Tag: December

UPDATED! Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Your Guide to Free Heads and Skins at the LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas Event, Dec. 9th to 21st, 2023

The list of merchants participating in the LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas event

At 12 noon SLT (Second Life/Pacific Time) yesterday, December 9th, 2023, LeLutka and 78 other stores in Second Life launched the biggest-ever 12 Days of Christmas event! The notecard sent out to the LeLutka group states:

It’s a wonderful time of the year, and we want to express our gratitude to you, our loyal customers, by offering some amazing gifts for the December festivities. We are excited to announce that 79 stores are joining us for this event, making it even more spectacular.

As per tradition, Lelutka is offering one female and one male head as a gift from today until the 21st of December. After this date, the heads will return to their regular pricing. To access these special gifts, please ensure that you are wearing your LeLutka group tag, as this will enable you to teleport to the designated gift regions and claim your presents.

To get your LeLUTKA gift heads, you need to visit two special Holiday Gift sims. Gifts ARE NOT located in the main store, so please use the landmarks below to get there:

…

PLEASE NOTE that you have 10 minutes to visit before you will be teleported home.

We hope you have a joyful and festive season.

Best regards,
Your Lelutka Team

You can get a complete listing of all the participating stores (with SLURLs) in three different ways:

  1. A notecard titled 12 Days of Christmas List, posted to the LeLutka store group, and also available if you click on the LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas sign posted at each participating store, near that store’s gift (the sign looks like the image at the top of this blog post);
  2. the LeLutka website; and
  3. SeraphimSL’s LeLutka’s 12 Days of Christmas list, which very helpfully includes pictures of all the gifts!

Now, before I learned about the Seraphim list, I had actually enlisted my main female avatar, Vanity Fair, and my main male avatar Heath Homewood, to visit almost every store on the LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas list, and now I am going to show you some of my favourite gifts.

Now, I must forewarn you that I am going to be laser-focused this year! I do NOT have time to drag each one of my small army of alts through seventy-nine stores!! Therefore, I will focus on the LeLutka heads, and those head skins which either come with body skins, or match Velour skin tones (of which most of my alts already own at least a few skin tones). That means that I will not be showing you cosmetics, tattoos, hair, accessories such as earrings and other jewelry, and any skin where I have to buy matching body skins! Please use the other lists posted above to find those items.

PRO TIP: Please also note that you must join the store group in order to pick up each store’s gift. However, all the stores participating in the LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas event have set their store groups to be free to join for the duration of the event. So join those groups, as many as you can juggle, and STAY JOINED throughout the year if you can! Many of these groups, particularly skin and cosmetic groups, will charge a join fee again after December 21st, 2023. (The LeLutka, Velour, and Leronso store groups are usually free to join year-round, so you won’t need to stay in them. Ives Beauty is an example of a group that will charge after this event, so join now if you like their skins, and you will be able to pick up all the group gifts for free!)

And that reminds me to remind you: look carefully around each store to see what other group gifts are available! For example, Tres Beau has at least two more female skin fat packs, plus several other gifts on their gift wall, located behind the wall at the front counter of their store. Avi-Glam also has a group gifts wall in their store, in addition to their two LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas gifts located outside their store.

LeLutka Heads

LeLutka has what I believe to be two brand-new Evolution X (EvoX) Bento mesh heads available for free, the Noel female head and the Kris male head. Both heads include head and ear skins in four skin tones. Here’s what the Noel head looks like in the Rose Kiss skin tone, using the included eyebrow shape and body shape:

I paired the Noel head with my new LaraX body, using the Snow skin tone, to show you what the default body shape looks like (obviously, this is just a starting point, from which you will make adjustments to the head and body sliders to get your preferred look):

Here’s what the LeLutka Kris head looks like (skin tone 6), paired with the new Senra 1.0 male body (Senra skin tone 3), using the default eyebrow shape and body shape included in the Kris package. Note that the included skins have a neck fade, which makes them easier to match whatever body skins you have in your inventory! Again, you’re going to have to hit the sliders to make that neck less long, and make other adjustments.

Male Body Skins

I’m going to cover the male body skins first. In this section only, I will mention if there are non-Velour body skins required (the two most common ones are by Not Found and Stray Dog). If a store has both male and female head skin gifts, I will mention both in this section.

ALT3

Mei female skins (3 packs, matches ALT3 body skin, ALT3 fantasy body skin, and Velour body skin, all sold separately) and Park male skin (2 packs, matches ALT3 body skin and ALT3 fantasy body skin, also sold separately)

Avarosa

Kris male skin (matches Not Found and Velour body skins) and Noel female skin (matches Velour body skins)

Avi-Glam

PLEASE NOTE: The Amara Beauty/Avi-Glam region is currently overloaded, and the vendors do not work. Please come back later when things are less crazy! I was unable to pick up these gifts. UPDATE 12:25 p.m.: the problems with lag on the region are so horrible, that they have moved the Kris male skin gift and Carol (unisex) eyes gift here, to a completely different region. UPDATE 7:09 p.m.: Even on the new sim, the Avi-Glam vendor still isn’t working properly. It’s clear at this point that these vendors were woefully unprepared for the onslaught of freebie hunters! Right now there are 80 avatars waiting for their items. Please note that you have to pay the vendor L$1, and it is supposed to be automatically refunded, then you get your item. That isn’t happening, and rather than have you fight the lag and keep feeding Linden dollars into a black hole, I would just advise you wait until they get their act together. UPDATE 7:15 p.m.: I finally got my Carol (unisex) eyes, but this is, by far, the worst vendor experience of the entire LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas event, and I would advise you to steer clear unless you have infinite patience.

Kris male skin and Carol unisex eyes fatpack

Brabos

Kris male skin (matches Not Found and Velour body skins)

Clef de Peau

Maghia female skin and Darius male skin (matches Velour body skins)

Fuoey

Yuri male skin fatpack (matches Not Found body skin tones)

Hype

Noel female skin and Ramon male skin (matches Hype body skins, sold separately)

Ives Beauty

Kaden male skin (Not Found, Stray Dog, and Veloue skin tones) and Noelle female skin (matches Velour skin tones)

MetaHumano

Talita female and Pablo male skins (1 skin tone each; matches Velour body skins)

Mister Razzor

Gabriel hairbases, skin and shape (matches Not Found body skins)

Not Found

Kris male skin (matches Not Found body skins) and Noel hairbase (to go with the gift from L’Etre/Doux)
The ponytail attachment for the Not Found hairbase can be picked up as a free gift at L’Etre/Doux, at the spawn point of the store region

Stray Dog

Kris male skin (uses Stray Dog body skins, sold separately)

Soul

Kris male skin and Noel female skin (matches Velour body skins)

Vendetta

The Kris skin matches Vendetta’s own body skin tones, which are sold separately

Female Skins

This list is much longer than the list of male skins. I will not be including any female skins that I already mentioned in the previous male skin list. And again, it will be a selective list, including only those skins which either come with body skins, or match with Velour body skin tones. Please use the 3 lists I linked at the top of this blog post to find other skin gifts; the Seraphim list includes pictures to save you the trouble of teleporting from place to place.

Amara Beauty

Like I said before, the Amara Beauty/Avi-Glam region is currently overloaded, and the vendors are not working properly. Come back later! UPDATE 12:25 p.m.: the problems with lag on the sim are so bad, that they have moved the Karol skin gift here.

Amara Beauty offers the Karol female skin (matches 3 Velour body skin tones)

Bold and Beauty

Holly female skin (2 fatpacks, 1 with Velour skin tones)

Cosmetize

Nao female skin (matches Velour body skins)

DeeTaleZ

Aurelia female skin (uses DeeTaleZ skin tones, but there’s a chart in store and in the package to explain how they match Velour body skin tones)

Guapa

Noela female skin (matches Velour skin tones, including some fantasy skin tones)

Heaux

Noel skin (matches Velour body skins)

Lueur

Sidney female skin (matches Velour body skin tones)

Moccino

Bia female skin (matches Velour body skins; please note: the gift is located OUTSIDE the store, and you have to click on the gift boxes, not the sign! See the red arrow in the image above.

NonNative

Tracie and Kira female skins (matches Velour body skins)

Nuve

Holly female skin (3 packs; 1 in Nuve skin tones which includes the body skins, one matching Velour regular skin tones, and one matching Velour fantasy skin tones)

Purple

Neolia mature woman’s skin (matches Velour skin tones)

Traditional Face

Noelly female skin (marches Velour body skin tones)

Tres Beau

Aspen female skin (includes a notecard explaining how to match the skins to various skin tones, including Velour). Don’t forget to pick up all the group gifts in the store, which include 2 more female skin fatpacks!

Happy holidays, and happy freebie shopping! Remember that some of these regions where the gifts are located are currently very busy, so you might want to wait until later to pick up these and other gifts. But don’t wait too long, this event ends on December 21st, 2023 (which, based on my past years’ experience with some stores, means midnight Second Life Time/Pacific Time on December 20th, 2023)!

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Your Guide to the 2023 Advent Calendars and 12 Days of Christmas Calendars in Second Life

December is the most wonderful time of the year—for freebie fashionistas in the virtual world of Second Life! This month heralds another edition of the popular Holiday Shop and Hop shopping event* (running from December 1st, 2023, to January 1st, 2024), with a gift at every participating vendor booth. We can also expect another iteration of the annual LeLutka Holiday event (dates as yet unknown), where you can pick up free male and female LeLutka heads, as well as many other freebies from a variety of creators supporting LeLutka, such as LeLutka EvoX skins, hair, and cosmetics. There will be sales and freebies galore all month long!

But the biggest reason why December is such a great month for freebies is that so many stores have an Advent calendar*, or a Twelve Days of Christmas calendar, where you can pick up a gift each day until (and sometimes, including) Christmas Day!

Various Second Life stores, groups, and organizations are still putting the final touches on their calendars and lists of calendars, but one that is already up and running is TeleportHub.com’s Advent Calendar Store List.

TeleportHub maintains a good list of Advent and 12 Days of Christmas calendars

UPDATE Dec. 1st, 2023: Another popular list of calendars is Seraphim’s 2023 Holiday Sales and Advent Calendars List, which also includes details on December sales being held at various stores.

Seraphim compiles a list of dozens of stores with holiday sales and Advent calendars

UPDATE Dec. 1st, 2023: Fabulously Free in SL (or FabFree for short) maintains the December Advent Listing of 24/25-day calendars and 12-day calendars. They also helpfully subdivide each section into free (or free-to-join group) calendars, and calendars where you have to pay a group fee to pick up each day’s gift.

Remember that these lists are updated often, so bookmark them and check back regularly. As I hear about other lists of Advent calendars, I will add them to this blog post! And please feel free to leave me a comment if you know about a store Advent calendar (or calendar list), thanks!

PRO TIPS: Dreamer Pixelmaid runs a Discord server, called Dreamer’s SL, with a dedicated Advent Calendar channel. Here’s your invitation to join us.

Popular Second Life YouTuber Naria Panthar also runs a Discord server with an Advent calendar channel; here’s the invite to join her Discord.

Volunteers (like me!) will try to post pictures of the gifts from various calendars to these Discord channels, but it will be somewhat hit-or-miss. Please see the next paragraph of this blogpost for another way to stay on top of the avalanche of Advent calendar gifts in Second Life!

UPDATE Dec. 1st, 2023: For the past couple of years, the very hardworking folks over at the Russian-language VKontakte group Second Life – FREE have posted a daily roundup of that day’s Advent calendar gifts, with pictures! And those Russian-speaking freebie fashionistas are doing it again for 2023. They even went so far as to create a handy directory of stores with links to pictures of each day’s Advent gift!

Bookmark this list and check back daily; this is probably THE easiest way to actually see each day’s calendar gifts without teleporting all over the grid, collecting and unpacking items! (Please note that you do not need to set up an account on VKontakte; if you click on an image, and it asks you to sign in, just click on the X icon in the upper-right hand corner of the pop-up window—see image, right. The image will then load in full size.)

To get around the language barrier, I usually have the VKontakte list open in one browser tab, and Google Translate in a second browser tab, and just cut and paste the Russian text into the translator. As I said, this is a very useful hidden resource for us seasoned Advent calendar plunderers! 😉

UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2023: The HuntSL website has a number of posts about Advent calendars; you can find them all here.

UPDATE Dec. 5th, 2023: I just discovered another Advent calendar list which I had never heard of before, by AmigoUFO, called Christmas Advent Calendars List 2023, which seems to focus on just the free ones (or those that require a free group join). Amigo also maintains lists for Advent calendars for dinkies, tinies, and child avatars, and Christmas trees with gifts.

Bookmark this blog post and come back often for the latest updates! I will do my best to keep this blogpost as up-to-date as possible throughout December, and into the new year (yes, a few stores do have New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day gifts!).

Happy freebie shopping!

It’s the most wonderful time of the year…

* I regret to say that, as I did last year, I will NOT be doing a daily round-up of Advent calendar gifts every day, either here on the blog or in the RyanSchultz.com Steals, Deals, and Freebies Second Life group (although I will still try and post some fabulous freebies and bargains to the latter, as I come across them). I’m sorry, but it’s simply too much work for me this year, and therefore I will leave that task to others. I have already posted my picks for the best 2023 Holiday Shop and Hop gifts to the group notices of my group. Happy holidays to all!

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Ryan’s Quick and Dirty Guide to the 2022 Holiday Shop and Hop

Yes, I am still percolating, but of course, the holidays wait for no one! This year, the annual Second Life Holiday Shop and Hop covers 16 sims, simply groaning with discounted items for sale. And each vendor booth has a free Christmas present for you—and a few have more than one!

I have spent the past week scouring social media for information to learn which stores are participating in this year’s Holiday Shop and Hop, and what gifts each store is giving. Then I drew up a draft list, loaded up Second Life supermodel Moesha Heartsong, and hit all 16 sims, to pick up, unpack, and inspect each gift from that list. As more information came in, I edited and updated that list, and it is now at version 3.0!

This final list consists of my picks for the best gifts from this season’s Shop and Hop (mostly fashion for female avatars, but also some male fashion, as well as any offers of gift cards or free store credit). Each item on the list includes an exact SLURL, so you can teleport directly to the gift, pick it up, and head on to your next score! Having all one sim’s gifts grouped together means less teleporting back and forth between sims, a factor to consider early on in the event, when some popular sims get congested with avatar traffic.

I have posted that detailed list to my own Second Life group, called the RyanSchultz.com Steals, Deals & Freebies group (just search for “ryanschultz”, all one word, under Groups in Search, and you will find it easily). More information on the RyanSchultz.com Steals, Deals & Freebies group can be found here. The group join fee is only L$50, and you will find it money well spent, as I often share many bargains and freebies throughout the year, which never make it to this blog!

As an alternative to my list, or if you really want to make sure you haven’t missed any gifts that I skipped over, I still feel that the single best way to tackle the Shop and Hop events is to watch Naria Panthar’s videos on YouTube.

Naria always posts one or two videos where she unpack every single gift from the event, both non-wearable items and avatar clothing, and shows you what they look like. Watch the videos with the audio at two times normal speed, and keep a pen and paper handy to note the stores which have gifts you want (Naria herself recommends watching and listening at 2X speed, so it doesn’t take as long!).

Then, use this handy list which Linden Lab has provided to find your Shop and Hop store by name, teleport in, and snap up your present! (Note that, in some cases, a store SLURL from this list might accidentally stick up behind a wall or, in one case, on top of the roof! This is another good reason to join the RyanSchultz.com Steals, Deals & Freebies group—I have tested all the SLURLs, and that should not happen!)

The Holiday Shop and Hop event is on now, and runs until January 2nd, 2023, so you have plenty of time to pop in and scoop up some fabulous freebies for yourself!

UPDATED for December 10th! Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Advent Calendars and 12 Days of Christmas Calendars in 2022

Photo by Elena Mozhvilo on Unsplash

It’s that most wonderful time of the year! And I’m talking about the time where on-the-ball freebie fashionistas can scoop up dozens of free gifts from the many Second Life stores which have either an Advent calendar (running Dec. 1st to Dec. 24th or 25th) or a Twelve Days of Christmas calendar (usually running between Dec. 12th or 13th and Dec. 24th or 25th).

Lists of Stores with Advent Calendars and 12 Days of Christmas Calendars

The Advent Calendar list by TeleportHub.com

If you’re looking for a list of such calendars, here are some that I have found useful (note that this list will be updated as I find new ones; many are not published until later in the day on December 1st, or even on December 2nd!):

  • TeleportHub.com’s Advent Calendar Store List 2022 is already up!
  • UPDATE 9:53 p.m.: December Advent Listing by Fabulously Free in SL.
  • UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2022: Holiday Sales and Advent List from Seraphim.
  • UPDATE Dec. 6th, 2022: Dreamer’s 2022 Advent Calendar List, from the Dreamer’s Virtual World blog (there’s also a gallery on Flickr). Dreamer’s list also tells you which calendars allow you to collect the previous days’ presents, either for free (no group needed), free with group, or paid with group! Very handy info to have. What I like to do for those Advent calendars where I can pick up all the previous days’ gifts, is wait until Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, teleport in, and then pick them all up at one time!
  • UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2022: Second Life Syndicate has a Google spreadsheet with over 200 Advent and Twelve Days of Christmas calendars, which you can access here (scroll down and click on the link that says “Commenting Spreadsheet”, which can only accommodate up to 100 people at one time; a second spreadsheet, called “Published Spreadsheet”, will be published soon, but is not yet available).
  • Low Price Fashion in Second Life is a little-known Japanese blog which, last year, posted a daily roundup of that day’s Advent calendar gifts. I expect they will do the same this year.
  • Last year, the very hardworking folks over at the Russian-language VKontakte group Second Life – FREE posted a daily roundup of that day’s Advent calendar gifts, with pictures! And those Russian freebie fashionistas are doing it again for 2022. They even went so far as to create an alphabetical list of stores with links to pictures of each day’s Advent gift! Bookmark this list and check back daily; this is probably THE easiest way to actually see each day’s calendar gifts without teleporting all over the grid, collecting and unpacking items! (Please remember to use the Russian-to-English translator in your Chrome browser, or Google Translate, to read the posts in this Russian-language community. You do not need to set up an account on VKontakte; just click on the “Not Now!” link every time the nagging pop-up appears asking you to log in.)
  • UPDATE Dec. 10th, 2022: I don’t know how on Earth I could have missed this wonderful resource until today, but Second Life YouTuber Naria Panthar has a Discord server, which you can join here. And in that Discord server is an #advent-calendars channel, where somebody posts pictures of as many Advent calendar gifts as they can find! There’s much less clicking involved than with the VKontake group I mentioned above, all you have to do is scroll through each day’s listings! Even better, a direct SLURL to the gift is included. A big thank you to hupe, who makes these valuable posts! This might well be the best and easiest way yet to see what each SL store is offering, without having to teleport all over the grid, and then unpack and try on gifts.
A sample of hupe’s work from the #advent-calendars channel on Maria Panthar’s Discord

Ryan’s Picks: Stores I Will Be Visiting Every Day

This year, instead of wearing myself out trying to hit every single calendar on the grid, I will be focusing my energy on just a select few which, year after year, consistently offer the best gifts. Here are my top picks for 2022!

  • Firelight Hair has a Twelve Days of calendar running from December 13th to 24th (you do need to join the Firelight group for free). You have to pick up each gift on the day it is offered. The gifts are mostly women’s hairstyles, but there will also be a few unisex styles. All hair gifts usually come with a mini 2 or 3-colour HUD.
  • 7 Deadly s[K]ins always has an advent tree in their store, with generous gifts every single day from Dec. 1st through to the 31st! Please note that you do have to join the store group, called SEVEN – [7DS]; there is a group join fee (when I checked on Nov. 30th, it was L$500). To get each day’s present from the tree, simply pay the vendor L$1, and it will automatically be refunded. If you missed a day, you can buy previous days’ gifts for L$25 each. Apparently, they are also giving away gifts each weekend, so pop in!

In the room immediately to the left of the 7 Deadly S[k]ins Advent tree, you can purchase a fatpack of skins for L$1 from the Today’s Offer board, as well as pick up another free skin fatpack from the Giftboard, plus there are six Mini-Mania boards to try your luck for even more skins (see arrows in the picture below):

  • WOW Skins had extremely generous gifts of skin fatpacks every day in their Advent calendar, and I expect nothing less this year! (UPDATE Dec. 1st: Looks like this year it’s just single skins each day, no fatpacks!) You do have to be a member of their group (the group costs L$350).
  • Essenz has an Advent calendar running from Dec. 1st to 24th, where you can pick up a gift of high-quality women’s footwear every day (you must be a group member; the Essenz store group costs L$350 to join). If you missed a day, or you are not a group member, you can pick up previous days’ gifts for only L$50 each.
  • Every year, the Baby Monkey 12 Days of Christmas calendar (Dec. 13th to 24th) offers a free gift each day (women’s clothing and footwear). All the gifts together form a complete, colour-coordinated capsule wardrobe! You do have to show up each day to pick up that day’s gift (no group needed; just pay the vendor L$1, and it is automatically refunded).
An example (from 2 years ago) of the gifts from the 12 Days of Christmas calendar at Baby Monkey; every year, the gifts form a colour-coordinated capsule wardrobe in three colours!
  • JUMO will be giving away lovely gifts of women’s apparel and jewelry from Dec. 15th, 2022 to Jan. 1st, 2023 (no group required, and you can visit on New Year’s Day and pick up all the gifts at one time). This is the place to pick up some beautiful ballgowns and costume jewelry!
  • Last year, SOFIA had some absolutely gorgeous ballgowns and jewelry in their advent calendar. This year, their calendar will run over 20 days, from Dec. 5th to Christmas Day. You must join the SOFIA store group for free to pick up these presents!
  • ALB Dream Fashion will have a calendar again this year, stuffed with gifts for both male and female avatars (the first Advent gift is already available when I checked on Nov. 30th!). If interested, join the group now while it is still free (the name of the group to search for is “LAMU GROUP”). Per the notices, it will be L$500 to join beginning Dec 1st, 2022.

UPDATE Dec. 3rd, 2022: I just noticed that ALB Dream Fashion has provided a sneak preview of some of the presents from their Advent calendar! As you can see, they will have an assortment of wonderful gifts this season, for both male and female avatars.

  • UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2022: Both Vagrant (womenswear) and its sister store Zerkalo (home decor) have Advent calendars running from Dec. 1st to 24th (both require a free group join).
  • UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2022: Salt and Pepper will be offering clothing gifts on December 1st, on the weekends, and on Christmas Eve, and gift cards on weekdays, which can be applied to any merchandise in the store. The Salt & Pepper group costs L$300 to join.
  • UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2022: Glitzz has an Advent tree encircled with 24 teddy bear-adorned giftboxes, where you can pick up each day’s present for free (no group required). Previous days’ gifts can be purchased for L$25 each.
  • UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2022: Celestina’s was slightly delayed in setting out their Advent calendar gifts, but the first few are now out, in a row along the front counter of the store. If you act quickly, you can pick up the gifts from both Dec. 1st and Dec. 2nd today, a strapless violet ballgown and a salmon shrug. The gifts for the next few days have previews on the boxes, and they look very nice! You must join the Celestina’s group for free to pick up these presents. If you miss a day, you can buy that day’s gift for L$35.
  • UPDATE Dec. 2nd, 2022: Seniha (womenswear) has an Advent calendar located outside their store. You need to join their group for free to obtain each day’s gift.
  • UPDATE Dec. 3rd, 2022: The advent calendar at ALTER is giving away lovely gifts of women’s clothing (you must join the ALTER group for free to get these gifts). If you miss a day, you can buy the previous days’ presents for L$55 each.
  • UPDATE Dec. 3rd, 2022: If you’re looking for something a little bit naughtier in your fashion, why not visit the Advent calendar at Erotik? Join their free store group to pick up each day’s gift. Previous days’ gifts can be purchased for L$35 each.

A final note: I regret to say that, unlike previous years, I will not be doing a daily round-up of Advent calendar gifts each day, either here on the blog or in the RyanSchultz.com Steals, Deals, and Freebies Second Life group (although I will still post some fabulous freebies and bargains to the latter, as I come across them). I’m sorry, but it’s just too much for me this year.

Photo by Elena Mozhvilo on Unsplash

Happy freebie shopping!