When people find out I am a Cosplayer, I get a lot of reactions. The most common one is disbelief. I am a homemaker and Real Estate Investor and I dress very conservatively. You don’t really expect your Landlord to go home at night and be working on a superhero outfit, but that is what I do to get ready for Dragon*Con.

I started planning costumes for this year’s Dragon*Con at last year’s Dragon*Con. My boyfriend and I head down with around 40 of our friends and a lot of us Cosplay. I am doing 5 costumes this year and three of them are group costumes. I love the group costumes the most because they allow me to spend time sewing with my girlfriends. I’m not a very experienced seamstress, so I tend to need a lot of help. I try to commission what I can, and this year one of my friends volunteered to make me a costume; which is awesome! I’m better at finding materials and items to modify to meet my purposes. Dragon*Con also serves as my motivation for staying in shape. You have extra incentive for hitting the gym when you know you are going to be squeezing into some spandex.

I will be dressing as Bubbles, as part of a group Power Puff Girl Costume; Captain America, as part of a group Avenger’s in Ball Gowns Costume; and Dr. Lauren Lewis, as part of a group Sci-Fi’s Lost Girl Costume. My individual costumes are Ms. Marvel and Emma Frost. I also have a great Dragon Costume that I pieced together from found items to wear to the nightly Rave at Dragon*Con. If I can finish in time I plan on entering a costume contest as Aleta from Marvel Comic’s Guardian’s of the Galaxy. Wait, is that more than five?

I have one costume left and just a few days to complete it so I plan on getting no sleep and lots of hot glue gun burns. Possibly even worse injuries since the Aleta costume requires cutting Plexiglas. It will all be worth it when I get to Atlanta, slip out of my conservative look and become part of the spectacle that is Dragon*Con!