The Real MAGFest 2019 Reflections Post

Magfest was a lot of fun this year. That's pretty standard. I was a lot more tired going into the convention this year because of an intense vacation near the end of December--you know, one of those vacations where you come home more exhausted than before you left and you want a real vacation from the vacation.

Anyways, I think I spent most of this convention in panels. I'm going to go off on a bit of a "Magfest is the best" thing here. I really feel that Magfest goes out of its way to have outstanding programming. Their events are good. Their panels are great, and cover a wide variety of topics. There is always something interesting going on. This year I attended a mix of cosplay makerspace panels, tabletop panels, and MAGES panels. I gave a panel in MAGES on tabletop roleplaying and relationships with Shaun as a follow-up to last year's panel on gaming in general as a couple. We got a bunch of questions related to roleplaying games after that panel, so we put together one on that topic. He gave two other panels that went over well. I think the only thing I've ever been super meh about was the Marketplace. There were many years where the vendor space was too small. This year, there just wasn't much that I wanted to see. I think my favorite vendor was the leather vendor in the very back of the room, who sadly does not have a website to share with everyone. They had some really cool binders and DM screens in tooled leather, and I really need to get one of the leather tunics they have... one of these years, when I have more money.

Anyways, most of the panels and events I attended this year were fantastic. They were either interesting or informative, and bonus if they were both. I came home super motivated to get back into cosplaying, which I've wanted to do for awhile now. I have ideas for several original cosplay designs, plus I have a long list of characters I want to cosplay. I'm also really excited about pushing forward on several of our larger (and smaller) projects. I'm not going to say a lot about them right now, since they've technically been on the board for a couple of years now, and although close to completion now (relatively), I don't have a clear idea of when exactly they will be done. Assuming I can stay out of the hospital this year and have no more major issues, then I'm pretty sure we'll start seeing some of these things wrap up early this year, but I've been saying that for a couple years now, and so far it hasn't worked. =P Anyways, I'll post when things actually happen. 

All in all, Magfest was the best way to start 2019.

The Post That Was Going to be MAGFest Musings

I meant to publish a post reflecting on Magfest, which was this past weekend. So, this post is just going to be a quick summary of my last couple of days. 

To provide some context, we broke our van while we were in vacation in Florida, Orlando area, in December, and we had to leave it in Florida for repairs. And that's all the backstory we need for this post. =P

Fast forward to last Sunday. We packed up to leave Magfest mid-morning and drove to North Carolina -- we live in the south central part of the state. This was about 6 hours give or take. Once we reached NC, I changed cars and people I was riding with and left again. From NC, we drove to the north part of Orlando, FL. I did this because I had received word while at Magfest that our van would be fixed and ready to pick up Monday. Monday morning, we drove to the car place where we dropped the van off, because I had been repeatedly told to pick up the van where we dropped it off. We got there and the receptionist gave me an odd look and said, "Ooh, I'm sorry, but your vehicle is in another castle [location]." I knew that they had sent the van to another location to complete repairs because they had an earlier opening to start the repairs. They were supposed to have sent it back to the original location. Communication clearly broke down because the van was not returned, and I was not informed of the change in pick-up location. This was mostly a nuisance and a lot of extra driving. Moving on, I finally got the van yesterday around lunch time, and I spent the rest of my Monday driving back to North Carolina.

Needless to say, I am very tired of being in the car. I did not get time to put together a post for Magfest, because I'm pretty sure driving and typing are incompatible activities. XD Anyways, I'll put up a reflection on Magfest in a week or so.

AZ With Sophie

It's been a while since I've gone to a convention with a smaller child -- not an infant or toddler, but not an older kid either. Sophie's birthday is right before AZ (This is why we missed attending in 2012). This year, Sophie was a brand new 5 year old, who was already planning her 6th birthday and telling everyone about it.

She was into everything at the convention. It was a challenge keeping after her, especially in the Dealer's Room and Artist Alley. She's also at a stage in life where rolling on the floor is fun. Another challenge because con floors are pretty nasty, at least in my opinion. She's at a more independent age where she doesn't want to hold my hand and doesn't want to stay with us--she wants to do her own thing, especially when her own thing entails screeching and rolling on the floor...

There were challenges, but also surprising positives. She was much more engaged with the con than I expected. She was thrilled with all the cosplayers, and she didn't just want pictures of them. She wanted her picture with them. She tended to pick out princesses, super heroes, and goth-style cosplayers. Everyone she asked for a picture was super kind to her and very obliging. They made her weekend. She was also absolutely enamored with Artist Alley, much more than she was with the Dealer's Room. She would have bought something from almost every table if she could have. This pleases me, because, as an artist, I love to see her enthusiasm to support other artists. It was also cool, because with very few exceptions (Pokemon, Ladybug, and Sailor Moon), she did not recognize any of the fanart, but she loved what people had created anyways.

It was nice being with someone with her enthusiasm... most of the time. The rest of the time, it was exhausting. I'm feeling the old after Animazement this year. It was tough keeping up with her.

Magfest 2017

Magfest was my first 2017 convention. I went as an attendee--no table. I have to say I had an absolute blast. I'm not super sad that I didn't have a table either. I can't remember if I even applied for this year or not, but if I did, I'm glad I didn't get in. Things went so crazy last fall that there is no way I would have been prepared for it. I look forward to tabling there again. =D

I think I had more fun at this year's Magfest than I have at a convention in years--closest comparisons were Animazement 2008 (I think, it could have been 2009) and Anime Weekend Atlanta 2011 (I'm pretty sure on this one). Animazement 2008 was fun because we cosplayed Avatar: the Last Air Bender (I was Mae and my husband was Zuko <3 <3 <3), and there was a really fun photoshoot. This was the year I discovered that I really liked doing group photoshoots. Ok... thinking back that was actually Animazement 2011 not 2008. I remember now because that was the year I left my friend's Azula cosplay on our couch. Oops--she was super forgiving of me (best friend ever). But, that was the only year we lived at the house where that happened. Yep, clearly my memory has some issues. My excuse: age, plus I've been attending conventions since 2000, so it makes sense that a few of them might run together, right? AWA 2011 was fun for similar reasons. My cousin and I cosplayed Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy. Again, I took a break from the table to go to a My Little Pony photoshoot. It was great, and included an unplanned sing-along of season 1-2 pony songs. It was awesome. I remember getting asked to leave the hotel because there were too many of us, and we were clogging up the lobby area. Fun times. 

I loved this year's Magfest for entirely different reasons though. There were no cosplays. I don't think I could have put one together even if I had the means. I'd only just been cleared by my doctor to even attend without a wheelchair or anything (severe activity restrictions). It was a little stressful because I did have to monitor my heart rate, and I could not go outside for the most part (this probably doesn't make a lot of sense, but I promise I'll explain; that needs to be its own blog post though). I did hurt a lot by the end of the convention because I probably pushed my limits a little too far. All's well that ends well, right though? I did not re-hospitalize myself or kill myself or otherwise cause any serious damage (as far as I can tell, so far). 

Now on to the fun stuff: I played all the board games. Ok, maybe not all--that's a bit unrealistic, but I did play a lot. I also joined a one-shot 5th edition D&D game. I had an absolute blast. Not only did I have a lot of fun, but this also revitalized my flagging motivation to finish some of the game projects we have had sitting on the table for a couple of years now. This includes a 5th edition version of the Anime D20 book. We are super hyped about that now. We're even thinking about trying to pull off another print run of the book. With the rise of crowdfunding options, it makes this possible. It took a heavy investment for the 4th edition version we printed, and we felt it was beyond our means to print the Pathfinder version, which has only been available for digital purchase. We'll see where this goes, but I see fun times ahead. There are also a couple of other tabletop games in progress that I look forward to finishing too. 

Magfest 2017 highlight: By far this was the Escape Room we participated in. It took sitting in 3 lines for over 5 hours spread over the 3 lines to get a spot--first 2 times waiting we missed the cut off, and the room events filled up before they got to us. Got in for Saturday evening. I have no words for how much I enjoyed this experience. The room's theme was Portal. There were 7 of us in there (5 from my group and 2 others). It was very well put together. Everyone was able to contribute. There were all kinds of different puzzles, some that would appeal more to 1-2 of us, while others would be better for say me, but stumped the others. We beat the room with less than a minute left on the timer, and we even found the cake (optional bonus thing). The cake was fake, so yeah, there was a cake, but it was still a lie. Loved it. On so many levels. 

We did some other things. I bought a bunch of prints, a t-shirt, and new dice. I always buy new dice. I have more dice than I could ever use. I probably have a dice problem. There could be worse things though, right? (I do use my dice--I design my characters to fit one of my sets based on the feelings evoked by the colors.) Maybe I'll put up a post featuring all the awesome stuff I got. Anyways, great time. Very motivating: for finishing games, ideas making new cosplays, and even some art stuff (although that was more the drive home). 

Anime Weekend Atlanta 2012

A little over a week ago, I spent my weekend running a table in Anime Weekend Atlanta's Artist Alley. I had a great time. It did not go 100% as planned--I did not get either of the costumes I wanted to wear for it finished (that was River Tam from Firefly and Rarity from the wedding episode at the end of Season 2). I did not finish all six designs for The Hunger Games. In fact the only one who finished anything was my husband who completed a new version of the Chinese zodiac. I am officially retiring the ones I made based off of Fruits Basket--it has been out since my first table at AUSA 2008, so it was time. Technically some of my tarot set has been out that long too, as I am reminded so painfully whenever I look at the earlier cards--I try not to because then I'm tempted to redraw them, and I don't think I'm quite ready for that yet. Yeah... not so great on that front. I have reasons though--we've been through a lot of life changes in the last year, so I'll count my blessings that I am getting anything done at all--traditionally art and fun stuff are the first things to go when things get really crazy around here. My 9-year-old son also had a bunch of Perler bead creations that he put out on my table, mostly My Little Pony, Pokemon, and Super Mario Bros. stuff. Also, from here on out if you see chain mail jewelry on the table, those will be the work of my 12-year-old, since my husband no longer has time to make any of it and he's been working on learning how over the last year or so.

One of the highlights of the weekend was a really excellent Firefly cosplay group--although that did make me doubly sad that I did not get my River cosplay finished. =( But, they were still awesome. I saw lots of other cool cosplays. I talked to lots of fun people.

With Sophie, the weekend went by in a bit of a blur. She was a little challenging; I think she'll be a little better for AUSA though--at this stage a month and a half makes a big difference. My husband spent a lot of time walking her around the convention in her snuggly.

During the convention, I made the mint-chocolate chip fox mini-plushie--the design is similar to my kitty mini-plushie, but I had to alter the ears a little bit, and the tail is entirely new. So this one is the first of its kind--I'm sure there will be more to come in different flavors in the future. I also drew a submission for the "Into the Woods" themed 6 pg. comic contest. My husband is responsible for the base idea for what I drew (he does serve as the writer for our team and the submission was from my studio, so I think that little bit of collaboration was okay), but I came up with the details and how to tell the story. The jist of it was some guy who really really needed to use the bathroom and could not find a working restroom to use goes into the woods to relieve himself. XD It's definitely not something I would have come up with personally, but I did like the idea in that it would be unique--my first thought with the theme would be either cute fuzzy little animals or scary woods. That was pretty much the convention for me, in a nutshell--not as exciting as some years, but I'd still say it was a good con. =)

What's up with Wednesday?

This is just a quick post to let everyone know what's been going on since I missed Monday's post. Monday was the big moving day. We got a call from the movers Sunday evening letting us know they would be at our house at 6:30 a.m. Monday morning. Of course we weren't ready. Long story short, we were up way too late trying to finish up. I got up at 5:00 to finish up last minute detailed. 6:30 came and went; no movers. 6:45 we get a call from them... It turns out that someone had mixed up the paperwork and had switched the move-to and move-from addresses. Although I feel bad for the poor movers who had an extra 2.5 hours to drive now both ways (they were starting out close to where we were moving from), we got a couple of extra, much-needed hours of sleep. After that, they came, they moved, and there was much rejoicing. In spite of the mix-up, they did an excellent job moving everything and were very polite.

So, most of the day was spent moving. We followed the movers up in the large van I was borrowing with a load of stuff (some for the house we were moving to, a lot for storage). Once the movers were finished and gone, we moved in the stuff from the van and attempted to unpack some and make things look somewhat decent. We called it quits earlier than we'd have liked primarily from lack of sleep. We made it back to Misenheimer, and pretty much fell asleep the moment we walked in the door. Proof as to how exhausted I was: we were sleeping on an air mattress since, of course, all of our furniture was now at the other house; I slept for 10 hours straight.

Tuesday, we spent cleaning the Misenheimer house--well mostly my husband cleaned the house. I spent a large chunk of the day sorting and trying to finish up some of what I had left to work on for Otakon. That continued today. Needless to say, I didn't get a fraction of what I'd originally planned to get done for this convention. I'd amended the original plan to maybe just get a bunch of charms done. That didn't get completely finished either. I did manage to get badges and bookmarks I had left to laminate from the end of the Anime Tarot set finished, and I did get a decent number of charms finished. So, there will be some new stuff for people who saw my table at other conventions last year--not as much as I wanted, but all things considered, I'm just happy to have something new prepared.

I'm really excited, and I can't wait for the convention. I haven't been to Otakon since 2002; I'm sure there's a lot that's changed. I'm a little nervous because I've never tried running a table in AA at a convention even close to this size. I'm determined to have fun though. Right now, I'm borrowing my in-law's computer--we're staying here for the night and dropping off Logan for the weekend. Tomorrow, we'll be heading back to Misenheimer briefly to pick up our bags for Otakon and our cats. We'll be dropping the cats off at the "new" house (Kisa will be going to a kitten-sitter). Then, we'll be driving up to northern Virginia where we'll spend the night at my aunt's house--I think by the time we reach that point we're going to be ready to pass out. Friday morning we'll go on to Baltimore. I have my doubts about posting a blog from my phone on Friday. I will be posting photos on my Tumblr once I get to the convention: http://gothic-panda.tumblr.com/. No promises about Friday, but I'll definitely be posting on the Otakon experience on Monday.

Moving Update

I posted Friday that there was a 50/50 chance that we might have to move. Now there's a forecast of 100% chance of moving, so I have 2 weeks to pack up and move most of a house into storage. I can't say I'm super excited about this, but it's just one of those things. I won't bore you with the details of the whole mess. The simple version is the housing market sucks and after a year of trying to sell our house while renting another much closer to where my husband works (like 3 hours closer), our house still hasn't sold and we can't afford to pay for 2 places, so we're moving back into our house and will just have to deal with a very long commute.

Obviously this will have some effect on my crafting world. I am trying to be very careful packing right now so that all (or at least most) of my crafting supplies stay available. I still plan on continuing to work on the many projects I've posted about in the last several weeks. The real challenge is going to be learning to keep my crafting mess *very* contained since our house will still be on the market. Basically I'll have to somehow craft while making it look like I don't craft--in other words, it should look like one of Martha Stewart's craft spaces, except I don't get to hire anyone to help clean up after me. =P

Packing is going very well so far. Because of the situation, it's forcing me to be 100x more organized than I usually am. Naturally, I'm actually a very messy person--not that I don't like clean, just that I don't notice that messes are in progress until they've consumed everything; maybe it's just part of being an easily distractable, compulsive multitasker. Cosplay projects tend to be the worst--at least with my art, since I do most of it digitally, and my crochet I can only make so much of a mess simply because of limited supplies. Really, how much damage can I honestly do with a crochet hook and a ball of yarn? Ok, so I could make a huge mess if that ball of yarn multiplied into the 7 balls of yarn that are now sitting next to my computer with 4 different crochet plushies in various stages of completion--if that's doesn't count as proof that I'm a chronic multitasker then I don't know what does. =P Considering what I do with just yarn and crochet hooks, imagine the mess a cosplay project makes with all the patterns, fabric, thread, needles, and notions, and that's all just for clothing parts; it doesn't take into account materials and tools for making props.

On that note, I am going to *try* to make the Suzaku and Euphemia cosplays for Anime Weekend Atlanta. We'll have to see how this goes. I'm going to have to really keep on top of things and avoid cosplay clutter; if it's not working, I guess I'll have to "shelf" the project, which will make me sad. Hopefully, that won't have to happen. =D I can be optimistic about this, although I still have my doubts. XD

Wednesday WIP - Sort of

I'd taken a break from posting WIP stuff on Wednesdays so I thought today might be a good time to get back to those. I thought it might be nice to post pictures of some of the stuff I talked about working on last week--like my mini-amigurumi and the new set of Zodiacs... Well, that's not going to happen as planned. We left early this morning to go to Raleigh to pick up my husband's dissertation (the big hard-bound print copy of it) from NC State. On the way, I stopped by the closest printer to my house (about an hour away) to drop off files so they can get me a quote for the anime tarot deck. Hopefully they can handle it and it won't be horrible and expensive. We also ran some errands around Raleigh. On the way home the air conditioning in the car broke, and after a long and exceptionally warm trip, I'm exhausted. So, I will not be finding my camera, taking pictures, and posting anything super detailed here tonight. =P

Don't worry. I'm still going to post something. =D I'm going to post stuff for upcoming cosplay projects. I know I told myself I was going to take a good long break from cosplay after Animazement. Apparently that meant I was going to be inspired to work on even more cosplay. =P First up: AWA is holding a formal ball with a mecha pilot theme. This got me to thinking. I know it's been fairly obvious that I'm obsessed with Full Metal Alchemist, but it is a lesser know fact that I am also obsessed with Code Geass, which happens to feature lots of ornate costumes and mecha. I've been wanting to cosplay C.C. (make my husband cosplay Lelouch), but given the theme of the ball, I thought Suzaku would be more appropriate for this event, and if my husband goes as Suzaku, then I could go as Euphemia. As if I'm not enough of a glutton for punishment just for trying to cosplay anything designed by Clamp, I found a really gorgeous art book picture while looking for references (see the bottom of this blog). The end result is, I'm going to try and make the art book version of the costumes for Suzaku and Euphemia (I actually really want C.C.'s dress too from this picture).

AWA is the end of September; I've got some time, so it just might happen. Now, come mid-October, a pair of good friends of ours is getting married at the NC Renaissance Festival in Charlotte, NC, and we're required to come in costume if we wish to attend the wedding (no problem right, I love dressing up). This means that I need to make costumes for myself and my husband, and I promised my good friend Melissa (yes, the same good friend whose Azula costume I forgot on our living room couch for Animazement) I'd make her a costume too. XD Costume count's up to 5 now.

Alright, so I've also decided that not only am I going to break my vow to never ever make a dress (fancy or otherwise) that was all (or even mostly) white with Euphemia, I'm going to remake my Twilight Princess Zelda costume for Magfest. Thankfully Magfest is not until early January 2012. I'm not sure how sane I'll be by then considering I have a lot to prepare with my art tables for Otakon, AWA, AUSA, and Magfest. I am wondering if making these costumes is really a great idea, but I really really want to, especially for the Code Geass ones--it's so perfect for the theme, and I've always wanted to attend one of the formal events at one of the conventions I go to. So, anyways. Look forward to updates on how these projects are going--I'm really psyched about them right now. =D I'm going to close with the art book picture that I'm basing the Code Geass costume set on.

Yes I know the pic is a little big for the blog here, but aren't the costumes gorgeous? 
I'm making Euphemia's, but I'd love to have a dress like C.C.'s as well.

Coming Soon to an Anime Con Near You

After posting such brilliant prose Monday, I was really hard-pressed to come up with a topic for today that could really live up to the standards I set. XD I've been posting about a lot of random topics lately, especially just stuff going on in my life. Since this blog is really supposed to be what's going on with my art studio, I thought it'd be nice to write a blog post on that subject. =D (About time I got back on topic, right?) So, what I'm going to do in this post is give a little bit of a preview of what I'm planning on working on in the next couple of months. Some of it's stuff that will definitely happen; some of it's stuff that might happen with in the next year or two; some of it may just end up forgotten or set on the back-burner for an indefinite period of time. If there's something that strikes your fancy that you'd really love to see me finish, then by all means point it out to me--that increases the likelihood of it actually getting done.

Now, I do a lot of different things for my table, so to give this post a little bit of organization, I'm going to break the projects down by type--mainly art and plushies right now, and I might break the art down into bookmarks and other stuff. Let's start with the plushies. Since a lot of my upcoming conventions have strict rules on fanart vs. original art design ratios allowed on the table, I will be spending much of the next couple of months focusing on my original art designs. First up in the plushie world is going to be a variety of mini-amigurumis. These will be smaller than my Pikachus, Mokonas and such; they will be cheaper in price (because they're smaller and a little bit easier to make) and will come in a variety of color combinations. I'd also like to work out a design for a kitsune/fox mini-amigurumi, but I'm going to try and stay focused and finish the kitties and bunnies first. I'd also like to see a panda plushie completed--I think this one will have to be bigger, maybe about the size as my normal plushies. So that's what I've got bouncing around my head right now for original design plushies. For fanart plushies, the list is extensive. XD I want to do a Miyazaki themed set (Yakul, JiJi, a Soot Ball, Totoro, etc.), plus a couple more Pokemon (Plusel, Minun, Espeon, Mudkip?, for sure), and some other random ones like P-chan from Ranma 1/2. I've also gotten a request for a Chocobo (which I think would be fun to do). On top of all that, I'd love to do an Eastern Zodiac themed set of animal plushies (based loosely on Fruits Basket). Think I've got enough on my plate?

Let's move on to art. Let's start with the "other stuff" first and leave the bookmarks for last. Near the top of my list--I will probably be spending July working on these--is the other half of the Western Zodiac set. When I put together the set I have now, I'd intended to do two of each zodiac design--one guy and one girl. I did not have time to do that many drawings when I started working on it for AWA last year, so I had to settle with doing half of them--I did 6 guys and 6 girls. So, now I plan to finish that set. =) I also want to draw some more archetypes (I love these guys)--I want to do 14 more so I have a total of 42 (that's such a great number). I have a couple in mind, but I'm still debating on what character types to do for most of them. I also want to do some themed archetype badges--like classic D&D character classes or the Real Roleplayer-Twink-Loony-Real Men set. I've got lots of fun ideas here. On top of all this, I'd love to do some mythological sets or fantasy creature sets.

Last, but not least (definitely not least--this is where a lot of my fangirl obsessiveness is going to be focused), bookmarks... Currently in progress, I have sets of World of Warcraft, Dragonlance, and The Guild bookmarks in progress. I also "want" to do sets for Final Fantasy I, IV, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X (X-2), XII, and XIII, Kingdom Hearts, Soul Eater, Full Metal Alchemist (*squee*), Hetalia, Black Butler, Firefly, Marvel/DC characters, Slayers, and the list could go on for a while. This is definitely one of those places where, if you'd really like to see it finished, tell me, or it could end up at the bottom of a very long list.

So yeah... that's what I've got planned, roughly. My "To-Do" list is always growing and changing--kind of like a mutant bacterial parasite that threatens to eat my life.

Pre-Con Stress

It's Monday, May 23, and I have four work days left before Animazement. As usual, I'm not even remotely ready (rushing to get stuff done is why there are no pictures in this blog today). I suppose it's worth mentioning that I'm doing better than most years at this time. In this blog, I'm going to go through a little of what I do to prepare for conventions--this season will include a record number of 5 cons starting with Animazement and ending with Magfest next January.

First, cosplay has always been a large part of the con experience for me. I have been going to Animazement since 2000. I have had new cosplays for our family every year since then. Admittedly this wasn't that hard to begin with. In 2000, it was just my husband and I. In 2001 we added monkey #1, and in 2003, there was monkey #2. Even then, it wasn't so bad. Cosplay for small children is fairly easy. Luke's, my #2, first cosplay took me only 2 hours to make--it was an infant Final Fantasy I Black Mage. This year, however, I am making 5 costumes for my family, and the kids are getting older which means more complicated costumes for them. On top of our family costumes, I am making one costume for one friend and helping another with significant parts of his costume. It's amazing how that starts adding up.

Add, on top of that preparations, for Artist Alley. I did my first AA at Animazement in 2009 (first AA ever was Anime USA 2008). That adds a whole new dynamic to the list of things to do. To start with, it usually involves sorting through whatever was left from the previous convention, taking inventory, and deciding what needs to be restocked. Then, there's the new stuff. I try to have new stuff at my table for each convention--I see a lot of the same people at the conventions I go to, particularly Anime Weekend Atlanta to Animazement or Animazement to Anime USA, and it's always nice to say hi and point out what I've done since they saw me a couple of months earlier. Even though I'm still wait-listed for Animazement, a friend of mine who did get a half table offered to let me share a corner of her space, so there's that, and there's also the chance that I will end up getting a table. So, being prepared is a good thing. The worst case scenario is that I will have less to do when preparation time comes around for Otakon in July.

Thankfully, for most of the conventions I go to, I don't bother with new costumes; that's just for Animazement. This leads up to the blog title: Pre-Con Stress. As I mentioned earlier, I'm not even close to being finished with preparations. I have 1 costume out of 5 finished--3 of those left have at least been started, but there's still 1 costume I haven't even started yet. I have new stuff and old stuff printed for the table, and I got the badges cut out, but I still need to cut out the bookmarks, the text for the back of the badges, and laminate the whole stack of stuff. I meant to have the Beholder plushie, 3 11x17 prints, and a quilt ready for the Art Show; the Beholder plushie is the only thing finished. One out of the 3 prints is almost finished; the other 2... I won't even go there. The quilt--it's ready to be quilted, but that's only because I started the project 3 years ago. XD I haven't gotten any work on it done recently.

It gets a little daunting when looking at a To-Do List like that--of course it's been worse... like the year where I had no finished costumes at this point and 3 out of 5 not even started. XD I keep saying that I'm not going to be up at 1am the night before the convention laminating stuff or doing last minute throw-together stuff for unfinished costumes (<3 safety pins, duct tape, and hot glue), but so far, that has yet to happen. I'm going to blame pre-con stress for missing Friday's post--I had plans, but in the chaos of trying to get parts of cosplays finished, record the audio for our skit (first year doing this), and *trying* to squeeze in a few moments to try and get the 3-4 pieces left I wanted to have ready for the auction... it didn't happen. To make up for it, if I can figure out how to upload pictures to Blogger from my phone, I'll post an extra Convention blog this Saturday. In the mean time, here's hoping I can wrap all this stuff up (reasonably) before Friday morning, although this wouldn't be the first year either the sewing machine, the laminator, or both got packed. =P