Anime Boston 2013

Sorry for the silence this month! I've sort of spent the month in a craft-tizzy getting ready for Anime Boston! I was lucky enough to score a table in the Artist Alley again this year and have been working on all sorts of stuff to fill it with!

This handy map will show you were I'll be at table S31, and it's a pretty easy find, as I'll just be on the back wall all the way to the left. If you're going to be at Anime Boston this weekend, stop by and say hi! This year I had planned on attending the Frill Lolita convention, but as it was so close to Anime Boston I had to, unfortunately, stay home. However, I'll still have some stuff from my shop in Frill's boutique!

Once this con is finally over, and I emerge from my traditional post-convention 14 hour coma, I'll be getting this blog back on track with some more posts.

Blogspiration: Juliette et Justine Fashion Shows, An Indie Lolita Design Contest, Lolitaopoly, and some upcoming Conventions!

Look at that! I managed to make another one of these link roundup posts in considerably under 6 months. I have a few random things to share with you all, in addition to some neat stuff I've stumbled across online, that I didn't want to bother with a whole new post with, so why not more blogspiration posts?

The UK Lolitas have a pretty large and active community, adorably called the Tea Party Club, and a few months ago they were lucky enough to get the chance to host a Juliette et Justine fashion show. They pictures are just now hitting the internet and you can check them out here. Juliette et Justine is such a stunning and opulent brand, so it's really amazing to get to see so many dresses from them all in one place, and done up so elaborately for a show like this! I seriously wish I had a local community that was able to pull off a feat like this!

If there are any aspiring designers and artists out there, the indie brand Pop Princesses is hosting a contest that is open for just a couple more days, that allows artists to submit their portfolios for a chance to work on an upcoming print with them! Check out this post for some more info on it. It could be a great chance to work with a skilled seamstress and make those burando dreams come true!

So, I was going to make this post earlier today, but I got a bit lazy and I'm really into MST3K and Rifftrax, so I kinda slacked off today because it was frozen and snowing out and watched a bunch of old Rifftrax, but I am really glad I held off (not just because I got to watch those Rifftrax) because I stumbled across this completely amazing project by Misirlou, of a Lolita version of monopoly called Lolitopoly. Seriously, check out this post! It looks completely stunning and hilarious. I want to be able to play this game so bad, it looks like a complete blast to play!

I absolutely have a soft spot in my heart for old school styled Lifestyle Lolita lists of cute ideas, so I was pretty pleased when I stumbled across this list of Princess Tips: 25 Spring Lifestyle Ideas. Spring is actually a lot further around the corner than I want to even think about, but these ideas are still really adorable, and a lot of them are really appropriate for any time of year, provided you're into the Lolita Lifestyle.

I actually stumbled across this post, It's Cosplay, Not C******, on an otaku culture blog I am particularly fond of, and it's about Cosplay vs. historical costuming, but I feel like a lot of what she says is very relevant to the Lolita too. Obviously the major difference between Cosplay and Lolita, is that Lolita isn't always, or even less than 90% of the time, a costume but more of a "Yeah, this is just what I wear" thing, but it's still a very interesting read and definitely something a lot of us have heard before coming from other people who dress outside what is considered "normal". I'd like to share the following quote from the post:

"It doesn’t matter if you play a character who was a queen 400 years ago, or you play one who will be queen of future Tokyo in a millenium. What matters is this is a hobby people are drawn to for their own reasons. As long as they’re having fun and not harming anyone, lets knock off the elitism and let them have their fun. It’s a big enough sandbox for us all to play with our toys together."

In F Yeah Lolita news, I've added an extra, and hopefully helpful, page to the site! Blogging Resources is a one-stop page for, you guessed it, resources for bloggers. I have been hoarding a lot of useful sites for myself to reference now and again, so I figured I would share them with the rest of you. The sites linked range from helpful blog coding sites, to Lolita specific memes, to blog posts others have written about being a blogger, to just sort of useful kawaii images. I'll be adding some new stuff as I find it, so if you're a blogger, you might want to check back now and again!

My final "OMG, guys, check this out!" is some fun news for me! It's just about convention season and I've managed to snag a couple tables at some upcoming conventions.

The most recent convention is actually only a couple of weeks away! The third year of U-con at Uconn is coming up on February 16th and 17th. U-con at Uconn is a completely free convention that's put on by our state's college. It's a small-ish 2 day con that has, I believe, between 700 and 1,000 people in attendance for the previous years. It's free and it's fun, and I'll be selling some stuff in the dealers room and just generally hanging out and doing con stuff. If you're in the area, stop by and say hi!

 The next con is actually a few months away, at the end of May, but it's one of my absolute favorites of the year, Anime Boston. I just got the news that I will get the chance to have a table in the Artist Alley this year, and I'm very excited for it! I have no idea where I'll be yet, or even what sort of stuff I'll be selling, but I just know I'm happy to get the chance to go back. I absolutely love the Lolita events that go down at Anime Boston!

I'd also like to mess around in this post a bit with link parties. If you're unfamiliar with the term (and you probably are unless you lurk around a bunch on craft blogs like I do!) it basically just means you get the chance to add your link directly to this blog post!

Lolita Conventions: Frill

In the US, Lolita gatherings have been pretty much limited to local meetups, anime conventions, and the rare brand-sponsored tea party, there have been very few "official" lolita gatherings in the US. Luckily, this year we're lucky enough to have another one come along, Frill!

I regret not blogging about this convention until just now, because Frill is this upcoming weekend (June 09-10th 2012!), but I have seriously been sulking a bit about this happening at the other end of a 20 hour train/car ride for me. So, because of my sulking, pre-reg tickets are all sold out, but you can still purchase tickets at the door. This two-day convention (However, I believe this close to the con, sunday is all sold out, as it is a separate event?) features a lot of the same sort of things you would expect from any other convention, panels, shopping, contests, even a dance, only everything is catered towards the Lolita.

I actually only recently found out (last week!) that those who owned shops and couldn't attend can send in items to be sold at the boutique, so I jumped on that opportunity to, at the very least, attend in spirit by sending in some stuff from my, so rarely on Etsy, shop. If this convention sees a second year, especially a second year that is a little further north up the coast, I would really love to attend in person!

This is what I'm sending up! I sort of freaked when I realized I had no more tags printed up, so I chopped up a bunch of scrapbooking paper and decided to go back to the individually packaged route!

As Lolita grows more and more popular, I would absolutely love to see more conventions and even just one-day events catering to the Lolita the future! I think they're fantastic ways to get the Lolita community together, and an awesome excuse to put on your finest and take a day trip! One of my favorite oh-gosh-it's-so-not-fair-that-I-can't-be-there events in the Lolita world is Sweden's yearly Lolita Flea market (Sadly, I can't find working pictures from recent years, as the market seems to get bigger each year, 2011 apparently had over 1000 visitors, but here's a post from it's still-very-successful first year), which is the sort of event that I would absolutely love to see happen in the US, and preferably not nearly a whole day's drive away from me!

If you had a Lolita convention happen near you, what kind of events would you love to see? At anime conventions I am a huge fan of the, somewhat boring to most people, panels about the early years in the fandom and otaku culture, which I think extends to Lolita, as is pretty obvious from my interest in all things Old School Lolita, so these are the sorts of things I would love to see in a Lolita convention. I can imagine a panel about the early days of Lolita, including display pieces of the sorts of things Lolita brands released over a decade ago! Of course, I also am also a pretty enthusiastic shopper, so any sort of flea market, swap meet, or consignment I would be all over as well!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just want to do a quick post to give a little shout out to everyone who's celebrating Thanksgiving today! I can't wait to dig into some pecan pie later tonight! As I mentioned last year on Thanksgiving, I am, of course, thankful for the little things, the day-to-day things, and the important things in my life. But, as I gather around my traditional Lolita meal of pink frosted cupcakes and bow my head to the great and powerful Mana-sama, bringer of all Lolita, what am I thankful for in the more frilly parts of my life? This:

Mana-sama sent his little Jrock angels down and made it so I chanced upon stumbling across this deal. A size 2 (which I am shocked and surprised to find fits me perfectly, as Juliette et Justine's size 1 seems to run incredibly small) Juliette et Justine print dress, covered in a gorgeous brown floral print complete with little cherubs. I got an incredibly good deal on it too, like BtSSB second-hand lucky pack old school style JSK good deal! I just got it in the mail yesterday, so I get to wear it for the first time for Thanksgiving today!

I also want to point out that for today until the end of tomorrow I'm having a little Thanksgiving sale over at my shop Ophanim. You can get a whopping 20% off your order with the coupon code THANKSGIVING20. Last year around this time I did lucky packs, but my scheduled has been so hectic I haven't really had the time to make any! I do hope to get some done for the Christmas season though!

I want to end this post by mentioning that I guess I'm officially going back to my blogspot address at fyeahlolita.blogspot.com. On the topic of thankfulness, I am truly thankful to all my readers who have stuck with me through this sort of confusing move, and all the people who were distraught at the thought that my blog may have just disappeared! I am very glad to know that those of you out there care as much as you do for this blog. As upsetting as it was to find out that I lost my dot-com due to my own forgetfulness, it really made me very happy to hear from those of you who were worried! Within the next week or so I plan on having a back-to-blogspot giveaway, to help get the word out about my url change!

Sweet, Gothic & Classic Lolita Etsy Treasuries

It seems it's every Lolita's dream to one day be able to sew their own clothes, but sadly, it's a talent that not all of us have. I am sure that if I were pressed, and had a pattern, I could sew up some fancy clothes for myself, as I do know my way around a sewing machine, but I'm simply to impatient to ever sit down and actually finish anything I can make under a sewing machine. So, instead, I like to spend time oogling the things various other Lolita seamstresses make and wistfully think to myself "One day..." On of my favorite places to do this is through Etsy, probably because I'm just a little bit addicted to making Treasuries! In my last Etsy lurking adventure, I made three treasuries, one for Sweet, one for Gothic, and one for Classic Lolita. These are all relatively simple treasuries, just some nicely made cute clothes by various Lolita seamstresses, with a few crafty accessories thrown in for good measure.







Looking at some of these gorgeous clothes really makes me want to at least try to ever finish anything on the sewing machine. It just seems like there's so much unlimited potential when you can make your own Lolita pieces!

Why have I been lurking on Etsy a little more than usual lately? Because I've spent the last week and a half getting my Etsy back in gear! It is nowhere near complete, there are still a number of things that I still need to get in my shop, but for now, it's at least a little bit full. For the next week or so, I'd like to offer free shipping as a little "Thanks for being so patient with me while I get everything back up", just use the coupon code WELCOMEBACKSUMMER and you can get free shipping on anything in my shop. I hope you don't mind this little aside to mention my shop update!

I'm sure you've noticed how quiet it's been on the blogging front for me! I just finished up my "vacation". Quotes because, while it was my vacation from my full time job, I still worked every other day at my part time job! There were several days in a row when I didn't even bother to turn my computer on, which is very rare for me, as I'm pretty obviously internet addicted. I hope you all can just bear with me for a bit while I get back into the swing of things, yet again!

What I Learned Vending Lolita Goods at an Anime Convention

Last weekend I got the chance to vend at U-Con, a local anime convention. While I vended there last year this year I was a lot more prepared and did a little more than just lay things out on a table. I tried a few different things throughout the course of the weekend to catch people's eyes and in this post I'll be talking a little bit about what I learned.

This is what my table looked like Friday morning! Sorry I didn't get any closeups or pictures of the other layouts I tried, I was pretty busy!

Now, this might not work for everyone, but these are the trends that I noticed at my own table. I know that a lot of Lolita's have their own handmade shops and have considered vending, at an anime con or elsewhere, so hopefully what I've learned might help you out a bit if you decide to vend.

• I had a wide range of prices, but more people went for the mid to high priced items. I sold things from $2 to $35 dollars, and I was really expecting to sell a lot more of the $5 and under stuff than I did. The first year at this same con, I had mostly cheap stuff, and the cheapest stuff sold the most. But this year most people passed up small purchases to buy more mid to high priced things at my table. I have no idea how this happened and I don't know if it was a fluke or if it's just a fact of selling.
  
• Classic goods sold better than Sweet goods. At least for me! I had a lot of people come by and ooh and aah the cutesy Sweet stuff and then leave, but most people who ooh and aah'd over the Classic ended up buying something! Oddly enough, the Classic items were more expensive than the Sweet items. As with the first point on this list, I was not expecting this!
  
• People are afraid of messing up displays, and might not buy stuff off of them. Before this con I did a lot of research (i.e. blog reading) about displays and so many people said to have a nice vertical display, as it attracts more people. So I brought my hat boxes with me and made some fancy standing frames to drape necklaces on, just so things had somewhere to go instead of just flat on the table. But, I found that people didn't buy things off of the displays! My boyfriend was in the booth next to me selling pins, some of which he had laid out on the table and the others in bins and people actually asked if they were allowed to sort through the pin bins! So, I really don't know what to think about the vertical display rule. Maybe my booth simply wasn't vertical enough for it to work? If I had to make a decision for the next con I think I would still stick with vertical displays but only have a few pieces on them, just to draw people in, but to have most of my stuff laid out where people could freely touch it. I would definitely not sell anything in a bin again though, even if it did make my table look neater.
  
• People love business cards, maybe a little too much! I had 2 big stacks of business cards, and people loved to take them, which is a good thing! But, I found that a lot of people were just "Business card collectors" or taking several at a time simply because they were in big, tempting, free stacks, which is nice for them, but not really helpful for me. After a while, when my card stacks started dwindling down to only a dozen or so people only took them when they were obviously interested in what I was selling. I think that the next con I go to I will bring just as many business cards, but only lay them out a few at a time. While it's great that people were leaving with my Etsy URL, it's not that useful for me that so many of my business cards are probably sitting in stacks of 2 at a time at the bottom of a purse somewhere with 100 other business cards.
• Write everything down. I had a little note pad where i wrote down what sold and for how much. As annoying as this was it's very helpful! You can easily see what is selling, and how much you've made and keep those records for later. I also had some fun counting up my total every now and then and giggling over it XD
• Talk! Talk! Talk! Say "Hello!" to everyone that even looks in your general direction, if they come over, talk to them. Then talk some more, tell them about what it is you're selling, how you made it, and just be friendly with them. The vendors room at this con was a mixed Artist Alley & Dealers room so I actually had to let people know that I made what I was selling, this usually intrigued people into, if not buying, but staying a little longer. Being friendly to people is good for you too, I actually met a few people who I sold things to before, one girl was even wearing a necklace she bought from me last year. Needless to say, I was very excited to see that!

Again, I don't know if these things were just particular to my table and the con I was at, but I figured I might as well share them with other Lolitas who are interested in vending at cons one day. This spring I'll be at Anime Boston vending, which is a much, much larger con (and Artist Alley!) than U-Con, so it will be very interesting to see how different the experience is.

Have you vended your art or crafts at a con or art show? Do you have any tips and tricks to share? I find that most of the "Artist Alley vending tips" are aimed at 2D artists selling prints and the things that attract anime print buyers is considerably different than attracting Lolita accessory sellers.

If you are interested in some more Artist Alley vending tips, check out the ShadowScript blog, as the artist who runs it vends at a lot of conventions and often has some really great tips and writes a lot about the subject. She sells both 2D and 3D art, so her tips are pretty relevant no matter what kind of art you're selling!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just a heads up that I'm having a little sale over at Ophanim, I'm offering 15% shop wide if you use the coupon code BLACK15. The sale will only last until Friday is over, so if you missed out on the lucky packs and still want a deal, now is a good chance!

Besides that, I hope everyone in the States had a happy Thanksgiving! Of course I'm thankful for all the good things in my life, even the things I take for granted, that goes without saying. But, since this is my Loltia blog, let's have a little fun and talk about all the frilly things we're thankful for :3 Are you thankful you managed to catch a really good deal on an auction? Maybe you happened to get a hold of the very last of a popular print while it was in stock, before the price sky rocketed. Or maybe you're thankful someone taught you to sew so that you could fill your closet with pretty frillies?

What did I thank the great and powerful Mana-sama, Lord of Lolita for when I bowed my head at the dinner table full of a bounty of pink cupcakes*? Why for this, of course!

I managed to get a hold of the pink colorway of Angelic Pretty's Rose Toilette skirt, a print I have been dreaming about for some time now. I got it for a pretty reasonable price too. I'm still dreaming of red JSK or OP, but I am incredibly happy to get a hold of this piece! Sarah of Momoberi actually sold it to me, she even remembered me blogging about how much I love it!

*That cupcake and Mana thing didn't really happen.

I Do Declare's Giveaway, Some Sold Out Lucky Packs, and 500k Hits

A few weeks ago Kelsey of I Do Declare was having a give away on her blog. I commented on the post not expecting much, since I never (and I mean never) win giveaways. But about a week ago as I was going through my blog roll I saw she was announcing the winner. I almost skipped over it because I thought "Oh, well that has nothing to do with me XD" But I clicked anyways and was quite surprised to find that I was the lucky random winner of a couple totes and a tee shirt, all of which are screen printed with I Do Declare's unique designs!

The prize, all bundled up and pretty! I loved the card, it was so elegant and fit Kelsey's designs perfectly.

I promptly tore into the package to see what I got! Even though I already knew what it was XD I was still surprised to find two totes in the package (only 1 pictured, the other is identical, I just didn't have room in the picture for it).

The screen printing is awesome. On the totes it's thick and gorgeous, and on the tee it's much lighter and sort of vintage looking, which suits tees much better than thick printing, as thickly screen printed tees tend to crack and shrivel the first time you wash them. The design, as you can see, is an amazing unicorn. Angelic Pretty can keep their plump little carousel unicorns, I love badass medieval unicorns!

The tote bags are really great, if you want one for yourself you can pick them up at the I Do Declare Etsy shop. The very first thing I did with my totes? Filled them up with a dozen packages. What was I shipping out? Why, Ophanim lucky packs! I was completely prepared to announce them on my blog, I even made a fancy graphic and everything....

But, as you may have guessed, the lucky packs are all sold out. They actually sold out within a half hour! Something I was definitely not expecting! These were so successful I definitely plan on doing some more lucky packs once it gets a little closer to Christmas. If you want to grab one the next time I put them out, follow me on Twitter, since I'll be tweeting about them as I make them and when they are posted!

In keeping with this post's hodgepodge of awesomeness, I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for reading my blog :D You might not notice it, since it's aaaall the way at the bottom of the page in a tiny little font, but my hit counter hit 500,000 sometime two nights ago. I tweeted for people to be on the look out for that then went to sleep, the next morning I got a few screen shots of counts reaaaally close to the 500k, including one of 499,999 by Zeloco of the Etsy shop Eat Me Ink Me. I figured the 500k went unnoticed until later that day Neena commented on my lucky pack sales post letting me know that she actually got the 500k but couldn't send me a message on Twitter about it! She sent me a full page screen shot, but I've cropped it just to show you the magic number.

500,000 hits :D That's half a million! Thanks again to everyone who reads F Yeah Lolita!

Some Art I've Been Working On

Recently I've been trying to pick up the tablet and open up the Photoshop a little more than I normally do (which is to say, at all!) So I decided to put my rusty skills to use and make a few Lolita illustrations for my Etsy shop. And I want to show them off here, because I'm actually happy with them!

Click for a bigger picture

I tried to cover the three different styles of Lolita that I love and like make things for, Classic, Sweet, and Gothic. Making these was actually kind of addicting, and it was really fun to, once again, be able to sit down and be able to finish something. I kept the shading really simple in order to keep me interested in finishing them though! I used to go all out and try to shade as realistically as possible, but it takes so long I typically lost interest before I got to any interesting part of the piece.

Clearly, Lolita has pretty much completely overrun my life when I sit down and all I want to draw are fancy dresses I want to wear! Hopefully I'll stick with art, for a little while at least, and try to make a few more Lolita-themed pictures. Because these ones are shop related, I'm actually getting these printed on post cards to include with orders from my shop. I've already got one set! Now I'm just trying to decide if there's anything I need to fix with the remaining two before I get them printed up!

Amaranth Opulent, Ophanim, & Lolita Nouveau

Last week I got the chance to get together with not only a couple of incredibly talented Lolita designers, but also a number of lovely models. Aly a.k.a. Miss Lumpy has recently opened her own shop, Amaranth Opulent, and Lindsay of Lolitas-N-Cream, a sweets jewelery collection, has recently branched out into clothing designs under the name Lolita Nouveau. It was incredible getting together for a day of photo shoots with these two, I could practically hear my wallet crying out in fear as I got to see first hand the beautiful things they both create. The models were fantastic too, I got the chance go work with Crystal of Pretty Wonderland, Jesi of Sweet Teef, Dalin of La Vida Frills, as well as sneaking Aly and Lindsay away to get some photos of them in my designs.

In anticipation of this photo shoot, I spent some time making new bonnets as well as a few new items for my shop, such as mini tricorns, cake hats, and sweeter styled jewelry.

A couple getting ready shots. We sort of overtook part of an incredibly beautiful ivy covered stone walkway. Check out the second picture, of the end that we didn't cover with hat boxes and suitcases and makeup bags, it's like something out of a fairy tale!

My newest bonnet is a pink and lavender OTT Sweet Lolita one. This bonnet, while the base is relatively simple it is very decorated with a lot of flowers and little chiffon bows.

A new addition to my shop, which the first one actually sold out within an hour of posting it is cake hats. I just love making things out of felt, it's so fun and the result is always adorable. I could not resist making an over the top cake slice on a headband! While this one may be gone, keep on the look out for more in the future.

Another new addition to my shop is mini tricorns. I've been wanting to make these ever since I got into millinery and finally got around to just now covering a base I made months ago. I found out it was so fun that I made another one a couple days before the day of the photo shoot.

Something that is not yet in my shop are straw bonnets. This one is from my own personal collection and is a prototype for future ones. Straw bonnets are very different from my regular bonnets, as they are made with straw hats, cut and shaped into bonnets and then decorated with trims and flowers. They are much simpler than my regular bonnets and will be much less expensive, that is, when I finally have the time to make a couple and get them posted!

For a while now I've been making sweeter jewelery, mostly featuring little hand sculpted teddy bears I've been making out of polymer clay. I really enjoy making jewelery for Sweet Lolita's because it's so colorful and fun.

As well as some new pieces I also got some great pictures of a few of my older pieces, a few hair corsages, and the couple of bonnets I had left for sale.

Here's Lindsay and a few girls modeling her new line of skirts. The park had a fantastic ruined greenhouse that was the perfect place for her Steam Punk coordinate.

Another quick behind the scene's photo! Lindsay fixing Crystal's skirt while our photographer gets ready to take some pictures.

Here's a couple more photos of our location! We were in the beautiful Harkness Park, a Connecticut state park that's filled with beautiful gardens, architecture, and a couple of sprawling mansions.

A final photo of the three designers. I'm on the left, Aly's in the middle, and Lindsy is on the right. While I did all of my own photography (I'm trying to learn to be a better photographer!) this particular photo was taken by the photographer that joined us, Sean Walsh.

Lindsay and Aly have both posted their own photos from the day, check out Aly's photos here, and Lindsay's photos here. And don't forget to check out our shops!

Ophanim
Amaranth Opulent
Lolita Nouvea/Lolitas-N-Cream