Chuunibyou Rikka Charm

When Chuunibyou first came out, I bypassed it because the cover art made it look like a harem. One normal-looking dude and a bunch of girls - meh.

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But then for some reason Sak and I watched the first episode last year, and I was instantly smitten with the characters! I especially love the main charater, Rikka, and her friend Dekomori.

Here is my home-made Rikka charm :)

She's a little too..long..Maybe because it baked funny?  I also should have lightened the colors a bit more.

Inverted triangle mouth!

Anyway, I really liked the first season.  It had me screaming at the TV a few times - "JUST ACCEPT YOUR TRUE SELF ALREADY!" But it had plenty of doki-doki moments and a pull-and-tug between not being ashamed of who you are, and not using fantasy to escape reality.

Kinda in a very tiny nutshell - Chuunibyou is a story about larpers (live action role play).  Some are recovering larpers, and others stay stuck in their imaginary worlds. It's got a cute love story too!  And it's by Kyoto Animation, so the art is top notch.

I wasn't as big a fan of the second season, as it didn't have as strong of a story and fell more on standard rom-com love triangles. But the OTP is super cute, so I did appreciate a continuation of the series!

Nisekoi Chitoge Charm

Much to the detriment of my productivity, we have Netflix, Hulu, and Crunchyroll access. Which means..I watch a lot of anime.  And even though I prefer binge-watching shows, Sak and I have started the habit of "watching the first episode of new series".  And then only continuing with the ones we like :P

Nisekoi was one of the 2014 winter anime series that we picked up, and I kinda liked it at first.  School life, with the two leads forced into a fake relationship by their gangster parents. Nothing too groundbreaking, but it was funny and the art was nice.

Unfortunately, as the season progressed it got more and more harem-ey. Love triangles I can do, but when it gets to three, four girls liking a guy (who really has very little in the way of attractive qualities)..Not my cup of tea (unless it's really funny).  But I'm not going to knock the harem genre too much - because I am guilty of watching my fair share of reverse harem.  There's just something about picking your favorite 1 dimensional guy and rooting for him? Haha. I usually go for the reliable, yet angry/grumpy boy that only awkwardly expresses his feelings or the intellectual megane (glasses) type. Interestingly, Sak can fit both those categories.  I am nothing if not predictable :P

In any case, I stopped watching around when girl #4 entered the scene. Episode 15 or so?  I might pick it up again later just to see if the guy picks one of the girls in the end.

I made a charm of my favorite character from the series, the tsundere - Chitoge Kirisaki.  Daughter of a mobster, she's got attitude, which I find more entertaining than the sugar-sweet type of girls :P

I wanted to draw her because her outfit is cute! It's rare to see an anime school girl uniform with a tie - much less a tie clip.

I used the printable shrinky dink material again (more info on that here) to make this charm, coated with a thin layer of clear nail polish.

It's a pretty small charm.

In other news - anyone else looking forward to the summer anime season? The re-make of Sailor Moon! Gwah! Sak is looking forward to Sword Art Season 2 more though :P

Fanime Artist Alley Recap

Okay! Time for an overview of my first time selling homemade stuff!

The South Hall, aka, big blue tent outside the con. Needs some more signs, eh?

I can start by saying it was very nerve-wrecking.  I was very insecure! Many of the people that sell in the Artist Alley are..actual artists that went to school! Not just hobbyists like me.  I was also worried that maybe the stitching on my bags would magically start to unravel, that'd be embarassing too! (Luckily, they stayed in one piece.)

So Friend E and I priced our stuff pretty low.  Partly because we're insecure, and partly because we're tired of seeing super expensive over-priced buttons.

We sold buttons for 50 cents, laminated bookmarks for $1, silhouette-cut greeting cards for $2, and bags for $7 (later $5).  On the last day we did some deals too, like 3 buttons for a dollar.

After getting badges in the special line (1 hour wait vs. 5 hours my poor sister had to do in the regular pre-reg line), we trekked our wares to the South Hall to set up.

Setting up at table 215!

The big tent was HUGE. And very, very, long.

Long hall is long. This is only half.

We got really lucky, getting a nice table right in the middle and close to the bathrooms. We also got to sit by our friends R & J, who were selling their popular crochet pokeballs.

Pokeballs!

Magikarp!

For set up, we put on a black tablecloth and two 2'x1' towers made from wire cube grids.  We covered the towers with black fabric, and pinned buttons and bookmarks to the front. I put tissue paper in my bag designs and hooked them to the sides of the towers.

In the middle of the table we laid out the cards and the rest of the bookmarks, held up by binder clips that Friend E took the handles off of.

I used leftover wedding easels to hold our price signs, which were laminated so we could change the price with a dry-erase marker.

Overall, I thought our set-up looked pretty nice for complete noobs!

Now, as for what we brought with us - Friend E brought 5 of each bookmark design (a total of 26 designs or so), and I brought 3-4 of each button design (enough circles cut to make 20 of each, but I only put the button together if we ran out).  I had a total of 42 bags, with 7 different fabric designs. And about 20 of each card design.

Our material costs totaled about $300.

And our total sales at the end of the weekend totaled $337.50.

Back of the cube tower was perfect for storage!

I'm happy we broke even, but we didn't do as well as I thought we would.  Why is that?

Sadly, I think it's because I'm too old. @_@  I feel like I was off in guessing the desires of the market.  The majority of attendees are probably highschool age, not nearing 30.  I should have consulted with my sister more I guess!  We had someone come up and look at cards, only to move on because she didn't know what she'd do with it.  While holding a handful of printed artwork.  I'd think a greeting card had at least as much use as a 4x6" print!

But then I thought about it - did I use greeting cards in highschool? Or even college? I used stationery with penpals but never really cards.  I didn't find value in cards until..marriage.  Target audience fail! Haha.  On the bright side though, the Tardis cards did sell out!

The other thing I misjudged were the bags.  I thought - cute bag, cheap price, it'd sell out for sure, right?  Nope. I think when most people come to Artist Alley, they are looking for their favorite characters.  Though my prints are cute and exclusive to Hawaii, they are generically cute.  They don't have Naruto or Ichigo or Sherlock on them.  I think maybe they'd have done better at a regular craft fair.  It's a bummer since sewing all of those took the majority of my pre-con prep time!

As for buttons, can I say how rewarding it was to see people stop by and look at the old man buttons, then crack a smile? That alone was worth it! And to the one guy that bought my inko-chan button - you totally made my day! :D

Inko-chan, the mentally challenged parrot from Toradora.

In the end, I'm glad we had the experience. I'm very grateful to all patrons of our small shop - thank you, thank you, thank you!

Friend E and I are splitting the $337.50 and donating it to charity.  My half is going to City Impact, a homeless ministry in San Francisco.

That all said though, I don't know if I'd do Artist Alley again.  I was very nervous the whole time, and we couldn't do a lot of regular convention activities since we were busy manning the table.  But I'm happy we tried it! Next year I'd like to try something else new too - like a panel, or an AMV submission!

Now..what to do with all the leftover stock?  @_@

Dim Sum Christmas Card

Yum yum yummm. Keeping with the food Christmas post card theme from years past (here and here), I tried my hand at some dim sum squishies this year!

Muahaha. Can you tell what types they are? I think people may have trouble with the har gow, as they are maybe too pink. And the potsticker looks more like a calzone than a dumpling. >.>" Sak likes grandpa bao the most, followed by crazy-Totoro-face baked bao.

I printed them through vistaprint again, and am super pumped to send them out! It's not even December yet - ahead of the game this year, that's rare! And I get to use the new Aloha shirt postcard stamps, whee!

Are you doing holiday cards?

Halloween Party Invites 2k12

Whee! I love October, especially since we get to host our somewhat-annual Halloween party! YAY!

Here's the invite for this year, which I emailed out practically five seconds ago.

I decided to use our bunnies as inspiration, haha! By the way, we came to an agreement on names: Nobukatsu and Mochizuki.  Both somewhat silly sounding samurai names. We call them Katsu and Mochi for short. Can't go wrong with food names, right? Much better than Bempi and Rhea at least.  And they actually have halloween costumes! I can't wait to show you..they are halloween hats for cats, but they totally work for bunnies too. I'll show them off once I can get them to hold still for five seconds (impossible!).

Anyway, here is the "blank" invite if you'd like to use it as a template. (Click image for the full size.)

And here's the link to last year's invite template, if you'd rather have pac man ghosts! Oh, and also check out Kim's invites for her own halloween party, they are pretty amazing!

Now..I guess I ought to work on our costumes. I haven't even started! (Though I did buy some fabric, does that count?)

Are you going (or hosting) a halloween party this year? You can come to mine if you'd like! :)

Roann's Buttons v2

I've had the pleasure of making buttons for Sak's friend Roann in the past - so I was super excited to see the new designs he came up with! Can you tell the theme?

Zodiac animals!  In brush paint style, pretty cool!

Looking at the bunny button reminds me...we still have the bunnies! For whatever reason, it appears that we are keeping them? Which is fine, I will treat them well, but it wasn't really the original plan. They are rather big now! And it's hard to trim their nails because they are ridiculously squiggly. They also need names. I was thinking Bempi and Rhea, but Sak's against it because bempi is Japanese for constipation, and Rhea short for diarrhea. Haha! They are cute names if you don't think about the meaning..muahaha. Other alternatives are Crazy and Lazy, or Humper and Thumper. That's right, I think one is a boy. I need them to be old enough to get fixed at the vet! (Until then, their pen is separated in half.)

Anyway, back to buttons. Though I am an ox, my favorite has to be the chicken and the monkey..

Their big eyeballs are so funny! I love it.

Ox are supposed to be hard working and stubborn, I think. I guess that describes us. Though sometimes
we're pretty lazy too. :P

What animal represents you in the zodiac?

Roann's Buttons

Recently, I got to do some collab work with Sak's Hawaii buddy Roann.  And by collaboration I mean I made buttons from his artwork! (Any excuse to use the 'ol girl..) I did it in exchange for Hawaii snackage. Hehe.

I love making buttons..and it's even better since I discovered that Kinko's has self-serve printers, all I have to do is put my file on a USB and plug it right in! Sooo much less awkward than asking the staff to print random stuff.

Anyway, his buttons are super awesome! Check them out!

Soo fun! I picked the penguin and Sak picked the floppy disk to keep.  Which is your favorite?

Check out Roann's blog, he's got a lot of cool artwork, including Boba Fett drinking a boba tea, haha! I think he also does commissions, if you need some custom graphics!

Anyway, just some cheery buttons for your Friday from an awesome artist! We'll be at Maker Faire this weekend, so Bay Areans, hope to see you there! ^_^

More Graduation Goodies

Seriously this is a graduation bumper year in the family.  Two of my cousins, two of Sak's cousins, and my brother are all college grads! I love commencement season. :)

Sadly, we won't be in Hawaii for the Sak-cousins UH ceremonies, so we're just sending cards.  I doodled a little one for Sak's girl cousin, cute just like she is!

The Daiso neko lycee (lei see?) is cute too!

Here's the image if you want to make a card for your own brown-haired relative/friend..haha!

Meanwhile, Sak was busy making an absolutely ridiculous lei for my brother. I fully intend on going all-out-crazy with baby bro's graduation, so this is all part of the fun.  A lei made from gigantic machine washers!  Perfect, given that Penga-bro will be graduating as a mechanical engineer. *Sniffle* I'm so proud of him..

We bought a box full of big washers from the hardware store, and Sak weaved two ribbons through the line of them.

Then he took two more ribbons and weaved those through as well.

under...

Over..

Tie off the ends and you're done!

This maile-styled (open-loop) lei weighs some serious poundage.  I shouldn't have used such high-quality washers! Good thing Penga-bro is strong, haha!

Do you have any graduations to attend this year?

Sushi Christmas Card

Okay.  Late in the game, but I finally finished my Christmas postcard design! Yaaay!

Christmas sushi!  Hehehe.  The hand roll is my favorite..it looks so...painful! Or maybe the wasabi Christmas tree, that'd be pretty easy to make in real life maybe?  Sak wrote the equivalent of "Merry Christmas" in katakana on the chopstick shapes on the bottom.  I'll have to take his word for it since I don't know Japanese.  Maybe it really says "my wife is a big weirdo".

Anyway, last year I finished my cards in mid November, so I had to pay for express shipping this year since I was so late.  I ordered through Vistaprint's free postcard deal again.  I love, love love that offer.  Hopefully they arrive in the mail soon! Then I can send them out! Whee!

Will you send Christmas cards out this year?

Printable LOST Greeting Cards

Always late in the game, Sak and I recently finished watching LOST.   And as per usual, I was left with a sense of loss at the conclusion.  After spending so much time getting to know the characters, poof! suddenly it's all over and they're gone.  So depressing. (Not Harry Potter depressing, but more like Battlestar Galactica depressing.)

So I consoled myself with a bit of silly fan art.  Which I'm sharing with you in the form of printable greeting cards! Pass them along to your fellow LOST fans and let me know how they react!

(To print, click the link under the picture(s) of your choice.  It will take you to a PDF via Google Docs that you can print. Print out the picture onto an 8.5 x 11" paper and fold twice to make the card.)

 Hugo/Hurley Card  (Inside reads: "You rock my island!")

Link to printable PDF of Hurley Card here.

 Richard & Smoke Monster Card  (Inside reads: "You don't look a day older.")

Link to printable PDF of Richard/Smoke Monster Card here.

Ben Linus Card  (Inside reads: "My sincere apologies")

Link to printable PDF of Ben Card here.

Locke Card  (Inside reads: "Best of luck! You can do it!")

Link to printable PDF of Locke Card here.

*These are free to use for personal use only*

I sent the birthday card to my buddy E, who painstakingly allowed me to talk about LOST everyday, even though it's an old show and it had been over a year since he watched it "real time"!

Now, what old show should we tackle next? :)

Halloween Party Invitations

It's October, whoo! That means it's time to send out the Halloween party invitations!

It's Pac-Man simple, but still cute and get's the point across. And by terribly-bad movies, Sak wants you to know we mean poorly-made/bad-acting/borderline comical horror movies. Not the kind that make you pee your pants in terror. I don't want people peeing on my couch.  Though I suppose it's possible there could be leakage due to laughing as well. I better get a couch cover.

Also, I'm not sure how I forgot to include the "costumes are mandatory" line either.  Maybe because I haven't even started my own costume yet! This will be a busy month.

Anyway, I'm emailing these out since Sak was too cheap to let me print them.  Boo.  Let me know if any of you local ladies would like to party-party, and I'll send you the uncensored version, haha.

And if you're hosting a Halloween party this year and need a silly free template, here's a version to use without my custom text:

Happy October!

Greeting Cards On The Wall

Recently my grandmother gave me a collection of antique Chinese painting lithograph greeting cards.

Apparently they came from a place called Cathay Arts in San Francisco, and my grandfather knew one of the artists back in the day.  I'm not sure how old they are exactly, but they certainly are amazing!

Though I will probably end up using some for their original purpose, I couldn't help but want to frame some of it.

I grabbed a couple of thrift store frames from my stash...

Experimented with a few different background colors...

And eventually went with a black background.

Sak helped my punch some holes in the wall, and suddenly our home is a little more filled in.

I put them in the corner of our dining room, next to a small corner shelf.

Please excuse our disturbing wallpaper.

I found a home for Magikarp too.

And just for scale, here's the overall dining room (though it is far from complete).

I'd ditch the placemats if we weren't so horribly messy all the time.  Maybe a different color would work better. And a rug might be nice? I don't know.

Anyway, framing pretty cards is a really good way for making some wall art.  And I don't know about you, but I have a collection of "cards too nice to ever possibly use".  This may be a good way to get them out of the hoarding-closet and into the light!