Fall book haul
Bought
- Map of the Otherlands by Heather Fawcett (Fairyloot)
- Immortal Dark by Tigest Girma
- The Games Gods Play by Abigail Owen
- The Last Dragon on Mars by Scott Reintgen
- Somewhere Beyond the Sea by TJ Klune
- When the Moon Hatched by Sarah A. Parker (Fairyloot)
- Ouroboros duology by H.E. Edgmon (Illumicrate)
From subs
- Mistress of Lies by K.M. Enright (Illumicrate, August)
Romantasy Con Recap & Haul
Haul
Freebies from the High Lady tote bag:
- Romantasy Con 2024 tote
- The Glass Mermaid by Melanie Karsak
- Wicked is the Reaper by Nisha J. Tuli
- A Dawn With the Wolf Night by Elise Kova
- Dragon diamond painting
- Amethyst dragon statue
- “So many books, so little time” campfire mug
- Random swag
I was able to get all 3 of the books signed!
Freebies from the market:
- SO MUCH SWAG!
- A crap ton of stickers too
- A couple keychains
- A candle from an author (not pictured because I gave it to my friend who ended up not being able to go, so I don’t remember where it was from or who the author was *facepalm*)
Things I bought:
- Romantasy Con 2024 shirt (that I was able to get signed by ALL the authors!)
- Romantasy Con mug & “I’m my own fucking hero” mug from Sunset Hill Stoneware
- Moonflower nectar wax melts from Deep Soul Candles
- The Cupcake Witch by Melanie Karsak
- The Book Witch by Melanie Karsak
- His to Love by Elena H. Covens
- Mini 3D printed bearded dragon
- There were 4-5 stickers that I paid for
- Lupai & Astral sprite bookmarks (from Of Shadow & Moonlight by Luna Laurier)
I also got the books I bought signed!
Recap
Romantasy Con was SO MUCH FUN!! I was incredibly lucky to have been chosen as an influencer (thank you, Fabled Fantasy Events)! I was originally going with my coworker/friend, but she was on her honeymoon in Iceland the week before, so decided it was too much to fly to Florida right after coming home from that trip. She ended up giving one of my other friends her ticket so it wouldn’t get wasted!
Thursday
We had to register on Thursday, so we went to do that first. It was honestly a bit of a nightmare, because we had to park at the hotel, and when we went to get out we realized they charged TWENTY FIVE DOLLARS! How fucking ridiculous is that?! We were there for all of 20 minutes. There was only a flat rate per day instead of hourly, and there was no parking pass for the Con. It posed a problem, because the evening events every day were several hours after the day events. We had to pay again to go the cocktail hour.
Thursday night was the mingle and cocktail hour. When we arrived we went straight to the painting station instead of checking out the other stuff, because someone there said it would get packed and we didn’t want to miss out. I kinda wish we’d done the other stuff first, because painting took FOREVER (but hey, it came out pretty cool – see top pic!) and by the time we got back to the other side of things, there were no gifts left in the box for people with keys (they came with the High Lady/Lord tier). Womp womp. But we were able to make it to Threshing, which was fun! There were little cauldrons that you had to throw balls into, and when you got one in you could go pick out a dragon (3D printed). They also had some hors d’oeuvres and free pizza in the bar.
I didn’t get a good pic, but we dressed like dragon riders for cocktail hour!
Friday
Friday was the first day of market, and there was SO much! There were tons of authors with books and swag/merch, as well as several bookish merch shops. I had a great time meeting all the authors and checking out all kinds of books to add to my TBR. We spent hours walking around looking at stuff. As you can see, I made out like a bandit! I got TONS of free swag, and spent too much money lol.
Friday night was the Realm of Romantasy event! I spent forever on my hair and makeup. We decided to Uber to the hotel this time to save a little money, which was kind of a pain in the butt. It was too expensive to Uber from the AirBNB, so we were planning to park close to the hotel and Uber from that point. There was this shopping center we thought we could go to, but the layout was whack (it was almost like it’s own freakin’ amusement park) and we got stuck in there, and it was too complicated for an Uber driver to find. So we wasted a bunch of time driving around figuring out where we could park and safely leave the car for a few hours. We finally ended up parking at McDonald’s, and by the time we got to the event we were late. (And honestly, Uber wasn’t even that much cheaper than the hotel parking after two trips, but oh well.)
The event was so cool! It was by far my favorite part of the whole Con. There were tables set out with various DIY crafts stations on them, like masquerade masks and bookmarks. There was a place setup where you could do archery – it was plastic arrows, but still fun! We did a couple rounds of that, then went to stand in line for axe throwing. And OMG, that was waaay harder than I expected it to be haha! I was utterly terrible at axe throwing, I think I hit the target like twice out of a dozen throws XD
After axe throwing, we went to get henna done as well as a tarot reading! I’m gonna be honest, I don’t even remember what the guy told me in the reading, lol oops.
Saturday
Saturday was day 2 of the market. We weren’t planning to stay as long, since we had already walked around all day Friday. But we both bought event shirts, and I had the idea to get them signed by all the authors, so that’s what we spent the whole day doing! We barely made it, but we managed to get them signed by EVERY SINGLE author at the Con! No small feat, because 3 of the authors were ticketed and we didn’t sign up for anything in advance. We were able to score cancellation spots for one of them, but the other two we squeaked in by pure luck. We asked the attendants if we were able to go in just to get the shirts signed, and they were really gracious and let us in. We also had an issue finding a couple of the authors – several were MIA for hours and it took a while to track them down. Then we just had one single author left, and her friend said she’d already left for the day. I was so bummed! I ended up finding her on Instagram and asked if she’d be back at any point, and she said she would. We messaged back and forth trying to figure out a meet up spot, and we kept missing each other. I was about to give up, but by a stroke of pure luck we passed her coming up the stairs as we were going downstairs to leave! It was awesome!
Saturday night was the masquerade ball. It was my first ever ball, and I had a lot of fun! I will say, we had a lot of stress along the way and the night started off a little rocky. We were both struggling with hair and makeup, and we ended up being 45 minutes late to the ball. I had press on nails (in the henna pic), and popped a nail off in the first 5 minutes we were there and spent a good 15 looking for the damn thing. I did find it, though! I worked so hard on them and wasn’t about to lose one, lol.
But the rest of the night was great! They had yummy cakes and snacks, and a drink bar. The drinks were hella expensive at the hotel, but we got a couple of drink tickets in our bag for free ones. There were plenty of photo ops, a throne area for the high court, and a dance floor. We also got live entertainers like an acrobat, a dancer, and the hoop guy (I don’t know what to call him lmao). You can see a recap of the masquerade ball on my TikTok!
We got to see so many amazing costumes over the weekend! It was all so much fun and I hope to do it again some day!
What I learned
So, honestly, I planned VERY poorly for this event. I didn’t really know what to expect, and I just kinda figured I’d just show up and have fun, lol. Turns out there were a lot of things you had to sign up in advance for – namely, the big hitter authors (like Adalyn Grace) and workshops that would have been cool to go to. There was an elf ear crafting workshop I’d have loved to go to but missed out on because they were full by the time I realized you had to register for things. It was a bummer. So, if I ever attend again I would definitely plan better! I’d also leave more time and be more prepared for the major events that took hours to get into costume for. Ideally, I’d have loved to have paid to have my hair done there instead of fighting with it for hours.
What I’ve been up to lately
September
Work was a little rough in September because I was feeling some major burnout. Getting away for a week helped a little, but we were so busy at the Con the whole weekend that I almost needed a vacation from my vacation! My general life burnout wasn’t really eased at all by vacation. I was also feeling pretty depressed going into November and just struggling with everything in general. November and December are hard months for me ever since I lost my parents. Not only because of the holidays (which I hate now, without them), but my dad’s bday was Nov 2 and my mom’s was Dec 18. I would be happy to just skip the last two months of the year entirely.
The best thing that happened in September was I got to see Falling in Reverse! They were AMAZING!! I went with two of my besties, we drove to Indianapolis for it (about an hour away). Tech N9ne and Black Veil Brides opened for them. Tech N9ne isn’t really my cup of tea, but I was STOKED to see BVB finally! I’ve been wanting to see them for years. They put on a great show, too.
I also attended my coworker’s wedding in September. It was absolutely beautiful and I had a great time drinking and dancing with my work friends!
October
I took a week long vacation with a couple of friends while we were in Orlando for Romantasy Con, and rented a super cute AirBNB for the 3 of us. The place was great! It was disgustingly hot or raining (because of the hurricane) pretty much the whole time we were there, so we didn’t do much else. I did get to go to Friendly’s for the first time in over a decade, which is great! It was always my favorite restaurant growing up. I moved right down the street from one and it ended up closing within like a month of me moving -eye roll-
The AirBNB had a pool, so I did a lot of lounging near the pool or hanging inside in the AC to escape the heat. I wanted to do more walking, but it was just so hot that if I didn’t get up and go at 7 am I couldn’t handle how hot it was. So I didn’t do much of that, lol.
We ended up having to leave a day early because of the hurricane, and boy was it rough. Everyone else was trying to get out of the state, too, so the highway was backed up for miles. (I saw later that many people were breaking down on the interstate because they ran out of gas and couldn’t get out of the traffic!) It took us almost 20 hours to get home and it’s usually a 13-14 hour trip. It was awful!
In October I also got to see From Ashes to New, Set it off, New Years Day, and If Not for Me in concert together. It was amazing! FAtN is bomb AF live – seeing them live at Inkcarceration in July bumped them into my top 5 bands. If you ever get the chance to see them, I highly recommend you do so! Set it Off had fantastic energy, and the other two bands were great as well.
November
In November I went to YALLfest, though, which is something I look forward to every single year! You can see my full recap of the event here!
I hosted book club in November for Thanksgiving and we did a carry in with the theme of charcuterie boards. Everyone picked a type – alcohol, candy, pasta, dip, etc. I made a dessert board. It was a great time!
December
The most exciting thing that happened in December was that I got to see ENMY! I discovered them fairly recently, so when I saw they were coming close to home I was super excited. I also am friends with the drummer of the band that opened for them, so I got to see him play! ENMY was also amazing live, and I have an enormous crush on the lead singer lol. I was RIGHT up front, leaning on the stage, and I got a couple of videos of him (Brady) singing to my phone camera! It was fucking awesome!
Other than that, December was pretty meh. Holidays are rough for me, have been since my parents passed. I don’t enjoy Christmastime like I used to, so I was just glad to get it over with.
Current obsessions
Movies: none
TV: none
Music: I’ve really been feeling Motionless in White’s albums Disguise and Scoring the End of the World, they’re comfort music for me and I binge them on the regular. ENMY released a new album, which is bomb AF!
Food: I tried Insomnia Cookies for the first time and I’m obsessed! I think they might be better than Crumbl!
Games: still on the Secret Cat Forest train, haha.
Apps: I have recently been on Threads a lot, after not using it for months on end.
Crafts: I made my first ever book nook and I had so much fun with it! I love how it turned out and I already want to make another!
Other: My coworker got me into the Up and Vanished podcast and it is so engrossing! The whole story was so wild that I kept forgetting I wasn’t listening to a fictional mystery/thriller.
Things I’m looking forward to
Honestly? The holidays to be over. I’m also hoping to start fresh in 2025 with a new year. 2024 really sucked, tbh. (And here I thought it would be my year, because it was the year of the dragon. Ope.)
See anything you like? What did YOU get last month? Link me up!
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