Animazement: Friday

I got home from Animazement about 12 hours ago. I will say the convention was a lot of fun, but a lot of things didn't quite go as planned (putting it lightly). XD Over the next couple of days I will be posting a run down of what happened at the convention, and hopefully pictures of all those costumes that I was working on over the last month or so--sadly I didn't get any pictures of our costumes at all, but I know a lot of other people who did, so hopefully I can share some of those.

So, anyone who follows me on Twitter will know that part of Thursday was spent distracted by a new kitten--taking her to the vet to get checked for lukemia, get dewormed, etc; this also meant though we needed to find a kitten-sitter for her because she's so young and needed to take medicine for an upper-respiratory infection. Needless to say, come Friday morning I was behind from the start. Let's also add in to the mix that my husband caught the cold/flu thing my kids had earlier last week, so that put him pretty much out of commission for most of Friday. I did get up extra early and finish the Momo costume, and I got most of Azula done minus the boots. We spent about an hour trying to pack the car--we wanted to try and pack everything in one car, which considering we had 5 people, 1 kitten, a portion of my Artist Alley table stuff (since I didn't know if I could manage getting a table, I didn't take everything) and all the stuff that goes with that (clothes, costumes, cat food, people food, etc.), plus the sewing machine and stuff to finish off the costume piece that didn't get finished.

We did get everything into one car--we drive a small 4-door Saturn, so you can imagine how tight everything was. We grabbed fast food drive thru for lunch, and got under way--only 3 hours later than I'd planned originally. All things considered, that wasn't too bad since I was packing everything by myself (mostly--Shaun helped some, but was mostly feeling too icky to do anything). The trip started off nicely. It was overcast, which was great since we have no AC in our car, and I didn't want to roll the windows down too far since the kitten was running loose (there wasn't room in the car for a cat carrier). Unfortunately about an hour into what should have only been an 2 hour drive, it started to rain... and when I say rain, I mean the kind of rain where you can't see 2 inches from the windshield, let alone see the road or where you're trying to drive. Add to this the windows fogging up because of AC not working and the windows having to be rolled up because of the rain. It rained like that, letting up for a few minutes here and there until we hit Raleigh--4 hours later than I'd planned on getting there.

There was a brief lull in the storm when we stopped at my aunt's house to drop off the kitten. We also got a bit of a break while I stopped by Target and Jo-Ann's to pick up stuff that I'd forgotten or hadn't gotten before we left and get cold medicine Shaun. I'd stopped at Jo-Ann's for white buttons (since our Walmart did not have them, and I didn't want to drive an hour to our closest craft store just for a pair of buttons and we'd drive past a Jo-Ann's on the way to the convention). The white buttons were for a plushie I had wanted to put in the auction (if you can't tell, it did not get finished over the weekend). While in Jo-Ann's it went back to raining. I ended up about as wet as if I'd jumped into a lake running back to the car. Yah, errands done...

Thankfully the rain did not continue like that for the rest of the trip. We pulled into the hotel parking garage at 3:00ish--this was a bit stressful because I was supposed to be in the Art Show room at 4:00 ready to draw for a charity event I'd volunteered for. @_@ So, parked, got checked in (hotel lost power briefly here). I left my kids and sick husband in the room watching cartoons, got my pencil case from the car, and headed for the convention center. Our hotel is conveniently connected to the convention center by an underground tunnel, unfortunately, I found they'd blocked the entrance to the convention center and wouldn't let me past without my convention badge. This meant going back to the hotel, running out through the rain (still raining--not a drizzle, but not as badly as it had been earlier) to the main entrance to the convention center... I was so happy that the registration line had gone down and I didn't have to wait too long to get my badge.

I'd successfully achieved access to the convention center. I then headed upstairs to where I thought the Art Show room was (where it had been for the last 2 years). I ran into a couple of friends who kindly pointed out that no, the Art Show was no longer up with the balcony Artist Alley, it was down by the Dealer's Room. Incidentally, the Art Show room is not 10 feet from where the guard stopped me earlier on my way to the convention center. XD I checked in there at 5 minutes till 4 (still wet, but at least I wasn't late). This was definitely the highlight for Friday for me. The event was to raise money for the Japanese Red Cross. The Art Show staff held a raffle to go with the art--for $1 you could get a raffle ticket for a drawing at the end of the one hour session plus another ticket for a drawing on Sunday for 1 of 3 free badge passes for AZ 2012. A $10 donation would get you a commission from one of the volunteer artists. There were 3 other artists at that session--between the 4 of us, there were 2 Sarah's and 2 Katie's, and the other Sarah had the same last initial as I do. I had fun chatting though with the other artists, one of which had come from as far away as New York. I got to draw 2 commissions: Jesse from Pokemon (yah, Team Rocket) and Rock Lee (that was interesting since I've never actually seen much of Naruto--<3 my fellow artists for helping me come up with a good pose for him). I wish I'd gotten photos of the sketches to post here, but things were moving fairly quickly, and I was still a little disoriented from the drive.

That finished, we gradually got the car unpacked. I checked with Artist Alley staff, but for the first time in AA history, everyone who registered for AA showed up. o.O No table for me. This turned out to be a good thing really though. I got my beholder submitted to the Art Show for auction 30 minutes before the room closed on Friday. I briefly put on my Princess Buttercup costume and walked around the convention with Luke and Logan (#2 and #3). They discovered one artist who had cake at her table and would give it to them if they looked cute (I knew the artist, so... yeah. I wouldn't have let them harass her if it had been a complete stranger). We didn't stay out long because they were sleepy, and it just wasn't as fun walking around without Shaun--who was supposed to be my sweet Westley on Friday. I got a couple of pictures--not as many as I'd like. I'd intended to be uploading them to Tumblr as I took them, or at least reasonably soon after taking them, but I never got the downtime I thought I would. I think this is partially because Shaun was sick, so I had no one to share the *watch kids* job with. I am uploading the pictures I did get gradually to Tumblr now.

So, that was my Friday--long story I know. I'll try and talk less about Saturday. It was considerably less adventuresome.