July 2021 Favorites

Do I even need to intro monthly favorites anymore?

Animal Crossing: I hadn't played much of my island for a few months until company was here. One cousin was already into the game. The other really wanted to get into gaming, and I thought it was a great choice for her. And with that incentive, I've been working on improving my island. Putting down paths for the first time. Adding decorative pieces. And trying to hybridize more flowers. My island rating is still stuck at three stars because I have "too many trees". 🙄 But I'm enjoying the game again, especially how much fun it is to play with my cousins!

Super Mario 3D World: Speaking of games that are fun to play with cousins, I introduced my self-proclaimed "newbie" cousin to one of my favorite Mario games, and she loved it, too! Turns out she's way better at games than she gave herself credit for. Once she went back home, we were missing playing with each other. And for a surprise, her brother picked up the game for their Switch, and we were all able to play together online!

Grishaverse: I mentioned the Shadow and Bone series while I was reading it, but I finished the trilogy this month, and yeah, it's really fantastic. The magic was fascinating, I loved the characters, and while there were a few parts in the second book that dragged a bit (I don't love sea voyages), I loved Alina's journey so much!

YouTube Favs: I've been watching Safiya Nygaard since 2019. I watched pretty much all of her videos with my Mom after we discovered her Melting Every Candle From Bath & Body Works Together video. I've recently been rewatching her videos, and now that she and her husband do weekly live-streams, there has been way more Safiya in my life. A newer YT favorite is Summoning Salt, who does history of speed-run records videos. I fell down the rabbit hole with this discovery, watching one video after another obsessively. He's so good at telling the story of each record in an interesting way!

Music Favs: Life in the Vivid Dream (Grimes), When I'm Small (Phantogram), Ghost (Adaline), Feather (Meg Myers), Be Like Water (Sarah Fimm), Over My Head & Wasted Youth (Fletcher), Claws (Washington), Run (Cascada), Intuition (Jewel).

And just a little reminder that you can follow my Sims adventures on Tumblr.