Blog| Fresh Start

I've gone through a lot of blogs. I was part of the Xanga craze, Livejournals, Tumblr, even the journal section of DeviantArt. Blogs aren't new to me. I've always needed some form of written release, being an introvert and all, and blogs are ways I can word vomit and get it all out. Raicodoll is my art, my videos, my events, but most of all it's me. So let's get to know each other a bit better. Blog I shall. If you just like seeing my art and or going to the things around town I host, that's fine. The News section has my non-personal stuff. That's cool. But if you don't mind a bit of word vomit and venting, then read on!

In October, after the weekend from hell (that is, the three event weekend where I attempted to kill me and fellow artists with exhaustion), me and Rony spent a week in Seattle for a conference he was attending. Seattle had been on our list to visit for a long time. Companies we loved were located there, it rained all the time, it's a very artsy town and it wasn't a desert.

Visiting Seattle was magical and we fell in love instantly.

Cut to this year. You can only grumble that you miss a place so much before finally just saying, we should move there. Before, moving to Seattle was kinda a lofty dream we would say when the weather was too hot and the wind threatened to take the fence down the block. But after a few google searches and some research, it wasn't impossible.

We made a plan. Two years max we'd move. After some re-budgeting, it was cut down to one year. We'd move in one year.

And that's the plan. We're going to get rid of all our non-essential things, save a ton of money, and pack up all five animals and a trailer and move everything up north! Which is wonderful and exciting but also terrifying.

I've lived in Lubbock my whole life. My whole family is in Texas, at most 5-8 hours away. Moving across the country is a brand new experience. Plus I'm a natural worrier so yes, I am already preparing for this move over a year in advance. Everything feels final. Final birthdays and holidays and events. Things I have created I now have to figure out what the future holds for them.

It's a bit daunting. In the end, I think it's a good decision for us. Sometimes you just hit the limits of your growth and have to move to a bigger sandbox. It's scary and uncomfortable but it'll make you better.

This weekend we're having a garage sale to start getting rid of the junk we've hoarded over the years. I'm purging what I can and deciding what makes the cut to stay. It's refreshing, like de-cluttering your life. Everything will be a new start and I think I'm excited for that. As much as I love what I do, it'll be so nice to start over back at zero and not have any pressures.

For now, I'm going to enjoy life here, doing what I love, and making memories. There's a lot planned for this year and if I'm gonna leave, I want to leave while things are good.

-Sam <3

The 1st Pokestop Art Drop

Very simply, yesterday was a good day. Woke up, made sure all the art pieces I had made were packaged and ready to go, and then laid on the couch for a few hours with the dog and cats watching the Overwatch Atlantic tournament. After a while, Rony joined me and it was good. All morning I did PR for the Pokestop Art Drop event, sharing and commenting to people and making sure everything was set to go. And then at 1, we headed out to Texas Tech to start leaving art pieces all over town.

Can I mention how crazy of a response I got to this little idea of mine?

In the beginning, I figured it would just be me leaving around 15 pieces around town for the Pokemon community to find. Nothing big, just a "hey if you're out hunting today you might find some art". Then, because I can't stop trying to help other people get exposure as well, I decided I would just see if any other artists wanted to donate some pieces for fun.

We had probably 15 artists? That's a lot that donated their time and efforts for free just to get art to new homes and participate in this little game. That's crazy.

And even better, we had people want to find them. Actively find them. As in I spotted multiple cars pull up to certain spots and people running out to find art. It was great. We even dropped some at some local businesses to get people to go there too.

Rony and I spent probably 3 and a half hours, driving and dropping art all over town and looking for some ourselves. By the time I got home, my phone was almost dead from moderating the event page all day, I was tired, but gosh I was so happy.

We will be doing another art drop event. Not sure when. Between the art business, shows, conventions, Ladies Night, and Geek Girl Brunch, my plate always seems full. But Hub City Comic Con is my last convention of the year, I have 1 Ladies Night left and it's pretty much planned out already, and my lovely fellow officers are helping with GGB. So I'll have time eventually.

Thanks again to everyone that donated their time and art and to all that thought a crazy art scavenger hunt across town was a good idea. Couldn't have pulled this off around you. Keep an eye on the events tab to the right for future stuff or subscribe to my events on the Facecbook page.

I'm going back to ducking my head in my office and getting things ready for Hub City.

Until next time

-Sam <3

The Slow End

...of my convention season. Not of me but I mean, you never know. Ama-Con is done and the prep for Hub City Comic Con begins. HC3 will be the last convention for me for the year, but not the last thing I do. Between two different gallery showings, Ladies Night (see Event calendar for details), conventions, and Geek Girl Brunch, my plate has been very full.

Better to be busy than to have no work, right? Right? Somebody?

First up, GGB had a Book swap brunch and then the following a Pokemon Go meet up. Both were awesome and had a great turnout. We've even started getting a tiny bit of press about our events and ended up with a crap load of sign ups.

Ama-Con was a wonderful experience this past weekend and it was great to have people come up and say they had previously met me at "insert convention" and loved my stuff. It feels like I'm starting to get a bit of traction after almost a year of entering the convention circuit.

Hub City will be my one year con-iversary actually so maybe it's time I add some new stuff. I'm working on a second sketchbook since I started getting requests for another one. Debating if I should make it of my fan art sketches, originals, or both so feedback would be nice.

And because Overwatch is a black hole that keeps sucking me in, expect some stuff from that.

I'm working on getting the Eevee set as a keychain version for those who either don't have their ears pierced to wear the earrings or boys. Boys, you can wear the necklace set. I promise you'll still look cool. I'm also finally getting the Starter Pokemon drawn out and done to add to the Pokemon set.

Also debating on doing some Pokemon Go Team flash art but don't quote me on that. They take a while.

Besides that, I have a lot of paintings to work on for the Suicide Squad Exhibit and for the FFAT at Star Comics Downtown. Ladies Night is this Saturday and we're starting to move to having a featured artist for each one. This one we're featuring Kyanne Birley who has previously helped out at the event! So come out if you can!

Gotta wrap everything up everything before family vacation (so much traveling. So so much. What is life)

If you have a request for something you'd like to see at Hub City Comic Con or just in general, let me know! I'll see what I can do!

Until next time

-Sam <3

Staple! Independent Media Expo 2016

And we're back from another convention! It's been a crazy month. Doing two cons within two weeks of each other was crazy. Now that I'm back home, I still have the jitters like I'm suppose to be working on something all the time. But Staple is over and our next convention isn't until May so for a few days, I am relaxing. Just for a few days though. Ladies Night prepping begins soon, after all!

(More on that later)

Last year we went to Staple since a few of my favorite comic book people were going to be guests there. We only went one day but it was an amazing show and oh dear god did we buy so much stuff. Like 4 car trips worth of stuff. It was awesome and we pledged to come back every year because Staple isn't a comic con, it's an artist show. No movie star celebrity guests or big box office name, just artists and writers and creators.

My people, more or less.

Then we started the business and started doing cons and somehow, we managed to get into Staple before they sold out. So we got to experience the other side of the show, as vendors this time.

Though we still bought a bunch of stuff. I don't know where we're going to put all the prints we got but my supply boxes are sufficiently covered in cool stickers.

We took off Friday and made it to Austin at about 8pm, going straight to the pre-show mixer Austin Books and Comics was hosting for the show. We bought comics, because of course we did, and got to chat to a few people also tabling. I also learned that the comic/art world is small and I will always run into people that also know people I know. Everyone knows everyone, I guess, especially in the con scene.

After that, we went to the hotel and I worked until 2am because of course I did.

Set up started at 9am and we managed to get our half table to look pretty good. The new displays we got for Lubbock-con were working out nicely and the new 11x17 prints came out really good and looked nice.

Show started at 11am and we were off. I think Rony spent most of the time getting up, buying things, and talking to every vendor in the room. Time flew by so fast I didn't even get a chance to look around our room until a few hours into the show. Everyone was so nice and chill and it was great to just talk to other artists about their business and mine and all sorts of things we love.

Another cool thing is we have two of our designs on t-shirts in the lobby available to buy! Both my Pokemon flash art and Murder of Crows sketch could be bought! I got one of each just to have. Don't judge me.

The day passed so quickly and before I knew it, the show was over at 6 and I had only seen one room of the two rooms filled with vendors.

Afterwards, we got a free BBQ dinner provided for us at Dragon's Lair comics and I had never been so happy for free food. There had been taco trucks outside the venue but I had only had time to scarf one down all day.

We shopped a bit there and I bough Sunstone vol. 2 and an ADORABLE No-Face from Spirited Away, knitting in a basket. It was so cute and I brought him the next day to put on my table. And then we ended the day with ice cream from Lick Honest Ice Cream which made homemade ice cream with odd flavors. I got grapefruit with champagne marshmallows and man, it was so good.

Day two was much more relaxed. We had breakfast with friends at Omelettry and then went to the mixer before the show for LGBTQA and Women artists. Did I mention how cool this show was?

I finally got to make it to the other room to shop and got my Through the Woods signed by Emily Caroll and Bitch Planet #3 by Robert Wilson IV. Both were super super nice. And then I shopped a bunch. Some artists I had seen last year so I went to their tables and some were new. I chatted with some that I had talked to at the mixers and geeked out over some witchy art.

I think the coolest thing was just how the artists at the show supported each other. I would go to their table and talk to them and they would come by later and talk some more. A vendor had had her money stolen from after the first day and everyone chipped in the next to try and help out. It was just the coolest experience.

Day two ended and we packed up, saying bye to everyone we had met and exchanging cards and Instagrams and things like that. We ate a celebratory Chinese food buffet and then started the long drive back to Lubbock.

Since I'm trying to get back into the swing of vlogging, we filmed a bit all weekend the the video is up if you'd rather go watch and see everything. We've had a pretty awesome start to our con season and I'm excited to see how YC3 will turn out. Thanks to everyone that came and saw us, all the new people, and all the rad artists! Hopefully I'll see you next year!

Now it's time for Ladies Night prepping. I'll have a blog up about that soon! See ya!

-Sam <3

Lubbock-Con 2016

So my plan for yesterday was to sleep and sleep and sleep and not leave my house because I was exhausted. Instead, I slept really late, ordered Chinese food, figured out my budget to restock my entire inventory, and started organizing the merch I had left for Staple. Lubbock-Con wiped me out, which is a good thing. Because it was pretty damn amazing.

Lubbock-Con was this past Saturday on the 20th at the Civic Center and happened to run not only during the pancake festival (which draws in an enormous crowd all day) but also the Little Mermaid musical. So think a crap ton of families wanting food and another crap ton of families with little kids dressed as mermaids and then an unholy amount of nerds and cosplayers all mixed together.

I was busy all day.

Set up was Friday night after I got off work and after that, my plan was to pull an all nighter to make sure I was prepared for Saturday. Mine and Rony's friend, Erica (Koolaid Girl Art), shared my table with me since it was her first con and first time selling. She's done our Ladies Nights at Star Comics before but hadn't ever made prints and sold those. She had far less stuff to get together than me since she doesn't try to make 10000 different things like I do (because I'm an overachiever) so she mostly helped me set up.

I didn't go to bed until 4am and that's because I was too delirious to see what I was doing and almost cried when I realized I needed to cut out Jolteon charms and oh god why did I make the design so spiky??? Woke up at 7am, panicked because I didn't finish, got dressed, and booked it to the Civic Center at 8am for pre-show finishing touches.

The line for the pancake festival which started at 7am was already long as hell and there was a line forming for the con. I scratched my display since a last minute trip to Michael's ended up with me buying new jewelry displays and quickly redid everything!

And from the time doors opened at 9am, I didn't have time to even breath. Instantly, we were busy. We got wiped out of dollar bills early, panicked, got some dollars back, and then almost cried when Rony showed up with a few more because why do people always pay for small stuff in 20's???

The entire day I only got to get up and walk and go to the bathroom once and it was during the Miss Lubbock-Con pageant when everyone was too busy watching to come by. Said hi to people, bought some Sailor Moon merch and a cupcake, ran back so I could prepare for Round Two.

I didn't even have the chance to take pictures of all the cool cosplayers. It was pretty awesome. Erica was busy all day doing sketch commissions and selling prints and every time I would finish one Eevee Necklace, another would sell out and I'd have to make more.

Everyone was super nice and excited and even though I was dead tired, it was a ton of fun. Everyone seemed to having a blast at the con and it was crazy how well organized everything was considering this was a con debut. (And we got free lunch which I was super grateful for because I was going to starve if I couldn't leave the table)

Overall, this has been the best con I've been to and a great start to the year. I'm sold out of almost everything which is mind blowing. I'm very excited to have been a part of it and can't wait until next year. Everyone was happy, business was good, and I had a lot of fun. Thank you to DeNae and the whole team that put this on and have been so welcoming and supportive of this little business of mine! You guys are great!

Now onto the big one, Staple.

After I sleep a bit more though.

-Sam <3

Hub City Comic Con!

After a month of prepping getting both ready for my first convention and redoing my online shop, the big weekend finally came. Hub City Comic Con was luckily being held where I lived so the stress of packing everything up and going to a different town was absent, but there was still stress. I ran out of chain and lobster clasps like three times and had the hardest time just getting change. I can't imagine having to do that in a different town. But after very little sleep but pretty easy set up, we were ready for preview night on Friday.

Now since this was the first year they have had this convention and the first one in Lubbock, no one was really able to measure expectations. Friday was for VIPs only, but I kinda figured the people that came would mostly be there for the Dragon Ball Z and Power Ranger signings. Which I was correct on. Also, we were the weird booth apparently. Go figure.

But Friday gave me time to organize and finish anything I hadn't. And it was a chance for the vendors to browse around since it was going to be close to impossible on Saturday. I got to network a bit and kinda made friends with the lovely ladies at another booth over our love of comics and Steven Universe. It was nice.

Day 2 was the big big day. General Public was allowed in at 1030 and by noon we heard there were lines. Big lines. Mind you, the convention center is like a wall-less pit. No outside light comes in so I didn't even know what time it was or how big the line was or what it was like for the crowd out there but I heard it was pretty crazy how long it was. Saturday I sold mostly stickers and charms.

I think I only ate like half a burrito throughout just because I was too busy. I did get a chance to make phone charms though which seemed to do well.

There were a ton of cosplayers though! This made me happy because you hardly see any in town but there were tons and tons! (And our booth seemed to have the most traffic so that was nice to get pictures of them)

I made back my booth and supplies cost and had an overall good time. I did pretty good for my first convention though I would probably tweak some stuff for next time. I ended up clipping displays of my charm necklace to grid and I would have liked to have a jewelry display holder. I was only able to get postcard sizes of my prints done and didn't get to finish them all or my portrait style ones. But I did good and I'm proud of myself for that.

I had Geek Girl Brunch cards out and got to promote the chapter a bit along with one of our other Officers Alex who had a booth selling her custom hats (you can check her out on Instagram and her Etsy will be opening soon!) so we had a few girls interested. We also had a Ladies Night poster hanging up so I got to let more people know about that! (Too many hats on my head but all well)

At the end of Day 1, we were all kinda exhausted. I ended up passing out on my couch before going to hang out with friends. I didn't even get to work because I passed out again as soon as I got back home. We were dead tired on Sunday morning but were much more prepared.

The crowds weren't as big as Saturday, but Lubbock is a church town so we didn't expect to get crowds until after noon. Last minute buyers were grabbing prints that day so i sold more prints and stickers and a few charms. I was even able to go and grab some prints and stickers myself from other vendors. But by 4:00 the crowd had pretty much disappeared.

Lubbock on Sundays closes down very early. Most retail stores are shut down by 6 and everyone knows that. So it was kinda not surprising. We stayed a couple more hours and sold a few things, but after a long weekend, mostly we just walked around the place, checked in with our friends at the other booths (I bugged Star Comics a bit), and packed up.

Like I said, overall my experience was good. Things could be better but it was a first time convention and I was a first time tabler so there are things to be learned. The hard part is over though. Today we are getting everything ready for the shop to open up tomorrow and I'm very excited. All my prints will be available, #Workcomics, my sketchbook, charm necklaces and phone charms, stickers, buttons, everything. One more push and then I will be able to relax for the rest of the week.

At least until we start getting ready for Ladies Night.

Thank you to everyone that came to see me and buy stuff! It was great meeting everyone! And until next time!

-Sam <3

Ladies Night 2.0

This past Saturday was once again Ladies Night at Star Comics. Planning this event wasn't nearly as stressful as the last one but that may have been because in between multiple road trips, having Geek Girl Brunch's prelaunch brunch, getting #workcomics ready for print, and getting the sketchbooks done, I was all out of stress. I think the most stressful part was getting the art for the flyer just right. I redid it 4 times in about just as many different styles. I'm glad it turned out so well.

Also I didn't bake this time so that took a load off my shoulders.

With this Ladies Night, we changed the format a bit. We raffled off the posters instead of giving them at the door (there was still a line waiting), snacks were put outside to make room in the store, chairs were put out there so people could sit and chat, at the kids table we set it up so they could make their own superhero masks, and we had two featured artists, Koolaid Girl and Kyanne Birley (she dressed up as Lumpy Space Princess!) Allison Terry Images was our event photographer for the night and did an awesome job, getting us some wonderful pictures. Even the local newspapers photographer came by and took some pictures of the event and its attendees.

With Lubbock being a college town and Summer essentially being off season, we didn't have as many people as our first one, but it didn't really matter. We still had a pretty big turnout and the ladies stayed almost the entire time, more space making it easier to chat and browse. The artists had prints for sale and did sketch requests most of the night while people snacked and found something new to read. I saw a lot of ladies from the first event and got to talk to more than a few. It felt more relaxed and comfortable. More like what I had first imagined: a space where girls can just come and chat with other girls with similar interests and find something new to read.

 I think that's my primary goal with the Ladies Night. To give women and girls of all types, transgendered, and non-binary identified a place to go to relax and talk and not feel like they're outcasts. I want to give female artists and photographers and vendors a platform just like I'm trying to give the attendees. Comics are for everyone, not just boys. Nothing is "just for boys." And if a little girl can learn that later on, maybe that'll give her a little empowerment later on when things get tough.

All in all, the night was a success. I'm happy and tired and forever glad to have been given the opportunity to do these events. Free stickers and buttons were grabbed, the posters were raffled, and there were plenty of cute little girls and awesome costumes through the night. Both our artists did tons of sketches and people walked away happy with some new art. Comics were read and suggested. It was a good night.

Much thanks to Star Comics for supporting me and hosting the event. They are continuously rad and so so so so so awesome and definitely helped me to not stress out too much! Thank you to our incredibly talented artists, Koolaid Girl and Kyanne! People loved you and I am grateful to have you both! Go check out their websites to see some super cool art. Thank you to my former roller derby teammate and awesome friend/photographer Allison Terry! These images are gorgeous! If you are in Lubbock, you should definitely get her to do some pictures for you! And thank you to my boyfriend for being our security again. Sorry you couldn't come inside but I appreciate you!

And now it's on to the next thing. Geek Girl Brunch Lubbock launches August 22nd and Hub City Comic Con is the weekend after that. Working on a lot of art and merchandise to get ready and we're getting the art prepped for #Workcomics to get printed. I'll put up more information about that soon! If you aren't aware, I revived my old Youtube channel where I do vlogs and talk comics and stuff so you can check that out.

Time to get back to work.

-Sam <3