Countdown to Con: 1!

     Tomorrow is the BIG DAY! I'm so excited! Ray has been cooking all day to get us ready for the big event. That was the main chore for today: cook. We also have to pack and make sure our phones are charged. I have slathered myself in hydrocortisone cream and used my allergy eye drops in preparation. I was still having a slight reaction today, but I made it to work and stayed there all day, even though I have blood blisters where I've scratched so hard in my sleep. The purple make-up should hide all the damage I did to myself, so I'm not too worried.

     The only thing left to do is to make sure our phones are fully charged and ready to go!

Countdown to Con: 2!

     It's getting down to the wire. The con is so close I can taste it. And today, we had doctor's appointment. Ha! That has nothing to do with the con, but it was significant nonetheless. They changed Ray's insulin to a longer acting kind. So we're excited about seeing how well it works. He was also down 9 pounds from his last appointment!

     After the appointment, it was time to get down to the business of shopping for food and sundries for the con. Once home, we had a facials, manicures, and pedicures to look our best for the con. Sadly, I turned about to be slightly allergic to the facial mask that I used, so my face is hot and broken out right now, but I put some hydrocortisone on it, and I may have to take a Benadryl before I go to bed, but this is why I decided to do it a couple of days early, just in case.

     Oh, well. You live; you learn. Excelsior!

Countdown to Con: 3!

     So we've been able to make some money from Blue Max Studios for the con, and I really don't want to spend it all on food, so we're going to take our food with us. This means extra planning. We'll need to eat a good breakfast before we go and take lunch and snacks for both days and dinner for Saturday. We'll also want to think about something easy to throw together Sunday night when we drag our tired and happy booties into the house after a long, fun weekend.

Saturday:
Breakfast: bacon quiche with olives on the side
Lunch: sweet potato salad with turkey
Dinner: chicken salad in Bejelly wraps with Bell pepper slices
Snacks: almonds and raisins (in case of low blood sugar)

Sunday:
Breakfast: Sausage and almond flour biscuits with Paleo gravy
Lunch: sushi
Dinner: crock pot chili
Snacks: pistachios and raisins

     This is a reminder that just because you're indulging in your geekdom doesn't mean you should indulge in crap food. In order to keep energy up, there will be a healthy fat at each meal and plenty of good quality protein. Take away all the sugar, and you have calmer kids who don't make you want to snatch someone's hair out. Plus, this food is delicious.

Countdown to Con:4!

    It's time to plan what we'll be taking with us to the con. I've been walking around with a piece of paper in my pocket for the writing of anything I could think of that we needed to take with us. That, coupled with Sam Maggs' recommendation have me feeling secure that we will be covered. Here's the list:

• Glucose monitor
• test strips
• lancets
• syringes
• insulin
• cell phones
• ibuprofen
• snacks
• receipt
• glue
• make-up
• cash
• chargers
• lip balm
• Germ-X
• calling cards
• safety pins
• stain stick
• poster tube?

     With this, we will be prepared for most events and emergencies.

Countdown to Con: 5!

     It is time to print out Social Media Calling Cards. These are very useful if you run into people you'd like to keep in touch with. If I had more time, I would design some myself for all of us, but I don't, so I went to http://katydwyerdesign.com/free-social-media-calling-cards/ and printed some out. These are pretty good. I would prefer if there was room to put my blog info on there, but beggars can't be choosers, and people will be able to find my blogs through following me.

     Having Social Media Calling Cards is really a great idea because writing down someone's info and trying to remember where all the hyphens are can be aggravating. Just remember that if you don't type them up, write carefully and legibly.

Countdown to Con: 6!

     This has been a pretty relaxed and lazy day, which I needed because I haven't had much sleep, and I'm feeling sort of sick, and I have to go back to work tomorrow.  My project for today was to just make sure I have plenty of room on phone for all the pictures I'm going to want to take.

     I mean who wouldn't want to take lots of pictures. There's going to be a costume contest. There are going to be people who cosplay as Ghostbusters. It is time clean out the phone, so I have room for all the awesome!

     We're also going to print out our receipt because they don't send you tickets that you turn in for a lanyard. We're just supposed to bring our ID's, but the kids don't have any, so I'm taking the receipt with us because I will not be refused!

Countdown to Con: 7!

     We saved up for Halloween and birthdays. We've saved up for Christmas. We've saved up for tickets, but we've haven't saved up much for anything at the actual convention. It's time to make a little extra spending money.

     Ray and I have started  new project together called Species Spotlight. It's a supplement for the White Star RPG. It's basically a small book that focuses on an original (or at least blatantly stolen, with the serial numbers filed off and given a new paint job) alien, its featured class, and it's favored space ship designed by Ray. All artwork and space ship designs are done by Ray. I'm more the idea person. It's a fun project, and if you're interested in purchasing it, you can do so here.

     If you need a great villain for your SF game, or you want to play a young alien looking to take over a planet, the Abbhoran species is just the right one for you, and this book contains everything you need to play or go up against one of these vile creatures. It also includes the Tyrant class and a detailed deck plan of an Abbhoran yacht.

Countdown to Con: 8!

      What to wear?

     Ok; this one really isn't that hard. We picked our Halloween costumes specifically to have something cool to wear to the con. For Ray, Lydia, and me, we're going as Adventure Time characters: Ice King, Lumpy Space Princess, and Marceline. The boys had wanted to go as Finn and BMO, but then changed their minds. They're going as Mario and Luigi.

     Since we already tried these costumes out at Halloween, we know they're a success. We've already been asked to take pictures with other people.

     The costume contest is Saturday, so we're going to wear the costumes, but we're just going to play it cool and casual in our geek finery on Sunday.

Here's a preview of our costumes:

Ray, Lydia, and I made our costumes. The boys found their costumes toward the beginning of October, so we went ahead and bought them. When making Ray's costume, Lydia had a brilliant idea to find a mask with a large nose. Ray found a fancy witch mask, and I took the fabric off of it and recovered it with blue material. We made the crown out of foam and attached batting to it for the beard and hair. My mom made the robe our of a sheet, and Alex lent Ray his penguin to tag along as Gunther.

     My costume is just a purple sweat suit, a "fresh to death" dress and purse that I made out of a plastic bag and a can full of beans, a purple wig, a gold star I cut out of foam and glued on with school glue, and make-up.

     Lydia painted her t-shirt and made that bass out of a plastic costume axe we found at the costume store. She cut some cardboard to fit over the blade to make it larger, added the tuning plate. Push pins became tuning pins, and she added thread to string it. Then she painted the whole thing. A wig, some fangs, and a purple umbrella with bones (not shown) complete the ensemble.

     This con is going to be so lumping awesome!

Countdown to Con: 9!

Day 9: Checking the Schedule

It's time to check the con schedule and dream about all the things I might see, and plan all the things I hope to see, and regret all the things I won't be able to see due to scheduling conflicts.

Saturday:
Main stage:
12:45 -"Making Comics the Inverse Press Way"
Panel Room:
2:45 - "Nuwho Dr. Who Panel"
4:00 - "Finding you Story"
5:15 - "Cosplay 101"
6:30 - "So You Wanna be a YouTuber"
Main stage:
7:45 - "Costume Contest"

Sunday:
Main stage:
11:30 - "Ghostbusting 101"
Panel Room:
12:45 - "My Little Pony Party"
3:00 - " Parenting the Geek Way"

Countdown to Con: 10!

    Our local convention, Fanaticon, is coming up in 10 days, and while this is not technically my first con, it might as well be. My first con was at a bookstore. It was the first one, and it was pretty small, but a lot of fun. This con is at an actual civic center with an actual celebrity, and I am excited.

     Since I am an over-planner, this is my countdown to the convention.

Day 10: Re-read the section on conventions in The Fangirl's Guide to the Galaxy: A Handbook for Girl Geeks by Sam Maggs

Prep: I have already asked for three days off work: two for the actual con, and one to rest and get over the geek before returning to work.

My con-clave: This is going to be a family event. Ray and I are taking our little geeks with us because if we didn't, they'd be upset. Fortunately, since we live close by, we won't have to spend extra money on a place to stay, and we plan on taking our own food.

I'm trying not to stress. I truly am, but I'm a little freaked out. I just have to remember that I have nine more days to plan and get ready.