Jan 10 2023

OOPS I’VE DONE IT AGAIN

Yep, it’s been almost six months since I last wrote in this blog. But… I do have justification… smiles sadly. As many of you know me and my rl situation, my beloved Duderz passed away Oct 1st… 2022. He was my rock, my foundation, my soulmate and I had a real tough time holding it together. We all knew it was coming, and he surpassed the doctors timeline for him by two years, those were bonus years I am grateful for, even though he suffered more and more each month. He was such a trooper and still made jokes and made those around him laugh and look at life in his silly way of accepting God’s will. I am happy he no longer suffers and is in supposedly a pain free zone… and I like to think he watches over me still as I continue this journey we call ‘real life’.

I’ve tried to do things that should help me through the process, sometimes when I think about it I say “OMG it’s only been a little over three months since he’s been gone”. Other times it feels like a lifetime of sorrow and grief and I wish it would end! I started a new blog about how to become an elderly widow… especially for those that were together with their loves more than fifty years. I redid the living room, the front porch and am working on the spare bedroom. I colored my grey to a beautiful brown with highlights and got a hair cut. I took a Road Trip and drove over 3,000K miles alone and proved to myself I am self sufficient. I spent Thanksgiving with my daughter and grandchildren and then spent Christmas alone with my memories and love of Jim to keep me warm.

Now what! HOPE! I am planning some fun times in the future… to go and meet friends I’ve had in SL for over 15 years and to see some of our beautiful USA countryside. Maybe do a couple cruises ? and the biggie… visit Europe, mainly Scotland and Ireland where my ancestors come from.

I have eased back into to my Virtual Lives… and am enjoying the escape that Second Life and Open Sim offers. But this time I am trying to keep a good balance between the two Real Life and Virtual Life. I watched ‘Ready Player One’ again the other night and the last words were exactly what I needed to not fall off this Earth and become…. a stat.

“…the OASIS will be completely shut down on Tuesdays and Thursdays, allowing folks to connect with one another in the real world.” Ready Player One… yes I am Ready! Are YOU?

Step in Sunshine!

Come Sail Away With Me!

Apr 22 2017

THE SUNS of the HYPERVERSE

The avatar adventures of Sunbeam Magic includes many Suns. Before I came and immersed myself in OpenSim I had many (many) alts. At one time in Second Life I think I counted a total of 25 *LOL*… many were used for Roleplay as for a couple years AAcme and I were totally into RP. Others were made to ‘re-create’ ourselves as many times we tried to “quit” the world and vowed never to come back. It seemed to be taking over our real life time and emotions ran high at times over silly incidents. After over a decade since we first discovered virtual worlds now I can not even remember the whys or what for regarding the high emotions!

One (out of 3 or 4) of my FREEBIE shops @Nara’s Nook

When we first went to an OpenSim grid (3rdRock and InWorldz) we made new avatars for new names and jumped in with both feet, socializing, becoming an Events Manager, building, creating, opening shops, managing others’ regions, Mentoring, joining Admin teams… you name it we tried it! Then we found other grids as they popped up and before HG you had to join them to see them. So as the years went on I became a member of over a dozen grids. Some (most) still have my original avatar on file, even if I have not logged into that particular grid in over a year. Amazing! I did decide after roaming away from the closed grids to always be ‘Sunbeam Magic’. IT goes back to my grass roots, as when I first joined Second Life, the legacy grid, I started as ‘Sunbeam’ Jewell… changed to Magic as surname because I feel these worlds are MAGICAL!

Below are a few of the profile shots from the many grids I am a member of:

CRAFT10-14-2011

DigiWorlds 3-17-2015

Osgrid 3-06-2012

Franco 12-16-2015

Great Candian Grid 4-13-2015

Island Oasis 3-08-2012

Kitely 10-14-2012

Lost Paradise 11-19-2012

Metropolis 9-03-2012

Nara’s Nook 11-11-2014

3rdLife Grid 1-14-2016

Tangle 4-22-2012

3rdRock Grid 12-18-2010

I’m sure I have other Sun’s out there… SimValley, Discovery, Zetaworlds, The Adult Grid, Virtual Highway ring a bell! But forgot the passwords and couldn’t get my Profile pic to show you my dear friends. So I’m stuck with only 13 images to preserve and record for future prosperity. Plus I did not include any of my still alive and breathing avatars in Second Life (about 3 or 4 or them I believe). Anyways, thanks for joining me in my trip down Avatar Lane!

As Always, Step in Sunshine, Be Happy and enjoy your lifes!

Dec 31 2016

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2017

Sunbeam took some TIME off from blogging in the year 2016. A lot of TIME off! A whole year of TIME off ! NOW she’s ready to start anew. 2016 was so full of lots of fun in OpenSim: special projects, special builds, HG VISIONZ magazine, many changes and much more she was involved with there just wasn’t any TIME left for blogging.

Anything and everything under the ‘Sun’ is fair game. We decided to revamp the way we do our blog for 2017. Instead of 50+ images showing her travels and friends and what she’s was up to in the OpenSim Metaverse each month, we choose NOW a simpler life, a simpler blog focusing on one subject at a TIME. We may blog on thoughts, on a word (or two or three), on an OS destination, on an OS event, on a friend, or an enemy, or a spirit. The main objective is to K.I.S.S. my blog (Keep it Short and Simple).

TIME is the word for today’s blog.

TIME: noun> “the indefinite continued progress of existence and events in the past, present, and future regarded as a whole”.

TIME: verb> “plan, schedule, or arrange when (something) should happen or be done”.

TIME is that one thing one never has enough to do all they want to do. We must use the verb TIME to make the noun TIME fulfil our dreams and visionz. As most everyone knows, the best laid plans of Fairies and humans often go awry. Things often go wrong even though you have carefully planned what you are going to do. With that said our new 2017 mottos shall be: ‘Go with the Flow’ and have a ‘Devil may care’ attitude and with thoughts like those TIME will always be on my side! I’m gonna ‘live in the moment’!!!

In closing I’d like to say “Happy New Year! Have fun, enjoy life and may 2017 be your best year ever!” Step in Sunshine

Jan 7 2016

Delightful December

December has so many facets; A) End-of-the-Year month B) Winter Solstice month C) Christmas Day. All Delightful! End-of-the-Year conjures up hope for a better tomorrow and an exciting future. Winter Solstice brings sparkle and beauty to our world, all bright, white and positive. And Christmas Day bringing family and friends closer oozing love and unselfishly sharing our hearts and humanity, true and giving. We believe the Magic of Giving indeed brings happiness to all.

Sunbeam was so busy in this month of December 2015 she took over 200 photographs: building her Happy Holidays area at AAcme City, GCG, attending various HG tours, attended OSCC, began Mentoring at GCG, going to fab Winter/Christmas parties including a Masquerade Ball, where Sun won 2nd Place in Theme Dress contest, joining in on two ‘Treasure Hunts’ (Tangle HG Hunt and GCG Winter Hunt) and chillin’ with friends and family! Of course we didn’t post all 200, lol, but do hope you enjoy our Delightful December Slideshow below. Enjoy ! Smiles!

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YAY 2016 is here. Happy New Year to ALL! and after much reflection and thought about Metaverse Magic, the virtual adventures Sunbeam has experienced over the last three years, we have decided its time for a change. A change to our format for 2016. After reading a post by Selby Evans on blogging “Keep it Simple” Google +, that is exactly what we intend to try and do. Instead of cramming a whole month of her adventures into one post, we will do a Simple Post detailing one event or activity at a time. Hopefully blogging a few time per month. Smiles!

As always my valued friends, and soon to be friends, thank you for visiting my Metaverse Magic and Step in Sunshine!

Obsessed by a fairy tale, we spend our lives searching for a magic door and a lost kingdom of peace. Eugene O’Neill

Dec 7 2015

NOVEMBER NOTABLES

November was a HUGE month for notable events that Sunbeam was a part of. Sun started off with the Premiere of the Immersive Edge, a hypergrid story, then on to the celebration of being an avatar at the AvatarFest and then the exciting Grand Opening of Leighton Marjoram’s new grid ‘Lighthouse Point’. There was a Birthday party for Nara’s Nook, Happy Birthday Two Years Old! AND her home grid GCG (Great Canadian Grid) celebrated their Two Years Old Birthday! and Sun and the team of VISIONZ produced their biggest issue ever with a whopping 90 page edition.

Christmas came to our Virtual Worldz with lots of winter regions popping up to explore and Ice Skating parties to attend. Naturally our party girl, Sunbeam, jumped in with both wings! She set up a Free Christmas shop at her friend Linda Kellie’s Christmas region on GCG and she also built a little Christmas scene at the Winterfest Expo on the Tangle Grid.

Of course in between all these notable events Sun went to HG tours, concerts and parties, enjoyed a private tour of her friends’ Anna and Steve Ford’s ‘Pet Gallery’, plus her friend Jessie Campbell taught her how to play the game ‘Greedy’. May of been beginners luck but Sun won both games they played! Sun also did some fun exploring and went shopping and bought some new gowns.

Sun also set up two new shops in AAcme City, one a Mermaid shop and the other Aine’s Statues (Of course all items are free to copy). She did some landscaping around the city (terraforming really relaxes us), added some animals to the forest and cleaned up some areas that were overly primmy. She moved the Halloween graveyard to a new area by the AAcme Airport and ser up her Happy Holidays HO HO HO area in it’s place. All in All November was a busy, fun and exciting month for this little Fae!

A high note in Sunbeam’s life was when she took her friend Scarlet ‘Abby’ Rose to meet Elsie and Anna, Scarlet’s idols, at Fred Beckhusen’s Ice Castle on his Outworldz grid. Scarlet was so excited and really loved riding the dragons. Scarlet was born with MD and is a very special young lady who guided by her nurse and my virtual sister, Kat Ewry finds fun and love in the virtual environment.

A low note in Sunbeam’s life was when she lost her dear friend and virtual nephew, one of the great musicians of our worldz, hunter Montgomery to a heart attack. hunter went peacefully in his sleep; may he rest in peace as he lives on in our hearts. Also there was the world wide tragedy of the terrorists attack in Paris, France. Sun has many friends in the Franco grid and was thrilled to hear that all of them were safe and survived this unfathomable incident.

If I must say what the most notable event that happened in Sunbeam’s journey it has to be when she FINALLY broke down and used her voice. Yes, she does has a voice. Ever since ‘Voice’ came out in Second Life (about 10 years ago) Sunbeam was distinctly opposed to it. Sunbeams’ typist being hard to hear and having ear problems most of her life aslo was against the activating their voices. The awful sounds from the ear plugs and the ear splitting feedback and the confusion of 20 avatars talking at once hurt their sensitive ears. Even though Sun’s ears are huge and pointy, they don’t work well at all! Plus she really liked ‘type text’ where she could always go back and review conversations, maybe something she missed or needed to make note of. One night after a party everyone was chatting and having a gay old time while Sun was typing away and no one noticed. We decided right then to ‘activate’ our voice and early the next morning she went to her friend Daisy Coronet who patiently taught her how to use the voice system. Thank you Daisy!

As has become our custom, here are a few pictures taken during the month of November… please enjoy the slideshow showing the fun Sunbeam has in her virtual worldz with family and friends this month of November 2015:

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As always my valued friends and soon to be friends, step in sunshine! Sunbeam

Oct 6 2015

SEPTEMBER SIZZLES

The month of September found Sunbeam busier than ever! She learned a lot about NPC’s and how to direct them like actors in a stage play, she worked long long hours on ‘Immersive Edge’ A Hypergrid Story (and game) which is a collaboration of many talented creators and scriptors coming together to make a vision of Nara Malones’ come alive. Sunbeam also set up a Steampunk exhibit at the Tangle’s grid Steam Expo that ran September 12th to October 7th. Of course Sun took some breaks from building and went dancing at Hedoism and visited some friends and went on a couple Hypergrid tours. The magazine VISIONZ September issue was the biggest yet with 46 pages. She attended the Farewell party for an OpenSim Core Developer, Justin CC, who is moving on to a new job. She attended Opening day of the Summer of Arts 2015 event on Metropolis grid and was amazed at the art displayed. .

September is also the month of Sunbeam’s rl typist, me, birthday. We celebrated with family and received many well wishes on the social site Facebook. Seems Nara Malone also has a September birthday and Sun went to Nara’s virtual birthday party. Fun times!

Sunbeam also went Dragon Flying! Yeah Baby! What a fun time at Fred Beckhusen’s Phaze Dragons region where you can fight skeletons, ride dragons and explore some great builds by Fred.

Sunbeam attended Market day at the River Lands, went fishing with fellow fae Talia Sunsong, and attended the HG Nights’ tour to explore the new Fairy region recently added to the River Lands community.

Since I’m a bit late getting this month’s blog out, we will just do a slideshow of images to speed things up ! Again thank you for reading my blog and reliving our virtual adventures. As always my valued friends, and soon to be friends, Step in Sunshine!

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Aug 1 2015

July Highs

July was a extremely hot month for my rl self, while my vr self saw ‘hawt’ things exploring the Metaverse. Sun attended meetings, some cool parties and concerts (Mr. Mikie String and Torben Asp) and published a great issue of her VISIONZ magazine. She visited the Wizard of Oz (Kitely, Talia Sunsong) and Alice in Wonderland (Franco, Cherry Manga)! She also worked diligently on her contribution to the HG Story, Scene five. There were two tour groups who visited her beloved AAcme City in the month of July (HG Nights and HG Safari). She also went to see her bff’s (Minethere Always) new huge 4×4 var region on Metropolis grid. AND she won first place in a Kayak contest at the Grand Opening of Brantley No. 3 (Kitely, Ruby O’Degee).

Overall Sun had some really fun high times the first part of this summer. Summer means sun and fun. Hope you’re haviing a wonderful Summer so far too!

Below is a slide show capturing some of her adventures. Enjoy and always ‘Step in “Sunshine” with a happy attitude viewing your worlds with awe!

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Jun 28 2015

JUNE BLOOMS

June was filled with magical realism in Sunbeam’s virtual worlds. Sun experienced many magical moments such as being a “Guest Guide” for the HG Tour group ‘Metaverse Tours‘, The group visited Tangle grid’s Kling Kingdom, Aqualand on Metropolis and The River Lands on Great Canadian grid:

She attended the The Hypergrid ‘WIP’ Shows held in June. (Works in Progress)

She magically became a ‘Mermaid’ and watched all the human folks walking on the docks across the water channel to AAcme City’s harbor.

She attended ‘Market Day’ on the medieval role=play regions The River Lands, Great Canadian Grid.

She was a nervous wreck waiting on the tour bus after working all day really hard polishing up AAcme City side=by-side with AAcme Fall to impress the expected visitors from

the Hypergrid Nights tour group. They explored the city then joined us for a magical party held at The Carousel Club (34 Avatars attended) with Dj Darrow Kanto playing some great tunes,

And she published the 4th issue of VISIONZ magazine – Hypergridders Dream.

She was asked to be a guest on the INWORLD REVIEW TV show to talk about VISIONZ and AAcme City. Inworld Review is hosted by Mal Burns.

( since Sunbeam does not have a microphone she asked her VISIONZ Sr Editor and also a AAcme City shop owner, Avia Bonne to appear in her place ) . She watched quietly below the stage area.

She attended her first ‘Writers’ Class’ conducted by Siobhan Muir on Nara’s Nook grid (Sun dearly wishes to became a better writer),

She attended a beautiful virtual wedding of her new friends Daniella and Josiah MacTire officiated by Jaekob Faolan.

She worked on planting even more flowers on her Enchanted Village (for non=humans), Hidden Glenn region located on Tangle grid.

Sunbeam and AAcme attended a ‘Crash Party’ on GCG and danced the night away, no matter how hard we tried the sim would not CRASH! lol 48 Avatars attended, I understand the record is 60.

Sunbeam and AAcme also celebrated over 100 visitors who have come to see our beloved AAcme City and share our joy in driving around the magical roadways, fighting off the zombies and strolling along the boardwalk.

Sun also enjoyed visiting with friends and family and going on many HG tours and trying out the new daredevil jump on our 2nd level roads and overall she had way too much FUN spreading Sunbeams.

June, the sunny month, shiny and as bright as the magic in our hearts ♥As always my valued friends and soon to be friends, Step in Sunshine!

Jun 2 2015

“Crazy as a Loon’

My title reflects my insane laughter as I merrily skip from grid to grid making new friends and new promises! Another ‘slang’ phrase that comes to mind is ‘biting off more than I can chew’ or perhaps I just drink too much coffee…LOL

The month of May found Sun pretending she was a Movie Star when asked to be in Nara Malone and Fuchsia Nightfire’s 2nd tutorial video on “NPC” fun , Sun also visited about two dozen grids, went on three HG tours, complied and published the 3rd Issue of VISIONZ magazine (38 pages woot), went to a couple of Metropolis’s 7th Birthday parties, partied at the Tangle grid’s Fashion Expo exhibit, worked on her Enchanted Village (Hidden Glenn region) on Tangle, started progress on a castle for her Fairytopia sim at SimValley grid, visited Kamis Haven – The River Lands – Cedar Point and Shoalwaters Bay regions at her home grid of GCG, hooked up with her dear friends Lion and Kat Ewry and Daisy Coronet and DJTommy Seetan, had Balpien Hammerer visit AAcme City and ride the chopper and then declare it “an amazing build, had fun!” , added a couple new blogs to the Blogz “R” Us offices, and of course continued working on tweaking and creating AAcme City with her soul mate AAcme Fall. Judy Muircastle specially scripted a couple of her awesome vehicles (The Chopper and the Bonnie and Clyde car) so that now anyone visiting AAcme City can rezz a ride and drive all around the 3×3 var (downtown area, country, beach, forest and mountains) and we finished connecting our paved roads land level to the two story roads hovering above the city. Phew!

Of course I took lots and lots of pictures which I will display here as slide show (40 images wow and I could added more ☻) instead of my typical laundry list of images 🙂

June looks to be just as busy for Sun. She is so excited to hold the first official VISIONZ magazine meeting now that we have official staff members! And on June 13th, Saturday, Sun is the ‘Guest Tour Guide’ for Metaverse Tours… hope you will join us. I’ve chosen 3 regions on 3 different grids hoping everyone will enjoy. So stay tuned as Sun continues to be Crazy as Loon ha ha ha ha (insane laughter).

As always my valued friends and soon to be friends, Step in Sunshine, enjoying your time!

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May 2 2015

May Day May Day May

April was such a busy month on the RL Grid I for one am glad we have moved into the month of May! AAcme City is now completely moved on to a 3×3 var region on the Great Canadian Grid and Sunbeam has acquired two Fantasy regions (works in progress). One called ‘Enchanted Village, Hidden Glen’ on the Tangle Grid and one called Fairytopia @ SV-66 on the SimValley Grid. More on those next post.

When not imagining great things that we should be creating and trying to create them, then I’m running around the Hypergrid space systems delighting in the awesome builds popping up like magic all over the place. It’s gonna take forever and a day to see all the glorious things the metaverse has to offer.

Finally made it to a group tour (with Metaverse Tour) and got a couple snapshots. Sunbeam always plan to go to these event, but somehow time slips away from me all too quickly. Next thing I know its the next day after and I missed everything I wanted to atttend. Sometimes, like this week I was off running some errands that took twice as long as I believed and ~poof~ missed another tour. Was really disappointed I missed the new WIP show put on by Serene Jewell and Selby Evans, hope to make it next time. Sure wish someone would invent a ‘time travel’ code so I could pop back in the metaverse and rewind to any missed events.

After promising TeslaCoyel for weeks and trying in vain to HG to his home grid, the Atek Grid, Steam Punk City Sunbeam finally made it albeit without hair, skirt or shoes. I loved the City and the big ships and the imagination used to create the most wondrous metaverse Steampunk space. Got myself a Landmark and plan to roam around again soon.

Stopped by to see my long time friend Peter Veliz (IamSambard Kingdom Brunel) who is very active on the Tangle Grid with Expo’s and his own region> Brunel Isle of Steam and the Brunel Museum of Steam. You have got to see his amazing steam engines and vehicles. Some of Peter’s items are built as exact duplicates (1/3 scale) of actual products on the rl grid. A little birdie told me he does rl models of steam wonders and may put up a website soon. Gosh, it’s been five or six years I’ve loved and admired Peter’s work and his sweet disposition. I was thrilled to connect with Peter again after about a year or two since we last interacted. Quite the family affair, his daughter, wife, niece, sisters (??? who knows who all else) have joined Peter in his favorite past-time torturing prims.

Of all the tours Sun missed we were totally thrilled to be part of the group that traveled over to the Tomb Raiders region on (grid.kitely.com:8002:Tomb Rider , temporarily on display hosted by Min Tigerpaw) created by the most talented artist Avia Bonne (Avia 3D Designs). Since it’s one of my favorite places to roam and get inspired I was excited to see it once again! If you’re a lover of all things fantasy or you want to pretend you are Lara Croft herself then jump on over and experience the thrill and joy of this very special region.

One early morning Sun popped into the Tangle Grid (residents mostly European time visits) and attended the ‘Meet and Greet’ with Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Hooked up with my disco buddies Gary Kling and Leslie Kling and ended up with a second location for my ‘Blogz R US’ (see separate page this Blog coming soon). Was amazed they still had the fantasy oar from the old Olantica grid where I had designed a fantasy region a couple years back. Its was great to see Sarah Fairport, a very dear girl and true friend, and meet some new folks that call Tangle grid their home. Sunbeam felt so welcomed!

January 2013

The month of April has always been a lucky month for me as my previous blog stated Sun attended an impromptu Dance Party at the Welcome center on Great Candian Grid (with awesome DJ Stormy Nights) and entered a Lotto drawing. We walked away with $1,000 Maples WOOOT Hooooooooooooooo! New hair!

AAcme and I purchased a 3×3 var region to accomodate the growth and imagination we have for AAcme City’s future. On 4/20 (yep I said 420… puff puff pass) our var was erected and on 4/27 our OARs were uploaded. Well it did take two times for the OARs to come in correctly… but we couldn’t be happier with the new lands where we’ll now have a country area and forests surrounding our urban fantasy AAcme City. Feel free to hop on the next ship heading our way and fly around to see all the improvements coming soon.

2 Region AAcme City B4 Move

3×3 var region AAcme City Now

This should keep us busy for a long long time! Forests, ranches, farms, warehouse district, harbour, and underground sewage maze to cover 9 regions space. Oh me oh my what have we got ourselves into AAcme!

Our first visitor in new lands.

Shawnmaloney Craftgrid

Who also likes to read the new magazine hitting news stand through the Metaverse, VISIONZ. Just a little side hobby pulbished by Sunbeam Magic and her heartsis’ Minethere Always all about Hypergridders Dreams. Shawn is reading March’s issue. April’s issue of VISIONZ is out now (Morning Coffee Shop on Hobo Park GCG and don’t forget to look for May’s issue coming out around the 24th of May.