DragonCon Recap

Ms. Marvel taking selfies with other superheroes

Check out all those superhero selfies!  I’m rather proud of them, really.  They were a boatload of fun to take.  I’ve got more that are slowly going up on Instagram (scribblerex), if you’re interested.  The selfies are a nod to the comics (if you haven’t read Ms. Marvel, go do that now!).  Kamala is a teenager and selfies are kind of her thing…also superhero fanfiction!

So…what happened at DragonCon?  Well, everything.  But I’m going to narrow it down to my favorite things or we’ll be here all day talking about pie, Katie’s sparkly shorts, Invader Zim, and how much I love watching people in giant mech suits try to fit through doorways.  So, my top 3:

1.Princess Alethea’s Traveling Sideshow

  • Basically a bunch of wonderful YA authors get together to put on a little…sideshow…?  There’s usually singing, storytelling (Tiny insignificant details!), and antics–like Leanna Renee Hieber turning her novel into a Hermione/Snape fanfic.  Other perks…well…if you’re one of the first people there you get some free swag…I love perks.  I also got Alethea Kontis to sign her newest Trixter novel for me, plus a collection of short stories.  And I picked up Mari Mancusi’s Tomorrow Land…zombies and Disneyland…I’m pretty pumped!  Who else was there?  Well…Gray Rinehart and S.J. Tucker brought their musical talents, and E.C. Myers played handsome prince.  The Traveling Sideshow has been hilarious both years we’ve went, and definitely worth setting aside an hour of your con for (especially you other YA fans out there).

2. The Canonization of Mother Teresa at Sacred Heart

  • Sacred Heart is about a minutes walk from the Hilton downtown, and I end up there for mass every DragonCon.  This year had an added bonus: Mother Teresa was actually canonized on September 4.  Luci and I went to the 6:00 mass for the fancy celebration of it–there were TV cameras and everything.  I can’t find a good article about the mass itself (everything online predates the actually mass, so that’s unhelpful), but this Georgia Bulletin article (the Catholic newspaper) tells you a bit about the Missionaries of Charity in Georgia.

3. Robot Battles

  • I love Robot Battles.  It isn’t quite like what you’ll see on Battlebots on TV.  Robot Battles are held sumo style on a little platform where the robots compete to see who can knock the other one off first.  Michael and I have looked forward to it every year since we first discovered it and it never disappoints.  One day I want to build my very own.  Check out their facebook page for info–I learned that they have a youtube channel as well, if you want to actually watch a battle and see what I’m talking about.  They have the rumbles up (they put all of the robots up on the stage at the same time and have them go at each other)…and I swear one of them probably has video of Kelly Lockhart whacking the bots with a wooden duck…

So…that’s it…that’s all that happened minus A LOT!  But you’ll just have to go with me next year and pick some favorites yourself.  Tickets for next year are still $80 (I just checked…but that could change by the time I hit post), so get ’em while they’re cheap!

————————————–Later in the day edit—————————————-

It’s been a rather heavy day, so I’m moving the heavy part of my post down here…

I feel a little weird about posting on 9/11.  I went to mass this morning and realized that 15 years have passed…how could it have?  America the Beautiful made me tear up a little…which is ok…so here are a few hopes for you today.  I hope everybody gets to take a moment today to remember.  I hope everyone takes a second to send out a prayer for those who lost their lives or loved ones during the attacks.  Be thankful for our country, and our loved ones, and our many brave heroes.

 

 

 

Finishing Up Ms. Marvel’s Scarf

Ms. Marvel update!

I started on the scarf…the tedious part.  You don’t want to know how long it took me to put the trim on just the edges; I knew adding the funky starburst bit was going to make me want to cry.

Ms. Marvel Comic

Instead of crying, I chose to flail my arms in the air.  Sometimes Michael flailed back.  It was a thing.

Ms. Marvel Stencil

So…to make my life easier I made a weird looking stencil.  (no I don’t remember why it looks that weird…I made it back in June, just never got around to using it).

20160820_173908

Then I traced it with a fabric marker so it would wash out (not that you’re actually going to see it).

Funky shape pinned

And then I pinned one side, sewed one half of the line and then flipped it over to pin the other.  It was moving way too much to risk trying to pin both sides and then sew.

Finished scarf end

The end result looks like this…I wish it didn’t look quite so much like snakeskin, but it looks fine from a distance, so I’ll deal.  Stephanie says it looks good and I’m being too nitpicky.  She’s right.  My nitpicky side is very resentful of her being right, but she’s right.

Michael with a Stick

Lastly, I’ll leave you a photo of Michael with a stick.  We took a brief break to go Pokemon hunting, and Michael found a stick.  Also, I realize I’m playing the WordPress lottery with photos here, and that this photo–the entirely unrelated one–will be the one that shows up on facebook.  Bring it on, WordPress.  Bring it on.

 

Ms. Marvel: Just Getting Started

Blue and gold fabric, Ms. Marvel Comics, Butterick Pattern

With only a month and a half left until Momocon,  I decided to finally break down and buy (part of) the fabric that I need for Ms. Marvel.  I went with the Ya-Ya Han fabric from Joann, not because I really wanted to buy her fabric, but because I really liked the gold and the blue matched the texture of the gold where the other blue that I liked better looked kind of funny next to it.  The Ya-Ya fabrics are very smooth, and it looks odd when you put a fabric where you can clearly see the grain next to one where you really cant…so…decision made.

No idea yet what I’m going to use for the red, but the dress itself needs to be completed before I bother with the scarf/undershirt/leggings.  so I’ll deal with that later.  Plus, I’d like to see if I actually like the Ya-Ya fabric before I invest in more of it.

The shirt patterns are for the dress.  I’m going to use a combo of the A body and C sleeves, and lengthen them to make the dress. (Though technically it’s a burkini! It’s a swimsuit! That’s a real thing, I Googled!)  Pretty excited about this one; I’ve been seriously fangirl-ing over this character recently.  Issues 3 and 4 just showed up at my door yester-afternoon and I’m slowly savoring them as #5 wont be out till the summer.

In other news, Appen News finally published the article–> here

It isn’t what I’d call good, but it does exist.

If you popped by my website thanks to the article, thank you for stopping by!  We haven’t gotten the print version on our driveway yet, but it should land in the next day or two.

And now, to clarify about the article: the title of it is such a great exaggeration that I can’t even call it an exaggeration.  It’s more of a I don’t know…mistruth?  I am a pretty good cosplayer(not to toot my own horn, but hoooonk!), and my current cosplays will go up on my blog which is my “business.” But somehow when I told the journalist that I was an a blogger/preschool music teacher/tutor/bookseller with two English degrees and a 50,000 word manuscript in the works, she interpreted that to mean that I actually ran a “Successful Cosplay Business.”  No idea.  I’m honestly sitting here looking at the word document I sent her in response to her questions, trying to figure it out; however, she seems to have made that leap on her own.  Since the original article (the one that started all this nonsense) was on the costumes Stephanie and I made for the GNFCC Expo (which we made to get a little publicity), maybe she thought that I was making costumes because I ran a business?  I really have no idea.  Stealing is still wrong, though, Appen News.  Period.

I apologize for anyone sorely disappointed to find out that I do not run a “Successful Cosplay Business”, but I do run a really nice blog and have a really nice Etsy shop with a brand new banner that everyone should go check out right now!  And then you should all buy my coloring bookmarks because they’re cute.