Recovery Mode + Upcoming Design

Hi all,

I apologize for being quiet this month as far as posting updates. Not much to report for one, but also, I was hit with a really strong wave of exhaustion for a few weeks. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that before we moved I was having a really good sleep schedule and after we moved, having to pull a few long nights to prepare for our move in February I ended up screwing up the sleep scheduled I worked so hard the prior month to build and my body has since just been yoyo-ing back and forth from one bad sleep schedule to another. Right now I'm in the lovely 4-8-4-8 schedule where I'm asleep maybe 2-4 hours, then my body thinks it took a nap, then wants me to stay awake for another 6-10 hours, then gets tired and wants to "nap" again. And the weeks before this one I was needing to sleep for like 10+ hours. Like, I just could not get my eyes to stay open for more than 10-15 min at a time. Thankfully, I do think that I'm moving more towards having more energy, so that's good.

In the meantime, I also want to apologize for the lateness in getting packages out. While I've had the December/January pins in hand for about 2 weeks, I did take a few days off around Taka's birthday on the 15th to celebrate him since we've honestly not had a decent celebration for him since he came to the US. The first year he arrived in the US the week before his birthday so we were broke and also hustling to get to our wedding date since we were on a time crunch. Then the next year the pandemic was announced right before his birthday, so I didn't really have any time to prepare anything fun or special last minute. Then last year was still the pandemic and we just moved the week before so were again, very broke from the move, and very tired, and still sheltering in place for the most part.

Finally this year, while yes we still moved very soon before, I had a couple weeks to actually prepare for his birthday. We ventured out to the arcade with some new friends we made at an event we tabled at, though even that was a little uncomfortable because while we were all vaxxed and masked up, it was the day that Washington announced King County (where Seattle is) didn't need proof of vaccination nor need to wear masks, so uhhh it was very very packed in the arcade that day. And please note, everyone has different view on the pandemic/masking/etc. I'm not asking for commentary on our choices. For us, we choose to still wear masks in public, apply sanitizer and wash hands when we can, and will likely still do it til there hasn't been any new strain of the virus for at least a year.

QUALITY CONTROL

So onto the actual business stuff! While my body seems to have been in an annoying recovery mode of needing extra sleep, I still have been working a ton whenever I was awake. This time around I had to do a lot of extra clean up on the Mars and Jupiter pins because I believe my manu is doing a new type of screen print which makes it a little thicker paint on the surface. I think this is good because it is less likely to get wiped off if you're the type to occasionally polish your pins, but this thicker paint is also a little more clumpy so I had to be extremely careful in cleaning up overprint on the pins lest some of the paint chip off in chunks. I definitely turned a handful of Collector grades into B-grades in the process. :( In any case, the pins do look fantastic. I do want to let you know that a good portion of the Jupiter pins will have low fill on the glow-in-the-dark dragon. Please be aware I'm not considering that a flaw as I know some types of paint have a tendency to be less stable, glow paint I believe being one of them. This low fill won't be that noticeable straight on, so I don't think it is an issue overall, but wanted to let you know in advance.

I've already prepped two batches of pins which have been dropped off and will continue packing up packages throughout this week, hopefully having most everything sent off by Saturday. Many of you will notice an extra sticker in your packages—this is the long overdue extra sticker we promised everyone who switched from Patreon to our website before the end of the year. We wanted those to get into the packages we sent out in February since it has our original characters with a new year theme, but they didn't arrive in time for those packages to go out. Anyway, that's just a small thank you sticker for those of you who made that switch!

Speaking of freebies, I want to let you know if at anytime you ever think you didn't get a freebie you were supposed to get at the 3/6/12 month membership marks, feel free to email us and I can look into it for you. I don't really reveal the freebies as far as pics go for y'all cause I want there to be at least a small element of surprise. Though please know that the 12 month freebies are not in hand yet. Those were ordered back in December from my second manu which is slower but more meticulous and tends to have less flaws. Since these freebies won't be restocked, I wanted to ensure they turn out great! I do believe they're on their way, though my manu said it won't get onto the next FedEx flight until April 5th. Our main manu has also been sending me a lot of updates and I believe the next batch of pins will hopefully get sent in the next week or two as well.

FAMILY TIME

Assuming we have a bunch of designs sent to us by the second week of April, I am hopeful we may have another box of pins to send out before we go on a small trip to see my family in Boston. Taka and I will keep our shop open while we are gone, but won't be sending any orders from April 17th-25th as we will be visiting my family that I've only gotten to see once since 2019. This is a big deal because while I used to visit my siblings and stepmom at least 3-4 times a year as they were growing up in Oregon, they moved at the end of 2019 to Boston area where my stepmom is from so we weren't able to easily visit due to both distance and pandemic. So this is the first extended time off we've had in YEARS, and it's been hard not being able to see my siblings who entered their teenage years since this time. But they have their spring break then, so we will plan to be with them then. We still plan to work a bunch while visiting, though mostly I'll be working on vectoring some projects I've been promising to work on forever, as well as getting caught up a few months in advance for things like backing cards, sticker sheets, etc... since most the time we'll probably just be chilling at home with them because let's be real, they're teens who just wanna chill at home and be on their phones most the time.

But Taka has never been to the East coast so he and I are definitely going to try to go to the Boston Art museum because art. I'm unsure if we'll try to make a trip to NY since neither of us has ever been, will just depend what my fam feels up for.

Once we're back, I'll be packing up any orders placed while we were gone, and hopefully if we already had the new pins in can be packing those up too but we'll see what shows up from our manus.

PRODUCTION UPDATES

I've posted a few production updates in discord as well as on IG stories, but want to send you everything I've gotten (minus the secret 12 mo designs) so far:

Lun@ remakes with proper dark background and colors appear to be done being painted and just need screenprint.

W!cked lady's previous mold issues look to be all gone and she looks fantastic! She only needs screen print, which.... please check out this really cool video our manufacturer took of her getting her screenprint put on!

And thankfully, Ch!b!moon doesn't look like she's posing any problems like her W!cked Lady version likes to do. She looks fantastic, and it looks like the variant already has screen print!

I just want to extend yet another thanks to all of you who have been so crazy patient for W!cked Lady and Lun@ remakes! There's no good reason it should have taken so damn long to remake, but unfortunately I don't control production. But I am so happy to see they will be home soon so I can finally begin getting them out to you all!

APRIL DESIGNS

And at last, I would like to share the designs for April that I'm working on vectoring. April's mugen design is the peony which is one of Taka's favorite things to draw.

And of course, we have S@ilor N3ptun3 and Calaveras up next for the Pretty Winkers.

For N3ptun3, Taka wanted her hair to be reminiscent of ocean waves. For Calaveras, we both agreed her hair was not wild and unkempt like most our designs, so less creativity to be had, so we had a lot of fun making the background stand out with the Black Moon arc's scenes with them at home base.

NEXT DROP

Finally, once I have all the packages sent out, I'm hoping to have all the extras for the new designs (Yuki Onna, M@rs, V3s V3s, Ume Branches, Jup!ter, Jun Jun, Tsubaki) up in the secret shop by next week so you can all snag any pins before the public.

I think that about covers everything for now, though you'll obviously be getting the finalized artwork for April and shop password sent out around the 2nd/3rd after all pin club charges go through. So look forward to sending you all another update soon!

- Mandy + Taka