Formalities

On Wednesday evening I went to my first SL formal dance, at Club Extasia. I've been to some less formal events on this sim and always had fun there.  The owner was very excited to have a live performer, Jacq (aka Jacqueline Luik) singing at this event.

Thanks to lucky boards and dollarbies, I've collected a few fancy lady-like dresses but so far haven't gone anywhere that I needed to wear them.  So I went through my inventory, tried a few of them on, ruled some out as unsuitable, and eventually took the final options to get a second opinion from my SL employer. :)

Dress #1 .:LC:.Evening Gown Anita silver [Lucky Board]: I really love this dress, but the silver would probably look better on someone with darker hair (or possibly platinum). While it looked all right, it was only that: all right. Not the exciting or dramatic overall effect I was hoping for.

Dress #2 - **Rag Dollz** After Dark (green) [Midnight Madness]:  I *almost* went with this one. I love the way the semi-sheer skirt flows, and the color of it. Something about the pseudo-corset doesn't play as well as it might with my figure, though.

Dress #3 - Stitch in Time "My Gown": This was definitely the most daring of the options I had lined up. The ruffles of the skirt don't move quite realistically, but I fell in love with the dramatic decolletage when I first saw it.

Dress #4 - .:LC:. Loress [Lucky Board]: I put this one on kind of as an afterthought; it's a lovely dress, but I wasn't sure how crowded the dance floor would be and thought the huge skirt might be a drawback. (After pointing out we could probably host a small party underneath the skirt, my boss agreed.)

The boss told me Dress #3 would have the best chance of knocking my sometimes-date's socks off if he showed up for the event - so that's what I wore.

...and the date couldn't make it. *wry smile* He'd told me he might not be able to, and I had a good time anyway. Jacq has a beautiful voice, and provided us with an hour of love songs to dance to. So I danced - first on my own, and then with a charming gentleman who proved to be very good at matching dances to the pace of the song. We chatted quite a bit about dance animations, avatar customization, finding one's passion in SL - whether dance or building or otherwise - and sent me a landmark for the S.S. Galaxy (a cruise ship that takes up 3 full sims? Really? O,o) as a recommendation of someplace I might like to explore. Thank you, B! :)

(Disclaimer: the following screen caps were not taken at the dance itself, I was too distracted by Jacq's voice and the conversation to think of taking any pictures then. I asked a friend to help me re-create them.)

Formal Dance style:

skin - [ROCKBERRY] Apple 2 Natural [Lucky Board]
makeup - .:Glamorize:. Revolver Moderate Red lipstick & eyeliner
hair - *Hazzard* -Amarillis- Bordeaux Red Hair
dress & gloves - Stitch in Time "My Gown" by Rbk Silvercloud
shoes - Yogi's Shoes "Yogi's weave wrap stiletto blue jay"
jewelry - Blackburns Boots & Shoes "Royal Wedding Gifts Ring & Necklace - April 2011";
    earrings, ~XM~ "Diamond Dew Drop"