Greetings to everyone!

Well our art commissions are trickling back in and we have a set of new
full-color logo shirts from Chris Curran. We look forward to showing them off
at PenguiCon and MichiCon this weekend. And yes, we will be at BOTH. Sadly, we
will not be able to attend the Palladium Open House as well. But there is a lot
of fun things going on this weekend, get out there and enjoy yourselves! :)

We are also thrilled with the wonderful interpretation of our Anime
mascots Mishu and Buddha. Angel Melzak did a great job of interpreting what we
wanted and was patient about changes and tweaking needed to get them just right.
We will be showing off her work on the site shortly. If you like what you see,
you can order things from her at: http://kuroitenshi.com

It may take some time, but her work is lovely.

If you want to see more of Chris Curran's work you can visit him on
myspace. http://www.myspace.com/sacredspatulastudios

We are still anxiously awaiting the logo re-imaging by
Nigel Sade, but he may not be able to finish by PenguiCon. He's got a lot of
commissions right now and is working very hard. Still, if you like his art
style, there is nothing else that will do! :)

You can see his work at his website: http://www.nigelsade.com/
Or you can see his myspace at: http://www.myspace.com/nigelsade

NOW! We attended Furry Connection North as a dealer this year instead of
just as a guest. IT WAS EXCELLENT!! I only wish we could have stayed at the
hotel instead of driving each day. Yours truly does NOT do well on 4 hours of
sleep and then 4 hours +2 hours later of sleep for the 2nd day. And I'm still
working on my stress reactions. Honestly, I'm doing better than I was but I
don't know if I will ever master the Southern level of grace some of my family
had. Didn't help to awaken from nightmares related to my brother's death. His
memorial was only last weekend and I'm sure I'm still processing. Still, you
have to work when work is at hand, and on those days music can be a blessed
friend.

But back to the convention! I missed seeing the person with the
Nishiki-goi/Koi costume but the variety of costumes that were there were
AMAZING! There are some very talented people there, fantastic artists that I
personally *love* and so many really nice people in general that it was a joy to
be there.

I got to do my first set of presentations and I think they went rather
well. What's really great is that I learned from the attendees as well so I can
refine the talks and offer more next time. Oh-and furry people do seem to rise
up a LOT faster than gamers for morning talks! Heh heh!

The staff of FCN are excellent. They managed little and big problems so
well that most of the convention never knew anything went awry at all. The
convention is in its second year and growing well. But the fandom is still
small so there is a feeling of being included rather than simply a fish swimming
upstream. If you can attend, I would go. They really do try to offer something
for everyone, from vehicle maintenance to tips on writing. And I got to see
both Uncle Kage and the Ranting Gryphon be there (although I only got to see
Kage's talk.) The whole thing was, fun, entertaining, and busy! We loved it
and hope to be there next year!

So remember-PenguiCon and MichiCon this week. See ya there!