Mini Holiday to Joensuu, My Birthday and Sleepless Nights

My preparations for a long train trip :) 

Two weeks ago I went to see my sister in Joensuu. It was my first time going there and now I'm so jealous of my sister who gets to live there and enjoy the beautiful scenery everyday. Even though Joensuu (on Finnish scale) is a big city it didn't feel like it at all while walking around. Which would be perfect for me since I'm not a city girl. I prefer smaller towns where the traffic isn't so heavy and people don't seem to be busy 24/7.

But anyway I got there on Thursday afternoon and we went to meet our great aunt that also lives in there. It was my first time meeting her and yet she seemed so happy having me as her guest which made me feel a bit ashamed of myself. I am the type of person who doesn't bother to keep in contact with others. All my friends know this already but...I really should learn to visit my relatives more often. It's not like I don't like gatherings and everything. I just feel like it'll be a bother if I go for a visit or even just call to chat with them.

I could have not asked for better weather to take a walk

The colors! <3

It doesn't even look like its' autumn

Water is like a mirror :)

Anyhow, on Friday we were supposed to go see the "night life" of Joensuu but we both were feeling under the weather so we stayed home watching Into The Woods. The movie was alright but I guess I was expecting something else... I think it was lacking something,...I'm not sure what but something seemed to be missing.

In Finland we have this "Pizza Friday" thing (in Finnish Pizza Perjantai)
So naturally we decided on pizza for dinner ;)

This year my birthday just went by. I mean the Tuesday is not the best day to celebrate one's birthday because everyone is busy with work/studies.
     I just kept doing everything else except schoolwork which probably was the worst decision. I've been postponing several things and it's been quite stressful me. Even the weather turned all gloomy like it is usually during the September in Finland.
     There are some projects I simply need to get done but it's up to me when I decide to start working on them and that's probably the worst thing that can happen to me. I always keep procrastinating till the last minute - even though I know it will definitely not help.
     In addition to that I can't deal with the stress because I really can't see it coming. But when I think about most of people are like that.
    It's going to be stressful year but it hopefully is worth it. If everything goes well next year I'll be going to South Korea as an exchange student. I'm already SO excited but at the same time I'm really worried about whether everything's going to work out or not. All I can do now is to study hard and get good grades and go through the application process for the university's exchange program.


Last week, however, was the worst in a long time. Like any other Monday I went to my Korean class and after that to study in the library. Nothing out of ordinary happened until afternoon when I went to my parents house. As soon as I got in my dad told that we needed to leave asap to the hospital for some further checkups the local doctors weren't able to conduct in the polyclinic.
    Originally, the tests were ordered just to make sure there wasn't anything serious going on with my dad who had been complaining that his arm wasn't working properly. But the reason behind all that turned out to be that my dad had had a small stroke. In the worst case my dad would have been dead for more than a week by now and this thought has been lingering my mind ever since Monday. All the sleepless nights have subsided for now that my dad's back at home but I'll definitely won't be able to stop worrying.

Sorry to bother you with these worries but I had to write my thoughts down. Next time I'll write about something cheerful. ^^'

TraconX | Cosplay

Last weekend I went to TraconX with my sister. For those who don't know what Tracon is: It is a annual roleplay and anime convention held in Tampere Hall , Tampere, Finland. For more information you can check the English description here.

I kinda forgot to take a proper picture of Tampere Hall but instead I took
 these from the park right next to it ^^'

This was my second time attending Tracon. Sadly, like last year ,this year also we weren't able to be there for the whole weekend so we ended up buying tickets only for Saturday. I wish we would have been able to be there also on Sunday since all the interesting programm (at leats for us) was on Sunday. For example, it would have been great to have been able to go watch Eat Your Kimchi on stage.

     However, we still had lots of fun though we didn't attend any workshops or lectures. Despite the weather being cloudy and a bit rainy for whole day we were able to enjoy outdoors for the most of the day and see many interesting costumes.

My sister as Sly Cooper from the Sly Cooper game series

Me as Carmelita Montoya Fox from the Sly Cooper game series

Of course we had to take a picture together :)
My camera was balanced on a bench and we used timer so it's not as good as it could be.

We were surprised by the fact how many wanted to take our picture. We knew Sly Cooper cosplay would be popular but it still surprised us. Especially my sister's Sly Cooper costume had lots of positive comments. Of course, cosplaying is not about making a popular costume but getting attention makes you always feel a bit special. Now we have to come up even better costumes next time we cosplay together. :P
     Naturally our costumes are nothing compared to those that we saw in the World Cosplay Summit 2016 Preliminaries. (Nowadays the Finnish representative for the WCS is chosen in the preliminaries held in Tracon) All the contestants were amazing and we totally agreed with the judges. Here you can find some pictures from the competition. (They also include some photos of pair and costume design competitions.) The winner - Otoyomegatari pair - took my breath away. The costumes were so detailed and accurate...WOW!

But yeah...That's what I've been up to lately. I'd be more than glad to hear about your cosplay stories and convention experiences.
Anyhow, till next time!
xxx

Project Draw EXO: Suho | Sketchbook

Sorry everyone!

I got it finished on Tuesday (just one day late) but didn't have any time to write the post. I posted it on Instagram (@howsminnadoing) and on Tumblr. (@minnakosartdiary) yesterday. But without further explaining here you have my drawing of EXO's Suho.

Model picture I used for this portrait

Though there are small mistakes in his face I am quite proud of myself. I really love the hair. I tried to draw it a bit differently from how I usually draw the human hair and it went well. It's so sad how taking a picture or scanning it ruins the colors. I assure you the actual drawing looks a bit more natural than this photo of it.

This was the first quick sketch of him. The silhouette is quite close but I went and ruined it so I had to start again. :P

I also made some practice sketches for the eyes. I seriously don't know why I have to do several sketches before I get it right. But it is my style.

Because Suho has quite pale skin in the picture I used as model I tried to apply color to his face as little as possible.

Final part was the hair. I really loved drawing it. There were so many shades and it was bit different from the usual. I mean I normally avoid drawing hairstyles like this but this time I wanted to challenge myself and luckily it turned out well.

Hope you like this series since I'm little by little starting to enjoy it. Maybe next time I'll be able to actually finish the drawing by the end of this month.
Anyway, let's see what I'm up to in the next post :)
xxx