Sakura Con, Part 2

More pics! Now of course, although this was an anime convention, you will see lots of other stuff, including Doctor Who cosplays!

Fourth Doctor Tom Baker brought the TARDIS with him

EXTERMINATE!

I swear, I only looked away a couple times..

Momma?  Kanti from FLCL

More Pokemon! Bidoof, which apparently, Megan says "everyone hates"

A bit blurry, but props for her prop

There were several Brave cosplays, this was the best

Loves me some Firefly cosplay!

she looks like a posterchild for Crayola

We coined her "dominatrixslut".. she had a little radio that she played and danced to, and those are little fake bills in her stocking top. 

DaftPunk in the house! Yes, the gold helmet had colored LED lights in it. Very cool.

Alan Walker and an Exorcist from D Grayman

Final Fantasy 7 

genderswapped Nicholas D Wolfwood from Trigun, she looked like a mafia guy

Sebastian and Undertaker from Black Butler

An AMAZING Motorized Patriot from Bioshock, George Washington. 

Little Sister from Bioshock

Wish this had come out clearer, the milky white eyes were freaky. Sub-Zero from Mortal Kombat

Shepard from Mass Effect

And more cosplay from Mass Effect:

Geth from Mass Effect and Dead Pool with a Totoro hat. Because, of course.

TIMMY TURNER! I'LL GET YOU!!! - Jorgen Von Strangle from Fairly Odd Parents

wut. Cosplays from Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo. Um. 

I hope Walter brought enough for everyone

Dude had some seriously low-ridin' pants. They were making me worried.

Pyramid Head from the game Silent Hill

This kid was SO TALL. I think the shoes ruin it a bit, unless they're part of the character?

Assassin's Creed group

Pretty sure this is from Attack On Titan, along with the gals behind him. There were TONS of people cosplaying from that

Bombermen!

Don't know what she's from but nice scythe. She said it took her 4 months to make

These guys told me what game this was from, but I honestly can't remember.. Island?? It was a Japanese game I think. They were total hamming it up for the cameras

Daughter dressed as Sakura from Naruto and her boyfriend as a Scout from Team Fortress 2

He and his Team Fortress 2 fellow cosplayers:

And my last cosplay pic is of this adorable little girl and her daddy:

A few other random pics I took, this was artwork I found really intriguing

This was artwork I found amusing:

This sign had a hole in it, with a little sign saying "glory" pointing to it. *snicker* I'M TWELVE

And lastly there were so many figurines on sale, this one was actually really cool:

Thus concludes my photo journey through Sakura Con. If you like anime, and cosplay of anime, then this is definitely a convention you may want to consider going to.  

Special Thanks to Megan, Adam and Walf for helping identify cosplays

Sakura Con, Part 1

Warning: this post contains lots of pics. I'll break it down into multiple posts. Part the First!

This weekend is Sakura Con in Seattle. It's an anime convention (pretend that last "e" has an accent over it, I'm way too lazy to figure out how to do that) and my daughter and her boyfriend really wanted to go, so I took them as an early birthday present for her.

I have never seen so many My Little Pony, Pokemon, or animal tails & ears cosplays in my life. Sadly, a lot of my pics came out a bit blurry, both because the lighting in the place is horrid (huge windows bringing in sunlight, causing all your pics to be backlit) or being unable to use flash. I took pics of ones that interested me, most of them I have no idea what character they are portraying, and a lot of the pics were on-the-go pics where I snagged someone as they were going so again not the best quality. You take what you can get!

You can click on the pictures to embiggen them.

My favorite cosplay of the day, from Studio Ghibli's "Howl's Moving Castle". When they walked, she would make the scarecrow "hop" as it does in the movie to walk, totally cool:

Second favorite cosplay. This guy is cosplaying as Captain Hammer from Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog. Explanation of why: when you go to big Conventions like this, that have cosplay, you have to bring your weapons to a security station to get checked, if they pass the regulations, you get green tape tied onto them to let the other door guards know.

 

See! He checked his fists with weapon security! HA!


Third favorite cosplay, from Monty Python's Holy Grail. Those coconuts do in fact make perfect horse hoof clopping sounds, it was really funny to follow her up the escalator because she made the noise the whole time! WIN!

Magicarp!

Hei from Darker Than Black and Dr. Franken Stein from Soul Eater. The screw in his head could turn.

Variation on a Heartless from Kingdom Hearts

Dude was supertall. Slenderman. Be afraid.

White Mage from Final Fantasy hams it up.

Say Hello to my little friend

Hawkgirl - her wings folded down, truly awesome

Cosplay from the game "Catherine". The whole time I was talking to him I was thinking "Look at his face, look at his face."

Ashitaka from Princess Mononoke

red Scout (my daughter's BF Bailey) and blue Spy from Team Fortress 2

Wheatley man! Portal cosplay

BMO and Finn from Adventure Time

Awesome cosplay of Lumpy Space Princess from Adventure Time

Found the Mayor of SimCity! I couldn't seem to make him do anything, must be cause he's the Mayor.

Awwww poor Creeper.

Pretty cosplay from the game "Journey"

lady Link -   I love gender-bender cosplays.. like..

Sailor Moon!!  I'd watch the shit outta this version:

How about some lady Thor & Loki action?

Another view of lady Loki:

 Dunno what this is from, but awesome!

Bit of a twist on Rainbow Dash. Pony Power!

cosplay from Princess Mononoke, pic doesn't do justice to her amazing makeup

She really did paint her entire self in gold

Warhammer 40k - Badass props

another angle

A dragon! Megan wanted this outfit so she could wear it to school, especially the mask

I think he's compensating for something. Darksiders cosplay

No, they're not furries (well, I don't really know that).. Pokemon! Delphox and Braxien

Zelda is not amused

This elf had glowy stuff!

Not sure what this cosplay is, but the costume was SO ELABORATE!

The poor guy on the left could barely move. Cool cosplay, bro

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Drip..... Drip..... Drip......

Everyone knows how the Chinese Water Torture works, right? Prisoner is immobilized, slow dripping water set to slowly drive them insane by dripping on their forehead. I'm sure this would be a most effective means of torture. It's non-lethal, and it's relentless. I can think of an even better way to torture someone. Make them itch. Make them itch so badly that no matter what they do, no matter how much they scratch, even to the point of rending their own flesh, the itch never goes away. It will break them, I guarantee it. Not right away, of course. But over a long period of time, if it never stops.. non-lethal*, yet relentless.

Welcome to Psoriasis.

I remember when I was younger, my mom using tar-based shampoo that smelled horrible and made her hair very thin, and trying various medications, and being out in the sun every chance she could get. Her body was peppered with psoriasis plaques, small red patches with silvery white centers that itched. Her feet were thickly calloused, and toenails very thick and tough. I don't recall her ever actually complaining about it in my presence, though I could tell it bothered her greatly, and did a number on her self-esteem. My aunt and uncle also suffered similarly, as well as her daughter, my cousin. I remember being terrified when I was little that I would inherit this, since it seemed to pass through the women in our family primarily. When would I start seeing the blemishes on my skin? When would I start itching?

After reaching a certain age, you feel like you've done it. You beat the odds! It skipped a generation - Yay!! It started out as something trivial, a small itch between a pair of toes. Surely just athlete's foot. It didn't go away, even after a strict medication regime. It spread, first to the other toes, then to the soles of the feet. My hands started to itch, and flake, and crack and bleed. I was thirty-six for godssakes. I was SAFE. I made it through my childhood, teens, into adulthood. THIS SHOULDN'T BE HAPPENING. And yet it was.

I've always had sensitive skin. Make-up has always been a trial to me, no matter how organic, hypo-allergenic this will NEVER EVER BOTHER YOUR SKIN EVER!!  Yeah. They always do after awhile. It's not just my face. I'll be sitting, and nothing will have changed, but suddenly I'll get red welts on my skin from who knows what, something that blew onto my skin, or that I brushed against inadvertently a few minutes earlier. Grocery shopping in short sleeves is a trial because I always forget and lean on the shopping cart handle, and then spend the rest of the trip itching the raised red areas on my arms that touched it. Snug clothing irritates horribly. The running joke is that I hate pants and bras.. well.. considering the entire time I'm wearing them there's at least a couple points of snug clothing contact that are itching and driving me nuts, can you blame me?

I know I shouldn't complain, my hands have cleared up and really my outbreak is confined to mostly one foot. But it gets so bad I will scratch til my skin is torn and bleeding, just because pain is better than the non-stop itching. It keeps me up late at night, since there's no distractions to help me ignore it once I'm laying in bed and all is quiet. It wakes me from sleep and takes me hours to get back to sleep. I've tried lotions, creams, scary tar-based concoctions (hi mom!) with dire possible cancer-causing warnings. Nothing has really helped. I suppose I shall go back to the dermatologist and see whatever crazy treatments they can come up with. Perhaps sun lamps, lord knows we don't get enough sun in Seattle. Til then, it's just the relentless drip, drip, drip.



*yes, I'm aware that some severe forms of psoriasis can in fact be fatal. I am blessed in that I have a very mild form.

It's Tradition!

In the last few years, every Christmastime we've created the tradition of our kids putting together Gingerbread House kits with the family. This year, I opted to try for a Train instead. My son, being almost 18 and unenthusiastic, went to bed. Spoilsport! My daughter and I then proceeded to make The Christmas Train. Or, as my daughter dubbed it, the "S.S. Cow Killer".

Here's us figuring out where all the pieces go. We have the caboose already "glued" together and setting up, some Christmas ribbon holding it together.

Next we put together the main part of the Engine. Later we realized we used the wrong sides for it, and it's short, but that's okay because we decided this is a train for Santa's elves, so it needs to be smaller.

 Getting the Engine roof decorated.

Working on all the decorations, now that we let the main parts set up a bit.

 The back of the caboose. NO COWS ALLOWED!

The completed train! Complete with the cow it hit on the way to the North Pole.

I had to explain to Megan what a "cow catcher" on a train was for, it seemed only fitting we make use of it. Merry Christmas all!


ps. no actual cows were harmed in the making of this.