#portvaletask
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A Secret Santa gift for Ishmael! I wanted to bring the Blackmore brothers together for you! I hope you enjoy the boys!
@morayblackmore
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TASK 004: SECRET SANTA
Ho ho hooo! It’s that time of the year again, the holidays are fast approaching, homes in Port Vale have started to light up, the decorations are being undusted, and the locals start buzzing about a Port Vale tradition that’s been coming back year after year.
Victoria Wolfgang has posted the sign up sheet for the annual Secret Santa event outside of the town centre, and people line up for a chance to participate. It is always a fun, exciting event as the town gets embroiled in festive cheer. Some people keep it a secret, some reveal and ask for help to get the best gift they can think of for their assigned giftee, but no matter what approach they choose, it’s about giving some love and joy to the other person. This year, with so many merfolk in town, the Christmas haul is sure to be interesting.
This task will be a bit different than the previous ones. We are holding a Port Vale Secret Santa event through the holidays. You have two options:
The IC Secret Santa gift exchange (for the characters)
The OOC Secret Santa gift exchange (for the writers)
Choose to sign up for IC or OOC, or both! If you have multiple characters you choose who participates.
Sign ups: until December 6th
Gift-delivery: until December 23rd
Please send an ask or submit to the Main on tumblr (do not use Discord or the IMs feature) with your sign-up in the following format. You can list OOC, IC, or both:
I'm signing up for Secret Santa!
OOC: [player name]
IC: [character name(s)] list multiple if you want, anyone can participate!
The Mods will then randomly assign pairings based on who signs up for what. Everyone who signs up will be messaged privately after the 6th once sign-ups are closed. Details on submissions and how this event will work can be found below the cut!
For IC gifts: you can do a thread about creating or buying the gift, or you can submit the gift to the character’s blog with a note. please ensure you have submitted your gift or started your secret santa thread before the 23rd of December!
For OOC gifts: some gift ideas include a moodboard, a graphic, a drabble, a playlist, a manip, a Pinterest board, etc. Any creative work that’s tailored for your giftee! You can post it or submit to the other player’s character blog. If you have an idea you’re not sure about you can always run it by the Mods. please ensure you have submitted or posted your gift before the 23rd of December!
As always, we encourage everyone to take part in the fun, but this task isn’t mandatory. Please do not feel limited to only gifting your match in this event! Feel free to make gifts for more people or have your character get gifts for their friends in town.
Please be sure you can commit to gift-giving, before signing up! We want all participants to receive gifts, it’s only fair! If you sign-up and then cannot make a gift, please inform the Mods before December 23rd! Everyone who signs up will get a gift, so don’t fret if there are unfollows posted; the mods will make arrangements in the case of unfollowed characters leaves someone without a match.
Please tag all submissions & posts related to this event with #portvaletask and #portvalechristmas! We encourage posting it in our discord channel, as well, to spread the holiday cheer!
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where: Baubles & Barnacles Salon
when: december
status: closed starter for @blackseariddle
While Vera still didn’t understand the meaning of the holiday (she had read all the picture books that she could get her hands on, and she’d seen many movies and she was just more confused than she had been before she’d started trying to figure everything out), or it’s many traditions, she had to say that she was a big fan of Christmas. Which is why, when given the chance to sign up for a ‘Secret Santa’ she had jumped at the opportunity. She had never met her intended recipient, Ridley Alara, but she still wanted to give her something nice.
In the end she’d made her a snow globe out of a glass jar and various other supplies, as instructed by a craft book she’d come across one day while shelving, and some cookies, because who doesn’t love cookies? She’d wrapped everything up with brown paper and a sparkly bow and set out on her quest to deliver it. She’d decided to try and catch the other woman at work. And then, if she wasn’t there, she figured that she could just leave it there and she could get it when they were in next.
She pushed the door to the salon open, peering around at everything curiously. “Ah, hello!” She called out to the first person that she saw. “I’m looking for... Ridley?”
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“I wish I could remember the moment when I was a kid and I discovered that the letters linked into words, and that the words linked to real things. What a revelation that must have been. We don't have the words for it, since we hadn't yet learned the words. It must have been astonishing, to be given the key to the kingdom and see it turn in our hands so easily.”
― David Levithan, Dash & Lily's Book of Dares
@vera-lynns happy holidays Cindy! I hope this captures Vera’s love for adventure and reading
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TASK #003: LETTERS FROM THE HEART
a letter to… someone you hope to meet, someone from your past
Dear Miss Mermaid,
... it feels so weird writing to you. I don’t know anything about you, not even your name to properly address this letter. But you’ve been with me every since I was six, ever since you saved my life.
I want to say thank you, but I don’t even know how to put it into words, how to properly express how much it means to me. I can thank you everything, my entire life in so many different ways. Getting to live, but also knowing that something else, something more is out there. I don’t know how my life would have turned out without you showing up in that crutial moment.
Not even sure what else I could say, but I hope one day I can thank you in person. Get to meet you and talk to you, even if it’s just for a few moments. It would mean-- it would mean the world to me. You have no idea how much.
Other than that, I just wanted to say that I hope your life is amazing and you get to experience so much joy in your life, as much as you gave me.
Love,
Steph
a letter to… someone you miss, someone you’ve lost, someone you love, someone from your family
Dear Uncle Armaan and Auntie Shaz,
I miss you guys so much. It’s been over twenty years now and it’s just-- you’re missed so much.
I still remember when abu told me that if I wanted to buy this book I really wanted, I had to work for it and you guys suggested dog walking and came along for my first ever walk to make sure it went okay and I didn’t actually lose the dog. It meant so much to me. Or the time I slept over and I woke up fromt his weird nightmare and you guys stayed up with me for so long and played with me to make sure I wasn’t scared anymore.
I wish I had so much more time with you two. All of us had more time with you guys. Especially Renzie. He misses you two so much. He doesn’t talk about it often, I think he doesn’t want to sound ungrateful or like he doesn’t like abu and mama, but I know he thinks about you guys so much. Wishes you guys were still here.
He is doing great, though. He is running the business, like 99% of the things that happen is him and pretty sure it’s going so well is because he is at the help. He has friends - yes, he does, no matter what he insists on! -, and I think he is finally at the point where he might find even more happiness. But no matter what, we just love and adore him. I think if I had a son and passed out way too soon, that is what I would want to know, that he is loved and adored and has a supporting family behind him even after I am gone, so that is what I want to reassure you in. He has it. And he is amazing. An amazing cousin and an amazing brother, I couldn’t ask for anyone better in my life.
I wish he could tell you this himself, I wish I could tell you all of this myself.
I miss you guys. I love you guys.
All the hugs,
Steph
a letter to… someone you hate
Tayden,
Fuck you.
I hope you never find happiness.
Hate,
Steph
#portvaletask#mermaid stuff#about#i did three letters alltogether#and used up almost all the prompts#only missed out someone she envies#might do it at some later time#but for now this was fun and really cool and i really enjoyed this task
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task 002 - port vale’s fashion
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even beneath the waves, val was never one to wear bright colors. under the sea, her hair was always tied back and her clothes tended to be practical, befitting a soldier. tight, aerodynamic clothes that wouldn’t slow her down while swimming were typical, and after the war in the mediterranean began, she was hardly ever seen without some sort of armor on. when she arrived on land, on two shaky legs, she felt defenseless. she was used to sharp teeth, sharp claws, and a tail ridged with venomous spines. so she went for the most intimidating clothing she could find, embedding spikes in her ears, around her neck, on her jackets. she protected her newfound legs with large combat boots she hardly ever takes off. the makeup came later; she started wearing it first because she realized that humans were less likely to misgender her when she had it on, and then she grew to genuinely enjoy it, so that sharp black eyeliner and painted black fingernails have become a staple of her everyday look. beneath her jackets, she typically wears band t-shirts - the record store sells lots of them, and as an employee, val gets a discount.
#portvaletask#task#task002#hopefully my writing is better than my photoshop skills LOL sorry for sloppy editing#inspo
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MERRY CHRISTMAS, TIAGO~
status: closed for @tiagonussbaum
location: the houseboat
date: dec. 22nd, mid-evening
There were few things in the world, both above and below the surface of the water, that Ridley felt she could truly pride herself on - well, that was a lie. She found herself of being within the scope of a great many talents; but a master of none. None, perhaps, save for one - she was excellent with a cellphone. At this point, she could basically be part-time FBI. Internet stalking had come to fingers quicker than any other mundane human task, so when it was a foreign name she’d never heard of drawn from the Santa hat and given to her for secret santa, Ridley knew what to do.
Google was her best friend in every situation, and the mystery of one Tiago Nussbaum was no match for it’s limits. Within mere moments, Ridley was on his author page, making mental notes of the importance of rye bagels, and his long lost of achievements. From there, it turned to looking at buying guides for keywords like best gifts for famous writer and what to buy an author, until eventually, painstakingly, the choices had been narrowed down. For someone experiencing her first ever Christmas, Ridley saved no effort in the pursuit for a winner gift - was it born of the natural desire to find success, in the small ways she could, or more to impress not only Victoria Wolfgang, but this presumably notable figure in Port Vale.
How fortunate, this Tiago, Ridley found herself musing as she made the final preparations for her scheme a bit too grand for something as small-scale as a secret Santa community game. With Weldon’s help, and the promise of returning the favor, Ridley had secured a fancy-seeming messenger bag for laptops. Sure, the wrong name was embroidered on it, but the siren simply assumed that was a brand name or something, like maybe a Chad Whitley was a fancy indie designer that someone of Tiago’s status, surely, would be impressed to own. Beyond that, a hat she had deemed sleek and looking just as an author should. And, if all else failed, a gift card for the local breakfast bakery on the corner, just down from the city centre - rye bagels, they did not have, but regular ones would hopefully suffice.
Armed with these gifts, and a card, penned in her own, childish script, it would read;
I’ve always said, you can’t do your best if you don’t feel (or look) your best.
What is a writer without the right props? Or snacks!
Merry Christmas, from a hopeful new friend
- Ridley Alara
The siren had done well in her research, asking a couple of the other residents of Port Vale she had deemed ‘important’, and eventually had managed to bring her cyber-stalking talent to the real world, with little regard to how weird that should be for any totally average human. The siren blundered on, the Christmas bag swinging over her wrist oversized and dusting her path with gold and silver glitter. Aside from the picture of himself on the author’s website, Ridley was flying blind; but her assessment of him was the same she’d had while reading his legacy- man, he’s intense.
Boldly, likely with more confidence than she should have, Ridley made her way to the man seated at the bar and gently tapped his shoulder, a smile brightly worn on her features and the a light dusting of snow still coating the top of her head. “Um, so, hi,” Ridley began, unable to help a quick glance down at her hand where she’d written his name - still forever fussing over how to properly say it. “Tie-Tiago? Right? Hi, I’m Ridley, and guess what! I’m your Secret Santa. Surprise!” With that, she thrust the gift bag forward, realizing her plan had literally no advancement past this; and, belatedly, she was struck with the first of the worry of it’s kind - what if he hated it?
#this was uhhh... half self para and half starter#im so sorry for this lol#; tiago#; tiago 001#portvaletask#portvalechristmas
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Dear Father,
I don't think about you all that often — in fact, I've spent more time trying to actively not think about you. It's not that your absence has had any effect on my life whatsoever — my mother has taken on every role in your absence and honestly I'm not sure exactly what you could have added in to my life.
Sometimes, however, I think about where we'd have been if you'd been in my life. Not about who you could have been for me but what you could have offered me in terms of escape; my life isn't my own any more with your absence than it would have been with you in it, I imagine. But I still wonder...
Call me crazy, but I think sometimes that you're dead. It's safer for me that way. Another person to miss and another way of letting go, an escape into sadness for someone I barely know and someone I still feel the loss of so keenly. I wish you were a wave upon the shores of Port Vale in reality instead of just within my mind.
I have no hopes that anything like this would ever reach you, or even that you'd respond if it did. I'll still throw it into the ocean, watch it wash away and sink and live quietly with the knowledge that my mother, sister and I are doing amazing without you.
... whoever you are.
#portvaletask#I don't know why I wanted to use this font for this but I did and I'm sorry if it's illegible i can change it slgnlsdgos
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PORT VALE FASHION; ISIDORE DELGADO
though he has been on land permanently (and in port vale) for a decade and a half, fashion has never been something isi has given second thought towards. as long as his clothes are clean and functional, he’s a happy camper; usually will rotate between the same limited choice of shirt & trousers, washing x2 a week. he tends to stick with muted shades, darker colors, and pale blue or a forest green are the only splashes of color to his wardrobe. what he lacks in style, he makes up for in living art; much of his body is covered in tattoos, extending across his torso and down his arms, over his knuckles and ankles, and even lining his back with a large, sprawling octopus. plaid flannels, leather, loose fitting v-necks, and trusty dark-wash denim are the major components of his closet.
...see more!
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TASK 002 ; BENEATH THE WAVES [ 1/2 ]
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MERRY CHRISTMAS !!!
For Soren, this Christmas was a chance to redeem himself in the eyes of the very harsh, very interesting librarian. He was still confused as to what he’d done wrong the first time around to have made such a bad impression, but with little to go off and plenty of heart to make up for it, he’d pondered what to get Nereida for Christmas for some time.
Gift giving, in general, was a new concept to Soren - but he supposed, he’d been doing it his whole life, without realizing it. Providing for the pod, sharing your food or your secure sleeping space, it was a simple form of generosity. And Soren had taken the responsibilities of caretaking seriously. He’d had to, for them to survive; but this, the holiday season, it seemed to come purely from desire. What was an item that could be useful, yet not essential? Something lavish enough to be given, but personal enough to be important?
Eventually, his master plan began to come together; after some research, and some helpful input from Scylla, Soren commissioned a painting of the Black Sea from Gabi Drake, what he thought was just a human artist in town. Soren wasn’t aware of the recent happenings in the sea, and still was under the impression that she must be captain - but Gabi’s painting was very abstract, and focused on many colors and unique shapes while still showing the scenery. It was a unique twist on the sea; and perhaps, he hoped, would help ease the feeling of missing home… he understood that, all too well.
As a back-up plan, Soren also put together a “Christmas Starter Kit”, since he figured that she, like himself & his selkie friends, were still struggling to understand the basics. His wrapping job could have room for improvement, but inside was a collection of festive items. First, a Grinch stocking ornament; followed by an assortment of candy & sweets with Christmas themed packaging, a silly candle, and finally, an ugly Christmas sweater.
The attached note read;
Dear Nereida the Librarian
It’s Soren! (Aka not Siobhan Waters… ha ha)
Your least favorite customer & also your secret Santa.
Merry Christmas! The painting is of the Black Sea, and I can’t take credit for it, because a lovely local artist named Gabi Drake let me commission her.
Please let me know if you wanted something else. I will get it for you!
Merry Christmas! Secret Santa Soren
He had Wren deliver it on her morning rounds a couple of days before Christmas and it would be sitting on her porch the next time she left.
pretend this was submitted on soren’s blog
#LMAO THIS IS AMAZING#the wrapping job is about as good as nereida's#ALSO THE PAINTING OF THE BLACK SEA SO SWEET#nereida will NOT cry thank you very much#portvaletask
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TASK 002 PORT VALE FASHION - EMILIA EDITION
[ template ]
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TASK 002 - PORT VALE’S FASHION
with so many new faces in port vale, the aesthetic of clothing around town has definitely taken a bit of a surprising turn. take this opportunity to show off to the town what your character chooses to express themselves with; for the mer, show us both the ocean fashion & their choice of style on land! for the humans, feel free to speak on how their sense of fashion has evolved, or if they have any particular style they like to emulate.
overall, this is a way for everyone to show off how their character presents themselves! remember - you can get a variety of interesting clothing pieces from the local thrift shop the treasure cove. for mermaid princesses and siren captains, feel free to go an extra step and include some lore for your character’s territory & their typical use of fashion in the sea.
feel free to create moodboards, graphics, pinterests, drabbles, celebrity inspiration or anything else that will show the group your character’s sense of fashion & what it means to them! take whatever route feels best-fitted for your character. please tag your tasks with #portvaletask! this task is not mandatory, but highly encouraged to show a more personal, intimate side of your characters feelings and inner thoughts, as well as style!
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Renzie Anand → an aesthetic study
A Secret Santa gift for Gigi! I hope you like it! I love making character aesthetic edits like these! @renzieanand
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Gemma’s Secret Santa from Mellora
The gift is a leather bound journal with nautical keychains collected from the various tchotchke sections of Port Vale’s shops. Inside it is a well-crafted, hand-written guide to all the bizarre things humans get up to on the daily that Mellora has noticed in her time on land including, but not limited to, how credit cards work, cash register functions, Word Docs vs PDFs, Instagram and Tiktok (with confused notes about Gen Z slang words she’s heard), major pop culture references, and what fish are safe for humans to eat. Essentially, a quick look for all the random questions she knows a mer would not like to actually blurt out to a human, but should probably know and have a familiarity with. Most of the back pages are left blank for Gemma’s own notes and observations.
Additionally, there is a large, wrapped basket of her favorite candies (Swedish fish, chocolates, salted caramel, a maple candy in the shape of a lobster, nut brittles), fruits, miscellaneous treats, and a small, also hand-written recipe book of dishes she’s found favorable for fish people palates with a simple guide to measurements, temperatures, and necessary utensils.
Mellora, while not including her name even though that seems silly and one could probably guess who the gift-giver is, added a note amongst the treats:
“I don’t mean my gift to seem condescending or to question your ability to adapt on land, but I figured material items are only so useful in addition to being enjoyable. I’ve blundered my way through enough situations to start writing details down. I hope what I’ve learned will benefit you.
Also, I hope you enjoy the treats! The biscotti goes well with coffee.
Happy Days from your Secret Santa.”
#submission#//omg this is the perfect gift for Gemma!!!#She's putting this notebook with the one she's filled with the fake backstory stuff she writes down for studying/remembering purposes#portvalechristmas#portvaletask#melloraatoll
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task 2: port vale’s fashion
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jo has never been afraid to be bold in her fashion choices. she’s always gone for bright colors and funky patterns that she feels represent who she is - even if other people might say they “hurt their eyes” and “look horrible together”. beyond brightly colored tops, pants, and dresses, she loves to accessorize, with colorful heels and boots and chunky jewelry. ever since she became a teacher, she’s started dressing in themes that match whatever topic she’s currently teaching.
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