Something Special

A week or so ago, I asked my mom if she could help get measurements for my niece because I wanted to make her a costume for her birthday. She got really excited (because that's what she does), and after consulting with my brother, she decided that instead of trying to get measurements herself, she would just bring Charleigh down here for a visit. Then I got the crazy idea that, well if she was going to be down here, then I'd just make the whole costume while she was here 'cause, you know, it might be fun and then she could take it home with her. BTW, my niece is turning 3. So, I got fabric this weekend and this is what I will be doing tomorrow (the fabric colors match better than the picture suggests):

I Can't Belive It's Already Friday

Seriously, when did that happen? For some reason, my brain is having trouble processing the fact that it is not really Thursday. XD So, today's post is going to be pretty informal with a mix of what I'd planned on posting Wednesday and the results of some of the yesterday's adventures.

For no logical reason, I'm going to start with progress on our cosplay projects. Yesterday I had to pick up some stuff from the Scout Store, which happens to conveniently be right next to Hancock Fabrics (the only fabric store within 40 miles of where I live). We hadn't planned on buying anything yesterday; we were mostly just researching available materials for our upcoming costumes, since we're really still in the planning stages. We found some okay whites for Suzaku and Euphemia, although I'm still not sure about Suzaku's white. That one's going to be tough (at least I think it's going to be). It'd be awesome if I could find something similar to what is used in real military uniforms or maybe marching band uniforms. Anyone know what that is? We also found the most awesome yellow-gold fabric for Suzaku; the weight and texture were good and the color was perfect. As an added bonus, it was also on clearance. =)

Not the best background for the picture, but if you hold the fabric up, it is a spot on match for the gold on Suzaku's jacket.

Casting supplies we picked up yesterday.

Yesterday we also went to Michaels. The goal for this trip was to find supplies to make another attempt at resin casting. I had tried making resin gems for cosplay accessories several years ago, but the result was always very sticky and never seamed to set right. Fev--an awesomely talented artist and propmaker--recommended a different brand of resin when I asked her about the stuff she casts, so I'm going to give that a try. By the way, you should all go follow Fev; her stuff is amazing (Link to her facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/fevereon). Right now, we're mostly going to be experimenting with the stuff, but I'd like to use it to craft parts of the Twilight Princess Zelda costume remake.

Finally, I talked a lot about plushie making and art and stuff a few posts back, so I thought I'd share a brief update on how Otakon preparations are going. I haven't gotten much more finished on the new Aries design. She's inked, but I've spent most of my art time fighting with my computer to get it to work with the file--the zodiac psds file range from 70 to 90 Mb in size and my poor computer has trouble processing that. This probably means I need to upgrade my computer, but that's not really in the budget right now, so I'll have to deal with it. I've also been working on plushies. Earlier this week I finished pale yellow bunny and kitty mini-plushies, and I'm almost finished with a gray bunny. I've also been trying to build up my stock for some of my other plushies--which up until now, I've only kept one of on hand. So, I got a picture of all my finished plushies: from left to right starting with the back row: Black Mokona, Moogle, White Mokona, Pikachu, Pikachu, Kirby, Umbreon, unfinished Toothless, Pikachu, unfinished Kirby; front row: unfinished Gray Bunny, Yellow Bunny, Yellow Kitty, Peppermint Bunny, Peppermint Kitty. My goal right now is to have 3 of each fanart plushie and a decent (vague, I know) number of the mini-plushies.

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.