Lugia and APH Greece pre-con costests!

Yoo, you beautiful people ~

Närcon is right around the corner –aka 28-31 July– and I'm stressing my ass off because I still have things left to do. I need to iron everything (urrrgh, but it's worth it) and some lenses and accessories have yet to arrive. It's not the end of the world if the stuff doesn't show up because Lugia works without the gloves and, luckily, I do have at least one pair of orange lenses for Ibuki but yeah, if they're uncomfortable then I'm in the piss!

I spent the afternoon a couple days ago doing some outfit tests to see what the costumes looked like when worn; I had not tried them on before so I wanted to make sure that things didn't look funny. I didn't do any makeup because I was way too tired for that and it's too sweaty in here right now anyway, lol. Damn hot summer weather...

Lugia gijinka test.

Okay, so Lugia will look something like that, assuming that the gloves won't make it in time. I might still add some accessories if I come up with something. I will use a white wig for this. Yes, I pulled everything out of my closet. *Yoda voice* Convenient it is.
I do have some more elaborate makeup ideas for Lugia but I'm afraid that I won't be able to make it look good since I'm still quite clumsy and inexperienced with painting my face. I have a love-hate relationship with makeup right now, hehehe... ~

When it comes to Greece I borrowed the white t-shirt from Frozen Angel and the pants were a lucky find from a local second-hand store. The boots I had bought some time ago, to be used for another costume but they worked for Greece as well so eff yeah!

Hetalia's Greece outfit test.

I blocked out my face for the same reasons stated above – no makeup poop face. :) Another reason is that Greece's wig is still in progress! I decided to use one of my Okita wigs for him and so I washed off all the styling products from it and let it dry. Once the wig was dry and clean (sorta clean, two small spikes didn't wash away completely) me and Sacchan made the 'whale sprout', you know, the hair thingie that most Hetalia characters have.
We started by looking at references to pinpoint where the sprout was to be and then we took some spiking gel in the fingers and twinned the hair into a sturdy stalk. Once the stalk had dried in the right position we split the top into two parts, pinned each end into a roll (for shape-holding) and blasted some got2b freeze spray on it and then used the hair dryer to dry it in place – it worked. No steel wire required!

Wig in progress. The products next to it
are what we used to style the 'whale sprout'.

I have yet to style the rest of the wig but I think I'll save that for the con morning because I don't want to overdo it and it's easier to spike a wig when it's on your head anyway. I would also hate for the styling to be ruined (aka crooked) if I pre-style it and then when I take it out at the con it looks like hell went loose on it. Has happened, thank god my friend had a hair straightener back then.

Close-up of the 'whale sprout' ahoge.

I really should start packing but I'm feeling lazy. I guess I'm a time optimist because I always tell myself that I have time to do it later.... even though I don't. :D Oh well, if I can get myself to pack my stuff in advance there's a lesser risk that I'll forget something than if I stress pack the night before departure...

Oh and yeah, regarding the Närcon carpool I want to mention that the seat is now taken. We managed to snag one of our friends with us, on short notice, and it's no less than Karri the awesome one! I'm seriously so stoked to see him again and go to a big con together – he always brings the best company. I'm really thankful he can go with us because the search was starting to get really stressful because time was running out and no one had taken contact; I assume most people who had planned to go to the con had already fixed their traveling and so we were a bit too late to really get any response. But yeah, Karri saves the con and I couldn't be happier about it. ♥

That's all I had for this round. See ya!
~ Shiro Samurai

Närcon 2016 cosplans – The Guardian of the Sea and more!

Yo peeps!

My next convention will be no less than Närcon on 28-31 July in Linköping, Sweden. I'm honestly super pumped about attending the con (even though it has its faults) with my friends and yeah, I can't wait! ヽ(＾Д＾)ﾉ As things seem to look right now I will be traveling to Närcon with Sacchan, Ronya and Vicktor. There might still be place in our northern carpool for one more person though, maybe... *hinthint*

You see, for months now I've been fretting over what to cosplay and now, finally, it seems like I have an idea about my cosplay plans that might actually hold for longer than one week. Maybe. 

I've honestly been scrapping my plans and changing them every second day or something and, meanwhile, time is running out and now I don't even have enough left to safely order a new wig etc. D: 

But after a lot of thinking I managed to come up with some costumes but one of the main days still lacked a cosplay – either Friday or Saturday. I thought that I'd be pretty much forced to recycle a cosplay by now, for aforementioned reasons (lack of tiiiiiime), but I felt unsure because most of my cosplays are really hot to wear during summer and yeah, Närcon is not Närcon without its infamous heat wave!! I really don't like overheating at cons –which happens easily– and I want to believe that, by now, I should have learned from my mistakes... or not. Oh and yeah, it's also quite common that it will rain during Närcon, which makes me iffy to wear any cosplays that includes vintage silk kimono, out of fear for water stains – this and the heat wave limits my cosplay recycle choices a lot. (´＿｀。) *sniff*

But now, hopefully this will be my final cosplay plans!

There will be a Fruits Basket cosplay group meet on Thursday, hence why I will bring Kazuma there and then change to Greece once either the meet is "over" or when it gets too warm because it will.

Lugia will be a kimono-style gijinka and for Friday I thought long and hard before I finally decided on recycling Ibuki; I even asked over at my Facebook page for cosplay suggestions and one of my friends said Hakuouki and that's when it hit me – I haven't worn Ibuki much! I've fixed some size issues with the costume earlier (so he's ready to be reworn) and, best of all, it's my least toasty of all my current Hakuouki cosplays!

In a way both Friday and Saturday can be considered main days and thus I thought that I would maybe rather wear Lugia on Saturday because it will be quicker to put on and yeah, Ibuki will take a while and on Friday I'll likely have more energy and hype (or 'pepp', as we say in Sweden) to put time and effort into Ibuki's demanding makeup. Dem Hakuouki eyes. I know myself well enough that during a 4-day con I will be the most energetic and hyped on the first two days and on the third day I'll probably have the "still fun but I've seen everything" syndrome and on the last day I will just want a bubbletea and then go home and take a long shower, lol. So yeah, Ibuki first and Lugia second felt like the best way to roll.

I do have some small stuff to try out before all my cosplays are ready (mainly makeup and circle lens tests) and I might also need to make some accessories for Lugia (depending on what my finalized design will be) and restyle the wig for Greece. I'm just hoping that the gloves I ordered for Lugia will arrive on time, otherwise I will just have to deal without and add them for another time...

But yeah, I might do some pre-Närcon costume previews, makeup tests, circle lens reviews yada yada! Keep an eye out!

See ya later, alligator ~