There used to be a blog entry on this site about what a terrible blogger I am. I took it down a while ago for reasons that are too complicated to address in 1500 words or less. The point is, however, I’m fully aware that it’s been nearly two years since my Yaya Han bodysuit pattern review went up and I’m appropriately embarrassed about that fact.

If you know me or follow my Facebook page, you’re most likely aware that the last year and a half of my life have been… turbulent. I’m not out of the woods yet, but the trees are thinning and I’m beginning to see the sun. I recently found myself scouting fabric and writing a quote for a private commission, which I have avoided doing for some time due to the chaos in my personal life and uncertainty about my future. Although I am still under a great deal of stress, I’m finding that getting back to the things I love and tackling projects that I can control is a way to feel as normal as possible while I wait for the matters beyond my control to sort themselves out.

The equinox is tomorrow. Spring is coming. What better time to renew my business and my passion for this art form?
In the coming weeks, I intend to write more blog entries and tutorials, revise the gallery portion of this website, complete a new costume, and take you all on a tour of my upgraded sewing studio. I am also open to taking new commissions again (although I will be very adamant about only doing one at a time and I will not accept any rush deadlines – for my sanity as well as the quality of my work), so consider this my grand re-opening!
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Thank you to everyone who has stood by me so patiently all this time. You mean more to me than you know.

My decision to build my first comic book cosplay wasn’t predicated by the release of Yaya Han’s Ultimate Bodysuit pattern; It was simply fortuitous timing. I had already chosen the character and begun the planning and research stage when the partnership between McCall’s patterns and Yaya Han was announced, so I opted to postpone the build until the pattern became available in stores.

After weeks of obsessively checking the pattern drawers at my local Joann’s, I finally found the new design at Hancock Fabrics. I purchased both size ranges (as I often do with high-usability patterns) so that I would have them in my collection for future commission work.

I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Yaya Han in person. She is friendly and generous. She is beautiful  and talented. She also comes up to somewhere in the vicinity of my elbow (okay, shoulder, but the hyperbole amuses me). Needless to say, I wasn’t terribly surprised when I unfolded the pattern sheets and found the legging pieces almost comically short. Fortunately, nearly every pattern piece in the envelope is labelled with at least one adjustment point, often two. After taking some measurements, I added four inches of length to each of the leg sections. For future projects, I will probably make it five.

I also made some slight adjustments in order to more comfortably accommodate the junk in my trunk. While the stretch in the fabric should handle this reasonably well, I prefer not to risk spending my convention days battling epic wedgies of doom. As it turned out, this was mostly unnecessary and I ended up removing about half of the extra fabric I’d allowed for after the bodysuit was assembled.

The thing about a fitted bodysuit is that there will never, ever be one pattern to fit everyone. Bodies simply come in too many variations of shape, size, and proportion. This pattern is excellent because it’s designed with that in mind. Numerous adjustment points make it easy to extend or reduce the amount of fabric in nearly any direction. Furthermore, the general sizing is accurate. In other words, I used my measurements to select the correct size from the envelope, cut the pattern to that size, and when I put the garment together, it fit as it should. It is shocking to me how many patterns don’t meet this simple criteria.

There was one bit that I found confusing, which was the matter of the zipper. For the version with a zipper up the front, the pattern calls for a separating zipper, which are usually used for jackets and other applications where the two sides of the zipper should come completely apart. I couldn’t figure out why the zipper would need to separate at the bottom if it were placed in the front. As it turns out, it doesn’t. The separating zipper was used as a stylistic choice because they have bigger, chunkier teeth than traditional zippers. For my own suit, I chose an invisible zipper for its low-profile appearance and put it in the front just to make it easier to get in and out of the suit without assistance.

All in all, this pattern is very well designed, easy to use, and extremely versatile. While a fitted, stretch knit suit isn’t an ideal project for a true beginner, having this pattern on hand will be a massive time saver for the reasonably experienced sewer who is comfortable with some light alterations and the finicky nature of stretchy fabrics.

Let’s all be completely honest for a moment. Every convention is a commercial endeavor. The vendors, as well as the Con itself, need to make money in order to continue existing. They are all there to sell us things – which, in many cases, we are happy to buy. No one likes to feel like they’re constantly being advertised to, though, so there is a very delicate balance that must be maintained for the event to be enjoyable. Anyone who attends a lot of conventions knows that the commercialism is more apparent at some than at others. I have heard many a complaint about Wizard World being one of the more corporate, money-hungry events, so I came to my first one with that expectation firmly entrenched.

The thing about a convention atmosphere, though, is that it’s as much about the people who attend it as it is about the organization that hosts it. Yes, I shelled out big bucks to get in the door. Yes, the price of the autograph I got was more than I would have paid if I’d met the same actor back in March at Emerald City Comicon (which was entirely my own fault). Yes, the people hawking convention t-shirts at the entrance were being really aggressive with their sales pitches.

In spite of all that, however, I didn’t spend the weekend feeling like I had stepped into a Geeks-R-Us shopping mall of commercialism. I was much too busy interacting with people, which is my favorite thing to do at any convention I attend.

Being a Pacific Northwest girl at heart, I could wax lyrical about fir trees and clean air and the amazing variety of food here until I drop. The very best thing about living in this region, though, is the people. That’s not to say that we don’t have our share of jerks, creepers, and trolls milling about, but we also have what I consider to be a higher-than-average percentage of people who are made of awesome. The sheer amount of passion, creativity, and mutual admiration within our community of artists and art enthusiasts is enough to leave me dumbstruck, wondering, “How did I get lucky enough to know these people?!”

Although my friend Natasha and I were on the road by 10:30 in the morning on Friday, Day One of Wizard World Portland didn’t officially get underway until 3pm. I was pleased to be given a plastic wristband to wear for the weekend, rather than the brightly colored, easy-to-lose badge that I’m used to trying to conceal while having photographs taken.

Not being much of a Tolkien fanatic myself, the Weta workshop wasn’t at the top of my to-do list. The life-size statue of an Orc hovering menacingly over the entryway, however, was enough to elicit the awe of even the most lukewarm Lord of the Rings viewer. Upon venturing further in, we found all manner of delightfully creepy displays and squee-inducing collectables. I would later discover that another of my friends had enjoyed the opportunity to have his hobbit ears and wig styled by a professional, right there at the booth.

As a cosplayer, I typically wear my most elaborate costume on Saturday and choose simpler, more comfortable outfits for the rest of the weekend, which allows me to attend panels and shop unencumbered. I don’t expect to draw a lot of attention as a low-key Tenth Doctor, but I was surprised by the number of people who were delighted by my outfit, particularly the plastic banana that I carried along with my sonic screwdriver. At one point, a petite Rose Tyler cosplayer came hurtling out of the crowd, ecstatic that she’d found a Ten to have her picture with. It turned out that she was already friends with Natasha, and we were soon laughing and trading social networking contacts.

Since it suited both of our tastes, Natasha and I attended a Doctor Who panel that evening, where local enthusiasts shared their experiences of the series, debated the merits and flaws of the newest incarnation of the Doctor, and challenged the audience with on-the-fly trivia. While there was a great deal of disagreement on certain subjects, the overall mood was one of shared enthusiasm and lively discussion, rather than discord. It was a meeting worthy of the oldest running Sci-Fi show on television and its multigenerational fanbase.

Day Two began with a rather frustrating journey to find parking, as I didn’t anticipate the main lot beneath the convention center being full before I arrived. Fortunately, the weather was clear and pleasant, so my costume wasn’t ruined by the three block walk from my car.

As I mentioned previously, Saturday is the day I usually bring out my best costume, so I donned my re-creation of Margaery Tyrell’s wedding dress and joined several of my friends for a Game of Thrones group cosplay. If there is anything more fun than cosplay, it is cosplaying with friends. We met up at the same spot that we’d used for Rose City Comicon back in September, which unlike on that occasion, was nearly deserted.

Having only been to two conventions at the Oregon Convention Center, I am in no way qualified to define what is normal for the venue. That said, there were a number of differences between the two events that I observed and one was the way that the convention was organized within the physical space. Rose City Comicon occupied more or less the entirety of the building for the weekend, while Wizard World was confined mostly to the exhibit hall, a portion of which was closed off and reserved for Chocolate Fest. Large halls and panel rooms were used for special presentations, but the beautiful, wide, looping hallways, which are such a lovely feature of that building (as opposed to the M.C. Escher-esque architecture that is Washington State Convention Center), were largely unoccupied.

Inside the exhibit hall, however, a sea of humanity flowed endlessly through aisles of art, gaming, merchandise, and celebrity booths. There was plenty to marvel at, both behind and in front of the tables. The cosplay community in the Northwest is a strong one and although I don’t think I saw as many costumes overall as I had at Rose City, there was still an amazing array of wearable art on display.

I also took some time on Saturday to meet the lovely Eliza Dushku and get her autograph. This is where I ran into the one true criticism I have for the event. Whether it was Wizard World itself or the convention center that was at fault, the staff who were manning the autograph areas needed to have had more thorough training. Basic questions of policy and procedure like, “If I paid for an autograph but brought my own item to be signed, can I still have a complimentary photograph?” or “I paid online and brought my printed receipt, do I need to do anything else before I stand in line?” were confusing for the people who should have been there to provide that very information.

That said, everyone was, by and large, very polite and friendly. I even took the opportunity to simply have a brief chat with Ming-Na Wen and Brett Dalton (who were both absolutely wonderful) even though I wasn’t purchasing autographs.

I took care to arrive early for Day Three and was rewarded with convenient underground parking. While most people who were at the convention center before 11am that day were herded into a gargantuan line to await the opening of the doors, I shunned this bit of direction and chose to wander the aforementioned hallways instead. I just didn’t see much sense in standing in line for something, that, once open, would be easily accessible for the next several hours.

I was once again cosplaying with friends, this time as Minerva McGonagall, and eventually met up with several Order of the Phoenix members as well as a few notorious baddies. We took advantage of the outdoor scenery at the convention center to get what I think are some truly awesome group photos.

Before we could take pictures, however, food was on the agenda and I took note of another difference between this Wizard World event and Rose City. While several eateries on the premises had been closed during the convention in September, leaving con-goers with a minimum of choices, everything seemed to be open for business on this occasion. (I can’t help but wonder, however, why the infamous Portland food truck brigade doesn’t park nearby for major convention center events, since the guests would appreciate having more variety to choose from and the trucks would probably get a lot of business.)

A panel here, a bit of shopping there, and our weekend slowly wound down to the point where we needed to start our homeward journey. It was, all in all, a really fun weekend spent with a lot of awesome friends and I would happily do it all again next year.

I take a lot of intrinsic pleasure from what I do. I enjoy the entire process, from selecting or designing a project, breaking down the elements of the build, hunting down just the right materials, and finally putting it all together into something that I can stand back and admire. If I were to continue making things just for myself and my family that hardly anyone else would ever see, it would still be a very satisfying hobby.

That being said, there is nothing quite like the gratification that comes from having a stranger admire my work. When some random person, who has no familial obligation to say nice things to me, offers even a moment of their time and attention to tell me that the art I’ve created has peaked their interest, the feeling is amazing. I love compliments. I love them so much that I don’t remember most of what Karen Gillan actually said at ECCC this year, but I do remember that the random guy in line before the panel asked my husband, “Where did you get your costumes?”.

So why is it that certain seemingly complimentary statements and phrases are more likely to make my skin crawl than glow? We’ve all been given a backhanded compliment or an accolade tinged with sexism, but that’s not what I’m talking about here. What I want to address is something I have heard over and over, so many times that I’d have expected to be used to it by now. Yet every time someone says it, it is a jarring noise, a wrong note in the melody of conversation.

“I wish I had your talent.”

It looks like a compliment, doesn’t it? The statement has every superficial appearance of gracious admiration. Like a wolf in sheep’s clothing, however, this little cluster of words is something far less cuddly underneath. First of all, it’s self-deprecating, and no one I’ve ever enjoyed the company of likes listening to someone else put themselves down. It’s awkward, uncomfortable, and reeks of insincerity. Complimenting someone else should never involve belittling oneself.

The major failing of this kind of compliment, however, is that it actually minimizes the effort and skill of the person it’s directed at. Despite the intention of the speaker, it becomes a kind of insult.

Every time someone says to me, “I wish I could do what you do,” I want to reply, “You can” because it’s true. Anyone who wants to build costumes can do so, provided that they’re willing to learn, and practice, and make mistakes, and keep trying. That’s how I got to where I am. That’s how I will continue to get better. That’s how every person who makes awesome stuff became awesome: the hard way.

Every time someone says to me, “I wish I had your talent,” what they’re really saying is, “I wish that your skills would come easily to me.” This, of course, implies that my skills were acquired without effort, or that I was simply born with them. It negates decades of experience I have in trial and error, the countless garments I have irreparably screwed up and had to start over, the dozens of books I have studied to improve my methods and knowledge base. It ignores the fact that I sometimes lay awake at night for hours, mentally deconstructing and piecing together my next project. It assumes that I no longer make mistakes or get angry at my work. To put it simply, it disregards what actually makes the art impressive: the time and effort that went into it.

So when someone admires my work by lamenting that I have a talent they do not possess, I am not flattered, I am annoyed. I don’t want to be. The little voice in the back of my head that sounds a lot like my Grandmother tells me that the intention of the speaker should matter more than what was actually said. But words have power, and when we use our words carelessly and enable others to do the same, that power gets unwieldy. I think it’s important to say what we mean, and acknowledge when something that we say isn’t communicating what it should.

So let’s stop wishing for the talents of others and instead, try to acknowledge their dedication to their crafts. Give compliments that are simple, straightforward, and pure. “That’s a beautiful dress,” or “You did an awesome job” conveys admiration without all of the baggage of subtext. If envy is an emotion you are feeling and need to express, at least frame the statement honestly: “I wish I could bring myself to practice art the way you obviously do.”

I’m a firm believer in the benefits of a bad experience. For example, I hope my kids will, at some point, have a crappy teacher. Parents always want their kids to have the best teachers in school and I understand that. A good teacher is a powerful influence. I think most teachers should be good teachers. Yet I also hope that my kids will also have a teacher who’s kind of lousy – not a bully or a bigot, just someone who’s maybe a bit of a flake, or kind of arrogant, with less than desirable communication skills. How else are they going to be prepared for that frustratingly inept boss they’re inevitably going to work for someday?

I think bad experiences usually teach us more than good experiences, especially when the cause of the bad experience is our own fault. That’s right, screwing up is a good thing – but only if you can figure out when, why, and how you screwed up and avoid doing it the same way again.

This past weekend I volunteered at a black tie fundraising gala and auction for one of the local theater houses. About three days before the gala, something clicked into place in my brain and I realized that I did not, in fact, own anything that could even loosely be described as black tie apparel. Being me, I immediately decided that I would make use of some lovely black and silver brocade fabric I’ve had lying around for awhile and make myself a dress. When it became obvious that the fabric I had was not going to be enough, I simply shrugged and made a run to the fabric store to buy a larger cut of something different.

Up to this point, everything still could have come out just fine. Unfortunately, in my haste, I chose to use a pattern that I had handy and make a few adjustments to it rather than going through my stash for something that was appropriate as-is. The adjustments I made ended up leaving the dress too tight in the hips, which was not only uncomfortable but fairly unattractive as well. That’s how I ended up dashing into JC Penney at one o’clock on the afternoon of the gala and asking a very startled clerk, “Where’s your formalwear?!”

Luckily, I found an appropriate dress in the correct size for a reasonable price and it even ended up being quite comfortable to wear throughout the evening. I was in and out of the store in fifteen minutes. I’d have saved myself a good deal of time and stress, however, if I’d had the sense to go to JC Penney and buy that same dress three days earlier.

Everyone makes mistakes. In fact, I dislike the word “expert” because I think we attach a false expectation of infallibility to people who are deemed experts. Just because a person knows a lot about a subject does not mean that they will always be right. In the words of Albus Dumbledore, “I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being – forgive me – rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger.”

You could say my mistake was the patterning error that I made and that would be accurate, but incomplete. I definitely won’t make that exact mistake again. I will, however, make some other kind of measuring miscalculation or stitching blunder. It happens all the time. That’s why costumers and clothing designers use mock-ups.

My true mistake, the one that I need to learn from, is that it is never a good idea to make something from scratch under a tight deadline when it can be bought instead. I have joked with several of my friends that if I have three weeks to build a costume, it’ll be done in as many hours, but if I need it tomorrow, I will inevitably fail. Call it Murphy’s Law, call it bad luck, but the fact is, the less time you have to finish something, the more likely it seems that something will go wrong.

As much as it felt like last weekend was an immense waste of time, energy, and fabric, it wasn’t. Not only because I will eventually alter the dress to correct the mistakes I made and be able to wear it, but also because it taught me a lesson that I have needed to learn for some time. As the auctioneer at the gala put it, “We don’t make our money off of the highest bidder. That’s who we collect it from, but we make our money from the second, third, and fourth place bidders. They are the ones who push the highest bidder to offer the highest amount.” Likewise, mistakes push us to reach higher, to get better, to learn more. The good experiences make us feel great, but it’s the bad experiences that make us great.

This is in response to a comment made by my cousin that I’ll soon be famous. It is intended with all love, humility, and appreciation.

I’ve never been much of a celebrity worshipper. I remember when I was about 13, the music group All-4-One came to the Fred Meyer in my hometown to do a signing. Like most middle school girls in the early 90’s, I listened to their music (like, a lot), so I went with a friend and stood in line. I got my CD liner notes signed, told Tony that I thought he was cute (which, in retrospect, must have been horribly awkward for him), and went on my way. My friend, however, completely lost her sh*t. She was hysterical, tears streaming down her face and completely unable to form coherent speech. I remember thinking at the time, “What is wrong with you? I mean, they’re guys who sing and a lot of people know who they are, but they’re just, you know, people!”

That is not to say that I don’t have a certain amount of awe for people in the public eye whose work I admire. My costume work was complimented by Angela and Aubrey Webber (aka The Doubleclicks) at Geek Girl Con last fall and I am told that the expression on my face when I realized who had spoken was priceless. I’m just not the kind of person to treat another person, famous or otherwise, like some kind of god to be worshipped.

Unfortunately, too many people are. Worse yet, some people tend to treat celebrities like commodities, commercialized non-persons who only exist for the entertainment and satisfaction of the masses. Famous persons aren’t allowed to be “off the clock”. They can’t go about their everyday business in peace without being constantly harassed by random strangers and pushy photographers. Any objection to such harassment is viewed as rude or ungracious.

I like to think that the way we treat celebrities is slowly changing. The shift from traditional media to an internet-dominated world is cutting out the gatekeepers of entertainment and bringing artists into closer contact with their fans. Wil Wheaton, in particular, allows his fanbase an unusual amount of access to his thoughts, experiences, and daily life through social media but holds them to a high standard of behavior in return. He doesn’t want to be bothered when he’s out with his family or friends. He won’t pretend to be something he’s not in order to meet someone else’s expectations. He’s quite clear that you can either accept his terms or you can get off his boat. There’s still a lot of people on that boat, so obviously the arrangement works for most of us. In fact, I personally admire him all the more for his candor.

Still, I can’t help but believe that fame just isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. When John Green announced that he was going to do a tour to promote the TFiOS movie and the fanbase was going to choose the locations, I pinged my sister to vote for Washington (since I don’t do Tumblr because it’s the least productive time suck ever) because, hey, John Green! After seeing his recent vlogbrothers video about the tour, I’m kind of glad Seattle didn’t make the cut. I would love to meet John Green, but if I ever did, I’d want to have coffee and discuss books and geek out about stuff. Trying to wave at him from within a crowd of screaming fans while he is shunted past by bodyguards would be more weird than cool. I get the impression that he feels the same way. He would much rather sit and talk with nerdfighters, but when there are that many people clamoring for your attention, having any meaningful interaction with more than a fraction of them just becomes impossible.

I love it when people admire my work. I enjoy talking to strangers and I would be thrilled if this blog eventually accumulated a whole mess of followers. The idea of actual fame, though, just freaks me the heck out.

There’s a quote by someone somewhere to the effect that true adulthood is reached not when one figures out how to be a grownup, but when one realizes that no one ever figures out how to be a grownup and we’re all just making everything up as we go along.

I have this in mind as I launch my new website, because the part of my brain that is prone to freaking out is reeling at the enormity of my decision to put myself and my art out for perusal on a public forum where people can see it and might *gasp* actually want to hire me. It’s a very adult thing, having one’s own business. As is the recognition that the only thing scarier than the possibility of failure is the potential for success.

The website is, in all honesty, a work in progress. As a rule, I do not like to share works in progress. Costumes tend to look best when they’re finished. Yet costuming is an art that lends itself to finishing. There is a fixed desired outcome from the outset and a series of discernable steps to reach said outcome. Most of life doesn’t work that way. There is no road map for becoming an independent professional costumer. There will never be a point where I stop and put down my tools and say, “There, I’m done.” Like any true adult, I’m making it up as I go along.

So it was with a mixture of elation and trepidation that I clicked the “publish” button on the website building tool I am using and waited for all of my hard work to spring forth into the internet. Even though there are a ton of photos missing and I haven’t captioned the ones that are there, even though I haven’t decided whether the third person tense on the homepage and first person tense on the interior pages is acceptable, even though… you get the idea.

On the other hand, I had the same sort of feeling when I found out I was going to be a mother for the first time and so far I don’t seem to have managed to muck that up too badly.

Allons-y!