I decided it was time to show off my Korra costume. A while back, I had an assignment due for my professional communications class and I was paired up with an older lady. We had to make a presentation about anything, but sell it to adults, and a younger audience. We kept trying to find something we were both interested in, but with the age difference, and our interests being on completely different planes, it was really hard. However, we came across our shared interest of cosplay. Her interest in cosplay wasn't exactly her interest. Her kids loved it, but she would make them costumes and attend cons with them. And I just loved looking at people's cosplays online and always dreamed of doing one myself. We had to dress appropriately for our presentation and she decided to present to adults and I decided to present to the younger audience. I decided to dress up in cosplay for my presentation. I bought a bunch of material and asked Grandma to help me make my cosplay. However, Grandma didn't want me anywhere near her while making it. She doesn't sew well with others, I guess. So I didn't get to learn any sewing or anything. But she made the costume and it wasn't that bad for the amount of time she did it in. Still wasn't great, but I loved it.
So I decided to wear that to the con.
The night before, we decided to dress my sister, Kylie, up. We grabbed some stuff from Marshals and Walmart, and holy crap did we pull off a last minute Link costume!
She looked way better than I did! I was so jealous! But she looked great. So we eventually got to the con just before 10 am on Sunday. (When it started). As we were entering the elevator lobby, this guy holding tons of Darth Maul stuff and his son, who was dressed like Annakin Skywalker in his podracer outfit, were ahead of us. Mom, Kylie, and I all made a collaborated "Awwwww" sound at the boy and he turned to look at us, running smack dab into the door frame. However, his helmet bounced him back and he was alright. The boy just kind of smiled at us and his dad checked back on him and I said, "Well, Good thing he's got a helmet!" Later on, we hunted the boy down to snap a photo!
When we got into the area everyone was waiting in to get into the con, I was overwhelmed. So many great cosplays, people with merchandise from so many different eras. It was insane. There was a man in a Darth Vader Mask wearing a kilt riding a Unicycle playing the bag pipe. This place felt like home! And this was just the waiting lobby! We waited in line for a little bit until they started letting people in. Everything was nice and orderly. No one tried pushing and shoving their way into the con. We all just lined up and filed in. Kylie, Mom, and I just started scoping out the booths. Seeing what was up. We were really too broke to buy anything, but we were definitely looking.
We eventually got back to the celebrity booths and lurked around seeing who was going to be there that day. It was so crazy as to what celebrities were going to be showing up. William Shatner, Peter Mayhew, Billy Dee Williams, Elvira, Grant Wilson, Aaron Goodwin, Bruce Campbell, Ted Raimi, Adam West, Burt Ward, and a few of the Walking Dead cast, and a few others. However, to get anything signed cost a good chunk of money, and a photo cost even more. They also had workers that would block your cameras and yell at you for taking photos. It was almost too much of a hassle to even try and sneak a photo. I asked some of the people helping run the booths if we could just go up and talk to them, and they said, "Unless you're taking a picture or getting an autograph, you cannot approach them."
Seriously? How lame. I can't even TALK to someone. I paid $40 for a ticket to stand a good distance away from a celebrity? It was just very frustrating.
However; we did get in line to take a photo with Michael Rooker from The Walking Dead. A photo with him only cost $20! (Compared to everyone else's $50-$180). When we got up to him, he was so nice. Asked all of our names, shook our hands and pulled us in for hugs. We were about to take the photo and I was like, "You want to do it like a selfie?!" and he grabbed my phone and stretched out really far to take a photo of all of us!
The only person I was really interested in seeing (that I could afford) was Grant Wilson. When I was a freshman in high school, all I wanted to ever do in life was go on a ghost hunt with Grant Wilson. I didn't even care about Jay or Steve, I just wanted to go with Grant. I used to talk to him on Myspace about upcoming ghost hunts and we would talk about Bleach (the anime) because he loved it and I was really getting into it. I wanted so badly to meet him. I remember all the high school questionnaires about your future and the questions that said, "Who is one person dead or alive that you would like to meet?" and I'd reply "Grant Wilson".
I kept lurking around his booth. He never really had a long line if a line at all. We walked by once and he pointed at Kylie and said, "Hey!" and he gestured to her costume and gave the thumbs up. And I was beyond ecstatic waving and smiling like crazy. I got closer and asked the girl assisting his booth if I could just talk to him. She said, "Of course!" So I got in line and waited to talk to him. We got up there, I shook his hand and he gushed over Kylie's costume. He apologized to me because I looked great, he just loves The Legend of Zelda so much. I started to talk to him and I couldn't stop myself. I just spewed out all this random stuff and I'm sure I scared the hell out of him. So now I'm probably on super creeper status level to him and I feel so awkward. I did get a signed photo of him and I snapped pictures like a creeper from afar.
Every where we went, Kylie kept getting asked to have her photo taken. People loved it. I was kind of jealous cause no one wanted pictures of me in my Korra cosplay. Being next to all these great cosplayers, I felt pretty lame. But then finally, this boy came up to me and asked if he could take my photo. I was so happy. While (taking FOREVER) getting his camera out, he started talking about strong female roles. I couldn't really hear him or understand him. I started to realize that he was actually a bit mentally slow. So I was patient with him and was trying to answer his questions the best I could. He asked if these were really my muscles. Which was a weird question, but I flexed and said, "Yes, these are all real?" Then he started going on about how he draws porn on his DeviantArt. I said, "Oh, that's cool. I mean, I do love hentai, so it's really not that bad." and then he said, "So do you live around here?"
I responded with, "Well, I live toward McMinnville. So not here, but not too far away either. "
He looked me up and down and said, "How old are you?"
"22.""Do you have a boyfriend?"
I laughed nervously and said, "Sorry, I'm married."
Then, he growled and stomped his foot as if he were genuinely upset that I was married.
Finally he got his camera out and I pulled a traditional Korra pose of pointing at him with my index finger and pinky, to which he responded, "No, I want flexing poses only."
It took me back a second and I was shocked. So I started flexing for him as he took photos. After he took a few photos he then asked, "So if you could have sex with any female character, who would you have sex with?"
I stood there kind of shocked. I have this thing, where I have to be the utmost kindest I can be to any particular person, no matter how far they've gone. And because questions like this really don't bother me, just shocked me that I was being asked this right in front of my sister and mother and this kid had no shame, I answered him. I said, "Um.... probably Mikasa from Attack on Titan."
He groaned heavily and said, "Well of course, choose the obvious one!" I think I really upset him. I think my answer was not adequate for him. I was getting so frustrated with this guy. Most women would have either walked away or punched him in the face by now. However, I just smiled and dealt with everything he dealt me. Yet he wasn't happy enough. I hope to god he's not masturbating to my photos that he took.
We eventually got to walking around and checking out all the comics and artists. I ran into this one booth with Eric Trautmann selling a bunch of Vampirella and Flash Gordon Comics. They were pretty cool, but pretty far out of my price range. However, he'd recently published a kid friendly version of Vampirella that was adorable called "Lil' Vampi" for only $3. I spoke to Eric a bit about the work and him being exhausted, but eventually moved on and said I may be back later. Well, I found myself back at his booth and he only had one copy of "Lil Vampi" left. So I couldn't resist. I bought it. He was so excited, he told me that he'd sell it to me for only $3.00 instead of $4.00 because I am the first person in his career that ever said, "I'll be back" and has actually come back. However, I highly recommend everyone give this comic a look over and possibly buy it. At only $4 a copy, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. 
Another booth we stopped by that looked interesting was this one called "Oh Hell". As soon as I peeked at his booth, the writer just went into a full scale story, sharing the storyline with us, the art, sneak peaks of the next issue, and was so excited about his work. He won me over and I decided to buy the first issue. He asked that Kylie and I take a picture with his comic and he took a picture of us. They're trying to get "Oh Hell" turned into a graphic novel and starting up a kickstart to help it out. However, the first 96 pages of the comic are online. Everyone should check it out for themselves!
My mom's friend is doing a fundraiser for organ transplants and she asked if I could spend up to $50 on signed merchandise for an auction. So I stopped by the original artist of The Walking Dead comics and got a signed 11x17 print of the original issue #1 comic cover. We also stopped by Randy Emberlin's booth and had him sign 4 black and white prints for the auction as well as a few prints for Kylie and I.
Earlier, when looking at the booths, I noticed that Yaya Han was going to be there. I was so excited. To be honest, I didn't know who Yaya was before Heroes of Cosplay, but I love that show so much, I was so excited to see her booth. I was worried that they had cancelled Heroes of Cosplay because my DVR was acting funny around the season finale. Either they didn't have like a big finale that would make you remember that it's the end of the season, my DVR just stopped working and didn't record the finale, or they got cancelled. We kept looping back around to see if she was at her booth yet, but she was taking forever. Finally she was over there, I had already spent all my money, but I still wanted to see her. So I was taking photos from afar. She had this big camera crew around her and I wasn't quite sure what it was. I leaned in the big line and asked her fiance if I could just ask a question since Yaya was obviously busy and the star of everything. He said of course. And I asked, "So Heroes of Cosplay, I loved that show and I was just wondering if it's still going or what's going on?" and he points at the cameras and whispers, "They're actually filming it right now. It will be premiering in April or May!" I thanked him and back away. Kylie and I were on our own for a while and we decided it was time to find Mom again. She was in a lobby right behind us sitting down because her knees hurt. We walked over to her and started gushing about Yaya. I went to show her my photos and realized they were all blurry. So determined, I went back out there to get some photos, and lo and behold that creepy guy that wouldn't leave me alone was getting his photo with Yaya and refused to leave the table. As Yaya posed beside him, he lifted his arm to put around her shoulder and she slapped it away from him. I laughed quietly to myself and waited for him to leave because I did not want him in my photo. He still wouldn't leave, so I went and sat down with Mom a little longer and ran into THIS adorable couple cosplaying Dipper and Mabel from Gravity Falls.
After waiting a bit, I finally went back out to get a good picture of Yaya. Thank god that creepy guy was gone. I snapped this great pic.
Some other cosplayers showed up as some characters from X-Men and she got up and posed with them.
I also snapped a pic of the guys filming for Heroes of Cosplay as well
Finally feeling all pooped out, we decided to leave. On our way out, I was tapped on the shoulder and this girl dressed as Korra said, "So I feel we have to take a picture together. I've been here all weekend and I have not seen A SINGLE PERSON dressed as anyone from Avatar, let alone Korra!"
So we posed together. Her outfit was so much better than mine and very well put together, but she congratulated me on my hard work on mine because it "looked great".
So overall, it was an amazing experience. I had so much fun and really can't wait until Sakura Con in April. I think I need to fix up my Korra cosplay a bit, hopefully. I have another cosplay I'm working and will probably post more about that on here if I can ever eventually start working on it.
Here's the rest of the photos I snapped!
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