I think that to keep yourself interested in SL you have to ‘keep moving’. After the initial rush of clothes buying, setting up a home, making friends and so on, you reach a plateau of SL.

And from there, if you’re going to keep engaged with the game, you need to branch out a bit. So you look at Gor, role-play, other niches within the big, wide SL adventure. And you are often most impressed by something ‘different’. Naked skydiving? Done it.

Over at the November Gallery is something markedly different -rain. Lots of it!

And it puts a whole new mood on SL, a wholly different experience.

I rounded up a model and got a few photos which look great. While our model, Mal, looks gorgeous in them, I think that the real star of the show is the backdrop.

Harry

‘You started the postcards as a ‘what I saw in Spain’ series, didn’t you?’ asked Mr. Keng a couple of days back.

I did indeed.

‘Not that I’m particularly looking‘, Mr Keng chuckled, ‘but the absence of pubic hair makes the presence of pubic hair all the more striking’.

Hmmm. I reflected on this. This time last year I reported, or did a draft post, on how I thought pubic hair seemed to be making something of a reappearance within the naturist community. (It’s early, still dark, still warm enough to blog naked on the balcony 🙂 and I’m not about to go searching for that post).

And Mr. Keng is correct. Something we did do yesterday, between lazing about, was lazing our way along the beach and into the hotel, mid-morning, for the morning papers. And so I did a quick check on the state of pubic growth and I have to say it’s and endangered species. Almost everyone has been barbie-fied. Shaved, waxed, devoid of a single hair on young and old alike.

And yes, when you did come across some pubic thatch, it was all the more striking.

I almost got self-conscious about the fact that, down there, I’m all-natural, lol. But I’m not about to join everyone else. And, frankly, I’m a little surprised that naturism has gone this way. If it’s all about freedom and individualism, why have ladies uniformly decided to shave or wax?

What they do, of course, is up to them, but it strikes me that it has become something of a fashion, more than individuals doing what they want to do. Unless what they want to do is follow fashion slavishly.

Here at SLN the staff, by accident rather than design, are pubic hair…hmmm….guardians! 🙂 Barbara and I both like the natural look while Pookes flip-flops according to SL mood.

Anyway…I was going to set up a pose involving my ‘alt’, later on, but as luck would have it Pookes came online and so I grabbed her so we could pose together to demonstrate the differences between this look and that look 🙂

(What are you doing up so early, girl? It’s 630am in London!)

PS, as things would have it, Pookes was grabbing some SL time and doing some pix of her own for a subsequent SLN post. Yay!

So….SLN readers….what’s your preference? Pubic hair or not? In 2013 the naturist community seems to have voted with its razor.

Ella.

The gentleman we know to wave to has resumed his naturist activities, spending his usual late afternoons soaking up the sun, naturist style.

No sign of Consuelo, though! 😦

Sadly, he has put away the second chair set out this morning, so perhaps the visit is over, or his love affair is over on account of her not being able to reconcile herself to naturism. How sad that would be.

Ella

We can smell, but can’t see, a lunchtime barbecue in progress. Mmmm!

Despite being vegetarian, the smell of a barbecue is still divine. We do have a barbecue here, and the temptation is to go and buy some lovely fresh vegetables and marinade them in a garlic sauce. I will if I can achieve the will to do it, lazing about here 🙂

Mr.Keng and I posed for this BBQ photo, the only food I can find in my inventory being a hot dog :-O and a massive, bucket sized carton of cola.

I have to say part of the appeal of this naturist lifestyle is the whole al fresco element of it.

Ella.

The name Consuelo means ‘hope’, and that’s what we’ve named our reluctant naturist friend. We ‘hope’ she joins the naturist world, and soon! 🙂

Anyway…I’ve rejigged my ‘alt’ as ‘Consuelo’, and as we’re having a lazy day sunbathing on our terrace (broken by occasional walks to the pool to cool down), I’ve opted to do a bit of SL shopping so best to reflect her middle-years. And then, hopefully, trace her first steps into the naturist community, reflected in SL.

As reported, ‘Consuelo’ has only managed to get stripped down to a sundress or bikini thus far. We live in hope for her throughout today 🙂

She did hang out some bedclothes earlier, then disappeared, although the gentleman in the apartment returned (and hasn’t been seen on the terrace since). Has she been dumped? Has she gone to work? Will she be back later? Has she gone forever? Time will tell. Interestingly, two chairs have been left out with cushions on them. Does this signify a return? And the gentleman has made no attempt to take the bedclothes off the washing line. Will she do this later?

Ella

Well, my last posting for today, a hectic day in and out of SL. Lots to do and see, plenty of swimming to be had, and the promise of more tomorrow 🙂

Just to round up, ‘reluctant lady naturist’ has been around in her sundress again, possibly pantyless this time. Looks like she’s warming to the idea of freedom on her skin. Next stop, surely, has to be the dress to go altogether. Yes? No? We’re disappointed to report that the gentleman in question has remained resolutely dressed today, so perhaps she is winning the naturist vs textile battle.

Mr. Keng is currently cooking us a carbonara pasta, so I’ve been utilising the time to experiment with clothes design for only the second time in five years! My first attempt was a bad tank top, so I didn’t pursue design any further, and subsequently fell into blogging. Today’s attempt was inspired by a failure to find a tube type sundress, semi-opaque, in the style of our reluctant lady friend, so I tried to design something myself.

Not quite what I had in mind 🙂 as we’ve ended up with a see-through lace dress 🙂 but I thought I’d show your the photos anyway.

It looks OK, I guess, but not what I had in mind.

Harry’s post earlier regarding beach poses also had me scurrying off to bag a copy. And this produced a first for SLN. While Harry often attempts to recreate RL photos in SL, the photo below had Mr. Keng replicate a RL version, snapping me with an ice lolly, as opposed to ice cream, on the ground below our apartment. But, no, I won’t be showing that one here 🙂

Ella.

We all ‘people watch’, whether on holiday or not.

Across from our balcony there is a gentleman, in his 60s, Spanish, who we know well enough to wave at and who is, directly after work, every day without fail, a confirmed naturist.

He seemed to have lived alone until this holiday, when a woman seems to be in residence with him. She’d be in her 50s, certainly, and is a shapely 50+ year old.

Of course, we aren’t sure of the relationship, but we have speculated as to whether she’s a significant other, sister or friend.

Whatever the relationship, none of our business, we’re intrigued by her absolute reluctance to strip off, even on the balcony.

We’ve watched the body language with interest, of course.  She has sat on the balcony with a sun dress on, while the gentleman of the house sunbathes nude. We’ve watched her depart to the beach in a bikini. I’ve watched her watch Mr. Keng, nude of course, wander down to the pool we have here. I’ve watched her get as far as a flimsy linen sun dress with panties on underneath, clearly visible under a white dress, possibly no bra…and that’s the extent of her ‘naturism’.

Of course, Mr. Keng and I have invented our own back story. It’s a sister, come to stay, but we imagine there would be more of a sense of discomfort (or not, we’ve not had the experience and wouldn’t know) looking at, or being looked at by, a family member.

Or it is a girlfriend, a woman not disposed to the naturist lifestyle. The thing is…will she or won’t she before our holiday ends? We’re dying to find out, and I may make this a mini series within the ‘postcard’ series as we desperately try to find out if she becomes as beguiled by naturism as, say, Mr. Keng was. I was a naturist before I met him and he was initially very reluctant.

Of course, following a very nervous beginning, Mr. Keng is now as committed a naturist as I am. We live in hope that this lady also becomes sucked into the sense of freedom and relaxation the lifestyle brings, rather than remain a confirmed ‘textile’.

(nb: with the ‘instant’ nature of the ‘postcard’ series I obviously can’t ask Harry or Diane to round up some of our models and pose accordingly, so Mr. Keng and I logged in and -using my ‘SLN Model’ male and female ‘alts’, we’ve posed this as best we can. Note that my alts aren’t ‘middle-aged’, by any stretch of the imagination).

Ella

While Ella is living it large on holiday, some of us are left behind to work and keep SLN’s other posts ticking along.

So it’s with great pleasure that I can say that I’ve been photographing a model with free beach poses from Focus Poses and Le Forme

You get three props -a rubber ring, a beach ball and an ice cream- and eight poses, so you can experiment and mix and match them. An absolutely terrific naturist accessory. Or clothed, for that matter.

As summer slips away wouldn’t it be great to head off to your local SL beach and snap a few reminders of the long, sunny days and good temperatures? We’ll be heading rapidly in the direction of Hallowe’en next, and then a mad headlong rush to that holiday that begins with ‘x’ and I dare not speak of in September. 🙂

Harry

The Spanish love their dogs. And around this time in the morning, 9-10am, you’ll often see them being walked. There is, as with so much early morning naturism, a split between the dress codes of males and females. Males (Mr. Keng included) will happily go nude from first light. I, and most other females for that matter, will start the day dressed to some extent. I guess it’s because we feel the cold a little more. Oh, I’ll sleep nude all night here, then pop on a gown (at home) or a sundress or tank top for a little while, at least until the day heats up.

So if I look out from my apartment I’ll often see naked men walking dogs. With this in mind, I sent Mr. Keng out (yes! he’s actually logged into SL for a change) to find a dog he could walk while nude.

He opted not to buy…but he seems to have found the company of two dogs in the photo he took.

This morning I also spotted another dress code split between males and females, with a husband and wife riding bikes, he nude, she clothed.

Ella

One of the things I’m really enjoying during ‘down time’ on vacation is that I’m actually getting in to SL more often than I do at home (when my SL time is largely blog-needy). This week has obviously involved blogging, but has also given me time to zoom around inside SL for a change.

I’ve also done some catching up on other blogs I read, such as Daallee’s blog, which I like a lot because it’s not just about clothes. Poses and locations are also part of the gig, and these would certainly help inform me, make suggestions to me and sometimes steer me in how I put two and two together and nudge a blog post in another direction.

Daallee has blogged about pyjamas. Now that’s not something that would be part of SLN’s agenda, but I was intrigued by a pillow fight prop -I’m always interested in props and poses we can utilise in the blog, and I’ve sent both Harry and Diane the links, as usual, so they can maybe pose some of our models accordingly.

Anyway…while at Plowwie’s pyjama store , I spotted a nice (free) signboard that, while not naturist, certainly resonates with me every day in life.

I got up before daylight this morning and I’m about four cups of tea (I’m British, remember? 🙂 ) to the good already. I now feel like my engine’s all fired up to face the day. Coffee, I don’t do in big quantities. A cup every now and again, and always freshly ground beans. Too much of it makes me feel….wired!!!!

Ella