Tag: Free

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 one more female skin fat pack, plus several other gifts on their gift wall, located behind the wall at the front counter of their store. And Traditional Face has six group gifts in additional to the event gift, three of them being women’s skin fatpacks!

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, included in the package). He’s quite the handsome fellow!

I paired this head 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, this is a starter shape, and you’re going to have to hit the sliders to adjust that super-long giraffe neck 😂, and probably tweak a few other aspects to your liking.

PRO TIP: Always work from the starter shape that came with your new mesh head, like this Kris head—there are a lot fewer sliders to adjust under the Body, Torso, and Legs tabs, then there are under all the various head tabs!

If I am trying to duplicate a body shape which I used before, I write down the slider values in order for each of the Body, Torso, and Legs tabs, in order from top to bottom, then made the necesary adjustments to the body sliders while wearing the new head and the starter eyebrow shape and body shape that came with the head. Then, once you have the body to your liking, fiddle with the head sliders.

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. UPDATE Dec. 14th: The chaos has died down, so now would be a good time to go pick up these gifts.

Kris male skin (matches Not Found body skins), 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

UPDATE Dec. 14th: I don’t know whether I missed this gift the first time around, or they added it later, but there is now, in addition to the Kris male skin and the Noel hairbase, a female head skin, called Noella:

The Noella female head skin matches Not Found body skin tones, of which you will have some if you purchased an Inithium Khara, Kupra, or Kupra Kups mesh body, so check your body package!

Also, if you missed them last year, you can pick up last December’s LeLutka event gifts from Not Found on a nearby wall (the male Jack and female Faye skins, and a long, long, looong ponytail with a hairbase).

Just join the Not Found group for free, and you can pick up these four gifts from last year’s LeLutka December event, as well as this years.

Here are this year’s other gifts from Not Found, a male skin and a hairbase to go with a ponytail attachment you can pick up as a gift at L’Etre/Doux. Note that all of the male and female head skins from Not Found match Not Found body skin tones, but if you bought any Inithium mesh bodies (Kario, Khara, Kupra, or Kupra Kups), the package will include some Not Found body skin tones, so you’ll probably find that you won’t need to purchase Not Found body skins after all!

Kris male skin (matches Not Found body skins, of which you would have received some if you bought an Inithium Kario mesh body, so check the body package), and the Noel hairbase (to go with the ponytail attachment 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, located at the spawn point of the store region.

Stray Dog

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

Soul

UPDATE Dec. 11th: It took me a couple of days to figure out how to get these gifts! You don’t click on the signs; you click on the skin tone boxes marked with the LeLutka 12 Days of Christmas stamp (see the red arrows in the diagrams below). Please note that the other skin tone boxes cost L$350 each!

You have to pay L$1 (which is automatically refunded) to get one skin tone for female heads, which matches the Velour Icy body skin tone) and one skin tone for male heads, which matches the Velour Fair body skin tone.
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); don’t forget to pick up the six group gifts in addition to this gift once you join the store group, three of them are female skin fatpacks!

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 of 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!