Fall Days and Family Diners

One of the few trees around here that turns colors.

Ah, fall, what a wonderful time of year... not like I haven't said that already... But I love fall!

This weekend was great! Friday was Dad's birthday, so I attempted to make a cheese cake for him... but that failed. Fortunately we had a regular Safeway cake in the fridge! We had fun with a little celebration for him, and I can't really remember much else :p

Saturday was busy, but fun! Dad and I went to karate in the morning, and then I worked on my Mystique cosplay, and then I went to music lessons, then worked on my costume again... actually, I finished it! 

In our family, we have multiple birthdays in October-- my Dad, brother, and Zia Linda, so we have a birthday dinner for all of them. We went over to Zia Linda's house for dinner. Uncle D.L. had made gnocchi (my favorite!), salad, fried egg plant, and a tone of other food. He is an amazing cook. 

At various intervals throughout the dinner, I was getting ready for a Halloween party that Jaymes was putting on. Seeing my friends again was awesome! I haven't seen lots of them since the end of summer. There were quite a few impressive costumes! Syrena was Fem!11, her brother was Spock, Jaymes was Deadpool, Ollie was... himself...

When I finally got home, it took me past midnight to get all of my makeup off!

Didn't do much Sunday, just hung around the house and then watched Hook. It was a pretty fun weekend :D

This week is...

Asexual Awareness Week

And I felt like I needed to mention it. Yep.

Fall Break and Mystique Progress

Helloooooooooo.....


So I was on fall break last week, AND IT WAS FREAKING AWESOME!!!! Like, I don't know what made it so awesome, I didn't do much other than work on my costume or go to that anime convention, but it was really fun. You know, sometimes it's nice to just sit at home and not have to worry about doing much.

The pile of stuff I dumped out of my bag from the con. Signed poster in the middle, a cute little Totoro  sketch, my notebook, lanyard and wallet. After the con I picked up some new wig caps, blue face paint, and liquid latex.

I honestly can't remember much about Monday, but I didn't do much. I finished up sketching the Mystique picture, and watched Agents of Shield. I think I may have watched a movie with Mom... yeah, we watched "The Great Gatsby". I loved it! I feel like it really captured the spirit of the book. It was funny how all of the music had such modern sounds to it, instead of a 20's soundtrack, but it worked. It was beautifully done, and absolutely one of my favorite book-to-movie adaptions.

And then from Tuesday to Friday I worked on my costume!

Setting up!

So I did end up using Mom's shirt. A friend asked me the other day on how I got good materials for my costumes. Start with a base, then modify as needed. It helps a lot for a beginner cosplayer like myself, and it saves a lot of time.

Time to cut that shirt up!

So, as you can see, I took out the sides and most of the sleeve. I regretted not making a custom dress form over summer... this would have been so much easier!

 After cutting out the sides and making sure they were porportind right and all that jazz, it was time for *cue dramatic music* ... FABRIC GLUE

That stuff is amazing! Instead of having to hem the shirt by sewing by hand (my machine is in the garage under a pile of stuff -.-), I could just glue it! It still took a quite a bit of time, but there were no needles involved, which was nice.

Ok, so after hemming the shirt, it was time to move onto the sleeves. I had an old pair of dark wash jeans that I used. Surprisingly, making the sleeves wasn't that hard, but I did have to hand sew it (needles hurt, btw).

Yeah, thats GreedLing in the background. The FMA gang was keeping me company :p

Next: the side panels. I used the top part of the jeans that I used for the sleeves, so I had to deal with pockets and buttons and thick material and ugh it was reallly difficult. But! It worked! So who am I to complain. By this time I had almost completely run out of fabric glue, so I returned to sewing.

So, I'm almost done with the top! I just need to attach the arms and do the other side panel and it will be done! Oh, yeah, and the zipper... but that shouldn't be too hard (I hope).

So that's it for cosplay right now...

Other cool things that happened: I went to the County Libraries Fundraiser. The author speaking this year was Dom Testa. I bought his series, "The Galahad Books", which are pretty good.

On Thursday I got the "House of Hades" ...OMG IT WAS FANTASTIC I WILL RIDE OF INTO THE SUNSET ON THE ARGO II CRYING FOR A YEAR YAYY... and finished it Saturday morning before going to Karate.

Then on Sunday I got a new phone! This one has a nice screen... I can actually see it. Haha, I had slammed my old phone in a car door, so the screen was all shattered and unresponsive.

I also talked to my friend Jaymes about San Diego Comic Con, which we're planning on going to. I registers, and am praying that I get ahold of tickets!

God bless!

Anime iCon

Ok, first things first: I have had an absolutely fantastic weekend! On Friday I went to the aquarium with Ollie and Jaymes, and then to the comic book store where I bought my first comic! Yep, I decided that it is time for me to step into the world of actual comic books. Jaymes helped me find where to start, and I ended up going with Spider-Man (fitting, since it was Spidey that got me into the geek world). On Saturday I went to Sierras house (my bff from 8th grade) for a movie night. I met another of her friends, Kiera, and we bonded over fandoms and ships!

Down town after the comic shop

Dad brought me to the anime convention on Sunday! It's funny how it all worked out- a few weeks ago I found out about Kracken Con up in San Francisco, but because of previously planned events, it didn't work out. Earlier this week (or I guess it's last week now) I looked up more cons, and there happened to be one RIGHT IN MY HOME TOWN! Crazy, right? I wore my Winery cosplay. I was worried that my hair extensions would fall out, but they worked great!

So we didn't know for sure if we would make it until this morning. We dropped my brother off at a friends house so they could go to the walk for diabetes together, and then Dad and I headed over to the conference center. There weren't many people there, but that's no surprise, since it's the last day of the con. I bet most of the people were locals. Actually, there were probably 30 of us at most. It was cool getting to talk to some other anime fans :)

When we got there he bought me my ticket, and then we checked the times for the panels. The one that I had really wanted to go to (character development) had been moved, so he and I went for lunch.

After we ate we went back to the con center, and I caught the last half of a voice acting panel. It was really funny, and I totally connected with what the guy was talking about. Singing and acting can put you in some crazy circumstances! Once the panel ended, I went to the artist ally for a few minutes to look around. On the way to the Cosplay panel I got a picture of a Fionna (from Adventure Time).

It was the first time anyone had asked to take a picture of her in cosplay! It was so funny how she reacted, almost just like I did when I was at CVI..."Me? You want a picture of my cosplay! You actually think I'm that good!? How do you want me to posewhereshouldistandwhatdoido alksdhfa;lkjs THANK YOU SO MUCH!"

After taking her picture (gah isn't she just a perfect Fionna!) we went into the cosplay panel, hosted by StrawberryCensor. It was on Cosplay makeup. They had lots of great tips, and after I go through my notes and sort them out, I'll post what I learned. After their panel, they were out in the lobby signing and giving out prints! I went over, and while sighing my print, one of the girls asked if I had cosplayed before or if I had any plans to. I told her about my plans for Mystique, and she gave me some tips for it! I had no idea of how to do the scales, and she explained how to use and shape liquid latex. They were all really sweet :) I'm so glad I got to meet them in person!

After getting the signed print, I went into the artist's ally, and there was a girl dressed as Rose from Homestuck.

What's with all the perfect cosplays at this place?

Finally! Time for the character development panel! This is what I had come to the convention for! You see, I'm working on a project (it's a secret, even my parents don't know anything about it, other than the few sketches I've shown them) and I needed some help with characterization. Here is the artist that hosted the panel. He talked about the art industry, and the importance of being able to draw traditionally. He went to the art university that I want to go to, so that was really cool! Later I'll post my notes from his panel.

Alright, I guess that's it! Have a great day, everyone!

It's October...

Which means fall and pumpkins and Halloween and costumes and candy and pretty colors and cool, crisp air and caramel mochas and dorky sweaters and (for me at least) going steampunk!

Like, it's this weird thing I have... I tend to get into steampunk around the end of summer each year, and go at it during fall and winter, and when spring comes around I go back to normal... or some other subculture. I tend to incorporate little steampunkish things in my wardrobe/accessories all year though.

I've been listening to this a lot... it's the only Halloween song out there.

But that's not the point of this post. It's Halloween season, and that means costume making! I'm going to go as Mystique (First Class version), and I shall document my costuming process. I have break next week (YAY!) so I'll hopefully have enough time to make the whole thing.

First, I gathered some reference pictures:

 

So I also have references from here. It's a great help, because it has little details that I can't really see on the pictures I posted.

Next, Mom and I came up with a list of what I will need:

• short red wig from here ($18)
• Yellow Vest (have to cut out side panels)
• Black belt/suspenders... it looks like it also goes part way down her legs
• black leather material
• Jeans for pants+sleeves (?)... need zippers for bottom sides of jeans
• Black boots (prob. my Ahsoka boots)

• Cosplaysky has good references
• Zippers for vest and jeans

Last night we bought the wig (I can't wait for it to arrive!)
Mom had recently bought a yellow shirt that she doesn't like, so she might let me use it instead of a vest. Seriously, trying to find a yellow vest is almost impossible! Nobody sells them! I found a great one on Amazon, but it was $20-$40. Crazy, right? I can't spend that money on something I'm just going to cut up!

We also might have some ski pants that I can use for the costume, but I have a feeling that Jeans will work better. The uniform looks to me to be dark blue, not black. Hopefully I'll be able to get the leather at Beverly's.
Alright, I guess that's all I've got for now!

My camera died, and I have no idea where my charger is, so my art will either be up waaay late or just combined with Octobers.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Two years!

Wow, I just realized today that I have been blogging for two whole years now!

So... that means I was 13 when I started this blog. I guess the reason I started blogging was because of The Lakehouse. I remember thinking that I would have a very  "Star Wars" themed blog, because at that point of my life I pretty much lived and breathed "Star Wars". I still do :p. I guess this didn't turn out to be a very "Star Wars-ey" blog though. So first I sort of posted when and what I felt like, and now it's more of an art/review/travel blog... and then other random things I feel like throwing in. I guess, theme wise, I've got a very steampunk thing going on. Yeah, I'm very much into the steampunk sub-culture. I've been involved for about a year now.

But I want to say thank you to all of my followers! Y'all are awesome!

So here's an adorable bunny

And an amazing soundtrack

And I hope you all have an absolutely fantastic day you lovely people!