Conventions and Charities!!

HELLO ALL MY BEAUTIFUL DARLINGS!!

So, I have been incredibly blessed to be given the constant opportunity, ability, skills, and time to travel to, and sell art at anime conventions all over the Midwest; it has been such an amazing source of joy to get to meet so many of you guys and meet so many other people from all over the place, and talk and fangasm and connect over art and anime and gaming and whatever else. UGH AND IT’S ALL BECAUSE OF YOU GUYS, ENCOURAGING ME AND SUPPORTING ME ALL THE WAY BACK TO 7 YEARS AGO WHEN I WAS BUT A WEE LASS DRAWING _{now ttly embarrassing} GAYTASTIC KH ART AND THEN BEING SO KIND AND SWEET AND ENCOURAGING ME TO BE BRAVE AND VENTURE INTO THE SCARY LANDS OF ANIME CONVENTIONS FOR THE FIRST TIME, AND, AAAAAHHH I am so incredibly blessed by all of you guys, you guys are amazing and have helped me grow into the artist I am today, and I absolutely don’t deserve any of you, thank you all so much!! ;3;

I want to start giving back and share this amazing blessing I have in whatever way I can, and so I have decided—and I am ttly mad at myself for not doing this sooner— that at every con in which I have an Artist Alley Table, I am going to go to that con with a charity organization in mind, and I will give 15% of whatever I make to that charity.  The next con coming up is—oshit—is actually next week! _{omfg I am so not prepared fuck} Anime Milwaukee is February 14-16, and I have an Artist Alley table there (yay!!) And since it will be my first con of the year, now is as good of a time as any to start giving back! 8D A charity I’ve had in mind for the past couple months and have wanted to help support for a while now is an organization called Hagar International; Hagar is a world-wide organization dedicated to rescuing and rehabilitating women and children who are victims of trafficking, exploitation, domestic violence, and extreme human rights abuse.  I actually met a team of Hagar workers at a missions conference last year, and it is an amazingly well run organization with incredibly beautiful people helping run it, but the organization specifically caught my eye because it has a rescue team and rehabilitation division dedicated specifically to male victims of sex trafficking. _{(this is important as most rescue organizations only have female-only safe-houses and rehabilitation centers—as women and girls make up the greatest percentage of sex-trafficking victims and there is a huge need for these places—but every so often men and boys are rescued from trafficking, but they can’t go to women safe-houses and so often have nowhere to go to heal. But Hagar now has places dedicated to boys as well!)}

So next weekend at Anime Milwaukee 2014, 15% of my gross revenue from the artist alley will be donated to Hagar International. I’M SO EXCITED!! This money will go to help fund rescue missions, safe-houses, counseling services, education classes, and so many other fantastic things that are gonna help and bless so many people!! AAAAAHHH WE’RE GONNA HELP SUPPORT THIS WONDERFUL MISSION GUYS AND IT’S GONNA BE SO GREAT I’M SO EXCITED

And then for another convention, another organization I had in mind and would like to help support someday is Exploit No More.  It is a brand new baby organization still in (but near the end) of its raising funds and awareness stage, and it will be an after-care/safe-house/rehabilitation place for victims of sex-trafficking/exploitation in Milwaukee, making it the first place of its kind to offer such a service and house in Wisconsin!  I know a bunch of people on the planning committee (like my mom and some other friends) and the family that started it, so it’s a trust-worthy organization and I’m really excited that it’s being built in my hometown of Milwaukee!

So, so far my convention schedule so far for this year is:

Anime Milwaukee (Feb 14-16)

    -        Hagar International

Anime Detour (April 4-6)

    -        Exploit No More

Anime Central WAITLISTED booooooooo

               -

Anime Expo (July 3-6)

    -        ???

If you guys have any charity organizations you want me to look into for supporting with a con, you should totally let me know! I would love to hear about them and read about them!  And they don’t have to pertain to fighting human trafficking, that’s just a personal passion/interest of mine (along with churches/Christians being part of/working with/supporting/loving the LGBTQA community like Jesus properly would have and christians SHOULD BE DOING _{*stopping self before a rant starts*})

Guys I’m really excited about this, like, hella pumped. This is gonna be sO GREAT

Also, I’ve never done something like this before—usually someone else organizes support for a charity and I just throw money at them—so I’m gonna try to be careful as careful as possible, I know about the importance of researching orgs to make sure they’re run well and the money is going where it’s supposed to and all that jazz, but if anyone has any advice or tips they’d like to share I’d love to hear those as well