. She's also a designer in real life. Here's her RL blog. Here's her SL blog.

But anyway, back to the dresses.

This one is called Black Lace:



I'm not really the type to do a Look of the Day. I'm more of a "Hey, I found a dress that I like and I also managed to match my shoes with it" type.

But:

Dress: Black Lace (600L) from Vita's Boudoir
Shoes: Ashia pointe shoes in pewter (450L) from Slink (includes ballet poses)
Necklace: Diamond Necklace in silver (100L) from So Many Styles (the accessories are transferable there, BTW, in case you're shopping for the holidays)
Earrings: Hiral earrings in shell/silver from Zaara (225L)
Skin: Bella/Fair in Night from the For Your Eyes Only pack (2000L) at Tuli
Hair: Sinter (300L) from Tukinowaguma

I'm on a Tukinowaguma hair kick these days. It sounds like a battle cry.

TUKINOWAGUMA!

I also loved this Dirty Butterfly dress (450L):



When you're wearing a dress that sexy, you really don't need to wear much else, save for a sassy little hairstyle (Maison in Ash, 300L) from

TUKINOWAGUMA!

(Skin: Bella/Fair in Gogo)

And I dig this Forest Nest gown (700L):

>

Yeah, I'm kind of a fan of the laser-cut lace look thing. And I don't really think that was a fashion term, actually. Tim Gunn would not approve.

Anyway, here's your fashion mission, should you choose to accept it:

— Go to Vita's Boudoir Black Main Showroom
— Grab the free gift under the Christmas tree
— Hit the Subscribo and say "thank you!" for two more gifts (another dress and a fur stole) in History
— Then LOOK CAREFULLY because Vita is participating in the gridwide So 2010 Secret 50L Sale (for a list of participating stores, click HERE) and TWO, YES TWO, of her fantabulous gowns are marked down to 50L until Dec. 27.

Now you are a freakin' fashionista with four gorgeous gowns and a fur stole for a MERE 100L!

You know what else I like about that store?

Each dress has a "buy as gift" option.

I would wink here, but I don't really do that kind of thing.

But I don't have any of the dresses with rose or pink in them yet.

*anti-wink*

Shoot, I promised you some SLanxiety here in this post.

I thought signing up for three Secret Santas would be fun, but I'm TOTALLY OVERTHINKING IT, as I'm prone to do.

The one that's sort of stressing me out the most is the Fashion Bloggers' Secret Santa. I'm a member of that group, but I think we can all agree that "Emerald Wynn" and "fashion blogger" aren't exactly synonymous. Designers do sometimes drop me review copies of their creations, but I think it's because they secretly yearn for a break from sophistication.

If you're a creator and I like your stuff, you aren't going to see a glam fashion spread here. Instead, you're gonna see a lot of big bold capitalized words, an explosion of enthusiastic exclamation points, photos that most likely will make you laugh or cringe, my yard, and possibly a few barnyard animals thrown in the mix.

So as far as the Fashion Bloggers group goes, I had a small heart attack when I got the name of my Secret Santa recipient. She's glamourous and beautiful and upscale, and I'm pretty sure if I ran into her on the SL streets somewhere, I'd get all shy and run away.

Wait . . . let's keep it in perspective and rephrase that:

Her AVATAR is glamourous and beautiful and upscale, and I'm pretty sure if MY AVATAR ran into HER AVATAR on the SL streets somewhere, MY AVATAR would get all shy and run away.

And after typing that sentence, I now realize that I'm being ridiculous.

So instead of sticking to my original blog-post plan of whirling around like an angsty Tasmanian devil here, let me just cut to the chase and say:

"I have no idea what an appropriate Secret Santa gift for an SL Fashionista is."

To make matters worse, we're encouraged to give SEVERAL small gifts throughout the month.

. . . . . . HAIKU BREAK!

My SLagony, boxed,

gift-wrapped, tied with shiny bow.

Will you take it, please?

I thought maybe if I made something, something from the heart, it would be way more meaningful than something snazzy.

So I worked hard all day yesterday on this craft project:



WOOT!

Sorry, this post is long. What's more, I'm probably gonna write another one today too. Because tomorrow it'll be back to the RL, 14-hour-day corporate grind. No time for blogging, no time for fun, just time enough to work, work, work, work, drink, weep, sleep, work, work, work, not necessarily in that order.

I'll wrap up this particular post with a helpful suggestion and a deep, deep, insight.

Helpful Suggestion: If you're considering checking out this week's 50L Weekend Fever sales, I suggest picking up this 50L Comfort couch from Just My Imagination. Just be sure you turn off your AO before you sit down:



And now, a Deep, Deep Insight:



I've decided gold is the new red.

*anti-wink*

Mine eyes have seen the kitschy glory (and a NINJA!)

Hello! Welcome to the BIGGEST PICTURE OF MY FACE EVER!

I wish I could make you a T-shirt now! "I Saw A Big Damn Picture of Emerald's Face and SURVIVED!"

U.S. fashion guru Tim Gunn would probably say that if you have holly, candy canes, Christmas bells, ornaments, stars, snowflakes, and God knows what else crammed in your eyelashes, you should probably remove your earrings, as they'll steal the spotlight from all the CHRISTMAS CRAP dangling off your face.

Consider it done, Timmy!

Tongue in cheek aside, I actually got A LITTLE GIGGLE from these Christmas Cheer Eyelashes (200L) from Talon Faire.

(Other style notes — Eyes: I'm loyal to only a select few brands of eyes. Bodyline is one of them. The eyes are FABULOUS there. At top, I'm wearing Purple Line, 130L. Eventually I will own all the Bodyline eyes. Consider it a goal. Skin: Tuli's Bella/Fair in the makeup called "I Have No Lindens Now"— JOKE! The makeup is Sunset in the For Your Eyes Only pack, 2000L. There's also a For Your Lips Only pack. I want it so badly, it hurts. But I need to rein in my spending. *on hearing this, my spending whinnies and rears up on its hind legs*)

OK, so being an occasional Catholic, I'm now feeling a little guilty for using the phrase "Christmas crap." Don't repeat that, kids!

And just so you know, I usually can't stand it when people say stupid things like "a little giggle." Irritating. And I also usually can't stand prim eyelashes. They're hell to mod, and unless you're using a decent computer, chances are good they're just gonna look like a couple of smushed bugs on my face anyway.

But these lashes have a sense of humor. These lashes amuse me. And when I'm wearing them, I require no other festive accessories except . . .


(Eyes in Platinum/Large from Beloved Custom Designs.)

NINJA!

HA HA! My friend Kareem Glas made these Ninja Shoulder Pets carrying various weapons (some of them move!) and gave some to me. She doesn't sell them either! She just makes cool stuff FOR THE HELL OF IT! Can you imagine? But if you're yearning for your own, maybe she'll hook you up if you ask her nicely.

BUT WAIT! I just hopped over to Kareem's blog and it appears that she's a hot guy now! She chronicles her gender-bending HERE. I met Kareem when she was a female. But hey, a hot guy is even better in my book. So rock on with that, man!

(BUT DAMN KAREEM, I GOT YOU A HUGE PINK FOOFY DRESS FOR CHRISTMAS!)

The cool thing is, she — OOPS, I mean HE! — packaged them in this giant ninja box, which recently got its 15 minutes of blog fame over on the Ch'Know blog:



("What? Only two comments?" Love, Emerald "Queen of the Screen Shot" Wynn)

So many shenanigans going on in my yard these days.

So speaking of "cool stuff my friends made," my friend Estevan Preiss is getting ready to launch a jewelry line called Rising Star. He gave me some preview items. From what I can see, the line is big, bold, glammy stuff, so I'm excited for him! I'm not gonna really show it until he officially launches, but in the meantime I'm wearing his holly earrings — they're lined in gold with a gold back and I love them:



They match the holly THAT'S HANGING OFF MY EYE.

If you look closely, you can see that my eyelashes are actually floating about 1/4 of a centimeter away from my eyes. Yeah, I gave up. If you see me on the SL streets, just don't get too close to my face please. Particularly because on any given day, you will see some sad thing — a random strand of hair, an earring, eyelashes, a prim tattoo, vampire bites — orbiting my head, making a silent-but-tragic statement of total mod fail.

So anyway, my friend Eva introduced me to the eyelash-and-nail store Talon Faire. I suggest you check it out, because it's full of amusing eyelash awesome sauce. She also TPed me to the Stiletto Moody sale today, checked out my outfit and said, "Haha, I can see your @ss when you walk!"

AND YOU LIKE IT, EVA! I'm giving you a huge framed picture of it for Christmas!

But yeah, my current outfit: Winter fashion masterpiece or Las Vegas showgirl on crack?



Who cares! I love it. I love the flirty little Feather Dress from So Many Styles (available in other colors for 200L), the snowflake tattoo (50L) from Otaku Designs, those shoes everyone's talking about (I matched my skin, I matched my skin!) and the HAIR!

HAIRGASM ALERT!

I wandered over to the hair store Tukinowaguma for the first time yesterday and now my life will never be the same. So many fabulous, fabulous avant-garde hairstyles! The one I'm wearing is Brooke (300L). You can change the color to a more common shade if you like. But this time of year, my favorite hue is wintery white, baby.

Someday I will own every hair on that new "2009 Hair Collection Version" wall. Consider it a goal.

I think that's all my useless information right now. The only other thing I've got going on is SL Secret Santas. In a burst of holiday optimism, I signed up for three of them: Celebrity Trollop's, the Fashion Bloggers' group's, and the Lucky Chair Stalkers' group's. (*checks that punctuation again . . . OK*)

Now I'm sort of wandering around the grid wondering why the hell I haven't been making notes about what stores have cool gifts with trans perms. Because on top of Secret Santas, I also have my friends to think of.

And on top of that, ever since I signed up for Secret Santas, I've got that old-skool Atlantic Starr "Secret Lovers" song stuck in my head. Sort of . . .

"SECRET SANTAAAAAAAAS!
THAT'S WHAT WE AARE!
TRYIN' SO HARD TO HIIIIIDE 
THE WAY WE FEEEEEL!
BECAUSE WE BOTH BELONG TO SOMEONE ELSE,
BUT WE CAN'T LET GO
'CUZ WHAT WE FEEEEEEEL
IS OH SO REAL!
(Background singers: SO REEEEEAL, SO REEEEAL, SOOOO-OOO REAL!)"

*falls on ground laughing*

I'm so glad I'm around to crack myself up.

Probably time for me to stop drinking hot toddies for my sore throat. Or maybe not!

Cha cha cha, y'all! ♥

Was blind but now I SEE!!!!!!!!

Hi from the land of fever. 102.5 F to be exact!

WOOOOOO HOOOOOO! I have the flu. THANK YOU JESUS FOR THIS FLU because my company has a new "swine flu prevention" policy that says if you have a fever, you cannot come back to the office until 48 hours after it's gone. Gosh, that'll break my heart, but OK.

Excuse me for a minute while I go make a hot toddy . . . . . . .

(Starve a cold, feed a fever . . . with scotch.)

OK, I'm back.

It's been a while since we've had exuberant exclamation points and bold all caps over here, so here we go:

So HEY EVERYBODY! I finally got my new MacBook Pro, optimized for superior online gaming performance, and

WOW!

It reminds me of my childhood, when I spent years running around not being able to see clearly but not realizing it, and then finally getting glasses and just gaping at everything in wonder. And then to take it a step further, getting contacts later and looking so much more attractive than the Coke-bottle-glasses geek face I was before.

Because this baby is sleek! SLEEK, I TELL YOU! SLEEK!

This is the first time I've really been able to see you, my friends. Seriously, many of you have been lovely gray blobs to me up until now. And my house! And the island where I live! I didn't realize I had so many neighbors all around me!!

And the clothes are so detailed! For instance, I've always loved Evie's Closet, but now that everything is so high-res, I love it even more!

We now pause for some news you can use:

That Christmas Caterina Gown in the pic up top is a prize in the Evie's Closet Lucky Dip (50L per dip and there are several cute prizes to win). But if you're lazy like I am, you can just buy it (500L). And that great Blinky hair with little holiday lights in it is one of three 50L holiday hairstyles at Magika. LOVE! I'm also wearing Tuli's Bella skin in Elysium/Fair.

I never thought I'd see the day when I'd buy a fatpack of a freckled skins, but hey, never say never, kids.

Anyway, life is trippy right now. TRIPPY! Like a 'shroom trip!

For instance, the first time I saw my AV move on this new computer, I FREAKED OUT A LITTLE! You have to understand, on my decent-but-not-as-awesome plain ol' MacBook, Emerald kind of clomped and jerked around, like "clomp clomp jerk jerk clomp pause do the robot clomp clomp some more."

Now she moves so fluidly! Like a movie!

It's like a whole new world, and it totally makes me want to belt out that Disney song from "Aladdin."

"A WHOLE NEWWWWWWW WORRRRRRRRRRRRRLD!"

OK, I'll stop now.

The downside is that I can now clearly see horrible things like this:



Crack is whack! Even in a "hey, c'mon over and pop my" thong. Wow, those jeans are low. Why even wear pants at all?

But yeah, I can see what everyone's wearing now. And I'm watching you!

And facelights! Now I get it, I get it! Months ago, my friend Soph begged me to remove my facelight. "You're blinding me!" she wailed.

"But it makes my face look so pretty!" I protested.

"Not to me!" she said. "Just optimize your Windlight settings and you won't need a facelight!"

So I did. And she had a point. But I still didn't really get it, because my facelit face never looked blinding to me.

But she was right! Because now this is what people wearing facelights look like:



(Sorry, small pic.) At first I thought this girl was wearing a really flawed skin or even clown makeup. Then I realized it was her facelight!

And shoes! I never got the whole shoe craze. They weren't that exciting to me. But I finally went to the Shoe Expo, and not only did everything REZ around me, but the shoes looked delicious! I wanted to stick them in cones and LICK THEM!!!!



Dear Pixel Mode, I love your Danger shoes, but I hate my freaky feet and my even-more-freaky ankles.

So speaking of seeing the world with fresh eyes and childlike wonder, my three-year-old niece came over the other day. She brought her Barbies with her.

"Hey, wanna see MY Barbie?" I asked.

"HELL YES!" she screamed. (OK, no she didn't. But she did say "OK!")

I logged into SL. I showed her Emerald. I told her we could dress her up any way we wanted. I told her that Emerald could even do cool things like fly or ice skate.

For the record, my niece gave my Bax Coen ice skates a thumbs-down.

"NO MORE ICE SKATING!" she commanded.

Sheeeeeesh, OK!

I took her to Bliss Couture. Or actually, I sent Emerald to Bliss Couture while we watched.

I let my niece pick out a dress. Then we went to That Hair Store and I let her pick out a hair style. Then she picked out the makeup.

Here's the three-year-old fashionista-in-the-making's finished product:



Wow, purple! Lots of it!

And *cough* expensive!

The kid has good taste.

Dress: Scarlette Gown in Purple (750L) from Bliss Couture
Hair: Eva in Swedish (250L) from Truth
Skin: Bella in Sophia (Fair) from Tuli (Single skin, 1000L; Fatpack: 4950L)

"Now what does she do?" my niece asked.

"Well . . . nothing. She just kind of stands there and, well, she just stands there. But I know where a train is. We could make her go ride it! Or I can make her dance!"

"No. Let's go make some eggs and watch Mickey Mouse!"

OK! :D

(Meanwhile, a shot of the action on the other side of the monitor, as captured by the iCam.)

Dear Santa, all I want for Christmas is an upper lip. Love, E.