Welcome to the official tour of the Dunnavant Mansion, home of the illustrious Dr. Charles Dunnavant and his family…
Category Archives: Annabel Island
Books, Wine, and Bread
Hey, peeps. I seem to be on a roll with Annabel Island; my brain is brimming with ideas for it, and I’m making good progress building the lots. So poor Fran is just going to have to wait a little bit longer (although I did pop in to visit her the other day; she says “hi!”). Also, I don’t have the Dunnavant Mansion done yet — I’m having too much fun building stuff for the working class. I hope you’ll forgive me — I gotta ride the wave while I can.
In the meantime, here are some more preview pics. Everything is still in the experimental phase, so there are no official tours just yet, but you can at least see what I’m working on.
First off is what will eventually be the Annabel Island Public Library and Historical Society (to be known hereafter as simply “The Library”). The first floor will be full of books (including some for purchase) and tables for quiet reading and research.
On the second floor will be maps, pictures, and documents pertaining to the history of the island. Some local art may find its way up there as well. The actual “society” will meet downstairs in the library during off-hours and will probably consist of a citizen from each class.
The librarian will be Hope Krenzer — you may remember her as the maid from Dunnavant Mansion awhile back. As this is a community lot, she doesn’t live on-site, but will stay in the local boarding house and report here for work each day. As to why she left the Dunnavants, I’ll leave that for another time…
More pics after the jump:
More of the Island
Tonight I created the King family; they weren’t originally on Annabel Island, but have moved there since the hurricane (taking advantage of the cheap land prices), and started up a farm complete with orchard and enormous garden. They have more land than the Whidbees do, but they don’t have any chickens, and they grow apples instead of lemons and oranges. However, they do have a pair of dogs which they plan to breed so they can sell the puppies to other inhabitants of the island. Here’s a view of their property, which they call Kingstone Farm.
The lovely country road is part of a terrain mod by Stev84. It adds a nice touch of realism to the ‘hood. I’m also using a mod which makes the garbage cans invisible, but I might get rid of it — it occurred to me that if someone knocks over the garbage can, I’ll be clueless. (At least until the cockroaches invade. Yuck.) So I’ll probably just get rid of the invisible garbage can and use move_objects on to place the cans out of view (otherwise they’ll be in the middle of the road! Not good).
New Old Faces
Wow, new blogs and stories popping up all over the place. Looks like I’ll have some reading to do. Huzzah for three-day weekends!
Elsewhere in the news…anyone recognize these folks?
Whidbee Farm, Part I
I didn’t get as far as I wanted to on the Dunnavant mansion last night, so I’m posting a few pics of Whidbee Farm instead. I plan on doing a full-fledged tour once I’ve moved the family in and played them for a bit. But I wanted to show you guys what I’ve been working on, so here you go:
The Whidbee Farmhouse
This is the THIRD version of Whidbee Farm, so it looks a little different from the last preview pic I posted. The second one was on a lot that sloped downward from the road, and for some reason the roof got all glitched. It was also tough to maneuver the camera around. So I scrapped that one and built this one, which is on a completely flat lot. Much better!
Merry Measures (Part II)
Flora the Housekeeper was desperate. She had just witnessed Mr. and Mrs. De Groff — who had been married for ten years at least — kissing in the wagon outside as if they had never kissed each other before. How strange! How incredibly curious! she thought, twisting it around in her mind until it became bigger than it was. And now that it was big, she just had to tell someone about it. But who? Nellie? Yes, Nellie would do.
After a brief search of the main floor, Flora found Nellie standing in the middle of the study, paging through a tattered book. Flora entered the room on tip-toe, as if worried someone might hear, and closed the door gently behind her. Just as dramatically, she glanced around the room to make sure no one else was present, then leaned forward and gasped, “You won’t believe what I just saw!”
With an almost guilty flush of her cheeks, Nellie set down the book and took a step forward. “What? What is it?”
Merry Measures (Part I)
Christmas Eve day on Annabel Island was the coldest day in recent memory, yet still warm enough that the trees stayed green and leafy and the flowers did not wilt. As the families on the island gathered to celebrate the holiday, they discussed the possibility of frost, or worse yet, snow, which would mean disaster for the farmers, unless they could somehow turn their crops into coal and firewood. But talk of the weather soon gave way to excited speculation over what Charles Dunnavant, the “King of the Island”, was building by Sandero Bay — some said it looked like an Arabian palace; others said they had peeked over the walls and seen the columns of what might be a Greek temple.
It was of this very thing that Morgan and Madeline De Groff were speaking on Christmas Eve afternoon while they waited for their father. At the same time, they played their own made-up game, “Witches and Bandits”, with Madeline as the Good Witch of the Mountain, and Morgan as the evil bandit Thirsty O’Fallon.
“Mr. Dunnavant is building a playhouse for his children, of course,” said Madeline as she and Morgan squared off in the hallway to do battle. “And when it’s finished, I’m going to be invited over every day, while you stay home and do lessons!” She waved her magical pointer finger at the evil bandit, who wished fervently for a weapon.
Foul Whisp’rings
Cecily’s dinner with the Dunnavants went splendidly, despite the lack of servants and a less-than-spectacular feast. Dr. Dunnavant praised the behavior of Madeline and Morgan, who helped the nanny serve dinner, and Mrs. Dunnavant complimented Cecily on the beauty and elegance of her home. Cecily wanted sincerely to impress the Dunnavants, as they not only owned Annabel Island and spent a great deal of their fortune keeping it beautiful, but were respected and admired by both her husband and her father.
A few days later Cecily found a housekeeper, Miss Flora Smith, who had excellent references as a maid and cook and would have been a great help to them the night of the Dunnavant dinner, had she arrived but three days earlier.
