Tangled in progress

So my Tangled cosplay is continuing to be a giant pain the neck. It's literally going to cause pain in my neck because my wig weighs 20 lbs.

That's what mine looks like at this point in time. It may be drastically changed before it's over and done with. I kind of don't like the way it's looking. And it has to have combs and fasteners secured in there because it can't stay on my head the way it is.


As far as the costume itself I have the dress (almost done). It needs her front dark purple panel, the outer design, and lace at the collar and hem. Then I just need to make the sleeves....

got the fabric and cut it in strips

pinned the pieces together

8 pieces pinned for each sleeve cap (the poof part). Now I just need to sew and stuff.

Perfect Curls

So I am always on the lookout for how to make my hair perfectly curly like old hollywood glamour. I have a hair board on pinterest that is dedicated to such things. And pulling from that and my own experience, I'll show you how I get perfect curls.


This is a LENGTHY process. So if you're looking for the short version...try someone else. But..I have wavy hair naturally, mostly straight, fine, and difficult to keep curl BUT THIS WORKS.


"Perfect Curls"

So this is a combination of many different pins on my hair board. You can go look at all the tips on perfect curls or you can just listen to what I did.

My hair was a little dirty (24 hours since washing).
I put volumizing mouse in it.
Then I put it in hot rollers.

Hello hot rollers!
As I rolled each piece of hair I sprayed it with medium hold hair spray as it went into the roller.
I left the rollers in for an hour.
As I took each piece out I once again hairsprayed.
Then...I pincurled!

Basically a pincurl is just the curl that already came out of your hot roller, and you just twist it back up around your finger and bobby pin it to your head.

Full disclosure, this is neither my head nor my picture, but I wanted to show you a pincurl. And apparently I have no pictures of myself with them.

See how it's just a nice flat little spiral? This is also the best way to do your hair when wearing wigs because it keeps it flat against your head.

Alrighty. Well you just use a single bobby pin to pin it or you criss cross bobby pins for extra security. And then you go to sleep! (If you don't have time to sleep on them, then just leave them in at least half an hour and continue to follow the steps below. However, for best results, leave them in overnight)

(no, my hair is not pincurled in this picture, but it should STILL BE while you sleep. This was just an excuse to put up a cute pic of my doggie and I snuggling)

Ok, wake up the next morning. Give it a quick all over spray with hairspray again. Take the bobby pins out.

Hi Crazy curly hair!

Ok, so I spray it AGAIN. I know, this seems like overkill, but for people like me whose hair won't stay curly...it's not. Then I turn my head over and run my hands through it and kinda give it a hand-toussle messy tease.

Now, for a Cosplay outfit (River Song from Doctor Who) I continue to tease it because hey! she has crazy curly hair!

BUT if I'm wearing it in real life I just hand tousle it like that, give it a final spray, and use a comb to tame any crazies sticking out. Below are varying degrees of tousling I did. The first instead of tousling I retouched the less curly spots with the curling iron. The second is a light tousle. The third is a full shake out and tousle with my hands.

And my hair will hold up the curl (losing some curl and just gaining body / wave per about every 10 hours) for up to 48 hours without washing it. Different hair will perform differently.

Dragon*Con

Backtracking to fit in what else i've been up to: DRAGON*CON!

So, it was tiring, frustrating, but a lot of fun. My friend Jennifer Teeter was a real on the books performer for the con, which was really exciting. I manned her booth a bit and got a free Teeter button and cd out of the deal. She was amazing.

I tried to do the dress up thing: Rainbow Bright and Steam Punk Lady (such as they were). Next year I will be far more prepared and have as cool of a costume as everyone else did. My favorite I saw this year was Queen Frostine from Candy Land.

There were hundreds of panels I wanted to go to, and I didn't make it to a single one. The lines were atrocious, and I got so lost trying to figure out where I was that I missed most everything I wanted to go to. I managed to make it to the Time Traveler's Ball and both of Teeter's shows. I also made it to the AIE Guild Meetup and TwitTV meetup. I got turned on to my new favorite podcast, Ladies of Leet (which are actually my guildies!). I just wasn't prepared enough to market myself. I really needed a website and new headshots and business cards. I'm just not where I need to be physically, emotionally, or technologically for the amount of marketing I should have been doing.

So goals for next year:
have a hotel room
plan my costumes months not days or weeks in advance
have a fully functioning website, up to date headshots, business cards, and a smile on me
actually map out and follow my daily planner
order my ticket in enough time that it gets mailed and i don't have to wait in lines
be in the parade