Here’s a better look at the dress, which comes with an optional bolero jacket:
The December 4th Advent calendar gift from Entice is this summery outfit (and yes, I do like it when Advent calendars don’t just give me Christmas and winter apparel):
Finally, today’s gift from Alli&Ali Hair is this Catherine hairstyle in white, shown here on my angel avatar:
Happy freebie shopping! Remember, all these gifts disappear at midnight Second Life/Pacific Time, so don’t wait!
Hoo boy, do I have a lot of gifts to show you today! So let’s get started. Remember, these Advent calendar gifts are only available today, December 3rd. Snooze, ya lose! So, let’s get started…and please note, unless I say otherwise, you do need to join the store group to pick up the following gifts (and, unless I state otherwise below, that store group will be free to join, so if you are short on group space like I am, you can join the group and then leave it).
Today’s gift from Firelight Hair is the long Clarissa hairstyle, which comes with a mini-HUD with 3 blonde colours as shown:
Virtue‘s Advent Calendar today gives you this lovely peach-and-white floral blouse and matching long skirt, which can be worn separately:
Here’s the gift from Wow Skins (group join fee is L$199). The Sharon skin includes Bakes on Mesh body skin, and is designed for LeLutka mesh heads, but as you can see, it works well on the LOGO Chelsea head I am wearing in this picture!
Here’s the December 3rd group gift from 7 Deadly S[k]ins (group join fee is L$1,000). Today you also receive the Hope Bakes on Mesh skin with lipstick as shown below, plusa male skin, plus a fatpack of the Miss Behave Omega skin appliers!
The gift from Essenz (L$50 for non-members, or pay the L$350 group join fee to pick up all of the Advent Calendar gifts, plus a fatpack of the versatile Wales pumps) is called Guayadil, which comes in sizes to fit Maitreya, Belleza, and Legacy feet:
A large pink notice on the floor in front of the Advent calendar at Vagrant states:
So here’s a look at two of the gifts, from December 1st (the Camila earrings, which come with a HUD to select one of seven metals) and December 3rd (the Aurora floral wreath includes a HUD which allows you to tint the three different sets of the roses separately, either to match or differ, and also includes optional Christmas lights!).
Tucked in behind the Christmas tree at the Vagrant store are a whole whack of group gifts (the group is free to join, so be sure to scoop them up, too!).
Here’s the present from Emerald Couture for December 3rd, the Krista minidress in a plum-coloured snowflake pattern, perfect for your next holiday party!
Pink Mango offers up another minidress in blue suede:
The Advent calendar gift from Justice is this fern green Misty dress (which also comes in an ombre colour):
In addition to the gifts I have pictured here, there is a also a set of four unisex dances from Abranimations, a black puffed-jacket-and-T-shirt combo for men and women from ML Designs, and a pair of black sweatpants for male avatars from Fashion Fantasy (please use one of the Advent calendar lists in this blogpost to find the SLURLs).
Happy freebie shopping!
P.S. If you are in the market for an Ugly Christmas Sweater™, for only L$1 you can pick up the following red sweater from Xtra Ordinari (warning: adult sim), which comes in versions to fit a wide variety of both male and female mesh bodies:
And today’s Advent calendar gift from Entice is an absolutely HIDEOUS ugly Christmas sweater for women in purple and teal. I won’t show it to you here, you have to go over to Entice and see it for yourself. I have to give the designer credit, though…you have to truly work at it to come up with something so horrible!
I don’t usually do writeups on Advent Calendar gifts in Second Life, because they are only available for 24 hours, and for those people who don’t visit my blog every day, it can be a bit frustrating to see free apparel and footwear that they might have missed picking up the day before.
However, since I am still stuck in self-isolation in my home during the province-wide pandemic lockdown in Manitoba, I might start doing a show-and-tell of some of the bounty that I did pick up that day, just to keep busy. So, here is my haul for December 2nd, 2020.
Virtue is a store run by Abiela Heartsong, who is a Christian woman who specializes in modest but stylish womenswear. Every year, she has an Advent Calendar in her store, with a free gift each day (you do need to join the Virtue group for free to pick up these gifts).
If (like me), you have some time to kill, then in front of the Advent Calendar are two camping chairs, a relative rarity in Second Life these days! You can sit for 60 minutes and win this lovely pastel party dress:
Camping chair at Virtue: My avatar looks so bored…
While my avatar waits, I will show you a couple of the December 2nd Advent Calendar gifts I picked up today. The blue Felicia outfit from Virtue comes in three separate parts: pants, tube top, and sleeves (not shown below), in sizes to fit Maitreya Lara; Belleza Venus, Isis, and Freya; Slink Physique and Hourglass; and Meshbody Legacy. The texturing is lovely, and it’s the perfect outfit for being stuck at home!
The December 2nd Advent Gift from the Essenz women’s footwear store is this lovely pair of Athens high-heeled sandals in black, which include a HUD to change the colour of the sole and the bow. This shoe comes in sizes to fit Maitreya, Belleza, and Slink feet. If you do not wish to spend the L$350 to join the Essenz store group to pick up all the Advent Calendar gifts, you can choose to buy this pair of shoes for only L$50 by clicking on the appropriate panel at the front of the store! (I love it when stores provide that option for non-group members! I believe Entice does that, too.)
Just a reminder that both WOW Skins and 7 Deadly S[k]ins have Advent Calendars with gifts of female Bakes on Mesh skins for your avatar. If you missed your chance to join the 7 Deadly S[k]ins group before December. it now will cost you L$1,000 to join, but for that, you will get 31 days on gifts! The cost to join the WOW Skins group is only L$199, but with that you can not only pick up each day’s Advent Calendar gift, but also all of the monthly group gifts (there is a box with all the previous group gifts on a small table underneath the display of the most recent monthly group gifts).
Happy freebie shopping!
UPDATE 9:15 a.m.: Camping is done! Here’s what the Alexandria Dots party dress looks like:
The shoes in this last picture are the Wales pumps from Essenz. This is a group gift, a complete fatpack, which alone is enough reason to join the Essenz group for L$350, as I explain in a previous blogpost about the Wales pumps:
That means that you get 26 shoe colours times 4 sole colours times 4 metal colours times 4 shoe styles, which works out to 1,664 different shoes! So even if you aren’t already a member of the Essenz group and getting this fatpack of versatile pumps for free, the L$350 group join fee works out to L$0.20 per shoe! Now, if that’s not a deal, I don’t know what is!
The group gift of the Wales fatpack of pumps is located on the front counter of the store, just behind the Advent Calendar (see red arrow below):
So, you listen to your Auntie Ryan, the undisputed Freebie Queen of Second Life 😉 , and you get your pixelated ass down to Essenz, join their store group, and mop up some truly lovely shoes!
Well, as November winds down, it is time for the dedicated freebie fashionistas to begin planning for December, when many Second Life stores have either an Advent calendar or a Twelve Days of Christmas calendar, with gifts for you to pick up each day!
There are four lists of 2020 Advent calendars published by various websites:
UPDATE Dec. 1st, 2020: I have gone through and checked each of the SLURLs to the stores linked to below, and updated them where necessary. All of them should now take your directly to the store (some have changed location since last year!).
Six Advent Calendars I Will Be Visiting Every Day
Firelight Hair has an Advent calendar running from December 1st to 24th (you do need to join the Firelight group for free). The gifts are mostly women’s hairstyles, but there will also be a few male/unisex styles. All hair gifts come with a mini 3-colour HUD.
7 Deadly s[K]ins has an advent tree in their store, with generous gifts every day from Dec. 1st through to the 31st! You do have to join the group; I believe the group join fee is L$125 until the end of November, then it jumps up to L$1,000 during December!
Appliqué Chic offers two separate Advent calendars, one for men and a second for women! Each day’s gifts are free, and you can buy gifts from previous days for only L$10 each. No group join is required.
Virtue offers an Advent calendar with beautiful clothing gifts for women. The emphasis here is on classic, modest fashion. You do not need to join the Virtue group to pick up these gifts.
Entice offers Advent calendar gifts of womenswear from December 1st to 25th (you do have to join the Entice group for free). They also have a very handy sign on either side of their Advent tree, which shows you what each of the gifts look like, so you can plan ahead!
Essenz has an advent calendar from December 1st to the 25th, offering gifts of high-quality women’s footwear (the group costs L$350 to join).
Four “Twelve Days of Christmas” Calendars I Will Be Visiting Every Day
Please note that none of these calendars will be set up until mid-December:
The Baby Monkey calendar runs from December 12th to the 23rd, 2020 and is free each day. This year, you can pick up all the gifts at once if you prefer to make just one visit, between Dec. 23rd and the end of the year. All the gifts together form a complete, colour-coordinated capsule wardrobe. Even better, you do not need to join a group to pick up the gifts this year!
Altamura has a 12 Days of Christmas calendar running from December 12th to 24th, with a different gift every day: male and female accessories, clothes, skins, makeup, even a mesh head! Please note that the group join fee for Altamura is usually L$100, but during December the group is free to join.
JUMO usually gives away gifts of women’s apparel and jewelry from Dec. 12th-Dec. 24th, as well as on New Year’s Eve. This is the place to pick up some beautiful ballgowns and costume jewelry!
The eBENTO Event has an advent calendar that runs from Dec. 11th to Dec. 25th. Last year, the large red calendar numbers are randomly scattered around the shopping event, with two or three gifts from participating vendors each day. The eBENTO group is free to join.
