Antonius - The Story So Far

Hi! Welcome to the Antonius Family. Would you like a tour of the house and then we can chat? I'm Tori by the way.

I know what you are thinking, lovely home, loving husband, four fine young daughters, two sweet adorable baby boys...

What would I know about pain?

Well things weren't always this good. When we came to Fellowship Lane our family was falling apart. And if you wanted to blame anybody for that...

Blame me.

You see Rylan and I were high school sweethearts and married soon after we graduated. Things were sweet while, we had a lovely baby girl we named Paige. Rylan got a good job down at the co-op. I knew that he wanted to go college after we graduated but the time wasn't right so Rylan channelled his thirst for knowledge into his telescope and love of astronomy

He would stay up so late looking down the telescope that I would go to bed without him. But in the morning I would wake up and find him sleeping next to me.

Then one morning I woke up and he wasn't there. I went out looking for him and found him out on the street. He was a mess, his clothes were a mess. whatever he had been doing all night hadn't included sleeping in bed.

At least not in my bed...

I demanded to know what he had been doing all night and when he told me that he had been abducted by aliens I laughed in his face. I was insanely jealous

I will never forget the look of hurt on his face as long as I live. He sort of just closed up on me and went inside and had a shower

Thing were pretty difficult for quite a while. Rylan took to sleeping in the spare bedroom. Paige had just become a teen and started acting out. I think it was all the stress of what was happening with her parents that made her go off the rails.

The two people I loved most in the world hated me...

All because of my stupid jealousy, my lack of trust. When Rylan started to showed I finally admitted that I was in the wrong and thing began to thaw between Rylan and I. A bit

Then the Catastrophe happened. The police called us one night to tell us that Paige had been in a car crash and not only that the car was stolen and there were the proceeds of burglary in the car.

It was a pretty awful time, but it was the one thing that brought Rylan and I back together. We talked for hours after that, shared our hopes and dreams on a level that been on before. Rylan told he had always dreamed of becoming a doctor, I dreams of having Paige do well in life, to get of this mess that she was in and go to college. Make something of her life. And not just Paige, I wanted more children. We discussed what we could do, we needed to get Paige away from the crowd she was mixed up in and we needed to be somewhere where Rylan could study towards his dream. There was also a little matter of the fines that Paige would have to pay.

So we sold the house, paid the fines, and bought the plot of land here in Fellowship Lane.

You can see from the pictures the house was pretty basic to begin with. It wasn't our priority, repairing the relationships within the family was. Rylan and I tried to set some time aside to be alone together. It wasn't easy, Rylan gave birth to twin girls, Priscilla and Penelope. Two lovely twin girls but a handful to take care of. We don't have any pictures but we got Paige involved in caring for the twins. She really loved her little sisters. With the twins around we needed to make time to spend with Paige. We found helping her with her homework really helped our relationship with her. She made friends with some of the local teenagers, (some of the locals are really different!) Mostly girls though which was a bit of surprise, because where we were previously Paige was boy mad and you couldn't turn without tripping over one of Paige's boyfriends. I didn't think she had met any boys.

Until she walked in the day one day and announced that she was dating Brendan Lozier from down the road.

That was a real surprise to us, Brendan was so different from the boys that she had dated before. Maybe that was the secret. When they first met he wanted to be her friend before he wanted to be her date.

Rylan got a job in the medical career path and I got a job in the army. It wasn't long after we moved in that I discovered that I was pregnant!

I gave birth to twin girls shortly after Penelope and Priscilla became children. We named them Lucia and Gaia. Paige decided to delay going to college until Brendan was able to go, apparently he is an orphan and he had a little sister not much older than Penelope and Priscilla to take care of. I decided to leave my job in the army and go into politics.

After Paige went to college I discovered I was pregnant again! I gave birth to twin boys (Marcus and Petronius) after Penelope and Priscilla became teens

Paige did well at college, changing her aspiration to family at the end of her sophomore year. She married Brendan after graduation.

One down, six more to go!

My gosh, it's dark outside. It's our sons' birthday do you want to stay a little bit longer, we're just about to bring the boys to the birthday cake?

You're leaving? It's been nice meeting you, come again soon!

Te Waiata The Story So Far

Kia Ora, I'm Maui Te Waiata. My Aunt Pania has asked me to fill you in what has happened to the Te Waiata whanau since we moved to Fellowship lane. We came with my grandma Hine Te Waiata, Uncle Tane (her brother), my mum and dad, Aunt Moana, and Aunty Pania, me and my baby sister Aroha. I was just a kid at the time.

Grandma Hine is keen on all of us getting an education. She says that there is real mana in knowledge. She was really happy when when Rawiri my father went to University and got a degree in biology but was disappointed when aunty Moana said she wanted get a job after high school. She said there was too much fun to be had to waste her time at University. Grandma was a bit happier when she got as a lab technician at the local dairy. She was hoping that eventually Moana might be inspired to do some further study.

Uncle Rawiri got a job in SimCity working in a top research facility and decided to move the whole whanau to Pottville which was just outside of Simcity.

But when we got here tragedy struck. Uncle Tane got very sick and died. Then my mum got the same thing and died as well. My father was devastated and sort of gave the will to live. It was not long before he joined my mother. We had moved into a pretty basic house hoping to find something better but without the income that Dad was going to bring in we really couldn't afford to move. Pania's grades at school hit rock bottom because of all the stress of the move and followed by all the deaths in the family. It was a rough time but we were able to help each other through it.

Things got better when we got to meet the neighbours. Some of the people here are reallly different. I mean really different! This is me and Copper Maripossa from down the road. He's cool as. Guess that's whats such a cool place most people are pretty accepting of difference, if they weren't they'ld move on.

We discovered though that some people were from a bit closer to home. Grandma and Aunt Moana came home from visiting the neighbours all excited. They discovered thatthe Coopers came from the same part of the country that we came from and Aunt Moana actaully recognised some of them from her old job. It seems that old Fred used to own a dairy farm that used to send milk to the factory that she worked at. Aunty Moana being being Aunty Moana promptly asked one of Fred's sons, Ethan, on a date.

Typical.

When she was warned that Ethan was bit of a ladies man she just laughed and said she liked a man who fun. But as I said that was what Aunty Moana was like then. We weren't at all surprised. What did surprise us was that Grandma started dating old Fred Cooper. I mean they're both elders! We were even more surprised when she announced that she and Fred Cooper were getting married and she was moving with him. She siad the repsonsibility of looking after the rest of would be good for Aunty but she was just over the road if we needed her.

Aunty Moana had some crazy idea at the time that she wanted to date as many different men as possible. Dad had teased her and said she had to put a figure on it and Aunty laughed and said "Well if you insist I want to have 50 first dates." The Cooper boys were definitely in her sights. She had dated Ethan and Joel was next on her list but she didn't get around to dating him until after Grandma married Fred Cooper. Afterwards she said the date was really weird, part of her wanted to make out with Joel and the other part felt she couldn't now that he was her stepbrother. She ended the date giving him a family kiss. She did took her responsibilies towards the family seriously. After dating Joel the first thing she did was get some smartmilk for Aroha and she potty trained her and taught her to walk. She helped both me and aunt Pania with our homework and went out and got a job. She didn't tell us what the job was though, she was a bit vague when we asked.

Aroha grew up Aunty Moana started dating Romulas Bonacorrd from down the road. Aunty Pania's grades were starting to get really good at good at school and she ended up going to Uni with Amethyst Sylvaen from across the road. It's really weird, hardly any time seems to passed while she was at college but she did really well getting top grades. She and Amethyst founded this greek house while she was at college and Pania became really interested in making money (she used to be boy mad). She got involved with Remus Bonacorrd while she was at college and when she graduated Moana moved in with Romulas Bonacorrd and Pania married his brother Remus who moved in with his nephew Ramsey. Another thing that happened was that we moved the graves to a community lot. We were having problems with weird things happening around the house and I saw a ghost! I really did. I was pretty young at the time and it really scared me. So when Pania moved back from college she consulted some experts and they told her to move the graves so she did. Soon after Moana got back I became a teenager. I really began to understand what Grandma Hine was saying about how there was mana in learning so I chose the knowledge aspiration. Then Ramsey and Aroha both grew up. Aroha chose family and Ramsey chose fortune. I think Ramsey was influenced by Pania who had come back from college wanted to own five top busineses. She opened a venue just down the road that became very successful. Opened a discount store over in Bluewater and bought the grocery store there when it came up for sale.

She even tried her hand at hairdressing while she was pregnant. She started with some of the girls she knew in college. She had some interesting results... She had a little girl who she called Raureni and then she was back into things. Thats Raureni as a little girl.

Ramsey, Aroha and I all started dating. Ramsey was really interested in Mercedes Vega from down the road. Aroha is going steady with Velo Sylvaen from across the road. And me? Well things are a bit complicated at the moment. You see I started dating Kayla Dante from next door and she was fun to be with. Then Aroha bought Ellie Lozier home from school and I strating dating her as well. No, I'm not a romance sim, its jsut that I couldn't make up my mind. Both Kayla and Ellie are knowledge and I really liked both of them. Then my mind got made up for me. Ellie invited me down to her place and Kayla saw me there and things got really messy. I think Kayla's the one who has been knocking over our trashcan at night. Pania decided to give the house a revamp. Nice house, eh. Pity, Ramsey tried to burn it down the following morning. Just kidding, the fireman did come and put it out eventually. Pania got pregnant again. But that didn't stop her. She started selling cars at the Corner Shop and reached a milestone when she earned 100 000 simoleans. It was a bit of a awkward place to sell cars so she decided after it reached top ranking To buy the Landgraab Real Estate office. Her first sale was the corner shop. She's very keen for us teenagers to get some experience working in her businesses. she says its a valuable learning experience for us. Here she is passing on some of the stuff she learned in her businesses. She told me recently that the house was in my father's name and when he died the house was left to me. She only moved back home after finishing Uni because Me and Aroha were still kids and she wanted to see that we were secure before she and Remus moved into their own home. She says they are planning to do that pretty soon. So that's how Te Waiata whanau beem going since we came to Pottsville. Arohanui

The Coopers - The Story So Far

"Hello Fred Cooper here, the family wants me to fill you in on what has happened since we moved to Fellowship Lane. My wife Louise and I used to be dairy farmers in the Waikato district. We were doing pretty well, we had built a new milking shed, the boys had just finished high school and were about to go to University. Terrance always had his nose in a book since he was a kid, and was very keen to study medicine down at Otago University. Joel was sports mad and made the 1st fifteen at high school. He had dreams of becoming a top sports and Terrence persuaded him that goign to uni with him and studying Physical Education would be a good move. Ethan was always more interested in romancing the girls than study and was talking about heading to the big city after high school. That is until Terrance persuaded him that he could find plenty of young ladies from right around the country at uni. "I would have been very proud to see all three of my sons gruaduate from university, it was something that I always wanted for my children. But that was until Malcolm Phoenix came to town... "Malcolm came to the local town to persuade folk to invest in what he said was a exciting new venture. I'm afraid I was dazzled by his fast patter and mortgaged the farm to invest. All I could see was my sons graduating from Uni without any debt, marrying and providing fine homes for the grandchildren that I longed to see. "Then the bubble burst, Malcolm disappeared with all the money. He was eventually tracked down and charged with fraud but by that time the money was all gone. I lost my farm, my home, my pension. Then Louise died of a broken heart. In the circumstances the boys would hear of going to uni and leaving me alone. They are such fine young men but I wish they been able to go. "Then we had a small stroke of luck. One of my aunts died and left me her house in Fellowship Lane and small sum of money. So I came to Pottsville along with my sons (who insisted on coming). "The first day in the house we had visitors come to the house to welcome us. What a friendly neighbourhood! That's Joel talking to Moana Te Waiata from across the road, in the background is her mother Hine and in the bathroom is Romulas Bonacorrd. Turns out we know the Te Waiatas, well sort of. Moana used to work as a lab technician at the dairy factory where we used to send our milk. Well fancy that, imagine coming all this way and then finding someone from home the very first day we are here. I think I am going to like it here. (and Joel seems to like Moana - very much). "I also visited some of the other families. Shocking what the Sylvaen children next door have being through. From what I can gather they seem to some sort of political refugees. Their parents aren't here but the older brother and sister seem to be very sensible with good heads on their shoulders, I am particulary impressed with the sister, Amethyst her name. Also across the road are the Dantes. I've met the mother Liza Dante. She's got a bit of a sharp tongue but she's been through an awful lot since her family got here. Apparently her house burnt down taking her husband with it. Then there are the Antoniuses next door... "Oops, certain family member are telling me that this story is meant to be about the Coopers not every other family in the neighbourhood. They'll get their chance to tell their story when their turn comes! "Oh, yes I shall certainly tell them about Terrance! We had enough money in the inheritance to furnish the house and then there was a little left over. Now Terrance has always been interested in astronomy and had his heart set on getting one of those expensive telescope and considering the sacrifices that he has made who I was I to deny him. Now it had just turned dark, I was inside having a chat with my new neighbours when Terrance decided he wanted to try out his new telescope. Tori Antonius from next door was telling me all her family's woes, yes I'll let her tell them to the good folk when the time comes, when suddenly we heard this strange noise come from outside and strange light come through the window. We all rushed outside... "Terrance had been abducted by aliens! He was returned to us early in the morning. He didn't seem to be any the worst for wear so we went settling into our new lives in Fellowship Lane. Terrance got a job as a emergency medical technician and tells me that there the possibility that he might able to study part-time. Both Ethan and Joel joined the army. Joel says it's just temporary, that's he's looking for a opening in the sports career. Ethan has been spending a lot of his time on community lots. I thought he was going there just to meet the ladies of the neighbourhood but I was pleasantly surprised when Ethan told me that he had be moonlighting as a barista so he buy his own community lot. "Then he spent a lot of time at the lot building his business (although I suspect he found a lot of time to do a lot of, um, socialising). "I found my own special lady to socialise with. None other than Hine Te Waiata from across the road. I guess at the beginning it was just good to hear a voice from home. I shared my feelings about how my sons missed out on University because of my reckless investment and how good they have been to me since then. She said she could really empathise about the University part and told what had been going on in her family, how she had lost her brother and son and daughter in law when she arrived in Pottville. She wanted her eldest daughter to go to uni but Moana just wanted to have a fun time. How her second daughter Pania was still at high school but was failing because of all the stress of all the deaths in the family. How she and Moana were left in care of her grandson Maui and granddaughter Aroha. And how she was hoping that being responsible for her niece and nephew would bring Moana to her senses. "Somewhere along the line we found ourselves falling in love... Things seemed to fizzle out between Moana and Terrance and Terrance met Kasseri Fromage from down the road and romance blossemed During the day he been suffering from a mysterious bout of food poisoning but we couldn't identify why he was having problems while everyone else was symptom free. After all we had all been eating the same food. We were soon to find out why... Terrance was pregnant! That did not stop him from romancing Kasseri! Meanwhile things were going very well between Hine and I. "Terrance introduced Joel to Kasseri's sister Aura. Well there's a another pair smitten. "Two standing lamps mysteriously appeared outside our house... "Well not so mysterious, Hine and Kasseri were seen sneaking away... "Hine laughed when I asked her about it. She says she and Kasseri went to the local cafe afterwards and had a good chat. She thinks Kasseri and Terrance would make a good couple since Kasseri was a family sim and Terrance was knowledge. Then she winked at me and said we would make a good couple for the same reason except she was knowledge and I was family. "Something else Hine said got me thinking. She told me how Kasseri was seriously thinking of adopting, of how there were so many sim kids in need of a good home. I ended up telling her how I always wanted a big family but how Louise couldn't have anymore kids so we stopped at three, and how much I would love to ring up the adoption serivce and give some of those kids a home myself. "Hine asked why didn't I and I had to admit it was the money aspect holding me back. The adoption service wanted families with a certain amount of money in the bank and we simply did not have that spare cash hanging around. Ethan overheard the conversation and left the room with a very thoughtful expression on his face. He came back a wee while later and shoved something into my hands. It was a big wad of simoleans! "When I asked him about it he told me that he had sold his business so we would have enough money in the house to satisfy the adoption agency. He then grinned and said it was a temporary loan but he had got a large enough goodwill payment for it that would enable him to add some improvement and also provide a bit of cash on hand for the family. "I went and called the adoption service, they said they would bring a child around in the morning and went to tell Hine the good news. She told me she was so happy for me and then grinned and said you know those kid need a mother as well as a father. "Hint taken, I got down on my knees and proposed to her which was followed very quickly by very quick wedding ceremony. We wanted to make sure nothing would go wrong with the adoption the following morning. "Before that happened we were awoken from cries coming from the boys room next door. Terrance was going into labour! He gave birth to twin boy Sky and Rangi. My first grandchildren, I feel so proud. Later that morning my new daughter Lainey was dropped off. "Here's Hine having a good chat to her behind the house. "And this is what our house looked like then. "Then there were a whole lot of changes. Amethyst from next door told me about a mysterious device that can change a sim's aspiration and persuaded Ethan to use it. Ethan seemed to be a lot more interested in family matters. Terrance and Joel ended up moving in with the Fromage sisters and I'll let them tell their story when their turn comes so I won't spoil it for you. (I'd just say that Sky and Rangi aren't my only grandchildren). Amethyst from next door went to college and persuaded my step daughter Pania to go with her and while she was at college she got involved with my son Ethan and married him when she graduated. Shortly after they got married my son Joel called me and invited me down to Ethan's community lot. "There was something he wanted to show me he said. Then he showed me the deed to the community lot hanging on the wall priced at 1 simoleon! when I gasped he said look we've discussed this between the three of us. We all want you to have the lot, you don't get much working for a wage as a elder and this will provide a security for you and Hine and Lainey and the other little brothers and sisters of ours that you are going to adopt. I mean you rang a successful dairy farm for how many years , We're pretty certain that you can run a successful store. "And so we did. Hine and I worked hard and built a store on that site. "We hired a young man called Tempus Viator to work in the store. He brought with him a bench that could make robots. Now I wonder where that technology came from. We adopted more children, a boy, Greg, another girl, Sharlene and then three boys Chase, Zack and Stuart. This is Greg being teased by one of our neighbours. "Although he seems to have a sunny disposition and wasn't down for long. This is Zack arriving at the house.This is Sharlene becoming a teenager, the boy in front of her is Chase and the boy at the back is Stuat Lainey became very interested in my employee Tempus. And became romantically involved with him. "When she and the others went to University she persuaded Tempus to go with her. I am so happy to see these three go to University. By the time they left to go to University I had acquired two more business and I transferred them to Sharlene and Lainey before they left. "Why didn't Greg get anything? Well Greg is my heir and he will inherit the original business and house when I pass on... "This is me and Hine and the boys sitting down to eat breakfast on a very special day. "He's arriving in the car! "We rang up the adoption service last night and was greeted warmly by the social worker. "'Hi Mr Cooper,' she said, 'I know that you like to adopt children but would you consider adopting a toddler this time? We have a little boy who we think will do very well with you and your wife.' She told me of the tragic circumstance surrounding the child. It didn't take long for Hine and I to say yes. "So meet Michael, my tenth child "We want to provide the best for him. Bring him up well. We've expanded our home from it's humble beginnings. "We're doing well financially, own a successful business, have all the business perks, have gold badges in sales, restocking and cash register "But it is all a byproduct of caring for our family. This is what is really important to us, these precious lives entrusted to our care.