ANIME. This is me.

In a nutshell, my whole life I've been a cartoon addict.  No lie.  I recorded my faves on VHS when I was a teenager and I have never really stopped watching them!  

But as you get older you learn to appreciate new things and I fell, similar to Alice, down the rabbit hole, into the world of anime.

Why anime?

The character drawings are gorgeous.  The story lines are compelling, complex, at times have left me in hysterical tears of laughter and other times tears of welling sadness.  Getting lost in the lives of the characters, anime gives me so much inspiration.  I draw from it in so much that I create.  It's so special to share that love with my husband who is even more otaku than I am and to pass it on to our kids.  I mean, they fall for it all all on their own!  They have their shows that they love to watch and Mommy and Daddy have theirs!  I really could go on and on about how much it means to me... that I've emblazoned my back in anime tattoos dedicated to my children, heck, even the names of some of my kids derive from anime!

BUT.

That's probably not why you came here today.

This is what you're looking for:

I couldn't just pick one.  I JUST COULDN'T!!!!

I was talking with Celina about what kind of Sew Geeky she might be interested in and she actually came up with the anime idea, and since I know we are gonna do anime again in the future as a theme I thought about doing a classic anime theme!!  Max quickly brainstormed as did I, trying to pick the perfect one(s)!  

Kaneda from AKIRA

I was discussing about how I always wanted to do an outfit for Akira from the movie we got her name from.

It doesn't get much more "classic anime" than AKIRA.  

Not exactly one I'd watch with the kids, AKIRA deals with biiig ideals and has a very intricate story-line leading to lots of discussion.  Akira translates into "light" or "clear" and in the movie Akira is enlightenment.  But it goes waaay beyond that. 

It's available to watch for free on Hulu dubbed if you're into watching it!

So I chose to do the iconic Kaneda outfit: red motorcycle jacket, red pants, red boots, and motorcycle goggles.

I had to make it baby friendly so that ending up being:

• red asymmetrical sweater (remixed heavily from this pattern) with elastic cased bottom, polo-esque collar with flap and snap, faux placket, faux pockets, pill applique on back, and pleather quilted shoulder details.

• red baby leggings (remixed from this pattern) with red pleather knee pads.

• red baby boots (remixed from this pattern) with red pleather and minky brown lining

I used my husband's figurine of Kaneda's bike and a pair of kids red and black power ranger goggles as props for the shoot as well.

Her photo-shoot was really a lot of fun. She looks huge next to that tiny little bike.  HA!  Jon tried to help me re-create some of the iconic poses from the movie.

Peace sign Akira says "chill". hahah.  Poses are all her own, folks

Star Trek Akira says "Live Long and Prosper, yo."

Some were more successful than others.

 Check out these outtakes:

Jon wanted me to superimpose a motorcycle underneath her.  HA!

Trying to recreate this pose... she looks like her arms got cut off!  They're too small to rest on her head!

This is DEFINITELY something to check off the bucket list I just couldn't be happier with the result.  I could stare and laugh at her photos all day!

But if I didn't do that then I wouldn't be able to introduce your to Monkey D. Luffy, aka Straw-hat Luffy.

Money D. Luffy from One Piece

One Piece is a funny, adventure theme anime about a pirate on the epic quest for the treasure of a lifetime. It's the Great Pirate Era!

Luffy has a special ability:  to super stretch his limbs which is pretty awesome although he can't go in to water or he'll lose his ability.

This is an anime that was a part of Shonen Jump magazine (as a manga, the printed version of anime, similar to a comic "panel" layout) for a verrrrrrry long time.  And it too is dubbed and on Hulu for free if you're interested.  It's really a fun anime that's definitely a good one for kids.

Sephira's outfit consists of a couple of very wearable handmades:

• red Doli tank (remixed from this {affiliate link} pattern) with a v-neck modification

• chambray and white stretch twill Hosh shorts (remixed heavily from this {affiliate link} pattern using this tutorial as a guide) made as shorts with white cuffs.

The hat, Jon insisted, had to be straw.  He typically gets really into authentic accessories for cosplay, and so naturally he had to order a hat from Ebay... at the beginning of July... from China!  I just knew it was going to be late since the goggles I ordered for Tank Girl were ordered from Ebay and never arrived (to this day in fact they are still lost in transit from Pennsylvania!).  He assured me that he has "good luck" with this sort of thing.  I thought he was wrong, but lo and behold last week, there is our One Piece branded straw hat for our little Luffy sitting by our doorstep!  Unfortunately Max did not have as much luck with a wig she ordered from Ebay for this Sew Geeky which also is coming from China!  I thought for sure that since it was considerably closer than the Pacific Northwest, that she'd have gotten hers before me!  Go figure!

I've been given carte blanche from Sarah, one of my bestest buds in the world to giveaway a combo of patterns used for Sephira's Luffy look: the Doli tank and the Hosh pants!  Guys, these are, legit, some of my absolute go to patterns for life.  I have made and remixed the Hosh pants pattern in particular at least a dozen times but probably I am grossly underestimating.  There will details at the end of the post about how to enter the giveaway!

My little Luffy was not as chipper and upbeat as the real Luffy for her photo-shoot (though at least her eyes are always as big as his ;-).  We drove up to Horsetail Falls in Mt. Hood (twenty minutes from our house!!!) and it was a teeny bit chilly for the kiddos (but perfect for me!  I like brisk weather!)  It's so beautiful there, and amazing that you can get right on top of the waterfall without having to hike to it, but we did end up coming back the following day for an epic rainy, barefoot hike up to the waterfall's top with a friend and her boys the following day!  Can't wait to go back!  I am addicted to the place!  We not only took pictures for Luffy here, but for a secret project you'll see soon AND for a certain little magical girl of mine...

Sakura from Cardcaptor Sakura

Cardcaptors (aka Cardcaptor Sakura) is a manga/anime that is created by CLAMP in the mid-90s.  I mention this because CLAMP is amazeballs, guys. They created this story first then they made THREE more manga and anime a little later on but virtually at the same time that are very unique stories onto themselves BUT that overlap in story-lines together!  Cardcaptors, Tsubasa, Chobits, and xxxHolic.  Isn't that crazy?!  I am not lying when I say that they produce arguably some of the most intriguing and important animes of the 21st century.  Heck, my first tattoo, my "Azriella" tattoo, which takes up half of my back, is a scene from an extremely dear to my heart anime called Chobits.  I can't begin to go into what that anime means to me but suffix it to say it was enough for me to want it burned into my skin for all eternity haha.  And xxxHolic by CLAMP is one of the best animes out there I watch it over and over and over again.  It teaches you so many great lessons.

BUT ENOUGH ABOUT THAT!

Cardcaptor Sakura is about a magical elementary-aged school girl, Sakura, who unlocks a deck of magical cards, called Clow cards, with special abilities and must retrieve them all to save the world from calamity.  I started watching all the episodes dubbed on YouTube and Azriella walked in and lost her mind.  She became immediately infatuated with the show!  You guys should see her eyes light up when she talks about it now!

Warms my heart that she's so into anime!!!  

So for her outfit, I wanted to do some simple items that could be mixed matched later when she's in school but that still had cohesiveness enough to be recognizable as Sakura.

About Azriella's outfit:

• a white puff sleeved blouse (simplified from a pattern from this book) I kept it simple with no frills so she can wear it with any dress or jumper! and I tacked on a crisp red bow to the neckline (I didn't want to always use the bow on the dress and I can use the red bow in the future for other things)

• pink one-piece jumper (remixed heavily from this pattern) that I made to have a circle skirt instead of a contrast banded gathered skirt with a star circle applique and revisited my wing insertion tutorial but reinvented it to look more Sakura-esque. Also, I made those big red buttons on the back of the dress.

• pink beret (made from a pattern in this book) lined in red. Easy-peasy but it really mimics quite well the headdress Sakura wears but in a more everyday wearable way.

Some of you might recognize the shoes and the pettiskirt that I made long ago, but they were the perfect accessories to her outfit.  And no cardcaptor would be complete without her Clow Cards! I cropped and edited and then printed up on photo paper a dozen cards for Azriella.  She loooves them like treasure!  Only she wanted me to make like all of them and I told her a dozen is good for now ;-)

She has a new smile guys!   When we were at the beach for Sephira's birthday, she lost her front tooth!  Oh man it's so cute to me!!  She's growing up too fast for my liking!  She has become so intelligent and social over the past three years... Most hardly notice her autism; she's gotten much lower on the spectrum and I am so proud of her!!

So there you have it!  I hope I didn't forget anything!  I'm so action-packed with anime love I feel like I must have left out so many things and yet feel like I've shared so much with you all.  Thank you for reading because I know this is a long post!  Eager beaver over here!!  If you want to get into anime but don't know where to start or if you just want to see what kind of wacky stuff that makes me fan-girl all over the place, check out or follow me on Pinterest!

And you HAVE GOT TO SEE what my Sew Geeky co-host, Max-California, did for her classic anime look and our super fantastic special guest, Celina, did!  I love the pants off of those ladies and that's no joke!!  I'm just beyond tickled pink to have Celina sewing along with us this time!!  She is such an immense inspiration to me!!!  So much respect for her!  You might remember I did a post as part of a series of other bloggers who made creations as an homage to her!  She is the co-creator of the famous and outstanding STYLO fashion eMagazine that focuses on handmades of the latest trends from all over the world!

Enough of my yappering, go check it out!

And check out more Sew Geeky goodness by going to the Sew Geeky page here. Be sure to share your photos with us if you sew along!  We absolutely adore when people sew along with us!!

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