Hello everyone, good morning,

I have already said it elsewhere, I have had a wonderful, very contemplative and peaceful weekend. Besides all that, it was also very enjoyable for me, because I was able to do what I like to do in RLC and what I love RLC for: designing various items.

And now I come to the most pleasing point of all, this year I can finally design another advent calendar for you ... no, not open it already, but announce it already.

At last I can hopefully put a little smile on the face of one or two of you. I had to give up this habit for three years due to a terrible pandemic that is now behind us all. For my husband and I, it meant nothing more than an insane amount of overtime. But that's all water under the bridge now.

You'll have to be patient for another 17 days, though, because I won't be posting any more here before the first of December, or at least not giving out any modest little gifts.

But there is one thing I would like to say first. Dear Sweetpea, Anhton and Jonash Novo, thank you once again for carrying me along in your team during the three years of absence and for continuing my tradition many with many improvements.

You have turned my little advent calendar into a really big thing, in which many hands, this year finally also mine again along with you, have put a lot of work, invested a lot of free time, for one single reason:



And now I wish you all a good new week, stay healthy,

divingA

thank you Diving hun I can't wait till is all here
thank you so much also for your hard work as always


huggssssssssss Missy

Hello everyone, good morning,

hello Anhton, hello Missy, hello Sweet_Simona,

First of all, I would like to thank you for your answers, in detail for each and every one of them.




*sigh* Dear Anhton, I have the biggest problem with you, the problem that you or Sweetpea or Jonash could resent me for opening this Advent calendar despite your really huge efforts and work with Holiday Traditions. Therefore, my answer to you is also directed to the other two teammates of the HT team.

I have neither the desire nor the aim to outdo Holiday Traditions. That would also be a completely nonsensical undertaking. Because I can't compete with what you have offered/will offer there again this year with my few little things here.

I am delighted and have had a lot of fun this year with a small "traditionally German" Christmas market, a minimalist offshoot of the well-known Nuremberg Christkindl market, finally being able to play an active part in the HT team again. At last I'm actively involved again and not just a friendly, tolerated team member who has to be dragged along.



Dear missy,

hard work? I don't know anything about that. At least not when it comes to the few little gimmicks I've offered you in previous years and this year in the Christmas calendar.RLC is and remains a nice break from everyday life for me, a hobby that gives me the opportunity to live out my creativity. More about my motivation later below, when I want to explain my motivation to everyone.



Dear Simona,

Now you're making me a little embarrassed. Please don't expect too much. What I have offered here in my calendar in recent years and will offer again this year is nothing more than a few little gimmicks, not worth mentioning. I'm a bit like the woodcarvers I was allowed to watch at a woodcarving competition a few years ago. One of them, a woman, walked around a log lying in front of her, it was a mighty log, about 2 meters long. She looked at it intensely, almost meditating, from all sides and from all angles, kneeling, standing, even lying on her stomach. Then she finally grabbed one of her various chainsaws and began to work on the trunk.

When asked why she had looked at the trunk for so long beforehand, she said succinctly: "I only looked at the trunk to find out what is in it that I now had to get out with my saws and axes and chisels." That's how I feel about the many photos I take or things I see outside in real life and then photograph.

Hello to everyone else,

who may also be wondering why I do all this.

There are two reasons why I do it. The first is the many small experiences of success that I have with my design work here. Look at it from my point of view. As you know, I'm a nurse and have been deputy head nurse for a little over a year now, in other words the deputy to the nurse in charge of the ward.

I've been in this position since October last year, but no longer on the intensive care unit, where I've always had the occasional sense of achievement when my colleagues and I have managed to bring someone from the afterlife back to this world or we've successfully cured someone so that the patient could then experience the final healing on a normal medical ward.

I have been on the closed ward for mentally ill addicts since October. And here we are at the point where RLC is a compensation for my life. Here I can still have a sense of achievement when something goes well, but not at work. My patients are detoxified and treated more or less successfully, but their problems usually remain. As a result, when they are discharged, we see them again after periods of three to six months. 90% of my patients are too deeply trapped in their addiction.

And after so many serious words, it's time to play a little fun game. Open the link in a new browser tab I'm posting here now:



Behind it is an RLC screenshot. It shows a small section of my "UV: The Winter Workshop", which is also my Christmas workshop for you. Everything you see standing, hanging and lying in the corner is for the Advent calendar. Stop! Everything outside the red base of the Christmas tree, i.e. only on or above the dark red carpet with the grid pattern.

And now I ask you: How many items are there? Take a close look. Only what is IN!!! the room counts, the Christmas tree with decorations and presents underneath does NOT count!

Whoever posts an exact answer here will win a voucher for clothes designed by me worth 50 rays.

Have fun, have a good time everyone, stay healthy,

divingA

Hi diving,

I love the fact that you are reopening your forum advent calendar.

Sometimes with all the arguing that happens in the forum your advent calendar was something positive to look forward to every day.

I've been to the Christkindl market in Nuremberg and what you built at the Holiday Tradition's venue took me back to when I was a teen and lived in Germany and got to go there. It is an amazing place, and walking through Holiday Traditions that is an incredible addition.

There is absolutely no resentment felt towards you opening up your forum advent calendar. If you think about it, between the Winter Wonderbag (Swag bag) that RLC hosts, Holiday Traditions, and the forum Advent Calendar, the members of RLC will have an abundance of gifts this holiday season.

hugs
pea

Hello and good afternoon everyone,

The Advent season begins in a few days, in seven days to be precise. I now have two days off again, this morning at 06:28 CET I finished the last night shift of a shift block of six. That means I have a little time to get you in the Christmas spirit and prepare you for the Advent calendar.

In other words, I'm already starting to open the first present for you today. After taking stock of all the items I have made, I was horrified to realize that I have once again made far too many.

But first I would like to take the opportunity to point out the previous years' calendars to anyone who is not yet familiar with my Advent calendars. All the gifts contained in them are still available, apart from clothing, of course.



Since you may be new and joined RLC after 2020, you may be wondering why there was no Advent calendar in the following years. That's quickly explained. In spring 2020, the pandemic also broke out here in Germany. As a nurse, I had no more time from that point on. In those three years, there was only time to pile up insane amounts of overtime. I think you understand that, after all, real life should always take priority.

So in a few hours' time, I'll be starting here, but until then I'd like to let you know one more thing. As you know, this year's Halloween Swag Bag featured the very inspiring Zen Garden. Many of my gifts this year are dedicated to it. Okay, many things can of course also be used elsewhere, but first and foremost many things are Japanese-inspired because I was inspired by the Zen Garden.

Have fun everyone, the first universally usable sweets for a "Bunter Teller" (translated into english this reads: colorful plate) in your Christmas layouts will be available in a few hours and the next few days. You can then put together a colorful plate to suit your taste. And if you don't know what the term



means, click here for a clear explanation and let your browser translate it from German into your native language.


All the best, divingA

Hello everyone,

I have to get ready for work in less than three hours, I'll be leaving the house around 7pm my time. But before that I want to treat myself to a little sleep, so I'll keep it short here today.

Here are the matching chairs for the tables I gave you yesterday. Made from the same wood, one beech, one mahogany, with covers to match the table linen. But watch out!!! You can only see one texture. Nevertheless, this texture can be used on two different chair props. Once on the "Dark Wood Dining Chair" prop or, alternatively, on the "Chocolate Wood Dining Chair" prop. Which chair you use or whether you use both props and combine them, for example 4 x Chocolate Wood and 2 x Dark Wood Dining Chair to create a table for 6 people, is up to you, your taste and the space available.

As always, both prop maps are optimized to 512 pixels per side, both are JPG files, download them or use the hotlinks below the maps.



Have a good time, come healthy into a hopefully nice weekend for all of us,

divingA

Hello everyone,

according to RLC time, a new day starts in a few minutes, so I can give you today's gift for 11/26 before I go to bed.

Your table, your dining table group now looks like this after yesterday:



What's missing now, what's more or less mandatory to come next? Right, flower arrangements. And what flower could be more Christmassy than the classic flower in all good parlors around the world at Christmas time? Right again, the poinsettia.

Here I have three for you to choose from, take the one you want or two of them or even all three. All three are made for the "Alpha Pine Tree" prop, all in the same gold-colored flower pot with stars on it.



As always: Attention, these are optimized PNG files, which means that you have to check "Texture Translucent" in the State tab again and enter a very specific value in the box behind it for the best performance this time, either 88 or 111, depending on your environment.

Finally, a little tip. If you want your poinsettia to look really opulent, then make the first one the way you think is right and good for you, then clone the prop, rotate it 180° and place it exactly on the first prop.

Have fun, good luck, stay healthy and have a nice Sunday

divingA,

who is now going to bed after a really bad night shift

Hello everyone,

Here we go again, a new day is already more than an hour old. After you got mugs for mulled wine yesterday, today we're going to have matching plates, because after all, they're the most important thing we need alongside lots of sweets and fruit to create a classic "colorful plate".

But I'll tell it like it is, or rather was, there are more than just six plates to match the cups, simply because it was fun. I was in a really good mood yesterday, enjoying listening to J.S. Bach's Christmas Oratorio while sitting inside in the warm living room on a cold and unfriendly winter's day blessed with a bit of snow, drinking mulled wine and designing more plates.

All you need today for the plates is the prop "Giant Plate". In my opinion, the most sensible dimensions in the "scale" tab that I can recommend are 0.07 x 0.04 x 0.07. But ultimately it's up to you. Here are the six plates matching the cups above, they come in the same order as the cups they match.



I don't have to tell you that all the files are optimized JPG files again, do I?

Have fun, have a good time, stay healthy, see you tomorrow,

divingA

Hello everyone,

In my last post, which is only a few hours old, i.e. from today, I announced that I would be giving you a few healthy things. However, as I still have a lot, almost a little too much material that I can and will give you in the Advent calendar, and I also have more time today due to the weather-related cancellation of some appointments in real life, I'm adding a little extra round to the Advent calendar today.

At the same time, I would like to use this round to encourage you to reconsider your behavior towards your children and/or grandchildren in real life.

Yes, of course, all children and adults like sweets, be it chocolate or marzipan, Christmas cookies and everything else that can be found on a colorful plate. However, we shouldn't forget to add some fruit to a good Christmas plate. Especially in winter, when we can easily catch a cold, an orange or two and this or that tangerine can't do any harm, as they contain vitamin C, which can protect us and our loved ones from the onslaught of a cold.

But other fruit is also perfectly appropriate at Christmas time, such as apples, bananas, fresh figs or dates. Unfortunately, the latter two are usually only available in dried or dehydrated form and are rarely available as fresh fruit.

However, I now have a few files for you that can be used for various props. So let me start with the prop: "Tropical Fruit In Bamboo Plate".

Here come the bananas, which are very suitable as small mini bananas to enrich a colorful plate if the prop has been scaled to the size of 0.60 per axis beforehand.



The same applies to the prop's mixture of apricots, peaches and plums. This should also be scaled to 0.60 per axis, so that it can also enrich the colorful plate.



Next, I'll bring out some fruit that I already developed for the Advent calendar in 2016 and am simply refreshing here. First of all, there is a navel orange, made for the "Primitive Sphere" prop, which can be brought to a more or less realistic size with the dimensions 0.12 per axis.



We continue with tangerines, this texture was .... Watch out !!! ... developed for the prop "Pumpkin 02". Scale the prop down to 0.15 x 0.20 x 015 in the X, Y and Z axes, apply the texture and you get tangerines.



But the "Pumpkin 01" prop also works well, especially if you want to use it to represent apples. Here are two maps for this prop, representing a green and a red apple. A sensible size for Pumpkin 01 would be around 0.20 per axis.



That should be enough for today, you now have plenty to do depending on your taste. Have fun, stay healthy, stay away from colds, sniffles, coughs and hoarseness,

your divingA

and my answer is... 16!