The Clary Saga Part 1- Intro to the family - the very bad birthday

 So I was minding my own business, playing my LEPacy in Monte Vista when one of Linus' friends drew my attention. His name is Bernardo Clary.  He became best friends with Linus, and came over to Linus' house to play.  It got very late, and Linus and Cliff had gone to bed, but Bernardo stayed and played in the sprinklers all night long, wearing nothing but his underpants.

So I figured this was some poor kid from the wrong side of the tracks whose parents don't pay any attention to him and let him run amuck. Today, I intended to simply save the family in the library bin to play later, but I thought I'd take a peek into his life.  That peek has lasted on and off all day.

First of all, he isn't poor at all. His family is wealthy, lives in a very nice (by EA standards) house, on a large piece of property. There were some problems, however. This house originally had only two bedrooms, which was weird because, according to Simfandom.com, at the beginning of the game, this house is occupied by the three Giordano sisters, who are all single young women, so I'd assume there'd be one more bedroom.

While this house was pretty, the rooms were way too big and were sparsely furnished. The bathrooms were plenty big enough to be nice sized bedrooms, and the hallways were enormous! Cliff had been here once when the household needed a nursery.  When he got there he found a female toddler, so created a little girl's nursery by borrowing part of the parents' bedroom.  Then he noticed there was also a boy toddler, so he put another crib in the other giant bedroom for good measure.

Here's the write-up on the household at the beginning of the game: The Giordano Sisters couldn't be any different. Though all pretty and smart, their personalities clash. Georgia is rude, Paloma is shy, and Alessandra is just trying to find her place in the world. Without their parents to guide them, can the Giordano Sisters stay together? (Simfandom.com)

I don't know how accurate that description is. At any rate, when I checked up on Bernardo Clary as a child, he was the son of Paloma and her husband Al Clary. He has a teenage sister named Stefanie, and a twin sister named Alexandra (probably named after her aunt Alessandra, who no longer lived at this house.) His aunt Georgia also lived a this house (83 Chorus Court).  The family was very short on beds and bedrooms, and the youngest kids resorted to sleeping on couches. 

 I fixed things up by adding two more smallish, but big enough bedrooms where the massive upper floor hallway was, removing the cribs, and adding enough beds for everyone. Here's a rundown on the family members:

Aunt Georgia

She's the "cool" aunt, living on borrowed time. She is a member of the City Council, a great kisser, inappropriate, a heavy sleeper, ambitious, and mean-spirited, (but I didn't really see her picking fights with anyone). She is engaged to Gus Crawford, who I think is considerably younger that her. She's friends with all the female family members, but is only acquaintances with the boys (Bernardo and his father Al). 

Paloma is the glue that holds the family together.  She's friends will everyone in the family, but she's slightly closer to Cliff Gains (from my LEPacy) than she is with anyone else, including her husband.

Paloma works in the Journalism career as a Professional Blogger. She has no sense of humor, is clumsy, charismatic, a genius, and a hopeless romantic. 

Al Clary, Paloma's husband, is a loner and has literally no friends with the exception of Paloma.  He's not even close with his children.  He wants to be a professional writer, but had no skills in that area when I met him. I got him on track, and he's finished his first fiction novel, but he's an elder and doesn't seem very focused on his goal. He never autonomously works on it, but would rather play video games, play with toys and improve his physical fitness.

(You can see part of the family home in the background.) Al's traits are loner, childish, schmoozer, genius, and good sense of humor. I'm not sure how he can be both a loner and a schmoozer. I guess he can socialize, but doesn't like to. 

Stefanie Clary is the teenage daughter of Paloma and Al. She loves the outdoors, is unlucky, excitable, and a computer whiz. She wants to be a scientist, but hasn't made much progress toward that goal. They have a large faux orchard that she needs to convert into a real one and get her gardening skills up, but she's more interested in her boyfriend JC Costa, going to the prom, and learning to play the guitar.

Her closest relationship is with Aunt Georgia, then her boyfriend, then the others. She isn't close to her siblings.  Maybe it's the age difference. 

Alexandra is a slob, a genius, clumsy, and as she aged up to a teen, she became eco-friendly.

She is only close to her mother, and she does NOT like it when her father tries to pinch her cheeks!

She seem interested in learning - especially things that are science-related - chess, astronomy, chemistry. 

Bernardo is a slob, loves the outdoors, is good, and as he aged up to a teen, he had no sense of humor.

He likes sports and fishing. His closest relationship is with his best friend Linus, then with his mother. He's the kid that often gets overlooked. 

I spent about a sim week getting to know this family. It culminated with one action-packed day.  Here's how it went:

Most of them tend to be early risers, getting hungry around 3 am. They sometimes gather in the dining room to talk about their days and gossip. (Poor Linus!)

Aunt Georgia got a $10,000 donation from one of her friends, and she also embezzled some money while at work.  She never got caught.  Here she is coaching Stefanie who is interested in building her athletic skills.

Paloma threw a party for one of her co-workers, and it was an epic success. However, her sister's fiancé came on to her and offered her flowers.  She turned him down and didn't tell anyone else about the incident.

 

By the end of the week, it was the twins' birthday, and Bernardo was excited that his dad was going to take him fishing.  When they got to the fishing hole, however, Al decided to take a nap, and Bernardo ended up fishing alone.  On the upside, he caught two minnows, three goldfish, and two trout. 

Paloma was planning a birthday party for the twins, and was going to invite all the teens they knew as the twins were going to age up to teens. Then she remembered: It's Prom night. All the teens will be at Prom, so no party except with family members.

JC Costa arrived to take Stefanie to the Prom. He didn't bother to dress up that much, which kind of annoyed Stephanie. She sat as far away from him in the limo as she could.

When she got to the school, she noticed her guy wasn't the only one who didn't dress up, and some were even more "casual," so she forgave him.

On the upside, she became Prom Queen.

Meanwhile, back at home, Al awoke from his nap and rushed home for the party, forgetting to tell Bernardo, who kept fishing.

They told Alexandra they weren't going to wait for her brother and to go ahead and blow out the candles. When Paloma went upstairs to tell Georgia that Alexandra was ready to blow out the candles, she found her dead on the floor of the upstairs bathroom.

Al came running when he heard Paloma cry out. They told Alexandra to stay downstairs; they would be down in a moment.  They tried to collect themselves and keep the incident from Alexandra, but she could hear the commotion and sensed what had happened.

At least Grim stayed for the party.

By the time Bernardo showed up to blow out his own candles, everyone else was preoccupied and Grim had left.  Mom tried to act excited, but it was hard with the cake already in her hands.

Bernardo's party guest turned out to be the llama mascot from the university.  No one let him in.

Happy Birthday, Bernardo. May tomorrow be a better day.