Sometimes I do a throwback to how I'd play in the Sims 2 days - create a family based on a tv show, making them look as accurate as possible with only the stuff already available to you (so no searching for 10 hours to find the one hair CC that looks closest), and then build their house as close as possible. The house building is often a real challenge because very rarely do tv show house exteriors make sense with the interior, and usually the upstairs and downstairs don't make much sense with each other either, with the added difficulty of how stupid the sims are sometimes so you have to make the house accurate but also usable so they can get past a chair or whatever.
Also something like a decades challenge could keep you engaged! You could definitely do an abbreviated version of one if you don't feel like dealing with the "1 sim week = about 9 months" timeframe, just put everyone on the Long lifespan and play as normal. The addition of stuff like death rolls for children, childbirth, war, and disease adds some flavor, and changing the house gradually as the decades go on to change what's available for them to use and do is fun (also a quibble about the rules for the decades challenge - the rules for starting in 1890 are like "no wallpaper, no upholstery, no smoke alarms, etc" but all of those things existed in 1890. Upholstered furniture had been been a thing for hundreds of years, wallpaper was commercially available decades earlier, and the smoke alarm and fire sprinklers were invented in like the 1870s!)
I get really antsy when I don't get a pack soon after launch but then I don't really do anything with it. Like I only actually went with a sim to school for the first time 3 weeks ago even though I got HSY like a week after release.
