Well, it’s in the books!!!
I’m so glad to have been able to go and see all of my old friends and make some new ones! I always learn so much, and have so much fun, and this year was no exception.

To recap, I was working on Yog Sothoth and my Lava Worm. These were the only minis I completed and entered into the MSP Open this year. These are the final results.

I ended up taking home a silver on the Yog Sothoth. I was super stoked about that! Several other people were upset though, so I spoke to my judges. They said that they ‘just wanted more’. Which is fair. I knew I was going for a weird effect, and I am happy with it.

I took a bunch of pictures of some other pieces that I enjoyed. If I took a picture of every single entry I liked, we’d be here all day. But here’s a selection, in no specific order.

There was also tons of swag, and I spent way too much money. But I enjoyed every second of doing it. 😀 I got a lot of ideas for next year, and I had a ‘Target blackout’ at the Kawna minis section. Expect to see a lot of anthro cat minis in the near future… 😀

As I said, we are always excited to see our friends we’ve made over the years, and this year we brought 2 of our friends from home as well! My table is the Old Guys Table, here they are in all their glory. And the other picture is the only group picture we took during the weekend. Did I take one with my whole family that was there? No, no I did not. The Tiniest Overlord was not able to stay awake at one point, and the Great Bearded One had to carry him around all passed out and cute. It was quite a struggle, truly.

Sadly, the Reapercon family (and rest of the world too), lost 2 of our own this past year. Cathy Wappel and Ed Pugh passed this year, and there were several different memorials set up. One of the things that has always been associated with Cathy was the Gummy Bear Painting Challenge. You get a gummy bear (yes, from a bag. the ones you eat), and an hour, and you see who does it the best. I was never able to participate before, but this year I got to! And I won first place! It was a lot of fun, and I have some ideas about future projects relating to this.

Last of all, I had a super awesome opportunity to be an alternate judge at the MSP Open this year! It was a really cool experience to see what each judge looks for and how they award the medals. I was part of the team that judged diorama, and it took us about 4 hours to judge the entries on our lists. It was no joke!! I also got asked to teach some painting classes next year, so that was super exciting as well! GBO and I are working on some plans to make sure I’m able to paint more often this year so that I can really get in the groove and level up.

So, I hope to have more to share more often! I’ll keep you posted! It’s Old Guy Painting night tonight, so I’ll definitely get something going.

-marinealRose