Before I became a naturist I had the usual body hang-ups about being naked. Once I’d tried it, those attitudes changed. I’ll get around to reporting ‘My nude debut’ in due course (as it’s something of an SL Naturist meme) but I came to the conclusion that people will embrace naturism if naturist facility exists. Be this a beach, a campsite, a hotel, a whole village, if the naturist facilities are there and even initially reluctant naturists such as myself conclude there’s nothing to be afraid of and throw caution to the wind. I feel we need more naturist spaces to encourage people to try out naturism for themselves. As the poster’s slogan says ‘if we provide the opportunity, people will take the opportunity’.

So please, more clothing optional beaches. More naturist campsites. More naturist swim nights. More hotels, villages, woodland that adopt a naturist friendly attitude. Less politicians imposing their opposition on a peaceful, friendly, all-embracing lifestyle that harms no one.

Trine

A note and a photo from Howie, as he gears up for his naturist Christmas party. Over at Hudson’s Clothing, there’s a bunch of free gifts under their tree.

In his role as Santa, doling our free food, drink and gifts to his Second Life friends, he needs a beard and a hat, and both came from under Hudson’s tree.

Of course, Santa needs a little helper, and to this end Howie has grabbed Polish avatar Barbara to en-act the role in a ‘Santa Baby’ outfit, also from Hudsons.

Group join in free (L$0) and all items worn by both Howie and Barbara were free too.

Trine

There’s not a lot of photographs of naked ice skaters to be found on the internet, but I found a couple (above) to demonstrate how hardy some folk are.

Inspired by Trine’s post about Caitlin’s pose store earlier today, I teleported over to pick up ‘the freebies’ (I’m a sucker for freebies) and got distracted by two sets Trine didn’t mention.

‘Sliding’ and ‘The Clumsy Ice Skater’ (priced at L$65 and L$75 respectively) are the sets in question.

I then set off in search of skates. This isn’t a tough call, as doing an inworld search for ice rinks will find skates for free at most ice skating locations. I managed to get a nice mesh pair of skates at the first location I visited. I also tried a second place where there was, rather delightfully I thought, a free avatar add-on for cold breath.

A static photo doesn’t do it justice. It looks better when being used. Collect yours free at winter sim in question.

Abigail goes skating

Abigail goes skating, the caption says. Just as in my real life, I’ve no sense of ice-skate balance and I keep falling over, which is where these ‘Sliding’ and ‘Clumsy Ice Skater’ pose sets really do reflect my reality!

I blame the snowflakes getting in my eyes. Quite how I ever managed to get off the ice in one piece is remarkable.

Abigail

I was handed a bunch of links when I took over the role of SL Naturist editor, and as I’ve eased myself into the role I’ve felt more confident about visiting some of the sites listed without feeling that I was simply re-treading Ella and Pookes style, or lacked imagination of my own. It was important to me to indicate a Trine & Abigail style of blogging and up until now that’s what I’ve tried to do. But there are some excellent links in the list, and flicking through the back pages of SL Naturist it’s likely several bloggers were Ella & Pookes’ SL friends as well.

Today, I got around to visiting Caitlin Tobias’ blog page, Cait’s World, one of the links passed to me, and a great looking site it is too, as well as being a great read. The first post on the page referenced Cait’s own pose shop at the Basilique sim so I teleported over there to check it out for myself as we love poses on this blog.

One of the sets for sale (attractively priced at L$65 for three poses, each with a mirror pose) was called ‘Simply Nude’ and it was begging to be purchased for the title alone. 🙂

I’m not going to blog that set -yet- for reasons that will become clear. Also available (L$0) at Cait’s store is a ‘do it yourself profile’ pose.

You can try out the effect against a backdrop (see photo above) for yourself. And under the Christmas tree is another free (L$0) pose called ‘Pleased to meet you’.

Above you can see Abi and I testing it out, after which I used it a couple more times at a Second Life Christmas/housewarming party. Howie holds a ‘soiree’ every year for his SL Naturist friends, staff, models and anyone else who drops by. The reality is that this ‘soiree’ is held across several nights (and days) to accommodate people from around the globe who are logging in at different times. I met numerous people when I attended (yes, invitations and times are sent out as notecards) and the ‘pleased to meet you’ pose also got used having been introduced to Mark (see photo below).

Which brings me back to the ‘Simply Nude’ pose set. I sat by the pool for a while and used the poses therein. However, Howie has taken a lot of photos from the party (and other attendees did too) and we’ll be publishing a lengthy ‘housewarming party’ posting next week, so look out for the ‘Simply Nude’ set displayed in that. In the meantime, I’d recommend you pop along to Cait’s store and check out the poses available.

Trine