I’m not sure where to start…sleeping through my alarms (all ten of them!!), running late picking up a friend, or having a hard time finding parking. But, I guess I’ll start with how I brought along a friend’s son to his first ever convention, sadly he didn’t know he needed a ticket. Anime Washington had sold out for Saturday, but we met a kind family who was also looking for another ticket, and they helped us to get one along with them. It was a super kind thing for a complete stranger to do, and we were extremely grateful.
Just walking into the convention, I was having a blast seeing the kid’s face light up seeing everyone in cosplay. He kept telling me how he was trying to count all the different cosplays, then gave up and tried to just count all his favorites. It was a fun game to play, and I had a real blast teaching all about the best ways to go around a con and staying health aware (water, remember to drink water at conventions!). We had a nice rest when we found tabletop gaming. We worked on a Jujutsu Kaisen puzzle (incredibly hard).We gave up after an hour or so, it was just so tricky. We want to stop by on Sunday and see if anyone else was able to put more of it together.
There were so many kind cosplayers on the first day of con too! Right away I ran into more My Hero Academia cosplayers (as I was cosplaying Bakugou) and we hit it off right away. By the end of the day a group of us (five in total) were doing silly photos, videos, creating a chat group, and making plans for future cons. I don’t think I have ever been so happy and excited meeting and making new cosplayer friends.
There were also some really amazing cosplays today too! So many cute kids all cosplayed up, I was approached by a Sakura (from Naruto) and a Froppy (My Hero Academia). They were absolutely adorable and kindly asked me for a photo of us fighting, there was no way I was going to refuse this request at all!
My friend’s kid I took today was also inspiring me with his wide eyed look at the convention, it made me remember the first time I ever went to con. The more questions he asked about con and chatted happily about what he loved so far, just kept bringing more and more of my first few cons back to the surface. Wonderfully happy memories of my dad taking me to conventions and all the funny stunts he used to pull at them.
I didn’t end up meeting any voice actors today, every time I went by Sakura and Sasuke’s (from Naruto) line it was just too long for me. I do love them both dearly, so I’ll try to see them tomorrow or at MegaCon (the next con in just a few days). But I’m so ready for Sunday, and am looking forward to taking more photos and some more silly shenanigans with friends! I’m also planning on trying to get a bit more sleep and let myself sleep in a bit before getting ready and heading back over to con. There are still tickets available for Sunday, I recommend stopping by for some shopping (almost too many great vendors), and seeing all the great cosplay!
Are you going to be at Anime Washington this weekend? Feel free to leave a comment below or chat with us on Twitter/X at @TheConCollectve, Threads at @theconventioncollective, or Bluesky at @theconcollective.bsky.social
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