You don’t know it, but I have been up since the crack of dawn today. (A possible exaggeration as I wrote this nearly a week ago…) But I will have been at the Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre Hotel in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia since 7am today. There’s just no rest for the wicked! Or the BlytheCon planner.

If you’re not in Vancouver and hanging out with us in the biggest Canadian Blythe party ever… You’re missing out! We do have a livestream that is being hosted over on Ustream.tv. You may recognize it as it was used at a few previous US BlytheCons.

»» BlytheCon Vancouver Livestream is LIVE starting at 10am ««

If you are in Vancouver, be sure to find me! I’ll be one of the people at the Registration table until 11am, and then afterwards I’ll be wandering around the venue making sure things are going smoothly. I will have some animal ears on, so I should be pretty easy to recognize! If you do see me, mention BlytheLife and I may have some goodies for you!

I will have lots to share with all of you next week about the event. In the mean time, I will be running on sunshine & adrenaline!

I can’t believe it’s finally here!

On August 9th, 2012, I created and shared this simple little image after talking to Juliet about the idea of hosting a BlytheCon in Vancouver…

And now it’s just grown into so much more.

Literally 3 years to the day, it’s finally coming true. It’s all grown up and ready to be shared with the world. I can’t begin to tell you all how overwhelmed with BlytheCon planning I’ve been, and it hasn’t been easy at all because there’s just so much time and energy that goes into an event of this size. We’ve had so much support from family and friends. There’s been ups and downs, but we’ve had a pretty solid team working to make this day the best it could possibly be.

I’m so excited that it’s finally here, and it’s a vision that has been realized. We’ve received words of encouragement from BlytheCon organizers the world over, and we’ve had so many donations that have just poured in, it’s been crazy. All for the love of Blythe. It is truly an event organized by the fans, for the fans, of Blythe.

(Luckily our graphics got a lot better after Chun of Puppy52Dolls got on board. Our convention would be a sore sight to behold without her magic and if we were all stuck with my Photoshop work.)

The pre-BlytheCon Vancouver meet is happening tomorrow, Saturday August 8th, at the Jack Poole Plaza from 1:30pm to 4:00pm. Jack Poole Plaza (the site of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Cauldron) is located in downtown Vancouver at the Vancouver Convention Centre. The Plaza a short walk from Waterfront Station.

Over the past year, I have shared photos of my visits to Metro Vancouver tourist attractions on the BlytheCon Vancouver 2015 Facebook group. If you are coming to BlytheCon Vancouver and want some suggestions, here are all of the places that I had shared:

Shoreline Trail is an easy walking trail located in Port Moody, BC. It takes approximately 2 hours to complete. Click to read more of this entry.

Photograph by Chun/Puppy52Dolls.

If you’re coming to Vancouver, BC for BlytheCon Vancouver, here are some things that you might want to remember to bring along:

• Doll stands for your dolls. Because most everyone will have similar stands (e.g. the clover stands), I would recommend putting a label on the bottom with your name or user name. This handy tip is borrowed from Louisa of Blythe Couture who always remembers to bring stands and she has them labelled!
• Despite being in Canada, we do get a lot of sunshine – especially in the summer. I would recommend bringing a refillable water bottle, a hat, and sunscreen! Of course, mind the fluids/liquids restrictions for carry-on luggage. And if you are bringing bottled sunscreen and other toiletries – zipped top bags are your friends to prevent spillage and having clothes soaked through with sunscreen.
• Your transit trip plans! We do have a public transit system here, Translink. This covers our buses, Skytrain, and sea bus! There is no “official” mobile app, but Translink does have a mobile website that is pretty handy for planning your trips. Look up your transit trips ahead of time to save time. There are many locations throughout Metro Vancouver that have free WiFi networks.
• Bring a reusable shopping bag (or pick one up here for cheap!). A lot of grocery shops here charge extra for plastic bags (usually $0.05/bag). Help out the environment by bringing a reusable bag to carry out your purchases while you’re here!
• Chargers – for your phone, camera, laptop, and any other electronic devices that you plan on bringing along. Also, spare camera batteries and portable cell phone chargers/power banks are an excellent idea! If you are coming from outside of Canada, be sure to put your cell phones into airplane mode or purchase a travel plan so you don’t get dinged with horrible roaming charges for hopping onto a Canadian cell network.
• Copies of your flight information and contact details of whatever hotels you’re staying at. Always a good idea to have a hard copy on you in case something happens to your phone/tablet/laptop computer (e.g. water submersion, down a flight of stairs…) or you realized you had uploaded all that information to Google Docs and the moment you need it, there’s no free WiFi around and you didn’t buy a travel plan for your phone.

Save travels to everyone who’s venturing via car, bus, plane, boat, bike or feet to Vancouver for the weekend!

I will be at the pre-BlytheCon meet on Saturday, August 8th. I’ll be the awkward one holding Sophie, the Cappuccino Chat that rules the wardrobe here with an plastic fist. While Sophie won’t be attending BlytheCon Vancouver (she decided that needing to be at the venue at 7am for set-up was going to interrupt some far more important beauty sleep!), she will be hanging out the day before because that’s more her style. For Sunday, August 9th, I will be bringing some dolls you may expect and some that you may not… Any guesses on who?

Today’s the last last day of online ticket sales for BlytheCon Vancouver! Sales had been extended from July 31st to August 4th to accommodate those who were unable to purchase tickets prior to August. Behind the scenes, things are coming along splendidly as we finish getting everything together and put the finishing touches on everything.

Photograph by Chun/Puppy52Dolls.

If you haven’t already, pop on over to the BlytheCon Vancouver website to see what fantastic donations we’ve received! Tickets are available through Brown Paper Tickets until end of day today!

Proceeds from BlytheCon Vancouver will benefit the Orphaned Wildlife Rehabilitation Society (O.W.L.), who will also be at BlytheCon Vancouver with some of their volunteers and educational birds! We’re very excited that we’ll be able to make a donation to a local non-profit that cares as much about BC’s wildlife as we do.