This is just a quick post to show my finished Genis costume for Ricky for our epic Tales of Symphonia photoshoot. Ricky has been away on buisness so I didn't have him to model for me. I was cleaning up my dressform and threw this on to see if I could get a decent picture. Its not the best picture but you can get this idea.

( Picture cut for your protection )

I had an appointment with the Orthopedic surgeon today. I learned that the surgeon that did my left knee surgery is getting closer to retirement and has decided to no longer do major surgeries anymore. So I was referred to a new surgeon in the same practice. (I kinda knew this already)

I ended up getting into an argument with this new knee guy over the type of surgery that I wanted. I had a very painful patellar tendon graft done on the left knee and this time I decided to go the easier route and have a hamstring graft done instead. Well, he was not happy about this. "Patellar tendon is the gold standard, I don't like hamstrings." My former surgeon already told me I could have the hamstring, but this guy didn't want to hear of it. He was literally pulling his fingers thru his hair and banging his head on the wall in frustration with me. I wasn't going to budge. I told him that after a year and a half I still couldn't kneel on my left knee. I wasn't going to have the same thing happen to the right and lose my ability to kneel altogether. He said that it was unusual that I had pain with kneeling. Well, that doesn't change the fact that I do. So apparently this was the winning argument and he said fine. I was like, oh great this is the guy I'm going to trust to tear open my knee.

So I got the surgery scheduled. August 21st. Its a little sooner than I wanted, but whatever.

So after all this I then learn that the new doctor doesn't believe in a brace. I was like wtf! I wore a brace non-stop for six weeks last time. Now I'm going to be sent home with nothing but crutches. I couldn't believe it. He said my own self doubt will protect my knee. I won't move further than I feel comfortable. Ahh... I still like the idea of a brace that makes those decisions for me... The brace was always there to hold be back and hold my knee in place. I'm not liking this.

Now I'm really nervous. Thank god I'm having this surgery at the end of the summer. At least I don't have to worry about slipping on the ice and having no brace to protect me.

Trubie started working on his sword for his Jazz costume. He has the blade cut out and shaped. This is our first time working with insulation foam. So far so good. Now we have to start the process of adding tons and tons of layers of gesso to smooth it up. I'm going in search of a trumpet tomorrow that we will try to tear apart for the upper details of the sword.

I got my Shikayama-chan figure in the mail today. I've wanted this figure for awhile, but it was hard to find and I didn't want to pay expensive import costs. I ended up finding it on Amazon. Shikayama is cute little figure thats a "bad" dental hygienist and has a little baby tooth mascot. I'm not quite sure why she is bad, bad at cleaning teeth, or maybe bad girl bad. Either way, she is adorable and I was meant to own her.

I took a few pics of her. I have her displayed at work, which seemed appropriate. So while I was at it I took a few pictures of my operatory.

( Who wants to see where I spend my weekdays )

I finished my D.Gray-Man costumes for Otakon. They still need a couple little things here and there, but the bulk of the work is done. Lavi just needs his wig styled (which I ordered today) and Trubie needs to make his hammer. Allen also needs his wig styled (which I also ordered today), I have to find him a grey vest to wear under his coat (cause I don't feel like making something no one is ever going to see), and I need to work on his left hand. If you know nothing of D.Gray-Man, Allen has a deformed left hand. Its basically this waxy looking red and black hand. I ordered red gloves and once those come in I need to do some arts and crafts on them to get them finished.

The only thing I have left for Otakon (really the whole year) is Ricky's Genis costume. I have all my machines threaded and ready. I might start on it tomorrow.

( Here's some D.Gray-Man coats if you would like a look see )

I think most people have complained about Colossalcon enough for everyone. I'll just throw in my quick two cents:

~ It was hot.
~ It was crowded.
~ It was HOT!
~ You couldn't stop in the halls to talk to anyone.
~ You couldn't find anyone.
~ IT WAS HOT, NO AIR CONDITIONING

I enjoy seeing my friends at cons more than anything, and the hotel just prevented that. We were never able to find the twins other than on Pictochat during the masquerade (which was kinda cool). Only got to see Ameria during the karaoke contest and in passing. Kim, Tracy, and Melissa were busy with judging stuff and we only able to see them for a little bit Saturday night. Hopefully we'll be able to see peoples at Otakon. We just have to get with the times and start text messaging eachother to meet up like the kids do.

To copy off of Ricky. He posted a picture of his convention badge collection. So I decided to sort thru mine and take a picture too.

( Convention badge extravaganza )

Before ColossalCon I set some costume goals for myself. I needed to finish Trubie's Gojyo, Ricky's Goku. Done and Done. I needed to make Shaman King costumes for me and Trubie. Done and Done. I wanted to start working on Trubie's Lavi costume for Otakon. Not only did I start on it, I finished it today (I still need to order the wig and have Trubie style it, and Trubie needs to make the hammer. But those are for Trubie to do, my work is finished). I also managed to finish my Halloween costume.

All thats left is my Allen costume. I have everything cut out and many, many parts finished. A lot of parts for Lavi were the same for Allen. So I was making double of a lot of stuff. Hopefully I'll have Allen done the weekend after Colossal. I also have to make Ricky's Genis costume for Otakon. I bought the material... Last but not least is Trubie's Halloween costume. I think I'm gonna leave this until after my surgery. Its just one costume and I think I can handle it once my brace comes off. If its a little too much for me, there is a much easier alternative costume he can wear for Halloween.

So I'm basically very close to being finished with costumes for the whole year.

So I decided to take some pics of my new and improved Sheena costume. I also took some pictures of my Anna from Shaman King costume. Anna isn't the greatest things, but I thought it would be fun to wear.

On an extra note. I get a killer ear ache that woke me up at 5am this morning. I haven't had an ear ache in like 15 years. I went to the walk-in clinic and the doctor said, and I quote, "that looks really wicked bad!" So I'm on antibiotics and my ear is ringing so loud I can't hear out of my right ear. I have no idea how I got this.

( Lets see some Sheena )

I should be working on a costume, but I was getting too frustrated working on D. Gray-Man coats. So I took out my frustration on my sewing room. I decided to do a big cleaning. So I ran to Wal-mart and bought a bunch of new storage containers. I feel a little better now. Hopefully I can start sewing again tomorrow.

( What the hell, I took some pics )

I decided to take a trip to Jo Ann's today to load up on some material. My main goal was to get all the material I needed to make Trubie's Lavi costume. When I got there I discovered they were having a massive sale. All red tagged items were 50% percent off, and almost everything in the store had a reduced price. My greatest find was Sateen at 60% off. Sateen is one of my favorite fabrics. Since the prices were so good I managed to get all the material for Lavi and Allen.

Kim is organizing this huge Tales of Symphonia group for Otakon. We have every character except for Genis. I said I would think about making that costume for Ricky to complete the group. Well, after seeing all the awesome prices at Jo Ann's, I decided to buy some blue and make Ricky costume.

So after thinking about making the Genis I got to thinking about my Sheena costume. I've never been happy with it. I was pleased with the craftsmenship aspect of it, but I did a lousy job on the fitting. I wasn't keen on the idea of the Tales of Symphonia group mainly due to the fact that I didn't want to wear my crappy Sheena again. So after thinking Trubie will have his great looking Zelos costume, and now Ricky will hopefully have a great looking Genis, I needed to do something about Sheena. So I bought some purple material at Jo Anns, and tore my Sheena costume apart. I redid the whole mini kimono thing. I'm so happy with it now. I finally fixed all the problems I had with the costume. I also made myself some new cards. I think I might take a fews pics of it tomorrow.

So now I'm looking forward to the Tales group. I finally feel better about my Sheena.

So I decided to paint my bathroom again. I painted it like two years ago. It was a sand color. I wanted it to basically look tan, but it ended up looking pink. After walking past a shower curtain I liked at wal-mart I decided I wanted to re-do the bathroom based on said shower curtain. So last Friday I spent most of the day painting. I think I might paint our second bathroom now as well. :P

( Lets have some pictures )

I have been busting my butt to get costumes done. I have to finish all the costumes I want to wear for the rest of the year before my surgery in August. I'm doing pretty good. I think I'll have everything done in time. So I decided to make a list of costumes for the rest of the year.

ColossalCon:
~ Sanzo: Saiyuki - 100% completed sanzo.jpg
~ Gojyo: Saiyuki - 90% completed gojyo.jpg This is actually finished. I just decided to order leather pants and they haven't come in yet. We also need to straighten the wig.
~ Goku: Saiyuki - 10% completed goku.jpg This is a costume for Ricky that I'm not sure he even knows he's getting. I'm starting on this tomorrow.
~ Anna: Shaman King - 100% completed anna.jpg
~ Yoh: Shaman King - 90% completed yoh.jpg This is pretty much finished. I just need to buy sandals and the headphones.

Otakon
~ Falsetto: Eternal Sonata - 100% completed falsetto.jpg
~ Jazz: Eternal Sonata - 100% completed jazz.jpg The costume is finished but we still need to make the sword.
~ Lavi: D.Gray-Man - 0% completed lavi.jpg I'm hoping to have this finished before we even leave for ColossalCon. I bought one of Yui's giant zippers for this. I'm real excited to get started on this one.
~ Allen Walker: D.Gray-Man - 0% completed allen.jpg I ordered offical D.Gray-Man buttons for the coat. I can't wait to see them.
~ Sheena: Tales of Symphonia - 100% completed sheena.jpg
~ Zelos: Tales of Symphonia - 100% completed zelos.jpg
~ Genis: Tales of Symphonia - 0% completed genis.jpg This is for Ricky for the giant Tales of Symphonia group for sunday at Otakon. I'm not totally certain that I'll manage to finish this for the con, but I'm going to try.

Halloween
~ These are surprise costumes. I'm going to start buying some materials for these soon though.

YoumaCon
~ Lavi: D.Gray-Man - 0% completed lavi.jpg
~ Allen Walker: D.Gray-Man - 0% completed allen.jpg
~ Sanzo: Saiyuki - 100% completed sanzo.jpg
~ Gojyo: Saiyuki - 90% completed gojyo.jpg
~ Goku: Saiyuki - 10% completed goku.jpg

I don't really have a lot to say. The con was way too spread out which would be annoying as is, but with my knee it made it terrible. I needed to ice my leg every night but it was an expedition to find ice in our hotel. It always took at least 5 floors of searching to get any. False fire alarm goes off sunday morning. The hotel room was TINY. Annoying kids from who knows where all over the hotel, and then we go to the con and more annoying kids but they scream free hugs and shit.

However, I had a lot of fun hanging out with _dejiko_ nyaonyaoneko hikaruchan. We did our big Fruits Basket skit and had a fruits photoshoot. On Saturday _dejiko_ and nyaonyaoneko dressed as Eternal Sonata with us and we had a photoshoot with thereallink and got stood up by another guy.

We got to eat at a Tom Hortons for the first time, and a second time, and a third time. We've had enough of Tom Hortons. After the con we went to Niagra Falls. I think everyone thought the whole trip was worth it after seeing Niagra Falls.

Just an extra note. On our main site (http://www.rogueandflexei.com) I've added a con pictures sections. It used to be there, but was lost after defragmenting the hard drive a couple years ago. I also added all the Niagra falls pictures from this weekend.

So lets have some fun pictures. Everyone just wants to see pictures anyway. :)

( ONWARD )

I finally got some pictures of Trubie's Sasuke costume from Ohayocon. Trubie likes to have a goatee or some kind of facial hair, so I feel guilty asking him to shave for costumes. So I just waited until closer to Anime North to make him shave.

( There's a little jazz thrown into the Sasuke )

I finally finished Trubie's Jazz costume. Thank god. Now I can actually relax a little bit this weekend. We don't have the sword, but now we won't have to worry about driving thru customs with it. We'll have it finished for Otakon. I now have all of our Anime North costumes done.

( Jazz needs a good shave )

Just to let everyone in the Anime North Fruits Basket skit know, we are offically in! I got the confirmation email this morning. We basically have to check in by 6:30 friday night.

So we really need to get together thursday night, record lines, and try to get in some practice.

I'm so relieved that we got in even though I sent the entry form late. I'm looking forward to the skit. See you guys next week!

So the doctor has suggested that I start using ovulation tests to help me get pregnant. If you've never seen one, they basically look just like a pregnancy test and they work the same way. Its just a stick, you pee on it, wait a couple minutes, then you get a result. When you get a positive result that means the next two days are you best to conceive.

Basic ovulation kits costs $30 dollars. You get about 7 of them. Since you're never quite sure when to try to use an ovulation test, they give you a bunch of them. Somewhere mid cycle you start peeing on them and wait for it to come out positive. You might think 7 of them is a lot, but you're wrong. I've wasted 30 dollars a couple times. 7 sticks, 7 days, still couldn't figure out when I was ovulating. (I tried these a couple years ago, they used to be 30 dollars for only 3 sticks...ugh)

The test has these pink lines. 1 pink line means no ovulation, 2 pinks lines means yes, you are ovulating. Sounds easy right, wrong. I take the test and I get 1 pink line and 2nd foggy pink line. Box says 2 "dark" pink lines. After 5 days of taking the test I keep getting 1 pink line, 1 foggy line. wtf? There goes 30 bucks down the toilet.

So I decide to buy the more expensive 40 dollars a box "digital" ovuation kits. These have no lines. Instead a "digital" smiley face shows up when you are ovulating. I did look at this kit when i was buying the pink line kits and I thought, "how stupid do you have to be that you need a smiley face?" So I try these (therefore I guess I'm the stupid person), and I get nothing. Just a blank circle. I guess that means I'm not ovulating. So now I'm waiting for my smiley face. I'll probably end up getting a face with one eye, a frown, and a middle finger next to it.

So I had my MRI on tuesday and went to the doctor yesterday. Yep, I did it again. I tore my ACL in my right knee. Apparently my body is made of straw. I'm going to start physical therapy tomorrow.

So thats it, I'm done with TaeKwonDo. The doctor said it would be for the best for me to quit and I agree. So I managed to get my red belt. I got all the colored belts I could, the only thing I had left was to get my black belt. ::sigh::

Since I'm not in a hurry to get back to sports the doctor said I don't have to have the surgery right away. So I decided as long as my leg is comfortable I'm going to put off the surgery until September. This way I won't miss any cons and I can enjoy the summer. I'm not in any pain and I haven't even started therapy yet and I'm walking pretty good. Hell, I took all those costume pictures this week with the bad knee, and I stood in heels.

I also requested to not have the patellar tendon repair. For my left knee they took the tendon in the front of my knee to repair my ligament. It is the most painful place you can take it from but its supposed to be the best and strongest repair. Well, I'm not going back to TaeKwonDo, so I don't care about having the strongest. I'll go for the "pretty good" repair. So I'm going to have a hamstring repair. Its less scarring, and supposed to be a lot less painful. Only a little line and a dot on my knee. Most of the scars are hidden up under my butt where they take from the hamstring. I'm not a bathing suit model, so I don't care.

::sigh again:: I feel bad that Trubie is going to have to take care of me all over again.

I pretty much finished my Falsetto costume awhile back. I had everything done except her bracers. I got burnt out working on it, so I decided to finish the bracers later. So I made myself finish them this weekend so I could take long awaited pictures.

I'm happy with the pictures, I'm happy with the costume, but I still got issues with other things. I really like my shoes, but after only wearing them for like a half hour they were killing me. Ugh. I'm wearing this costume at Anime North and Otakon, two cons that are in convention centers with lots of walking. I see a future of me carrying comfy shoes for me to slip into when necessary. A second problem is the corsette. It looks nice but when I sit it bends the boning or jabs it into my stomach. So I worry about comfort and about warping the boning for future wearing.

I need to get on the ball with Trubie's Jazz costume. I'm going to make myself start on it this week.

( Falsetto under fake cut )

This time I'm posting my Karin costume from Time-jump Naruto. Old costume is old. I actually made this back in December. When I made time-jump Naruto and Sasuke for our Ohayocon skit I decided that I didn't want to go to all that effort to make Trubie a Sasuke costume and only wear it once for a skit. So I made Karin to go with it. I was on a roll back in December with sewing so I decided to just make Karin then for Anime North. Its taken me all this time to take any pictures.

( Does anyone even know who Karin is? )