Uwu Con 2024!

 

If you live in Arizona & love Anime conventions and are looking for one in the winter, then Uwu con is your answer! They usually have their event in late October or early November. Over the weekend we attended the 2024 Uwu Con & had a wonderful time. This is our second time at the convention, this year it was hosted at the Westworld of Scottsdale. Let's go over a short run down of this year's event! 

This three-day event offers interactive panels, meet & greets with voice actors, cosplay contests, a car show, dozens of vendors and more. It is a very family friendly event & we always enjoy going with the kids. It is a blast to pick out a cosplay, do some shopping and visit a panel or two. As the convention continues to grow each year, one of the things that I hope improves more and really grows is the panels. There are only a couple panels each day, it would be nice to see a bigger list of options to visit that really range from cosplay, to anime to even board games. 

The vendor alley is always fun to explore, there is a fantastic range of products that include so many fandoms from Marvel & Disney to different anime franchises. Chances are you will find some merch from your favorite characters. You'll also find a range of products including clothing, candles, custom dice, replica weapons and more. 

Getting to see & interact with others who love cosplaying as well is a blast! There are so many amazing and unique costumes at the event & they range from handmade all the way to store bought. While wondering around they have a few photo opportunity spots set up like the Uwu con themed funko box above. They also have a few late-night events for adults like a late-night dance party. I felt like the way everything was set up at this years event was better than how everything was set up last year. So even though Uwu con is done for this year, you should keep it in mind for next year! 

Here is what we purchased from the vendor alley;

Disclaimer- UwU Con. provided media passes for the convention for this review free of charge no other compensation was provided. However, no product compensation will influence the outcome of any review. My honest opinions are used in all reviews, they are solely my own & they may vary from others. My reviews are posted for readers in order to provide an informed decision before purchase.

Evil Izzy's Haunted Emporium Costumes & More - Phoenix, AZ!

As someone who enjoys cosplaying & putting together costume outfits for a variety of events and not just Halloween, it was always a bummer that options for year-round costume shops are slim pickings. I recently found out about Evil Izzy's Haunted Emporium which is new to Phoenix, so I had to visit. They are a year round costume shop located at 4239 W Thunderbird Road Suite B Phoenix, AZ 85053.

The store is still new & they are working on adding more inventory every week. They currently have a great selection of masks, adult costumes, kids costumes, pet costumes & costume accessories. They also have a large special effects makeup section and not the crap they have at Spirit Halloween, but the good makeup that is worth the price.

You'll also find hair dye, candles, random housewares like blankets plus horror themed clothing, ghosts in a jar up for adoption & more. I think this is a spot that I will end up visiting often and look forward to seeing what else they add to the store. Knowing there is a spot not too far from me that has my favorite special effects brand is a huge plus, especially if I run into an issue of needing something last minute for a cosplay.

Prices are about what you would expect at a costume shop/themed store like this. We picked up a Evil dead shirt & it was just over $20 with taxes. If you are in the area & are looking for costume pieces or even just want to take a look I would suggest stopping by to see what you can find.

★ This is not a sponsored post, we paid for this on our own. I enjoy sharing new places to check out in my local area! 

🌵 If you live in Arizona check out the "Things to do in Arizona" section of my blog to find entertainment, restaurants, vacation spots & more. (Click on the name or locate it on the right-hand side of my page). 

Taiyou Con 2024 Highlights + Review!

We are a family that enjoys cosplaying, so it is a no brainer that we enjoy visiting Animie & Cosplay conventions when they pop-up near us. Earlier this month we attended Taiyou Con which is an anime convention that happens at the start of every year. It was held at the Mesa Convention Center; this was my first year attending Taiyou Con & Also the first time I've been inside the Mesa Convention Center. The parking situation was fantastic compared to other conventions we've attended; the parking was included with your ticket & they had parking on site or close parking garages depending on your preference. We arrived shortly after it opened & we had no problem finding a spot to park. Getting out tickets, going through prop check & bad check was a breeze we had everything taken care of & were inside within five minutes of arriving. I really enjoyed all of the cherry blossom trees & decorations that had both outside the convention center & inside. Tickets for this event ranged from $35-$50 for a single day pass or you could get a multiday pass for a discounted price. For a convention this is a good price especially since you get an actual badge once you arrive to the convention & it covers parking as well. 

Inside of the convention center is where the majority of the events were taking place. Some conventions can be a bit confusing when trying to figure out what is going on event wise, when & where. Thankfully Taiyou Con had a phone app you could download that had schedules for all three days of the event along with where it was taking place, a map of the convention & more. I liked using the app, it was extremely helpful when it came to pre-planning our day before even arriving to the convention. The app also allowed you to add the panels you were interested in attending to a schedule & it would remind you of that panel fifteen minutes before it was due to begin so you didn't miss it. Now that we have the basic convention information out of the way, let's get down to what all we did, take a look at some of the cosplays we saw & go over a spot that could use just a slight improvement. 

Overall, we had a fantastic time at Taiyou Con, I think the only area we thought could use a slight improvement was the number & type of panels there were each day of the event. I hadn't attended last year, but my husband & daughter had gone, and they had more panels that included things like specific anime Kahoots quizzes. This portion of the convention does also heavily rely on the number of participants who sign up to host a panel, game, etc. I think it would be fun to host a panel or put on a fandom-based quiz/game for cosplayers to participate in. It may be something I look into doing next year. If panels aren't your thing & you are wanting to meet some of the voices behind your favorite characters, they had quite a few voice actors singing autographs & taking photos with fans. The price for a autograph or photo ranged from guest to guest, some even had the option to have them customize a recording for you, how neat would that be? 

The sellers' market was set up nicely, I found that it was easy to navigate through & even with the amount of people at the convention you were able to browse the stalls at your own pace. There was a nice mixture of small hand-made sellers alongside re-sellers & a few slightly larger businesses that came to the market. Included in one of the market sections were a few cosplayers signing photos & talking with everyone. While I do enjoy other aspects of cosplay & anime conventions, I would have to say that the market area is probably my favorite spot to visit. I always love looking through all of the goods & finding some new favorite items to take home. None of us left empty handed, we all found something we purchased to bring home. Some of the sellers even had fun mystery games you could play, and mystery bags that could be purchased! At one of the booths, they had one of those "Let's go fishing" board games where you hook a fish using a magnet. Each fish had a number on it that let you know what kind of prize you won. Below is a photo of all the loot we ended up bringing home;

While browsing the shops, it also gives you an up-close chance to check out everyone's cosplays. There were tons of fantastic cosplays, many of which I recognized & some I didn't. We saw great group cosplays like the One Piece Straw Hats crew & matching family cosplays like The Incredibles along with tons of stand-alone cosplays. As for us, my husband went as Kenny Ackerman from Attack on Titan, I went as Hange from Attack on Titan in her commander outfit, my son went as Sanz from Undertale & my daughter went as Shanks from One Piece. Here is a look at some of the awesome cosplays we came across, do you recognize any of the characters below??

If you get hungry, no need to worry, you have plenty of options! There were food trucks, vendors with snacks & a spot inside where they serve food. There are also vending machines or because you are allowed to leave and come back in, you could either bring food to have a small picnic outside or grab food nearby. The prices all ranged but there was something for everyone's budget & there are some neat dishes to try out. My son has been wanting to try boba tea, so he was happy there was a stand selling some for him to try. In the middle of the food area, you'll find a DJ booth & dance floor, there was a DJ playing while we were eating lunch & there were several people out on the dance floor having a great time. It really added to the whole experience & it was fun watching everyone have a good time dancing. I also appreciated that they had plenty of seating in the food area, it wasn't hard to find a spot to sit down in the shade to enjoy our meal before heading to check out more shops and panels.  This convention was very family friendly & we all felt comfortable, relaxed and happy with our experience at Taiyou Con. 

Have you ever been to an Animie or Cosplay Convention? Does this sound or look like an event you would enjoy attending?? What character would you want to cosplay as for an event like this???

🌵 If you live in Arizona check out the "Things to do in Arizona" (Click or locate it on the right-hand side of my page) section of my blog to find entertainment, restaurants, vacation spots & more. This was not a sponsored review, we paid to get into the zoo ourselves. I enjoy being able to share spots like this with my readers who may not be able to visit in person but are still interested in learning more about these spots, or for anyone planning vacations in the area. 

Disclaimer- Taiyou Con provided me with two passes to the con for the review free of charge no other compensation was provided. However, no product compensation will influence the outcome of any review. My honest opinions are used in all reviews, they are solely my own & they may vary from others. My reviews are posted for readers in order to provide an informed decision before purchase or attending an event.

UwU Con 2023 - Anime Convention Reivew!

Conventions can be such a fun way to connect with people who share similar interests as yourself, which is why it used to be sad when there was only one big cosplay convention that would come each year. But now there are a few other conventions popping up through out the year which gives cosplayers more opportunities to show off their hard work. Recently UwU Con hosted it's second three day convention for all anime & cosplay lovers at the Legacy sports complex in Mesa. This event included specialty panels, guest actors, creators and cosplayers along with dozens of vendors, food trucks, tattoo artists and more. This was a three day event, you could purchase tickets for the entire three days or select just one date that worked best for you. Tickets ranged from $35-$55 for a single day, $95 for all three days or they had a squad bundle + VIP package for purchase. Children ages 10 & under received free admission with paying adult. Additional passes you could purchase was a Otaku pass which allowed you to meet & get autographs from all of the Japanese voice actors that day, and they had individual photo ops & signature opportunities with the rest of the voice actors which range in price. My family & I received media passes to stop by & check out the event, we had a blast and we can't wait until it comes back next year. What did we dress as for this event? I dressed as Chopper from One Piece, my son went as Sans from Undertale, my daughter went as Sephiroth from Final Fantasy & my husband went as Nightcrawler from X-men. 

We've been to a few comic & anime conventions in the past and I have to say I think this is one of our favorite convention we've been to. I like the complex it was hosted at, it is a decent drive for us to reach it, however I enjoy how the complex is laid out it made everything easy to navigate. Getting our passes & getting into the con was a breeze, it took us less than five minutes to get through security, get our badge and get into the convention doors. The event offered several panels throughout the day, we had checked the website before we left & there was a panel or two that we thought about checking out depending on how everything went time wise. I had checked under the "schedules" section however I didn't realize there was a small link on the homepage with a bigger program for the event so there were two panels I would have loved to see, but we missed them as we weren't aware of them at the time of the event. If we attend again next year I will have to be sure to keep a better eye out for the link on their page. 

When you first enter into the convention you walk into event hall B where they had merchandise vendors, a main stage where panels were taking place & the area where actors/creators were singing autographs + taking photos. (Prices varied depending on who you wanted an autograph from). We really enjoyed how they had their vendor hall set up, there were over 150+ vendors but you didn't feel cramped. The area where they had the vendors set up was huge & they had plenty of space in the isles in between each section of vendors so you were able to stroll and view wares are your own pace without feeling the need to rush, get out of someone else's way or feel claustrophobic. I'd definitely say that the vendor area is where we end up spending most of our time at conventions, it is so easy to lose time going around looking at everything the vendors have to offer. It is a lot of fun to window shop, remember favorites you want to shop from online & of course pick up some goods along the way. While browsing the vendors we were also chatting with others who cosplayed, stopped for photos with cosplays we enjoyed & also stopped to take photos with those who asked. 

When it came time for lunch, there were plenty of food options to select from. Not only was there a food alley where quite a few food trucks & food vendors had set up shop, but the sports complex itself has a few food spots. We bought food from two of the food trucks, one of which we've already tried & my husband loves them, the other was new to us. There were also quite a few drink vending machines scattered all over the event so you didn't have to worry about finding a drink if you wanted one. Since the event was hosted at a sports complex there were quite a few bleachers lining the walls where you could sit & take a break if you needed to & there was plenty of seating in the food areas so you didn't have to resort to sitting on the floor if you needed a place to rest/eat. 

Along with snapping photos with fellow cosplayers, there were several spots set up with fun backgrounds & even a funko pop style box for you to take photos in front of/in which we found to be a lot of fun. Over all the event was very low stress & a ton of fun for the whole family! Since the event was right before Halloween many of the vendors has small buckets of candy or small packs of Halloween themed Pokemon cards that they were giving away to kids who visited their booths which added an extra layer of fun for our kids. If you are in Arizona you should follow their social media pages so you can be kept up to date on when they will be hosting their next event.

Here is a look at what we bought from vendors at the convention! We also received some freebies from different mini games at vendor booths that aren't shown here. 

Does this sound like a convention you would enjoy? What do you think your favorite part would be?

🌵 If you live in Arizona check out the "Things to do in Arizona" (Click or locate it on the right-hand side of my page) section of my blog to find entertainment, restaurants, vacation spots & more. 

Disclaimer- UwU Con. provided media passes for the convention for this review free of charge no other compensation was provided. However, no product compensation will influence the outcome of any review. My honest opinions are used in all reviews, they are solely my own & they may vary from others. My reviews are posted for readers in order to provide an informed decision before purchase.

Ace Comic Con Glendale!

**This was not a paid post. My honest opinions were used, they are solely my own & they may vary from others. I received two passes to the Ace Comic Con in Glendale in exchange for a review free of charge.**

It doesn't matter what fictional world you are a fan of comic con is a blast for everyone! This past weekend a convention called Ace Comic Con was in Arizona at the Gila River Arena for three days. The comic con featured a large number of vendors, different foods, celebrity appearances with photo & signature ops plus is also offered everyone who loves to Cosplay a chance to dress up. Tickets were $65-$75 for a single day depending on which day you went on, $125 for a three day pass and they also offered photo ops, autograph ops and VIP packages that ranged in price from $65-$645 for packages.

This year celebrity appearances included Tom Hiddleston, Charlie Cox, Michael Fassbender, Tye Sheridan, Alexandra Shipp, David Tennant & More. The nice thing about Ace was that you were able to attend all the Q&A's no matter what type of admission ticket was purchased, the first half of the session we were able to sit and listen to a small interview with the stars then the audience was able to line up and ask questions if they wanted to. The only thing I disliked about the Q&A we sat in was that there we so many speakers in such a small area that there was a echo making it hard to hear both the celebrity speakers, the host and the fans asking questions. The celebrity speakers on stage were having a difficult time hearing as well and had to ask many of the fans asking questions to repeat themselves due to the speakers. You never know what is in store for Q&A's, sadly I had to leave before he came on but when Charlie Cox (Daredevil) was on Tom Hiddleston decided to join him on stage for a bit. It was crazy how far some of the fans came to enjoy the con and see their favorite celebrities.

Along with Q&A's they also had a number of interactive shows and live performances with artists including a thirty minute drawing class with Mark Kistler, A trivia contest, A costume contest, A live crayon carving session with @Mumblestohimself (you may have seen his work on Instagram) and more. Vendor wise there was a ton of art work and comic books with some sculptures, stuffed animals, clothing and more. Each time we visit a con or similar events we always look for a print or a piece of artwork to bring home, this time was no different we picked up a cute Stitch sketch by Jonathan Hallett which will be going on our wall once we buy a frame for it. 

  Photo Credit IG @lv_cosplay_sickness - Two Cosplayers as 
Magneto & Professor X with my husband as a Two-faced 
inspired Nightcrawler/Gambit.

It was nice seeing the assortment of costumes at the con, there is always a mixture of people who do their cosplay's exactly as the characters are and then there are others who have fun with it and put a mix on the costume or come up with a character all of their own. I saw a mixture of costumes from video games, movies, and comics along with people in steampunk and renaissance wear, some handmade some store bought but all fun to see. Everyone has a great time walking around taking photos with each other and appreciating everything the con has to offer. My husband and I attended the event and decided to dress as some of our favorite X-men characters, we didn't get to stay nearly as long as we had wanted. I wore a pair of high heeled boots that went fantastic with my outfit, however I didn't think about the fact that I don't wear heels often so after about four hours of walking around I ended up with some giant blisters on my pinky toes and needed to get out of my shoes so we went home but we has a blast at the con and look forward to future Ace events. Last year Ace hosted events in only four states so keep an eye out for them to head to your state or a state near you! I will post on my FB about any upcoming events I hear about but for now it is only the Phoenix event they have listed on their site.
 

Zedtown Event Review!

**This was not a paid post. My honest opinions are used (both good and bad), they are solely my own & they may vary from others. I received four passes to the event for promotional purposes. It was provided by Zedtown for the review free of charge.**

It's no secret that zombies have become increasingly popular over the last several years, from video games to TV shows it seems like almost everyone loves something that has to do with zombies. Now you can add a live action zombie hunting game to the list of zombie themed fun. Zedtown is a mixture of tag using Nerf guns, the color run/ a live action Call of Duty game and LARPing, the whole thing was a blast and a half and was an experience unlike anything I've ever done before.

 

Zedtown originated in Australia but has been hitting various cities across the US for one to two days per stop, when they came through Arizona they set up shop at Rawhide which is a old western themed attraction we have here that has plenty of open space for a game like this. They have two ticket options for purchase, which are survivor tickets and Alpha zombie tickets. The event lasts for four hours from start to finish and there are several easy to follow rules in place to keep everyone safe such as only allowing certain Nerf gun ammo, being asked not to shoot anyone directly in the face and more. In total there were about 550 people at the event on the Saturday we attended (including staff), only 16 of them started off as Zombies!

Survivors need to bring Nerf guns or rolled up socks (used like bombs/grenades) to use to defeat the zombies who will be running around, when you arrive to the event you meet up with your faction color and download the Zedtown app which sends you missions and information during the event. Not only do the survivors have to fend off zombies but they also have to face each other! There are three factions in total, Red, Gold and Blue all of which have their own leader and will do different missions such as collecting gas to fuel their generators. Before heading to Zedtown you have the option to dress up based off of the suggestions given for the faction, for example the Red faction can dress like Mad Max or Borderlands characters while the gold faction can dress like Hunger games characters. If you do decide to dress up there is a costume contest at the end.

For those who purchase Alpha Zombie tickets, you arrive early and get treated to a seat in the makeup chair while a makeup artist transforms you into a zombie! Our group was split on how we wanted to start out, my husband and I started off as Zombies and the rest of our group went as survivors. Since we saw they were having a costume contest my husband wanted to dress up as a charger which is a character from the video game Left For Dead, we've done the costume in the past before but this time we ramped it up and fixed a few things on it making it better than before. I decided I would get my makeup done at the event instead of doing it at home so that I could see what their process was like.

My Thoughts;

I was honestly a little worried about the event at first, I am a big baby and sometimes my anxiety gets the best of me so I was worried about being split off from the rest of my group. However once everything got started I was perfectly fine and had a wonderful time. When we first arrived we made sure to get there early so I could get my makeup done. It was neat arrive early because several of the people who had arrived at the same time we did were checking out my husbands costume and asking for photos. They had several security measures in place to keep everything fun and safe, We went through a decent check in process where they used the metal detector wands, did bag checks, nerf gun checks and more. After getting through the checks my husband and I were directed to the zombie area where all the zombies would stay out of site until the event started.

The makeup process was fun although I wish they were doing it in a better lit room as the poor lighting made it hard to see and photograph in the room. Makeup wise I was quite happy with my makeup, the process was longer than I had expected it to be which is nice since Alpha Zombie tickets cost more than survivor tickets. Prior to the event I had thought there would be more zombies starting off so I figured it out be a five minute makeup process but it ended up being closer to a half hour. Once all the zombies were transformed we had to wait until the start of the game before wandering out so no one would see us, during the waiting time they ran down the rules and how to turn survivors into zombies. Like the survivors the zombies also had someone leading us and helping us along the way, they were both known as the Boss Zombies and were unable to be "killed" in the game.

They had gathered all the survivors into the middle of the western town so the mayor could make an announcement and tell everyone the rules of the game, towards the end of the instructions they opened up a gate which is when all of us dressed as zombies ran out. As soon as you started running out a adrenaline rush hit, all of the survivors started screaming and running to get away from the zombies and head to their faction head quarters. During the initial zombie release several people had dropped their nerf gums, ammo and more trying to run away and many others ended up falling and tripping trying to get away it was a bit chaotic but a lot of fun and resulted in several good laughs.

During the course of the game survivors were given tasks which took them through the other factions territories and of course near the zombies so they had to watch their backs constantly. It was a lot of fun being a zombie because you were able to hide and chase after people to "tag" them as a zombie, once you tagged someone they gave you their Zedtown dogtags (given to them at the start of the game) for you to scan and turn them into a zombie on the Zedtown app. After being turned into a zombie they were instructed to go to the zombie hub to thrown on some zombie makeup and re-enter the game as a zombie. Remember how I said at the start that we started out with 16 zombies (18 if you include the two boss zombies) and almost 500 survivors? Only about sixty people made it out alive as survivors by the end, some of the aplha zombies were pretty fast and racked up a lot of "kills".

As a zombie if you were shot and killed you had to return to the zombie hub and wait to re-spawn in the game. They had a small station set up that had a count down and music that would play, once the time and music stopped you re-entered the western town to hunt for more survivors. To keep track of who was who they gave everyone colored headbands, green meant you were a zombie. We were required to wear the headbands during the entire event and if we were shot we had to lower the headband to let the survivors know we were out and needed to re-spawn.

This event was one of the best events I've been to, everything was well thought out and executed. If you didn't bring a bag to carry your Nerf guns in after you were turned into a zombie they had a bag check area where you could store your guns, they also had paramedics on hand, water coolers out for everyone and marshals walking around to help anyone with questions or problems. The only thing we had a boo moment with was my husband was a bit disappointed zombies weren't included in the costume contest, but I can see why they wouldn't because most who are arriving as zombies don't do their own makeup. I am a bit jealous of the people who get to work with and travel with Zedtown it seems like a fun place to work. There is a ton of information that goes with this event but not enough space to write about it all! If you want more information on this event or to see if it is coming to a town near you (or you can request that they do) check out their website and facebook for photos, information and more.