#bay area cosplay

[zancorvid]

Dire Crowley (on vacation) - Twisted Wonderland @ Anime Impulse Bay Area 2023 (Sun 7/30)

[caliborniahomestucks]

Made by the delightful @grumpysalt, our Lil Cal cosplayer!

[xice-fire]

Anime Impulse is in a couple of weeks! If I’m still alive by then I will be there working at rubysama.art(IG) table AA169.  

[silenthill2ps2]

crunchyroll expo got canceled this year

[covidsafecosplay]

This Week in Covid & Health News (Posted November 14, 2024)

Covid-Safe Cosplay and its admin are unaffiliated with any of the sites or authors linked below, we're simply sharing the information. If you have related news links that we missed, especially in other languages, please share either in the comments or a reblog.

General

San Fransisco Chronicle: Sonoma County reinstates mask mandate for health care workers amid rising illnesses (Nov. 12, 2024)

NPR: What happens when a vaccine skeptic leads health policy? Ask Florida (Nov. 13, 2024)

Covid-19

The Beacon: Weathered COVID before? Scientists say every new infection puts you at risk of getting long COVID (Nov. 11, 2024)

CIDRAP: Cardiac inflammation markers show role of long-COVID symptoms (Nov. 12, 2024)

Cleveland: Having COVID-19 doubles long-term risk of heart attack, stroke, new Clinic study suggests (Nov. 13, 2024)

Avian Flu

Hawaii News Now: Avian flu detected on Oahu for the first time ever (Nov. 12, 2024)

CNN: Canadian teen in critical condition with bird flu; source of exposure is unknown (Nov. 13, 2024)

Global News: As bird flu emerges in Canada, experts urge preparedness (Nov. 13, 2024)

Stat: Canadian teen's bird flu infection is not the version found in cows (Nov. 13, 2024)

Fortune: Canadian teenager in critical condition with presumptive bird flu as U.S. official warns the virus 'seems to be gearing up for wider impact' (Nov. 13, 2024)

TIME: Is It Time to Worry About Bird Flu? (Nov. 13, 2024)

Whooping Cough

WPRI: 4 Portsmouth High School students have 'very contagious' whooping cough (Nov. 12, 2024)

ABC News: Washington state sees 'sharp increase' in whooping cough cases, mirroring rise across US (Nov. 12, 2024)

KHOU: Whooping cough cases surge in Texas, across country in 2024, DSHS says (Nov. 12, 2024)

KOIN: Whooping cough, chickenpox outbreaks hit Clark County schools (Nov. 12, 2024)

The Spokesman-Review: Six Spokane County residents hospitalized with whooping cough during outbreak (Nov. 12, 2024)

Fox KTVU: Bay Area surge in whooping cough; some counties see highest numbers in decade (Nov. 13, 2024)

CNY Central: Health officials warn of increased whooping cough spread in local schools (Nov. 14, 2024)

Walking Pneumonia

CDC: Mycoplasma Pneumoniae Infections Have Been Increasing (Oct. 18, 2024)

WTOP: Urgent care centers report 'unprecedented' spike in walking pneumonia cases around DC area (Nov. 14, 2024)

[madredhattie]

did you guys know that BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) has anime mascots and you can buy merch of them???? And that at Fanime if you cosplayed a transit worker from any series you'd get a 5% discount?? anyway Fanime was an absolute blast, I genuinely forgot that extremely specific vibe anime cons have, but I thrived!! I even got to meet and befriend @manchasama by pure chance!

As always, Ingo is me, and Emmet is my incomparable roommate @stedecore-speedwhore!

[theoriginalsinner28]

So I saw Hayden Christensen at the tampa bay comic con friday and I was sooo shy. First off, I thought he was going to be out in the celebrity row area where you can see him giving people autographs. I was really hoping to walk by and lose my shit before I actually met him for the picture. But I guess not! He was in a different room where we had to line up and there were different sessions. So I get in the line and instant shaking. And this couple was talking to me and they said he's super sweet they saw him before. So then It comes to be the girls turn in front of me and I peek my head around the wall to see him and oh my God he's even more beautiful in person! So I covered my mouth with my hand and squealed a little. Then it was my turn and he shook my hand and I told him my name and asked if we could hug and he smiled and hugged me for the pic!!!!! I died because we r literally holding each other in the pic!! When I went to go get the pic, the couple I saw in line was trying to tell me how to get my digital download and I told them they r gonna have to repeat that because my head was in a whirl and I was dying! My hands were shaking sooo bad! Then I was trying to decide for an hour if I wanted to do the autograph and I decided to do it. It was worth every penny! So when I went back for the autograph, I was less nervous but still nervous. The first thing he did was pick up the picture and he said "this is a really good picture!" And I died even more! Ahhhh! I Then said yes it was great! I asked him if he rode horses since he has a farm in Canada and he said he doesn't have any on his property right now but he does ride. I asked if he rode western or English and he said western and I smiled and told him I did both but I grew up on a small farm. I started to get red and he didn't respond but looked in my eyes then at my cheeks because I was turning red and then smiled a sort of shy smile and I thanked him and left. Omg I can't believe I was so shy and tried to hide it. I'm sure he saw through it and idk if he thought I was wierd or was caught off guard cuz I asked him something that wasn't star wars related or what he was feeling so im currently going coo coo. Lol! I think he was just being shy but idk! I just can't believe we were holding each other and I got to talk to him for a second! They best time of my life! That morning of the con I literally woke up at 4 am and couldn't go back to sleep. I've never been more excited for something in my life! I'm so happy and thankful I got this experience and it was worth every penny! Once in a lifetime! I have tickets for all 4 days of megacon in orlando in February and I will deff be cosplaying then for the first time and I will not be shy! I really wanted to tell him how special his character is to me but I was sooo shy. Next time! I worked out all month and ate super healthy just to prepare for this and I drove 2 hours to see him. I'm super into fitness anyways but this just motivated me even further. I love him so much and I'm beyond thankful that I got to have this experience. My dream come true! ❤️

[pinoy-culture]

✨️ I'm coming to the Bay Area and Las Vegas in November! Interested in doing a cultural heritage photoshoot and are in the NYC, San Francisco, or Las Vegas area? Then DM or contact me via my website!

https://thepinayphotographer.mypixieset.com/contact/

I also do travel and have future plans next year for Texas, Chicago, Toronto, and Oregon! So if interested, send an inquiry! Would love to work with you in celebrating and honoring your heritage and ancestors through cultural portraits.

📸 I am also available for graduation and senior portraits, engagements, weddings, events, debuts, dance and theater performances, cosplay, fashion, and family portraits.

[meeedeee]

My Fandom Journeys

Hi, I am Morgan Dawn. I am over 60 and have been in fanfiction/fanvid fandom for 30+ years. I have a love of fandom and its history. I am disabled and use voice recognition software to write so there may be typos and the occasional word salad. Please feel free to reblog or link to my tumblr. I love to meet fans by phone or video and live in the SF Bay Area.

Look for my fandom history posts under the #fandom history tag and my personal experiences across 30 years in fandom under #my fandom journeys

Fun things I am working on 1. Scanning and preserving fanfiction fanzines from the 1960s-2000s

2. Digitizing fanvids made on VCR videotapes (1980s-2000s)

3. Promoting a DIY Oral History project for fanfiction/fanvid/fanart/cosplay (transformative) fandom. Grab a friend and join the party

4. Documenting fan run conventions, fanzines and fanvids on Fanlore, the fan-run wiki run by the Organization For Transformative Works (OTW).

My Asks are open but I often take long breaks to rest and recharge so if I don't get back to you, please be patient

Note: this blog is for adults only. If you are under the age of majority in your country, please pass it by.

[zancorvid]

Marnie - Stardew Valley @ Anime Impulse Bay Area 2023 (Sat 7/29)

[caliborniahomestucks]

sac winter i was considering a davestuck group

this was taken from the NY homestuck cosplay facebook page, circa 2011. i love that santa is wearing sunglasses too

[arimiadev]

(you can read this article down below or on my blog!)

How to Sell Visual Novels at Conventions

Or, “how do you table at an anime convention and actually get people to stop by your booth and actually get interested in visual novels????”

Picture this – me, someone who’s never been to California nor flown alone arrived to the Hyatt at the San Francisco Bay, being greeted by several online friends I’d known for years but never met in person. After a great time walking around the surrounding Burlingame area and meeting back up with the rest of our group, we had to actually put in some work for the day.

That is, setting up our booth for the convention starting the next day.

We unpacked box after box, taking turns standing around with our hands on our hips and heads tilted wondering “how the hell are we going to set all of this up?”. I decided to make it my job to set up our keychain display. All I had to do was get a copy of each keychain we had and pin them up – we even had a box from prior conventions that had a single copy of (most) of our keychains, for displaying. But as I opened more boxes, I found more and more keychains…

After threatening to change the password on their Vograce account, I found we had 10+ boxes of merchandise for niche visual novels that we were trying to sell at a vtuber convention. Not an anime convention, not a gaming convention, a vtuber convention! Going to bed that night, already tired, I was sure there was no way we would make a profit…..

…And yet, we made more on Friday than they had for the entire convention in 2023. By Sunday, we had made more than double that, having sold items to over 100 customers with most purchases around $40 each. We weren’t selling fanart, we were selling a majority completely original art.

We lived the dream of a lot of indie developers – we sold physicals of our indie games and people bought them. But how did we do it??

a little context

Some background – OffKai Expo is an annual vtuber-oriented convention in Burlingame, California, a suburb of San Francisco and just 15 minutes away from their airport. If you don’t know what a vtuber is, just go watch my oshi Gavis Bettel. In 2023, Studio Élan had a booth at the convention as it’s somewhat local to some of our members. We decided to have another booth at the convention for 2024 and I offered to work at it (what’s a booth without a marketer?).

The only anime convention I’ve ever been to was the local one in Memphis, namely Anime Blues Con, but those are….lacking, to say the least. Not much to do, very limited artist alley, waning attendance (which was already small to begin with), barely any new artists nor sights year after year… I’ve always wanted to go to a convention outside my area, to say the least.

But how did we manage to make the weekend successful?

conceits

What we did won’t be entirely replicable for most devs reading this, but there will be some insights and takeaways that I’ll highlight that are applicable to anyone wanting to table at conventions and sell their games.

Our table was for Studio Élan x VirPro – it was a joint table between our yuri visual novel studio and our indie vtuber friend streaming group, Virtuality Project. We sold some merch for VirPro, but I’d estimate that was no more than 20% of our sales – we still would have made a profit even if we weren’t selling that merch.

this table held our limited VirPro merch. we were able to hang our Élan prints on the wall behind it thanks to our friends at Studio Nekomata allowing us to tape our prints to the backside of their display. we also had a Miho cutout, but she didn’t want to stand up this weekend…

However, it is important to note that Studio Élan is not a new studio. We’ve been around for years, have 15k followers on Twitter, and have several visual novels released. We’re not extremely well known, as we are within a niche within a niche, but we aren’t unknown either. Some people actually cosplayed our characters at the convention! It’s definitely possible some locals came to OffKai Expo just to see our booth & panel (we also held a panel on Saturday where we announced 2 new games).

Another thing to note is that we have a stock of merch from running an online store and having held Kickstarters before. Specifically, we have physical copies of almost all of our games as well as artbooks, soundtracks, clothing, and more. We had tons of keychains and 11×17 prints, sure, but we also sold a lot of merch that is much harder and more expensive to produce.

So, tl;dr, things we had going for us:

We are established developers with a following & released games

We have a sizeable amount of merch already made for our online store, including physical games & artbooks

We were boothing with our indie vtuber friend group and selling their merch on the side

But our main problem:

We were boothing at a vtuber convention, not an anime or gaming convention

Now, with all of that out of the way….

convention standards

First off, let’s look at some basic things you can expect while tabling at a convention. (for the purposes of being specific to visual novels, when I say “convention” I’m only referring to anime & gaming-adjacent conventions—OffKai falls under this as vtubers are both anime & gaming-adjacent)

At a convention, you will typically be selling in either the artist alley or the dealer’s room, which are both referred to as the vendor’s hall. For small conventions, these two may be the same area. The artist alley is typically for artists selling keychains, prints, and more. The dealers room is for vendors that sell larger merch or have more items to sell – this can include artists but also includes people selling imported items (such as anime figures) and companies.

Conventions have a set amount of hours that the events go on and the vendor’s hall is usually not open the entire time. These rooms will usually open in the morning, around 10AM or so, and allow vendors an extra hour for fixing things before opening every day. For OffKai, we had to stay at our booth for about 8~ hours every day, except for Sunday. Sundays are always the shortest days for 3-day conventions, as the convention will usually wrap up around dinner time (if not earlier).

Vendors get time the night before the convention starts (usually Thursday night, with most conventions I’m referencing being Friday-Sunday events) to set up their booths. It took us around 3 hours to fully set up our booth, with 4 of us working on it. Setting up your booth will go a lot smoother if you do a trial run before the convention.

Every convention I’ve tabled at or known a vendor at provides vendors with at least 1 table and a chair. More chairs are usually easy to get, you just need to ask staff before the vendors hall opens up.

tip 1 – bring a friend

Conventions provide tables and chairs, but they don’t provide helping hands! You’re probably going to need help unpacking and setting up the table, but you’ll definitely need to take breaks during the convention for the bathroom, food, and more. You can’t just ask staff to sit at your table and you can’t just hide everything while you’re gone. Bring a friend to help out!

If you have to go alone, make friends with the people boothing next to you and ask them to watch over your table if need be. Be sure to keep your money and payment processors with you if you ever have to step away. And bring snacks & water!

our merch

Like I said, at Élan we have typical merchandise for our visual novels like keychains and acrylic standees, but we also have physical copies of our games for PC & consoles, artbooks, soundtracks, and more.

We had these types of merch:

Acrylic & wooden items

Keychains

Standees

Pins

Print media

PC discs

Console discs & cartridges (Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 & 5)

Artbooks (game artbooks, limited edition anniversary artbooks)

Soundtrack discs

4×6 prints (CGs, key artworks)

11×17 prints (key artworks, exclusive convention artworks)

Clothing & fabric

T-shirts (4 designs, 1 color each)

Hoodie (new collaboration design, for all of our games)

Scarf (new collaboration design, for 1 of our games)

Fabric flags (key visuals)

Misc.

Grab bag (misc small items)

$5 bin (misc small items)

Pencil bag

Mousepad

Enamel pin

Plushie (limited Makeship leftovers)

Some of these were items we’d never sold before such as the hoodie, scarf, and 11×17 prints. Some of them were also much more of a hassle than others.

In terms of storage and cheapness to make, prints and stickers are by far the winners (we didn’t sell stickers at OffKai but plan to in the future). Prints are basically the best thing you can sell for production cost:profit, as a 4×6 print can cost you $0.20 but sell for $5+ and an 11×17 print can cost $0.60 and sell for $15-20.

On the other hand, t-shirts can be some of the most difficult merch to work with. They take up a lot of room (we had at least 2 boxes of just shirts/hoodies) and require you to have multiple different sizes. The plushies were great & easy to sell, but at the same time they cost a lot per unit and take up even more space than shirts.

The physical copies sold great, but the cost to produce & room to store them makes them unwieldy for most developers. I would recommend them over more bespoke merch like clothing, though—several people came to our booth, having never heard of our games, and left with a physical game. CD discs rather than DVD cases are much easier to store and can be handmade, although ours are manufactured.

tip 2 – be selective with what merch you make & bring

Unless you’re lucky enough to have a convention down the street from you, chances are you’re going to have to travel to the convention. That means packing everything up, possibly shipping it, etc…. You need to be picky with what you bring if you don’t have multiple cars to throw it all in.

My merch recommendations:

4×6 prints

Ours were $4-5

Dirt cheap to print, easy to store

Easy for people to buy because of the low price point and ease of carrying

Idea – these are so cheap to print, at the very least print some of your key visual & logo to hand out to people for free

Stickers (die-cut or sticker sheets)

Dirt cheap to print, easy to store

Easy for people to buy because of the low price point and ease of carrying

Idea – some conventions won’t allow you to hand out free stickers. For conventions that don’t, I would sell either singular die-cut stickers or sell them in packs

Keychains

Ours were $12-15

Cheap to print, not very hard to store

At this price point people want to have an attachment to the characters before buying

Idea – if your game is relatively unknown but you still want to print keychains, consider packaging them with something else like the game or a sampler CD of the demo / soundtrack

Physical CD disc games

Ours were $30

Not cheap to print, not very hard to store

People will buy copies of games they’ve never heard of because it’s an interesting item to own and seen as more value than a digital copy (even if physical is more expensive)

Idea – it doesn’t cost much to get a 50 pack of CDs, the cost comes from the packaging and time to make the entire thing. If you don’t have a finished game yet, consider printing your demo out on CDs in paper slips to hand out for free

our booth

Now that I’ve talked about basics for conventions and what merch we sold, what did our booth actually look like?

We didn’t have a pre-convention trial run, so we were essentially winging it. With all of the merch I outlined, could you believe we crammed all of the display copies on 1 table, 2 shelves, and 1 clothing rack?!

Our main focus was making sure each of our physical games were visible. After all, we were at a vtuber convention where most attendees didn’t know us, so we wanted to have a way to show off our games. We spent a lot of real estate on showing individual game copies and having brochures spread out.

tip 3 – have an idea of how you’re going to display things before the convention

We also brought several items to display merch. For keychains & pins, we had a simple corkboard leaning on a photo stand / easel. For acrylic standees, we had a clear nail polish stand. For physical copies, we had photo stands and bookends. For clothes, we had a small clothing rack. For physicals, we had 3 small bookcases. These were all extremely helpful, but they are added costs and more things to carry to the convention.

here’s a better look at our 2 bookshelves. the purple ladder one was at the back of the booth highlighting some items and storing various artbooks & bundles and the smaller one was at the front left of the booth by the VirPro merch, basically in the walking aisle

The corkboard and various photo stands were must-haves, regardless of what you’re selling. A corkboard makes it easy to display anything on it, whether it’s keychains, stickers, mini-prints, announcements, posters, and more. Photo stands were also super helpful for propping our corkboard on but also showing off individual physical copies.

this was me trying to arrange the corkboard and acrylic stands. photo stands and art easels can in handy!

Along with the display stands, we also brought some decorative items like pink table clothes and flowers. These aren’t required, but help make your booth more noticeable.

A few miscellaneous items I plan on bringing to our next convention are a hand sanitizer dispenser, a small air purifier, and fliers. I always keep hand sanitizer on me, but it’s easier to use it when it’s in a convenient bottle and place. Several of us got sick after the convention (despite me wearing a mask), so I’m also bringing a small air purifier to keep some germs away from the table. I also want to bring small fliers for our upcoming games—while brochures are wonderful, I want something that’s easy (and cheap) to hand out to anyone who looks at our booth, not just the people we talk to.

tip 4 – be aware of merch thieves

We arranged our table in a way that we didn’t have to worry much about people stealing merch, though that is a problem at some conventions. As you might’ve noticed from the pictures, our smaller items like the keychains are at the far back of the booth, right beside where we sit. That allowed us to keep a better eye on it.

Rather than sitting behind our tables, we arranged our booth to be where people would walk inside it. This allowed us a way to talk to people easier. We also made sure to hide our card readers, phones, and more when any of us left the table, though this was easy because we almost always had 2-3 people at the booth at any time.

my advice

If I were an indie dev looking to booth at a convention and had the time and spare change, I would if it were close enough to drive to and the booth cost under $500. Unless you’re an established developer or have a popular artist working on your project, it’s hard to justify that cost.

tip 5 – don’t forget to budget for…

booth costs

extra badges (most booths come with 2 free badges)

hotel

travel

food

merchandise manufacturing

any shipping fees (your luggage, merch, etc.)

display items, extra things for your booth

While you may find a booth for $250, you also have to remember the travel fees, cost of food, all of the extra items you’ll need aside from merchandise, and more. A $250 booth for a 3-day convention could easily end up costing you $2,000+, and that’s if you don’t pay yourself or coworkers for their time at the booth!

If you’ve never been to a convention before then definitely go to one as an attendee before becoming a vendor. Get a feel for the place and have some fun, even if it means you won’t be able to booth there for months or a year.

tip 6 – be sure to bring…

Some kind of handout for people with your game & logo on it (fliers, business cards, brochures, etc.)

Small stationary merch for your game (4×6 prints, stickers, etc.)

Corkboard to display things on and something to prop it up

A way to take card payments and cash for change

Hand sanitizer

Pen/pencil and sticky notes

Clamps

Tape

this is the inside of our old brochure! it details our different games and highlights some upcoming titles

I’d also try putting your demo on CDs to hand out to people who seem really interested if you can. CDs are pretty cheap to get now, and even if you just get a 50 pack that can run you around $12, which ends up being $0.25/CD. Not a bad cost for getting a potential fan, if you hand them out only to people who are really interested or package them with other merch and sell them.

Your main effort if you’re not an established developer, however, will be awareness. Talk to the people who stop by your booth. Tell them hi and explain to them what you make. I had several people clearly not understand what visual novels were, but I had many more who became interested once I mentioned we made these games. “Wait, you actually made them?!”

tip 7 – talk to people!!!

People at conventions think art is cool. They think indie games are cool. Be honest with them and show them your hard work. Yeah, this means you have to put on your extrovert cap for the weekend. Just don’t treat it like you’re a car salesman—you’re a game dev first and foremost and enjoy this line of work so much you want to share it with strangers at conventions. Let that shine through in your words.

All in all, conventions are stressful, tiring, and a lot of fun when they’re run well. If any of this sounds interesting to you and you find a convention close enough to you or one that will be relatively cheap to attend, I recommend trying it out.

------------

OffKai Expo was so, so much fun and I’m so happy I was able to attend. It was a well run convention, our booth did amazing, I got to meet actual fans IRL, and I was able to finally see a lot of my online friends in person. I was scared leading up to it but I’m so glad I pushed myself to go. Having an in-person panel there where the room was almost full absolutely blew me away—I kept asking “do they know what room they’re in? Did they get lost?” If you came to our panel or booth, thank you!!

— Arimia

read more of my articles on tumblr here!

[ofoceansandtombsanew]

14:25 ー TAMARACK BAUMANN. honey ain't got nothin' on you, 'cause you're sweeter.

Summers are different in Golden Grove.

Truthfully, Golden Grove feels different no matter the season. For a town called Golden Grove, autumn is the season that suits it best. When the leaves are shades of red, oranges and golds and there's a pleasant chill in the air. Summer, to you, is just when it is the most apparent.

When you were still a child, experiencing your first Golden Grove summer, it was exciting. There was no school so you had all the free time in the world to explore the forest surrounding the cul-de-sac you call home. It had changed, with its green leaves and the sorts of seasonal critters inhabiting it.

When you were much younger, that meant more goodies for you and Tamarack to find and bring home.

Now that you're a teen with more of a mind to hate the summer heat, summer has lost its appeal. You can tell it has also lost its appeal to Tamarack who sits squarely in front of the fan in front of your desk, cheeks flush from the heat. Summer is only enjoyable in small increments, you believe. If there's too much, all the energy gets sapped out of you and you lose the drive to do much of anything.

Case and point, the wig you are supposed to be practicing your braiding on. Now that wig and the mannequin head you placed it on lie abandoned on the floor while you lie eagle spread across your bed. You haven't even begun braiding it. Not even Tamarack could make herself sit and practice her cello in this sort of heat.

Why do conventions have to be in the summer? There are only three major conventions in Oregon ー WasabiCon, Ani-Medford and KisuuCon ー and only two of the three take place at a time your mother accepts. "Why do conventions have to be in the summer," you groan once more, this time for everyone in your room to hear. "Is this really the curse I have to bear for quality cosplay?"

"Autumn can't come quickly enough," Tamarack murmurs in agreement. Autumn may come at the cost of school's return but it's the perfect season for everything. Her ruby eyes glance at your lack of progress. "Maybe you can practice later tonight instead?"

You shake your head, pushing yourself into sitting. "No, if I wait until then, I'll just put it off until tomorrow and do the exact same thing again." Then you'll put it off and put it off, citing the summer heat as the culprit, until finally the weekend of your chosen convention arrives and you have an incomplete cosplay. That's what happened last year when you were 14, you'd rather not make it habit. "I'll work on it now."

You just need motivation. Proper motivation.

That can wait until you've gotten yourself something cold to drink, however. "There's lemonade in the fridge if you want some."

"Please," Tamarack pleads.

The trip downstairs to the kitchen is quick yet arduous as you shuffle through the less cool parts of your house. You can only hope your mother is having a better time where she works. You hope everyone you know is doing better than you are right now.

Serenity is out of town visiting family in the Bay Area.

Vianca and Qiu are at ballet practice in an air conditioned building.

Ren is with her family kayaking for the week so you're sure she isn't minding the heat in the slightest.

As for Baxter, he's off at his fancy university in Virginia. You never really reconnected with the guy before he left either, so you can only hope he's somewhere that has good air conditioning, if any.

So to your knowledge, you and Tamarack are the only ones suffering in a building too old to have an air conditioner. You and Tam, ever a pair. Even if that means suffering during summer vacation together.

"I'm back with the goods," you announce needlessly when you return to your room. Tamarack's already reaching for a glass before you reach her, gratitude all over her face. You're happy to be directly in front of the rotating fan, relishing how it feels on your sticky skin. The tangy-sweet chill of the lemonade is a wonderful accompaniment.

Tamarack cups her glass in both her hands much like how one would carefully hold an injured pigeon. You feel a warmth more comfortable than the sweltering summer heat permeating through your room.

Thick, fluffy hair that shines gamboge pulled into a messy bun. Dappled in an autumn sparkle that never goes away even in another season.

Berry-red eyes that are much too pretty for this world and as expressive as they come.

All things that make Tamarack Baumann 'Tamarack Baumann'.

Tamarack is here. Truly here and she isn't going anywhere. That was the resolution of everything that happened last year when you were 14. No more moving scares, no more hypothetical surprises haunting your every waking moment. Tamarack Baumann is a true blue resident of Golden Grove and you won't let anyone forget it.

"What is it?" Tamarack catches your staring and you're sure that you see her cheeks flush a deeper color. You take satisfaction in knowing the summer heat isn't the only thing that is making her face red.

Yes, this is the life.

"Nothing," you smile into your glass.

"You're thinking something," Tamarack insists with a playful yet embarrassed lilt.

"I'm just thinking about your hair, that's all," you tell her smoothly. You can talk about how your world has become much more vibrant since the confirmation Tamarack wouldn't be moving anywhere another day. "It's really pretty. You're pretty."

You remember thinking Tamarack was the prettiest person you'd ever seen when you popped out of that pile of leaves. Your opinion has yet to change now that you are 15, you doubt it ever will.

Almost instinctively, Tamarack pushes a lock of her hair behind her ear in her embarrassment. "You're the pretty one."

"We have to agree to disagree on who is the pretty one in this relationship," you close your eyes petulantly. Dorothea Baumann would tell you both that you're equally the pretty one in this relationship, but where's the fun in that when you know you're right? As far as you're concerned, if Tamarack suddenly decided she wanted to pursue a career in modeling you would be right there at every audition.

It's then, you feel as if you've struck gold.

"Can I practice on your hair?" Tamarack raises a thick eyebrow. She's stopped plucking them recently, no longer self-conscious about how they look. "My braiding, I mean." Before your girlfriend can smartly argue about the heat, you already present your counter arguments. "We can stay in front of the fan without it rotating! And I'll only take out the parts I'm working on."

Tamarack's face scrunches thoughtfully before she ultimately relents. "Only as long as you don't take everything out," she smiles lightly.

Yes!

A press of a button to stop your fan from moving about the place and you're too happy to be running your fingers through Tamarack's hair. It's always been soft, carefully maintained by her grandmother. Now that she's old enough to care for it herself, Tamarack's haircare is still delicately maintained.

Maybe I should run my model Tamarack idea by her again, you think humorously. Nothing will come of it. It's merely a long-standing joke between you both. Modeling is a career you both know wouldn't make Tamarack happy in the slightest. It's for the best. All the other models would be out of work if Tamarack was there.

"I don't feel any braiding," Tamarack notes in a sing-songy voice.

Guilty as charged, you grin, "I'm just making sure I've got the right amount of hair for this section, that's all."

Tamarack's playful hum of disbelief is her only response before you begin.

a request from @luv-indigo that sounded really adorable so i wanted to give it a spin as something set between steps 2 and 3. autumn is personally my favorite season, so i love that's the season that olnf is perpetually set in. but i do get curious as to what life could be like in the mountain down during a different season and thought this scenario was the perfect excuse for it! (disclaimer: this is something written pre-release of olnf)

[amadwinter]

15 Questions for 15 Friends

Thanks to @somethingsteff and @sky-kenobye for the tags 🧡

1. Are you named after anyone?

The first and middle name on my birth certificate are the names of queens.

2. When was the last time you cried?

I honestly don't remember. Months at least.

3. Do you have kids?

Nope.

4. What sports do you play/ have you played?

Technically? Dance/tap as a tiny thing, softball/baseball as a less tiny thing. Not very long for either because I'm not physically very gifted. I never got the hang of wakeboarding but I kept trying for while there.

5. Do you use sarcasm?

Frequently.

6. What's the first thing you notice about people?

If they are outwardly a nerd. I seek out my people.

7. What's your eye colour?

Blue-gray.

8. Scary movies or happy endings?

Happy endings. I only watch scary movies if i I can laugh at them.

9. Any talents?

I'm told I'm really funny. Doesn't always translate well online, and I can't write a comedic story to save my life, but I can speak funny words, I promise.

10. Where were you born?

San Francisco Bay Area, California, where I've lived all my life.

11. What are your hobbies?

Writing and reading mostly these days. Trying to draw more too. Sewing has been difficult with my health but cosplaying and going to conventions too. Also Dungeons and Dragons/tabletop roleplaying games, video games... uhhhhhh I used to sing more but haven't been doing a lot of that, same with hiking.

12. Do you have any pets?

A cat, my orange and white boy named Peter Parker. I didn't pick the name, and I don't think he even knows it because we always just call him "kitty" or "cat".

13. How tall are you?

5' 6.5", or 169cm which is, ironically, the same as both the people who tagged me

14. Favourite subject in school?

The part of school where I got to sit on my own and quietly read my books. And also history, I guess.

15. Dream job?

Reclusive author.

No pressure tags: @veloursdor, @dreaminghour, @lilredghost, @briliantlymad, @obikinwhore, @jedibongrip, @notebookishtype, @posthumousvigor, @bunnywan, @virahaus, @geodax, @ragnarlothcat, @mari-lwyd-fannibal-blog, @kana7o, @lovey-dovey-and-sad

and anyone else who wants to. I tried to pick people who I hadn't seen tagged already, but forgive me if I messed up. Feel free to ignore if you don't want to play 💕

[tomboy014]

Found out there's a thing called OC-tober and I want to participate! I'm not really going to be following any prompts or post on any sort of schedule (especially since I didn't have time to prepare anything), but I've got more than enough OCs, so I figured I'd throw my hat into the ring.

First up: one of my Danny Phantom OCs, Ramona Sanchez

Ramona is Paulina's paternal cousin and roughly the same age (only a few months apart). She's very outdoorsy, loves hiking and exploring tide pools, is a geek and loves going to conventions and renaissance fairs.

After her mother died, her father moved Ramona and her younger twin brothers from the Bay Area to Amity Park to be closer to the rest of his family once the school year was over.

It's been an... adjustment for them all, and Ramona suffers from some parentification, being expected to take care of the home and her brothers while her dad worked. Her dad had hoped to take some of the pressure off of her by moving closer to his brother and family, but not much has changed.

It was one hell of an adjustment for Paulina, too. While she got to move into a bigger house (which was awesome), it's gone from just her and her dad to her, she also has to share with her tío and three cousins.

Because of this, Ramona and Paulina fight constantly. It's not uncommon to find the two of them screaming at each other in spanish behind the bleachers at lunch. Ramona because she's sick of Paulina trying to change her, and Paulina because Ramona is a geek and ruining her reputation.

But no one else is allowed to talk bad about the other. No one. Anyone who dares to talk bad about her cousin will find themselves facing down their full fury. Paulina lit into Dash when he called Ramona a "freak" and Ramona has blown up at Sam multiple times over comments made about Paulina.

Having a fresh, outside perspective, Ramona clocks Danny Fenton as Danny Phantom pretty quickly and joins the team as the "underground medic" since she's had the most first aid experience (bandaging up brothers after pee wee football, and her dad is a doctor).

This pisses Paulina off because it now means the biggest losers at Casper High keep coming over to her house. It also causes an insane amount of jealousy after she walked in on Ramona stitching up a shirtless Phantom in their bathroom.

Random Facts in no particular order:

Gets along the best with Tucker since they're both cosplaying comic book geeks

As much as Paulina insults her lack of fashion, she comes in to steal Ramona's "hobo clothes" (extra large sweats) all the time because they're super comfy

Ramona and Paulina are nearly identical, so Ramona does her best Paulina impression to tease Danny a lot. He does not appreciate it

She has the biggest crush on Fright Knight. He's a literal knight in shining armor! Paulina teases her, but supports her

Paulina and Ramona get along a lot better behind closed doors and have a much better relationship than most would guess

Ramona is still in charge of getting her little brothers to and from pee wee football

Ramona's cosplay makeup has gotten much better since moving to Amity Park... because Paulina does it

Fun Fact: Ramona started out as a self insert before I fleshed her out, and her relationship with Paulina's was inspired by an IRL relationship with one my cousins.