5 How to Tips For Contestants and Contest Hosts in Regarding to Outfits: a Subject Suggested by moynistwo

Tip #1, Make Sure You Understand the Theme: Don't be afraid to ask questions or request further explanation. Not only does this help you do your best in the competition but it can help the contest host learn how to explain herself to her contestants. To my Contest Hosts out there, if you can tell that someone does not understand what you are asking then find a way to help them without making them feel humiliated or embarrassed. 

By understanding what you are dressing for, your outfit will be way better equipped for the contest and you've got a very good chance on making it to the next round.

Tip #2, Combine Matching and Colorful: Try to have matching items in your outfits but at the same time don't be afraid to add that pop or surprise item that can take your outfit to the next level. You want their first reaction to be "wow, this person did a great job" or anything like that.

This is something which I apply to more than just Fashion Story Avatar Contests. I also apply it to writing blog posts, drawing, the list goes on. 

Tip #3. Beautiful Can Be Less Coins: You might think that the more coins/gems an item is, the cuter it will be. This is not always the case, so I don't worry about the end cost of my outfit in real life or in Fashion Story. For instance for my Christmas Outfits I used some of the items you get for free in the beginning, at like level 80 (or something like that). Anyway, price isn't a defining factor in my choices for winners of my contests nor of what I wear for contests I am in.

Just something to think about and watch out for.

Tip #4. Accessories, Accessories and more Accessories: I know you have most likely heard this many times, but I happen to know that the accessories you chose can change an outfit from elegant to casual, basketball time to date time, etc. Pick your accessories with care and remember to experiment with what goes and what doesn't. 

Tip #5. Ask For Pointers From Contest Host if You Get Eliminated: If your outfit doesn't 'cut it' ask for the honest reasons and learn from their critic. Most of the ladies I know would gladly give pointers to their contestants and I know I have in the past though only when asked.  

To those of you who are contest hosts, keep in mind that you owe it to your voluntary contestants to make being in your contest as fun as you can. 

To those of you who are contestants, I hope this list helps you and I hope that you will have taken something away after reading this. 

If you have an idea of a good subject for a post please either leave via comment here or at Questions & Suggestions. Thank you! ~ Sky's Limit

The Bat Cave: My Semi-successful Fashion Story Boutique

A few months ago I wrote a series of posts on how to start a Fashion Story boutique. During that time I started The Bat Cave on my mother's phone so I could show you how it works from start to finish. Today I wanted to show you how The Bat Cave's theme is coming along.

As you can see I have quite an amount of work to do still on the store decor, and I am having trouble keeping it stocked up since its on my mom's phone. I have also changed the theme outfit from idea to realty with a few tweaks. I am still saving up for some gem items to finish it off, but this is what it looks like now.

If you want read my posts or want to compare the differences between the before and after you can see the posts here:

Starting a Fashion Story Boutique: Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3

Thank you for reading and please leave a comment! ~ Sky's Limit and The Bat Cave

Creating an Beautiful Outfit: A Tutorial Requested by Style N Fit

To start out with, you need to have an idea in your head what the outfit will be whether fancy or casual, dark or light, dull or bright, summer or winter you need to start with something. 

In this tutorial i will be showing you how to make this outfit, along with how to make your own with the 11 different things you can customize on your Fashion Story avatar.

The first 4 are your avatar's hair, eyes, lips and skin color. Though skin/hair color does not make an outfit, choose your lipstick and eye shadow carefully. I usually go simple until I finish my outfit and then go back and fancy it up if I want.

The next 3 things to customize are your avatar's shirt/dress, pants/leggings/tights, and shoes. This is where making your outfit really begins. Look around for a shirt to start off your outfit, and remember that anything you do can be changed so fell free to try something new!

In this case I went for the green dress/shirt (it depends on the outfit) to start out my outfit. Now to choose the pants. Like shirt you can try several different options until you find what you want.

In this case I found what I wanted pretty fast because I knew what I was going to do for this outfit. By  this time I had already decided to do blue and green, and I think it shows. Now for the shoes...

The next and last 4 things to choose are your accessories, such as purses, necklaces, bracelets, hats, glasses, etc. 

Always keep an eye out for affordable items that you can buy to go with your outfits, but at the same time remember you don't need every item in the closet.

Now that you've completed your outfit, you can either discard it and start over by pushing the grey arrow near the avatar's head or tap the pink X in the top right hand corner and save your avatar. 

Thank you Style N Fit for suggesting this post, if you have an idea for a blog post or questions about Fashion Story please leave a comment here or on my Questions & Suggestions Page.

How to keep it Functioning: Space and Patience (A Subject Suggested by Anna's Fashions)

Having trouble selling your clothing and accessories on Fashion Story? If stocking up isn't your problem, then this post is for you. When I asked my younger sister if she had any ideas of what I could post about on my blog, she reminded me of a tip I gave her when she was starting her boutique on Fashion Story.

Let's Just imagine for a second that the graph below is your boutique and we are looking directly down at it.

The black squares are the walls of your boutique and the break in them is the door. Green Squares are your tables, the pink squares are your racks, the yellow squares are your changing stations and the blue are your mirrors. 

See those red lines? They are where in this set up your buyers can go. The issue is they can only buy what the can walk up to, so in this example only 40 out of the 105 displaying racks/tables are bought off of. 

For those of you out there who use this to your advantage and stock up, there is nothing wrong with doing that. Nevertheless, I think a boutique looks better when spaced correctly and it functions better earning money at a steady rate. 

This is a picture of my boutique Sky's Limit taken on March 30, 2013. My racks and tables are spaced accordingly and now all you and I both need is a little patience. 

If you have a question on this post please comment and if you want to make a suggestion like Anna's Fashions did go to Questions and Suggestions and leave a comment with your idea or ideas there. Thanks for reading! ~ Sky's Limit

Managing Your Time On Fashion Story: Time & Avatar Contests

One of my favorite things to do on Fashion Story next to hosting a contest, is entering one. Every time I learn something and most of the time I enjoy doing the contest even if I don't win. However, there was a time when entering and competing in contests was more work than fun. Why? Because of Time Limits and Limitations.

For example, I can't be playing Fashion Story when I am sleeping, and I don't know anyone who can. This of course becomes a 'problem' when the host of the contest is giving out 2 hour rounds after my bedtime. With no chance at ever winning her contest/s, I choose never to enter her contests again.

But, back to the point. Since you can't play when you are asleep, and some of your contest hosts are on different time zone. Here is a tip: "If the first contest round is under 18 hours and on a different time zone, then the likely hood of you getting eliminated just went up." Granted, sometimes it works out but only once in a great while.

If you ever plan on hosting a contest, keep this in consideration, and if you are entering a contest remember it may not work out as you had hoped.

In addition, entering more than 3 contests at a time can and will most likely get dicy. Though some outfits can multitask, there are some themes you can't use a multitasker for. This makes collaborating your outfits and turning them in on time even harder. I suggest no more than 3 contests at a time, which should be enough to keep you busy and yet leave you time to enjoy the game itself.

If you have a question, please ask it via comment and thank you to all of my faithful readers. ~ Sky's Limit

Giving Gifts On Fashion Story: What is the most helpful Gift to Give?

As you may already know, you can give gifts to your neighbors on Fashion Story such as, Red Sweaters, Contrast Pumps, Black Slacks, and Sunny Hand Bags:

Notice the numbers below each item? Those numbers represent them number of items you are sending, which if you think about it is also the amount your neighbor will be selling once they receive your gift. Since the gift is free for you to give, I suggest sending the gift with the biggest amount of items. Contrast Pumps are what I send as gifts except during Christmas time when I send Red Sweaters in honor of the season. 

Why give the larger amount of items? Because that also means a larger amount of coins for your neighbor, and why not give them the most valuable gift? Unless they ask for one of the other options, sending Contrast Pumps is what I think is the best thing to do.

Even though the gifts above are the only built in gifts you can give to your neighbors, there are others  you can give if only you choose to give them.  For example, a kind word can go a long way to brighten up someones day. A complement on their avatar's outfit, their boutique decor, or just for being who themselves are some examples of things you could say to them as a gift. 

Another gift you can give is advice and new players aren't the only ones looking for advice, trust me. Even if it just a suggestion on store decor or subtle changes to their avatar outfits, it is a gift. The last example, which is by no means the least, is funny or encouraging quotes. I have been encouraged and/or laughed when I saw some of the things that I still have on my wall to this day. 

Just remember that even though you probably have a lot of things to do other than play on your video games for hours at a time, it only takes a few seconds to type an encouraging message on someones wall or a piece of advice. And that by taking those few seconds to say something nice to them you show them how special they are to you. 

Just a thought, hope it helps. ~ Sky's Limit

Starting a Fashion Story Boutique: Creating and Completing a Boutique Theme, Part 3

Now that you have a Boutique and a Boutique Name it is time to come up with (if you haven't already) and find decor/avatar clothes for, your Unique Boutique Theme. In the case of my new boutique, The Bat Cave, I was thinking of using the colors gray, blck and yellow. 

To come up with a theme, think of why you called your boutique the name you did. In some cases, people name their boutique something like 'Anna's Fashions' 'StayBeYouTiFul', which I think are names which you can do anything with decor and clothing wise. On the other hand, names like 'The Bat Cave' or 'Ocean Dreams' should look like they sound. 

When naming The Bat Cave I was thinking about what to name it and since I am a Justice League fan, this name seemed to fit. So, I considering this, I decided to use the colors gray, black and yellow (back and gray being Bat-man's colors and yellow being a bright color he sometimes wears). 

The first thing I did was design my new avatar's outfit to figure out how much coins and gems I need to save up to buy it. Here is what I came up with for The Bat Cave:

As you can see this outfit will cost me 48 gems and 73,000 coins. Considering this I am holding back on buying my avatar other outfit items, and other things as well. Since the decor I want to use, I have yet to unlock this is turning out to not be as hard for me as I thought it would be. I already have 27,000 coins as of this morning. 

as with most things, along the way you will make some changes to what your outfit will be and what decor you want. However, by choosing some of it now you save yourself a lot of trouble and time. Why? Because, if you just buy decor and outfits willy-nilly and then at level 30 decide to have a theme, you will have more trouble saving up, especially gems. 

Since I have yet to complete The Bat Cave's theme yet, here is what my main boutique's (Sky's Limit) decor and avatar outfit look like when I am not in a contest:

Now, in the case of Sky's Limit, I could have gone in many different directions with my theme. However, I love the beauty of the Beach and Ocean, so I chose to make that part of my boutique's theme. I have since then come up with a name for Sky's Limit theme, Blue and Green Beach Chic.

I hope these posts help you when you decide what your boutique name, theme and your avatar's main outfit will be. Please feel free to ask questions via comments, I would love to try to answer them. ~ Sky's Limit

Starting a Fashion Story Boutique, Part 1

Starting a Fashion Story Boutique, Part 2

How to Get Emoji on a iPhone or iPod

Emoji is a group of smiley faces that you can use at anytime on your iPhone or iPod when you use the normal keyboard. I use it in texts, emails, Fashion Story and other games like it. Here is a basic walk through, though it might be a little different for those who do not have iOS 7. I have used this on both iPhones and iPods, and I wouldn't be surprised if it would also work on an iPad.

First open 'settings': 

Go into 'general'

Select 'keyboard'

now tap 'keyboards'

and add a new keyboard:

Then you can test it out! 

Emoji can be used in Fashion Story simply as a way to tell others you have visited or you can use it in Emoji Contests to earn prizes that will vary depending on the contest host. Though, honestly I enjoy texting my friends random emoji to see if they are on or not….. :) Either way it especially fun around holidays (for example christmas) because… well it just is. 

If you have questions please ask via comments. ~ Sky's Limit

Starting a Fashion Story Boutique: Getting a Good Start on Your Boutique, Part 2

Now that you have your boutique name in mind, it is time to start a boutique. First you need to go to the place where you buy apps on your gaming device of choice. Once the game is downloaded, open it. Your screen should look something like this:

Once it finishes loading it will run you through the following basic tutorial.

After you have completed this tutorial, there is no other hints as to how to do the rest of the required things to keep your boutique going. Last time we discussed Starting a Fashion Story Boutique, I mentioned the importance of a Boutique Name and how to come up with one.

To choose your boutique name tap the pink tag that says "main".

It will show you the screen above, now tap "profile". It should show you something like this, though you might need to tap the word 'profile' like in the picture below.

as you can see it says "Boutique Name: Choose your name…" tap the pink choose button and it will do this:       

Type the name you came up with and then hit done.

Tada! you just named your boutique! This name can be changed, but it cost gems which in this game are rare, so choose your name wisely.

Go back to the main menu and tap 'social':

now tap invite friends and make an ID. You haft to have a Storm8 ID to invite friends to be your neighbors which is a very important part of the game.

Now that you have started your boutique and have come up with a name, storm8 ID and hopefully a Boutique theme, you are ready for the next step which is completing the dream of your theme! ~ Sky's Limit and The Bat Cave