Angy's SecondLife Diary: This happens in 2019

A view back to 2019 (will be continued)

It is really difficult to put such a year into a blog post. It was a breathtaking year with so many different highlights to share with our friends and many guests, and with so many unforgettable experiences. We are really thankful to run this place and share this with our friends. So I would like to try it anyway. Of course I can't talk about every experience and can't mention every event. What makes the Sunshine Realm so special? Why do we have so many regular visitors, many of whom are our friends, and have been able to organize so many different events. The secret is the Sunshine Family. They support us and keep on encouraging us. And so we can now look back today on the 2nd successful year in a row.

Content

Existing (old) Venues

List of Events 2019

The year in numbers

Perhaps the easiest way to describe this year is simply to use the key figures. We have organized and ran 155 events. In that year only the first and last appointments were not used. On 1/1/2019 and on 12/31/2019 the events were cancelled by us. On all other Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays the events took place as planned. Altogether 7,969 guests and friends visited us at the events, so there were only 31 visitors missing from the 8,000 guests border. At each of these 155 events we also ran a contest with at least 1,000 L$ in the jackpot. These were often increased by us, and from our friends came donations which we also used to increase the jackpot. The total winning amount was an incredible 242,500 L$ which we distributed to our guests. We distributed 5,001 shares of the winnings. So it is a year of superlatives.

We started with 780 Members in our Sunshine Rocker Group and reached 999 Members at the end. Between it was an weekly up and down, many people leaved us but a lot came. The maximum was at the 26th of November as we celebrated the "Erntedankfest". We had 1,000 members at this night.

And some other numbers. I have written more than 160 blog posts about events, happenings and summaries over the months here at Sunshine Realm. Another number for that. in preparation for the events and as snapshots during the events there are almost 8,500 images in 170 albums on Google Images. These are all shared and there are links to most of these albums in the respective blog posts.

And this blog has had more than 20,100 page views. The most read post on this blog is of course the "Upcoming Events" page, which we regularly update and publish our events. Of the normal blog posts about the events, "Venice at Night" was clicked and read most often, followed by "The Strong Girls of Hedeby". After that "Buried Treasure / Pirates" and "Hearts On Fire" came on the following places. The 5th place was then taken by "Launch to the Moon".

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New venues

We have built some new venues this year. Some of them were only meant for one event, but are now an integral part of the Sunshine Realm and are used by us regularly. Others we have built with a lot of effort, but later we gave them up again. Nevertheless we enjoyed building these new venues. But it did not only cost time, but also investments.

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Alien

In January we had an "Alien Event". It has always been a dream to build a SciFi club. At the end of 2018 we had already taken the old warehouse out of the inventory and wanted to celebrate one of the Halloween 2018 events here. Unfortunately this event was cancelled due to technical problems.

But the Warehouse was still there and we wanted to use it. So we organized a 2 day special event here in January. The events Alien Attack: Last Fight For Earth und Alien Continuum: We are not alone will surely remain in the memory of many.

But we later deleted this set and gave it up again to make room for something new.

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Realm fo Shades

Who remembers the Super Blood Wolf Moon at 20th and 21th of January? It inspired us to build our own venue. The week before we created our Realm of Shades. An old gothic church ruin with a churchyard in front of it, and a cemetery. All around it were old castle walls and a path that led into an enchanted swamp that was all around it. And in addition the howling wolves and many other eerie noises that came out of this swamp. Here we performed the three events Darkness under the Moon, Enchantment under the Moon and Behind the Moon.

Actually we wanted to delete it afterwards. But somehow this place grabbed us all and we fell in love with this scenario. So later we deleted the swamp and used the free area for other events, but the core with the church ruin, the churchyard and the cemetery remained. And became the Realm of Shades, our counter-earth. Bic even designed an own logo for them. The Realm of Shades is one of the most important venues today and we had some really exciting events here.

For example our Walpurgisnacht or during the Halloween season Night of Witches & Warlocks and Festival of Frights. During Halloween there was another event place in the swamp with an enchanted mansion.

We made the events Night of Walking Dead and Blues, Boos & Brew. But also before Christmas we were here for Nightmare before Christmas, now the Realm of Shades was even snowed in.

This place inspired me to write 2 erotic novels. The first was "Awaken in the Swamps" which descripe the first awaken in the swamp. Was it a dream? The 2nd story "Enchantment under the Moon" would answer this, maybe. Or not?

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Sunshine Temple

Only a short time later another breathtaking place was built at the Sunshine Realm. We wanted something special for Valantine's Day. After some thought we remembered the kit we used to build a temple for the Ballroom Blitz in July 2017. But the model of the Greek Acropolis in Athens was to be placed on a mountain and highlighted. Everything was assembled from mesh parts from different kits and so this unique venue in SecondLife was created.

Here we celebrated our Hearts On Fire event, which was attended by more than 80 people. It was really an amazing night and is unforgettable. So many impressions. The naming of our Sunshine Temple fluctuated for a long time back and forth, so we often call it Mount Olymp or Sunshine Temple, and somtimes only "temple".

Actually the temple should be deleted after the event. But we just couldn't do it and instead quickly planned further events. Already in February Garden of Gods and in March the colorful events Holi Festival (Spring Formal) and Air, Earth, Water, Fire followed. Both events were breathtaken and unforgettable.

The temple proved to be very adaptable. So we held an Asian Paradice (Oriental Formal) here, but it also became Venice in Venice at Night. This should be our most successful event in 2019.

At Christmas time Winter Penguin Formal followed, and it was again a successful formal ball night. The colors were black and white and it was one of our first winter events last year.

We also celebrated our big end-of-year party Silver and Gold Formal here and thus ended the year 2019. It's really worth reading the blog posts again and taking a look at the picture albums.

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Sunshine Gym

Also in February we converted the old warehouse into a fitness studio. Bic made wonderful logos and textures again, and the inside of the Warehouse got a completely new look.

We opened it with some friday events under the theme Fitness Friday. But some more events followed here, which of course were all about sports and fitness. So we created a venue that we use from time to time to hold events without much preparation.

However, we are thinking about rebuilding this place in the new year. The warehouse could then perhaps become an event place for steampunk events. But this is the future, and maybe everything will be different.

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Viking village "Hedeby"

It was one of the most complex construction measures at the Sunshine Realm. We wanted to make an event that would be about the Vikings. The name was quickly found, "The Girls of Hedeby" is a song of the German folk band Santiano and is also about the Vikings returning home. And this was exactly the image that inspired us. The Vikings returning from a long voyage of discovery and expected by their families. And all together they celebrate a party. This is what we called the event "The strong girls of Hedeby"

But we really didn't have much material to build with and the topic was really new.

So I went through some Sims and looked at shops. I was especially impressed by the lovingly and very elaborately designed Sim of Thorvald Ragnarsson, who showed me everything and I was allowed to spend a wonderful evening. He also offered me to hold the event at his place, but then it wouldn't be the Sunshine Realm. A cooperation with shops was unfortunately also not possible, some underestimate the possibility to make products more known through Sims like ours. And especially with such exotic topics. So we built our own Viking village.

We also wanted to point out the culture of the Vikings, they were not only conquerors. They were sailors and explorers, but also craftsmen and farmers. They had runes and they knew how to celebrate. Our village should reflect all this. And it was a mad event, a breathtaking night that none of us will forget.

Even though we rebuilt this village twice more, for a GoT- Special Event and during a time travel to the dinosaurs day, we gave it up later. We needed the space and unfortunately most of these parts were not mesh buildings and therefore very prim-hungry. But who knows, now we have dragon boats and a ring castle, we have the big assembly hall and much more. Maybe we will repeat this excursion into the history of Northern Europe once again.

The blogpost about this event is one of the most read in this blog. Its seems a common interest of the theme.

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Primeval World

After we have already travelled far into the past with our Viking village, it should go even further back in June. We gave up the Viking village and built our primeval world at this place. At the event "Dinosaur Day" we all became prehistoric men and danced in the world of dinosaurs. Well, there were also friends who were dinosaurs themselves. Many surely remember Odette, who led the dinosaur Phil on a leash.

It was fun to create this world and bring back the dinosaurs in this virtual world. It was a very successful event.

Also this venue was only used once. After the event we cleared the area to make room for new projects.

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Caribbean Beach

Already at the beginning of April the idea for a beach at the Sunshine Realm was born. We had deleted the winterland and needed something. Actually a Japanese garden should be created first. But while we were still thinking about how to design it, we planned an event Hawaiian Luau. We wanted something special and somehow after the winter we also longed for a beach.

So we first built the new beach club and designed a beach around it. We had a lot of fun building this place, even if it was only meant for one event.

We were looking forward to many beautiful and colourful outfits. And the "Hawaiian Luau" event was also a very successful evening from the place and the outfits. But there were internal problems that evening, once again a catfight. So not everybody was there. Actually a reason to be sad, and we were. But because of that the decision matured to repeat the common fun at this place and we planned further events at our caribbean beach.

And we continued to expand. New mesh parts completed the beach, new palms. And it became more and more beautiful at this place. It was one of the most important places at the Sunshine Realm for 8 months, just a few days after "Hawaiian Luau" found the "Surf up!" event took place. Now on the finished beach.

Of course we also used the beach for our Cinco de Mayo event. Mexico and a nice beach club, that fits together very well. Also this event was colorful and will probably remain unforgettable for many. We had a lot of fun and laughed.

Our beach was now an important venue and we decide to keep it. And if you would ask me, surely one of the most beautiful beaches that SL has had this summer. But yes, it's always relative and I'm sure I'm also biased.

After the "Surf up!" event was quickly followed by others. In May "Swimming Lessons" and "Tanning at Sunshine Realm" followed.

With this event we wanted to draw attention to the dangers of sunbathing and to sensitize people to pay attention to the children, but also to themselves.

In June we went on a time travel to the Pirates of the Caribbean with the event "Buried Treasure / Pirates" and welcomed the summer with a "Summer Welcome" party.

We also celebrated the 16th birthday of SecondLife here.

Also in July we went to the beach and had a wonderful "Reggae Party" and came back for "Surfing Lessons".

In August we came to the beach for another pirate event. For the "rum day" it was called "Pirates - the return". This happens when you forget something, and the pirates probably left some barrels of rum on the beach at the first event.

For a second event we went to the front part of the beach and there we have to make some space for a "European" beach party. The theme was "A Day in Ibiza". I couldn't resist putting some lifeboats on the beach and pointing out to everyone the problems of boat refugees on the Mediterranean and the negative attitude of many European countries towards this topic. So it could have been a day of sea rescue.

It was still a nice event. And it should also remain the only one we did at the front part of the beach. But we also have a lot of options to organize our parties.

And also in September we used the beach for a special day. We were all horrified by the suffering of the people in the Bahamas and wanted to draw everyone's attention to it. So we called for support for the respective national aid organisations. Our event was "Bahamas Support Day".

Also during the Halloween time we went to the beach. The theme was "Ghoul's Night at Beach" and it was a special theme here at the beach. Besides the pirates, ghosts and ghouls were added and it became a special Halloween event. Especially in the change lies the fun.

After we weren't at the beach in November, we came back in December for "Ice fishing". Parts of the beach were already changed, like the Caribbean volcano and the reef in front of it. But there were ice islands and polar bears. It was the last event here before we built the new winterland here.

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Burlesque Palace

We react to the wishes of our friends from time to time. And Odette said often that she wished we could make a burlesque event. But we didn't really have a matching venue for it. But we wanted to fulfill her wish and make her happy. But we didn't have any experience about this topic and only few equipment for this. That's why we started searching, went to Sims, visited other clubs. So I also went to Babylon Berlin and met Sultry Sonata Masterson and heard her sing for the first time.

What do you need for such an event? Which equipment would we need. Is there a suitable building that we could use. This time of year is always especially exciting. And again Bic helped and created new textures for some banners.

After some searching we had a concept and the idea how everything could look like. And also a building was found. There were some candidates, but most of the buildings were too small. But there was this ballroom. The building was big enough, but not perfect. So we only wanted to use it for a weekend. But also here the attempt to "rent" the building just for a weekend failed. Somehow the vendors in SL are sometimes very short-sighted. So we merged and bought it. The ballroom building was not perfect, the textures inside were all bright and it was much too bright in the ballroom. But since they were all modifiable, we bought it and built it on the platform at the Sunshine Gym. And then we rebuilt a lot and changed a lot of textures.

Finally we decorated. We had found big champagne glasses, burlesque dance chairs, had a dance pad with burlesque dances and many other decorations. It was really fun, and so the new place became step by step our new Burlesque Palace.

Of course we all had to find outfits as well. And some of us also used all this to take some pictures and trips in other sims. This is the challenge for our events and some of our friends are really wonderful to fullfil the topics and dive deep into the themes. We were ready for our first burlesque event.

It was a lot of fun then. Our first burlesque night was a great success. And the new venue worked really well, even if more guests would come. Sadly some of our friends couldn't join uns in this night. But rl is the first life. But so it happened again. Although only planned for this one event, we decided to continue building the Burlesque Palace and leave it standing for now. And we immediately planned new events here, wanted to try out what our ballroom would be used for.

Our next event here was "End Prohibition / Speakeasy" and we went back to the 20's and the time of prohibition. Here a subculture was formed and beside small back rooms also big hotels and ballrooms were built. And somehow the burlesque time is not so different, so our ballroom was the perfect choice.

And so, our Burlesque Palace became in this night one of the establishments of the 20ies. And it was again a very nice night, the preparation was very exciting, and beside the search for the outfit I also learned a lot about this time. You can not only learn English in SL.

So we immediately planned the next event, this time we wanted to go to a casino and the name was quickly found: "Casino Royal". Also the big casinos rather follow a classical ballroom style, and so this place was perfect.

Again it was Odette who inspired us. Just as she likes burleque, she is also fascinated by everything to do with "red light district and whores". So we planned a very erotic event and around the Burlesque Palace typical buildings were created, like the ones on Hamburg's Reeperbahn or in Amsterdam.

In addition the typical lighting, some big cars, and the Burlesque Palace suddenly stood in a red light district.

Of course we came here for Odette's birthday. And I had already mentioned that Sultry Sonata Masterson thrilled me with her singing in Babylon Berlin, we hired her for this event in our red light district here at Sunshine Realm.

And we wanted us this set for a public event later too. We wanted go in our Redlight District. And this was also the name of our next event here: "Red-Light District".

Then we had a few weeks break. We spent a lot of time on the beach in summer. But in autumn we came back and did a "Hollywood Night" this time. So actually something similar to a time travel. Movie classics were to be used as a model and our Burlesque Palace was a matching place for that as well.

Then Halloween came and we wanted to come to the ballroom for an event. First we had found the theme "Costumes & Cocktails" and later we developed the concept. So it should be a steampunk event and we rebuilt some things, covered the walls with rusty metal panels and added some pipes. It was wonderful and a lot of fun. And even though we hadn't changed the floor plan, a completely new place was created.

And we felt like maybe the first new venue in 2020 will be a steampunk place. Who knows.

Finally 2 events came up. With "Vegas Nights" we went to a casino again, but with "A night in the Playboy Mansion" it was a new setting, this time the Playboy Mansion and we were all bunnies and the men came in tailcoats and suits. Some in pajamas, of course.

So the Burlesque Palace has become a permanent part of the Sunshine Realm. And that even though it was just a fixed idea, it was actually only planned for one event.

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Moon Station

We built this our Moon Station to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first moonlanding. We organized a themed week for this.

With this special week we followed the moon mission of Apollo 11, which was launched 50 years earlier. For this we placed a moon over the Trails End Music Hall Club with Bic's help. It was hollow inside and housed our Space Station, where we celebrated all events in this special week between 16th and 21th of July. Already the preparation was a lot of fun, and we changed the decorations in the Moon Station several times during the week.

On 16 July 1969, the Apollo 11 Mission to the Moon was launched. And 50 years later, our mission started on July 16. So our first event was "Launch to the moon" and we all had a lot of fun. And besides space travelers we could see androids, aliens and space troopers of the future. It was really an impressive crowd that came together. Our Events of the special week to celebrate the successful fly to the moon and the first landing of humans at the moon were planned before and independent of the SecondLife Challenge (#Apollo50th, #Apollo50, #Apollo11, #SecondLifeChallenge). But many new guests came and some used our Sim and events to make really fantastic pictures and took part with this at the Challenge. And everyone could share his pictures which made in our sim in our Flickr Group too.

On July 19, 1969, the Apollo 11 reached moon orbit and swung in. With that the first stage was finished and the preparations for the landing with the special module "Eagle" could begin. Reason enough to have an event for this at the 19th of July. Our Moon Week arrived the orbit too, and we celebrated the "In the Moon's Orbit" event. Like the Launch event came many guests, a lot new members in the group joined us.

Our special week for the 50th anniversary of the moon landing achieved its climax. The Apollo 11 mission reached its destination 50 years ago on 20th of July. The lunar landing module "Eagle" successfully landed at 20:17 UTC in the Mare Tranquillitatis on the lunar surface and Armstong's words went around the world "Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed". This is 1:17pm here in our common virtual world. As we started our party at 4pm, and we looked back at the mission 50 years ago, "Eagle" was already standing on the lunar surface. We had added a small lunar landing place with the model of the lunar Apollo 11 Eagle lander placed to our set. And the Apollo 11 Service Module with the Command Module flew about the walkways. Our event "The Arrival on the Moon" was a success and more as 70 guests celebrated this anniversary with us. This was our event in July with most visitors.

The lunar week was a huge success and we had more than 200 visitors at these three events. After landing on the moon we cleaned up and the space station left the Sunshine Realm again. We will certainly use it again in the future.

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Camp Sunshine

This is the meadow between the Trails End Music Hall Club and the Sunshine Garden. So it is not really a new place. Already last year we had the idea to use this area for the Octoberfest, but at that time the sim border between the two Sunshine Realm Sims ran right in the middle of this meadow and made it difficult with the DJ- board and tipjars. So we rejected the idea last year. Later the two Sims were finally connected to the current Sunshine Realm, so today this border doesn't exist anymore.

When we wanted to do a "Summer Camp" as an event this summer, we remembered this idea. And we expanded the meadow, thought about how we would place the necessary equipment and developed the idea of our first "Summer Camp" at the Sunshine Realm.

And also the name for this venue was found, it became our "Camp Sunshine".

This area at the Sunshine Realm is one of the most beautiful. So we were quickly drawn back here. The events here should bring nature closer. So the next event here became "Butterfly Watching" and was dedicated to the naturalists of the last centuries.

This event was also simply wonderful, and many followed this somewhat crazy idea. Some also came as butterflies.

Then we went to the loggers in the woods. Our event "Lumberjack Day" also took place at Camp Sunshine. Like all our craftsmen events it was less visited. But it was just great fun.

We should repeat this theme in 2020. It was amazing.

With the autumn came the Octoberfest. We already had the idea to celebrate here last year. This year we celebrated our 2nd Octoberfest event here. Since we had two locations for the Octoberfest, the first event took place at our central festival place (in Berlin), and second the Camp Sunshine changed to the "Octoberfest Munich".

We had some technical problems during this time and had to think about some things. But we could finish all events regularly.

Autumn and nature, so it was time for a "Harvest Festival" again. In this time Misty was not there, so I was nervous. But our friends helped. The theme for the outfits was "Indians and Pilgrims". Unfortunately some of them came without costumes at that time and started a discussion because they still wanted to take part in the contest, and complained loudly when I ejected them from the Sim.

So during this event the blogpost "Some about our Events" was created, in which I discussed this topic again and made it clear for everyone. The Sunshine Realm is a private Sim, we use our house right and decide who meets the conditions and who we ask to leave. If he doesn't go, we eject him and send him home.

The last event here was our "Erntedankfest", the German name for Thanksgiving or a Harvest Festival. But it wasn't just to be an early Thanksgiving, we wanted to thank nature. And the harvest festivals in Germany are end of September and begin of October and happen mostly in a Church.

Its seems much better to thank the nature outside of churches. And how do you do that? We themed the nature spirits and elves and invited to this special event in our Camp Sunshine. The spirit of the world is in the nature, and we all live together in one world, share it between us.

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Woodstock Anniversary Place

The legendary Woodstock Festival took place in the summer of 1969. So we celebrate the 50th anniversary. Already last year we built up a big festival place next to a farm and celebrated the 49th anniversary with 2 wonderful events. The music of this time, the lifestyle of the time of the Hippies and Flower Childs and the free love work up to our time.

Hippies created their own communities, listened to psychedelic music, embraced the sexual revolution, and many used drugs such as marijuana, LSD, and psilocybin mushrooms to explore altered states of consciousness. Even though the song "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll" was written years later, it describes the attitude to life of this unique time. Woodstock is one of the events that changed the world.

So we celebrate the anniversary again this year. And we built a very special venue for this festival again. We set it up during the week before the anniversary next to the Realm of Shades. Of course there was the meadow with a very big stage. At the side of the stage there are lavender bushes. On the opposite side there is of course a cow farm.

It was a lot of fun to build this up together with Misty. There is a Google Images Album with pictures of the preparation time, which show the festival place. And of course we were curious what our guests would say and how they would take up this theme.

The performances in the year 1969 took place between the 15th and the early morning of the 18th of August, we started our anniversary festival with the first event on the 16th of August. We asked our guests and friends "Are you also a flower child?" and invited them to come to this special event. Together with our friends and guests we wanted to go back to the time of hippies and flower power. And a lot people followed.

We celebrated the 2nd event of our 50th Woodstock anniversary celebrations on the 17th of August. We went again on our new festival place before it will be dismantled nat the next day. I have changed some at the stage, there is a new cover and some new lighting effects and fog machines. And we celebrated another rock night in the spirit of the music of the late 60s and the hippies. We were flower childs again and felt the power of this very special feeling of life.

SecondLife had some problems this weekend. But the place was prepared and we could manage all. So it was an unforgettable event again and we stays together till in the morning.

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Air base

This was our first event around the topic "Airplanes and Flying". It is a very popular topic in SecondLife, and you can really fly in the virtual world. There are big airfields, trainings and various airplanes of all types. But our theme was not about flying and airplanes, it is the theme for an event and therefore the costumes.

Also here we started with trips to other sims and shops to see first of all what is available and what you can build. And of course the search for a suitable costume. Already there many pictures were taken.

So we built an air base and celebrated our airport event "Flight School". Some airplanes landed before and it became a wonderful event with many pilots, ground staff and flight attendants. Many of our friends and guests convinced us with imaginative and impressive costumes and many were inspired like us to take pictures and explore other Sims. We deleted this venue a week later, but before that it remained open for photo sessions. Some also used this.

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Halloween extension of Realm of Shades

Like every year, Halloween was an important time of the year. We all love this special time. And we are all were "Children of the Night" in the Sunshine Realm for this time. We made the october to the longest Halloween event period we've ever had. It's an eerie time when we can all slip into different costumes. And we've thought about different themes that we'll be doing in different places all over our Sunshine Realm.

Samhain is the ancient Celtic origin of today's Halloween festival. On this day the access to Otherworld is open. Well, we've already opened it and our Otherworld, or Counter-Earth, is the Realm of Shades. And whether you call it Halloween or Samhain, it's an exciting time we're all looking forward to.

In October was Realm of Shades the center of our Sim, the old gothic church ruin is again surrounded by an eerie swamp and at the corners there's a Celtic cult place and at the other corner a witch house. We designed the area around the church and churchyard new and added a lot stuff. The space around the new haunted Mansion was fenced as new festival place for this time.

Between the events there was the landing point. The Sim was open for excursions and some people dropped by to explore the place and took pictures.

It was time again, the undead came to the Sunshine Realm. Again we didn't manage to prevent the apocalypse. Also this year the undead walked around in the Sunshine Realm. Sorry, we didn't pay enough attention, they are appeared at the cemetery at the Realm of Shades and found their way to the gates. The festival place was transformed into a ghostly swamp again. It was a very good place to hide for undeads. And between the moor witches the undead were on their way.

They tried to reach the new festival place in front of the new Haunted Mansion, where the living have barricaded themselves. We just managed to close off the festival place with a rusty fence, but we didn't knew if it would last long. So we sent a distress call to all survivors of the apocalypse to come to us and help send the zombies back to Otherworld this evening. And who knows if a haunted mansion is the best place to entrench? This was our first event here at the new place, the Night of Walking Dead, (Zombies). ss

In 2017 we spontaneously celebrated a "Zombie Apocalypse" for Halloween and hunted zombies. Back then the set for this event was created in only 3 hours. We converted the warehouse above the Sunshine Cove Beach Club. Then we repeated this 2018 with "Zombie Apocalypse 2018" in the urban skybox, at that time already with more effort. The zombies had already overrun almost the whole Skybox, only a run-down junkyard in one corner we could protect.

Our Blues, Boos and Brews was the next event here. It was Sunshine Realm's 6th event in our October Halloween themed extravaganza. This event featured Blues music, Ghostly Halloween costumes and lots of beer and wildness. You should think of a rocking college party - Halloween style. The term "Boos" clearly references ghosts so the costumes should be scary and spirited. We looked forwarded to spending a fun and exciting evening with the Sunshine Realm gang! And a lot people followed the invitation.

We planned this event first in the Sunshiner's Pub. But by the courageous and resolute effort of the zombie hunters at our "Night of Walking Dead" event it was possible to recapture the place in front of the "Haunted Manor" in the swamp of the Sunshine Realm and to expel the zombies back to the otherworld. So we moved it to the regained place in the Realm of Shades because its possible, that more Beings and Witches coming to this event and the space could be to less for all in our Sunshiner's Pub.

We celebrated the relief of the Realm of Shades. So we came back to the place in front of the house in the swamp. Here we made a more general halloween party together with our friends and guests. All kinds of Halloween costumes were allowed, as we celebrated that we could fight back this place from the undead.

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Winterland 2019 / 2020

The Winterland is a long tradition in our sim. We were a little late this year. But in the first week of December it was finally time, the winter was back at Sunshine Realm and we opened our Winterland 2019/2020 step by step. And at least in Central Europe the winter hasn't arrived in the RL yet. But now it is finally here at the Sunshine Realm. And it will accompany some of our events for the next 3 months.

After we cleaned up to prepare everything, the Caribbean beach, where we celebrated so many wonderful events over the summer, was cleared for this. So there was enough space for our new winterland, and by tidying up so many prims that we could get started. We also tore down the wall behind the alcoves to create a transition between the street with the Sunshiner's Pub and the new winterland. After some start problems the design developed even faster than expected. And even if some smaller decorations had to be added and some small things had to be fixed, we were finished after less than 4 hours. Its each time so much fun to build together with Misty. Hand in hand, and often without much coordination and planning. Spontaneously following a common idea, simply using fantasy.

The street was again a Christmas market this year. We opened it with our event "Winter Wonderland" on Saturday, December 14th. In the alcoves came the new stage, a winter pavilion, and over a bridge you get to the winterland behind. And somehow the Advent season is always something special. And Christmas markets have a long tradition in the Sunshine Realm.

We can look back to 2016 and the old Trails End Music Hall Club, where we built the first Winterland 2016 in a Skybox. And there was also a Christmas market where we celebrated the Christmas Holiday here. It was a spontaneous reaction to the cowardly terrorist attack on the Christmas market at Breidscheidplatz in Berlin. I didn't want to let my fear control me and thank my friends here in SecondLife for the awesome support and wonderful help. Many spoke with me at that time and it was my way to thank me. And we also built a winterland in 2017. At that time the Sunshine Cove Beach Club had just closed and I had opened my homeland. At that time we were not sure what 2018 would bring and if it would go on at all. But Valantine and I built it and Yezika and Vanny supported us as DJ without the tips. And it should somehow be the beginning of today's Sunshine Realm. And of course we had a Christmas Market here too.

So it was even nicer to build another winterland the following year. Misty and I had a lot of fun building a fairyland with Winterland 2018, and it was one of the most successful venues. We had a lot events here in the Winter 2018 / 2019. But it's difficult to rank, because we had a lot of very nice events in 2018. That's what I put together in the Youtube video "Farewell 2018 Sunshine Realm". And there's also a reminder video for Winterland 2018. And of course we also built the Christmas Market in 2018. Still as a reminder of the cowardly terror attacks and to say "Fuck you" to each of those idiots who think that terror against innocent, even children and women is justified. We are not afraid". Christmas is a time of new beginnings and forgiveness.

The centre of the Winterland is again the pond for ice skating where we celebrated some great events last year. The pond is only turned by 90° this year. But there is also a 2nd smaller pond for ice skating this year and again a lot to see left and right of the paths. And this year we did without the panorama walls and added some offsim stuff. So the Winterland invites to a visit again since today.

We opened the winterland and the big pond this year with our event "Christmas story time by the campfire" on Friday, December 20th. We repaired the last little things and everything was ready. All guests were welcome to come and explore and relax for a moment, close eyes and enjoy the peaceful atmosphere of a winter landscape that transforms our world into a fairytale land. Because the time has come, "Winter is back at Sunshine Realm.

The Advent season is a colourful and exciting time and that's why our event at the 21th was called "Santa's Helper Party". It was finally time to put out special Xmas Clothes. Our guests were invited to come as Santa or one of his little Helper to the Sunshine Realm. We went to the Christmas Market again and celebrated colorful that Christmas was so close.

Our last event in 2019 here in the Winterland was "Ugly Sweater". We invited our guests to this event because holidays can be a stressful time and it seems like there is a never-ending list of invites to sort through for the entire month. And this in real life and SecondLife. We couldn't help our guests in real life, but we tried it here in SecondLife. We invited friends, group members and guests to break this stressful cycle for a little Christmas fun. We celebrated our naughty Ugly Holiday Sweater Party.

The Winterland is still open and we will celebrate a lot events here in the next weeks.

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Old Venues

The Sunshine Realm is in constant change. Even after 25 months new venues are being created and others are being abandoned to make room for new ones. This fate also befell our Sunshine Garage in 2019, where everything started in December 2017 as Haunted Garage and where we celebrated many events, the last time the lights were turned off was in 2019. The effort to continue to use the humid gloomy garage was just too much, even though we tried to repair it several times. So we finally moved it under the warehouse, thus saving the landing point around it. Then we gave it up to make room for new ones. But some of the places that were created in 2018 also accompanied us through 2019.

Sunshiner's Pub

Our pub is our secret clubhouse or the "frat house". Many nice events took place here. The first time we moved the pub to our then new street, the then French Quarter, for the Saint Patricks Days 2018. At that time it was still on the left side of the Sim and decorated in green as befits Saint Patrick's celebrations.

As the street was only planned for a series of events before, we also wanted to keep the pub only for a weekend. Thus we also did not give the pub a name. Of course the Saint Patrick celebrations with the two events "Formal Green Saint Patrick" and "Green Beer Party" were a complete success. Because we also built our new garden for the Easter time in the same month, the pub and the street stopped for a while. During the Easter time our plans for a new, bigger Sunshine Realm were born and became more and more concrete. So we decided to rebuild the pub and gave it the name "Sunshiner's Pub". The reopening Party "Sunshiner's Reopening" took place at the end of April and already in 2018 we had many nice events here.

And so it went on in 2019, with the "National Trivia Day" we opened the year 2019 here. In total we had 33 events here last year. I don't want to enumerate them all here now. But I would like to mention some highlights.

We had our "Opposite Day" here, where we turned everything around. It was really a lot of fun and we laughed a lot. Such events show how the Sunshine Family sticks together and we can laugh about ourselves as well.

During the "Salsa Night" it became hot and erotic. And with DJ Yezika we have a Latina who can do the entertainment for us. It was a night of hot rhythms and we all had a lot of fun.

It is well known that many of us are football fans. So also the Super Bowl weekend was something special. We turned the pub into a sports bar and celebrated the weekend here. We started with "Super Bowl Preheating" on Friday and "Day before Super Bowl LIII" on Saturday. We also watched the Super Bowl together, but on Sunday in the "Club Room".

After the success of the "Salsa Night" with the hot rhythms we wanted to go to Latin America again with a theme. And which place is the capital of Salsa? With our "Havana Night" we celebrated our 2nd Latin American event in the Sunshiner's Pub.

Then we came back again for the event "Hats are put on". It was a nice evening and everybody was asked to wear a hat. It is always exciting what some people make out of topics like this. It is really often a challenge.

Then Phils RezDay came and we wanted to do something for him. Because he likes jazz music, we organized our jazz night with "Mobsters & Molls" in the Sunshiner's Pub. We invited Joaquin Gustav, who sang live for an hour. It was a wonderful event that we ended up in the upper floor at the private Rezday Party.

It all started with Saint Patrick a year before, so we came back here again this year. If you already have a pub, you use it. Our "Preheating Saint Patrick" - event was a nice evening. We started the Saint Patrick Celebration a day before outside the door at the street. Of course not only the beer was green that day. And it was hot again.

And also the Tartan Day we celebrated here. Our event "Gaelic Heritage Day" was dedicated to Scottish customs and was beautiful. Already here it became clear how many different events we can celebrate in our "clubhouse".

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Street

The street is the place for our big street festivals. Originally built as French Quarter built us for Mardi Gras in 2018, we moved it to its current location in the summer of 2017 as we rented additional the right side of the sim and opened our Summerland with the Soccerfield.

Although the left side of the street has changed from time to time, but after we deleted the winterland 2018/2019, we closed the site with an additional row of houses. In addition, we added the alcove, which gave us the space for a stage in front of which many of our most colorful and exuberant events took place.

So we celebrated "Mardi Gras" and the "Samba Party" here. For these events we put blinds in front of parts of the houses to enhance the impression of the street carnival. Both were very colorful events.

Of course we also celebrated "Saint Patrick" in the street. Here we built the alcove and the stage. Now the street really offered us enough space even for very big events.

And we celebrated more traditional and naughty at the naughty Friday Party here.

And we continued at Saturday with a more formal Saint Patrick Party in green. It was an awesome weekend.

Of course we also celebrated the "Memorial Day" here.

Also our PRIDE Days 2019 took place here, after the event "Tonight we are all PRIDE!" followed one day later "Rainbow Colors". That both of these events were very colorful, doesn't need to be mentioned. It was a successful week.

Every year we also celebrate July 4th at the Sunshine Realm. I have many friends in the USA and Misty comes from here too. So it is always a special friend for me to prepare this day. Everyone was invited to the event "Belated Independence Day". The celebrations took place within the frame of an American week, where we and around July 4th put together typical American events.

Many of our long time friends come from France. So every year we celebrate the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille, the French national holiday on July 14th. Many friends and guests came to the event "Honor France".

In addition to this, there were some special events. So we celebrated the biker event "Motorcycle Mania" here. There were not many visitors, but it was a nice event and we had a lot of fun preparing it. And also the leather clothing of our friends and guests was a lot of fun.

Hot and erotic it became the event "Car Wash Day". Here we set up a place for washing cars in the alcove, also with many special poses. In the middle of the street was a car wash. And of course it was an erotic event and there was a lot of foam on the street.

Different music styles always play a role for us. And so we celebrated our "Urban Dance Festival" in the street and invited everybody.

And we also took to the streets on the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. But now the street was divided by a wall, there was an east side and a west side. In addition there were tank traps and the tank was not missing. I put information boards on a part of the wall and tried to explain the history of the wall, the meaning of the division and the miracle of reunification. Who was involved? So there were many interesting conversations this week. Guests and friends approached me or watched reports about the time on Youtube.

Our first event of this week was a time travel to the late 80s, which we did in the Sunshiner's Pub. But already here the street was redesigned and everything was prepared. So the guests on their way from the ock to the pub already got an impression of the division and the wall.

The 8th of October 1989 was the day before the Wall fell. There were many demonstrations and vigils in churches 30 years ago. So we thought about an event with candles. But how can you turn vigils into an event idea? And at the end are our events parties and not vigils. Our event should be called "The Day before" first.

But, than we had another idea for the event. Mikhail Gorbachev was in Berlin and his positive stance about the world was for many people visible. Even though the Soviet Union was responsible for the Wall. Now stood the government of the former GDR alone, the east part of Germany. How lucky we actually were. Than, who thinks about what could happened if everything else had happened that day? That the regimes weren't so weakened that it wasn't Putin but Gorbachev, and that Germany could be reunited peacefully.

That's why we shot the planned theme completely, and the event was "The Day after". What could have happened? We therefore invite you to an Apocalypse event in which civilization has perished and struggles to survive, as in the Mad Max Movies. We built the Wall and decorated the Street in front of the Sunshiner's Pub with burning cars and tires, and tank traps.

We planned with "30 yrs Berlin Wall Fall" a very special event as highlight for this week. It should be the grand finale of our week for the 30th anniversary of Berlin Wall Fall and the peaceful revolution in the east part of Germany. And we had invited the amazing live singer Wolfie Starfire to perform at this event. That's why we started one hour earlier and won the extra time. For many Germans is the 9th of November a special day and maybe the secret national holiday here in Germany. And I wanted make an amazing event for this in SL too.

Some month later the reunion would finished at the 3th of October 1990, the National Holiday here in Germany. But all this was only possible because thousands people went to the Streets and demonstrated against the dictorship.

And even if we now live in a difficult time, and in many countries walls are being built again rather than real walls or border fences or even just in people's minds. I wrote in some blogposts about this. The 9th of November will always stand for the liberation of a whole people. And that is why we celebrated it here in the street.

We've been celebrating this day for many years. And especially after last week, when we celebrated the fall of the Berlin Wall, it was more important for me. Since our Sunshine Realm had a rest day on November 11th, we started our Veteran Day Event a day belated. We went to the Street again. The wall was now fallen and away and instead some military vehicles were parked around the alcove. And yes, Misty was back after her long travel and it should get a wonderful event.

The street was already our Christmas market last year. And also this year we have built up a Christmas market again.

Here we celebrated two events. We started with the opening party "Winter Wonderland". The guests were invited to come in winter clothes, not unlike a visit at a Christmas market in RL. Warm boots and gloves, a thick scarf and coat.

Shortly before Christmas we went out on the streets again. This time it was a typical christmas party and it was called "Santa's Helper". Everyone was invited to come in a Santa Claus costume or the outfit of one of his little helpers. It was the last party in the street last year. But I am sure there will be many nice events here in the new year.

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Sunshine Garden

dd

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Trails End Music Hall

dd

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Travels through the time

Very popular themes in SL are also time travel. That is the fascinating thing about this virtual world. If you have enough fantasy and can bring it into concrete ideas of a world, then you can really create any illusion. And so there were also some time travels at the Sunshine Realm. And those were really beautiful and unforgettable events here. We often went to our Sunshiner's Pub here, but also the Burlesque Palace was rebuilt, we went to the temple and even built our own worlds just for time travel.

Dinosaurs Day took us furthest back into the past. We also built our own world here, our primeval world at the Sunshine Realm. It was built on the site of the Viking village, so we kept the gate area and parts of the ring wall to create an entrance to the world.

Already in the dark forest in front of the gate the guests met the first dinosaurs. These could also break out of the park in our world and waited hungrily in front of the gate for the arriving visitors. Through the stable gate we went into the inside of the park where the actual event took place.

Of course there were also some dinosaurs and the landscape was designed with rocks. It was a wonderful event that took us back to primeval times. Unfortunately the dinosaurs are very hungry. So we cleaned up the park after the event and packed everything up to make room for new ones.

Garden of Gods
Vikings

Mobsters and Molls

End Prohibition / Speakeasy
Burlesque
50s. Sockhop

70s Disco

80s

90s
Literature Night
Holliwood Night

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Sport Events

This kind of event is very important at Sunshine Realm too. We build different places this year

Football

Baseball

Motorsport Day

Roller Derby

Bowling

Basketball

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Yearly Holidays and Celebrations

Another way to look back is the view at different themes which each year repeated and some of this have a long history for us.

List of Events 2019

The easiest way to look back on the year is certainly to list all the events that took place in 2019. The following list contains all events assigned to the months. For most of the months I wrote a review in the last year, the links to these are next to the name of the months.