Nimona Science Buddies!

Whew! Where to even start fangirling about getting to meet Noelle Stevenson, aka Gingerhaze, at this weekend's AOD con? Maybe let's start with proof:

Aaaah there she is right next to us! She was super nice and possibly just as excited to see us dressed up as we were to see her.

My sister Emily and I have been planning this cosplay ever since we found out Gingerhaze would be in our hood. We both love the webcomic Nimona, and we both love science, so it was only natural that we dress up as Dr. Meredith Blitzmeyer* and Ballister Blackheart as Gregor at the Science Expo.

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How do you think we did? Close enough?

Why hello there! Come check out this Anomalous Energy Enhancer!

I say now, there's a science if there ever was one. 

The tubing on the side had escaped its hot glue by this point. 

As I mentioned before, I started out by making the red cat Nimona to go around Emily's shoulders, and the last couple weeks have been a scramble to make the lab coat, goggles, beard, and cape. The lab coat was fairly easy as costumes go -- I used the back piece from Simplicity 2365 and the front piece and sleeves from Simplicity 2246, then modified them for length and design features -- and of course, I wouldn't be me if I didn't make it from a thrifted sheet. Yay for stashbusting while making fun costumes! It's actually very functional and has good mobility, so I guess there's nothing keeping it from being a "real" lab coat. The red cloak of disguise was another thrifted sheet, but I went out and bought it specifically for this costume. So sue me. It was a bit trickier to design since most of the times we see Ballister wearing it, it 1) manages to still show most of what he's wearing, and 2) has these swathes of fabric that cover the top part of his chest.  The final cape ended up not being totally screen-accurate (panel-accurate?), but I guess it doesn't really matter since the yarn beard hid most of the front...also Emily loved it, so that's always good. The final touch to it all was making the business cards that Dr. Blitzmeyer hands out.

I managed to obscure the goggle lenses by ironing a couple sheets of iridescent cellophane together and then cutting out circles to fit. Visibility was only somewhat obscured; the real challenge, though, was that the goggles kept fogging up. 

I'm pretty pleased with how the yarn beard turned out! I used about half a skein of fairly bulky yarn and loosely followed this tutorial; the main difference was that I secured the beard to a headband.

Is there anything so fun as an excellently swooshy cape? It was so fun walking behind Emily and getting to see it billow dramatically behind her.

I only ended up passing out a few :(

After the initial giddiness of meeting Gingerhaze, we spent another couple hours wandering around looking at all the wares, art, and of course, other cosplayers:

BBC Sherlock! He likes science, right?

And Ms. Frizzle -- she definitely likes science.

Not science-related, but check out this ridiculously awesome Magikarp. I may have screamed a little bit and then went running through the hotel trying to track it down.

Seriously, best use of a sleeping bag ever...

We wrapped up the day by going back to Gingerhaze's booth to pick up the sketch we commissioned:

Science buddies! I was so tempted to ask for Party King Thranduil, but in the end decided there needed to be more Nimona art.

Oops, we're standing in the wrong positions.

It was a very good day for all. Oh, except for the family cats, because when you have a yarn beard, the natural thing to do is to make them try it on:

Poor Gummy. 

Poor Fenxi. Don't worry, they got lots of treats afterward.

*Not a witch.