Pine Hollow began in February 2008 as a Sims 2 blog. It started with four original families–the Gates, the Smiths, the Craigs, and the Lloyds. Over the years, the families have expanded and are now in their fourth generation. They now include the surnames of Sutton, Tang, Gates-Watson, Chase, Norman, Austin, and Menon, as well as a few non-playable families that also inhabit the hood and appear from time to time. In April 2011, the hood migrated to Sims 3 with the same families due to computer issues.
The neighborhood is played in “rounds,” meaning that I play each individual household in a pre-determined order (although the order changes each round) and the round is over when I’ve played all households once. Each round lasts two years and there is at least one household update for each month during those two years. (The two year schedule was inspired by Laura, who also uses this method for her hood.) There are sometimes mini-updates that aren’t pre-scheduled but will appear as needed–for example, if a couple gets engaged early in the round, I may add their wedding as a mini-update later on in the same round. There are also birthday/pregnancy updates as needed that will show you any age transitions, pregnancy progressions, or births.
The early entries in this blog are a bit different from the later ones. When I first started, I didn’t play in a two year format and I didn’t focus on stories as much. The storylines developed over time as the characters grew.
Where should you start reading? This is the very first household update, so you can start there and then just work your way through chronologically. If you want to only read about a certain family, use the Categories on the right sidebar to select the family you want. I’m working on putting together a collection of the major storylines that have taken place, and I’ll link those when I’m done.
A warning about content: This is a blog about the lives of a bunch of different characters and there are many different lifestyle situations that take place. Some Sims drink alcohol or do drugs, one Sim has been in rehab, my Sims all have sex at some point (they do have to continue the family lines, lol!), some have affairs, not all of my Sims are heterosexual, children are born out of wedlock in some families, and sometimes people die unexpectedly. I try not to be too graphic or detailed in most situations, but be aware that these topics do come up throughout the blog if you think you may have any issues with any of this. Also, be aware that I don’t recommend this blog for anyone under age 15.
You can get to know my Sims through the family bios or the family trees, but these both contain spoilers as to who ends up with who and who dies unexpectedly if you haven’t read the older posts yet.
