Improvising

SINCE Ganz won't give us snowy yards that last all year, here's a "winter park" made of snow flooring, using snow chairs, sofa, side tables, and dividers, with perks in the form of icicle trees and Google ice sculptures, with the blue skies wallpaper subbing for real sky. Minerva enjoys the permanent snowiness. You can even take a hot-air balloon ride around the park!

The Animals Came Two by Two...by Two...by Two...

IN the wake of the new January Webkinz pets—the black poodle, the velvety elephant, the grey Arabian, and the tie-dyed frog, plus the new Easter duck—and recent news of the February animals—the schnauzer, the Himalayan cat, the pink and white cat, the black and white cheeky dog, and the kangaroo—there is now news of more new pets, these for March!

The "March Madness" bunch will be a brown dog (looks like a cocker spaniel/golden retriever, but chocolate brown), a Bengal tiger (has a completely different design from the earlier tiger), a tiger snake (it is striped tiger color), plus a Lil Kinz pink poodle and black Labrador.

There is also a stuffed Wacky Zingoz, but the rumor is that we will not get a virtual pet with it; it will open up a new section of Webkinz World. Maybe a "Wackyland"?

No news on the grey wolf, which is rumored to be a totally virtual pet.

Six is Swell...I Guess

BUT not compared to two. :-)

After a veritable blizzard over the weekend where the snowflakes of Winterfest were falling in intervals of multiples of two (sometimes they did come every two minutes, which was a "wheee!" moment), they have slowed down to the old Fall Festival/Goo-Goo Berry rate of intervals of multiples of six (and very slow sixes at that). Should have done more snowflake hunting over the weekend.

Catching Snowflakes With A Mouse

WINTERFEST has arrived; in fact it apparently arrived early in the Asian time zones that they now have. It looks like they are giving out all of last year's Winterfest prizes except for one, which I am happy about because I really want the snowflake sweater. I have the snowflake toque and the new parka, but am crossing my fingers for the sweater.

The snowflakes seem to have been reset from last year's six-minute intervals like the leaves in the fall festival and the goo-goo berries. They are coming in multiples of two; I've gotten one in the most recent catching session in six minutes and then the rest in four minutes. I think this makes the odds better in getting more "stuff.

Since I have a duplicate pig I'm seriously thinking about a second account. Most of the Webkinz World superusers have at least two account. Some started out as parents taking care of their kids' accounts and then starting one for themselves and finally taking over their kids' accounts. Most of the kids seem to play with it as Ganz probably intended; the adults have the collecting fever and the trading fever.

Me, I just want enough icicle trees to do a faux winter park. :-) (Actually I have a faux winter park, but no trees for it. Trees in pots are better than nothing.)

Where else could you decorate rooms for so little cash input?

Sliding in Soon!

COMING soon!

Hoping for Consistency

LOL to this menu. These choices came up in the hourly menu this afternoon when I logged on after work, above the actual hourly choices.

"Wheel of Bananas" is funny enough (evidently referring to the Wheel of YUM), but I love "WOTM (hopefully)." The Wheel of the Month is notoriously ticky and it seems even the Webkinz programmers are doubtful that it will work!

Christmastide Adoptions

I finally had a chance to adopt my pinto horse (I keep typing "pinot" as if she's a wine) on Boxing Day (St. Stephen's Day, whatever). She is named after Addie Mills' horse Treasure in The Thanksgiving Treasure. I had a hard time picking out the stuffed animal; most of them seemed "pulled" along the seams so they were all very obvious; it was hard to pick an attractive one (or at least I thought so).




I waited until January 2, since the site was hiccuping again on New Year's Day, to adopt my white seal. As you can see, I went traditional (but then I'm a Kipling fan). The seal moves like the google, gliding back and forth on the ground. I was hoping it might move a little more like a real seal, but that would be a difficult locomotion to animate.




I didn't adopt the penguin until today because I could not for the life of me think of a name for him. "Tennessee Tuxedo" and other permutations and Happy Feet names seemed too sterotypical. So did most of the snowy/icy names. I considered "Hoboken" after the little penguin in the Bugs Bunny cartoon that cries ice cubes, but wasn't sure about the name. Then I started considering fish (although my references say that most small penguins eat krill, not fish) names. The solution I came up with sounded the cutest. (Hey, it could have been "Halibut"!)

The penguin is so cute when he moves; he does indeed waddle!