FWA 2025

i recently attented FWA 2025 -- my first con ever!

previously i had only ever gone to local meetups and events. jumping straight from "hey a dozen furries are meeting in this park" to "literal thousands of furries are taking over three hotels in one of the largest cons ever¹", was, well. a leap. but not an unwelcome one, i had a blast and made so many new friends. (hi!! <3)

before the con

first things first -- con badges! i had previously slapped together a con badge out of printer paper and packing tape, and while it was in a strict sense functional, i wanted a nicely-constructed badge this time around. with his permission, i took a commission piece i had gotten from the wonderful AutumnFoliage and tossed together a design. since the badge was only about four square inches, i offered to print and laminate a badge for quat, my to-be roommate, at the same time, so as to take up some of the otherwise-wasted space. he sent me a design and --

yeah okay so i didn't exactly give the person at the print desk instructions on how i wanted the badges arranged in the laminate sleeve. i was trying to leave room around the design so i could use a hole punch to make a hole for the lanyard, but quat's badge wound up RIGHT against the edge of the laminate. decisions were made and now the badge hangs at a very appropriate angle. i think we're both quite happy with the results :3

i made sure to bring plenty of stickers. i use and recommend Vinyl Disorder for my stickers (not sponsored, i just like their service) because they have really good deals on bulk orders. i got 100 2.5-inch stickers for $28, including shipping. i brought two designs of stickers to FWA: the first being the one by AutumnFoliage (seriously, check them out!), the second being a design i drew.

before the trip, i needed to visit my mother to borrow suitcases (since i don't own any). she had these old bag tags, which had a QR code on one side and an NFC chip inside. the parent company, "eBags", introduced these tags in 2016², got bought out in 2017³, stopped selling them in 2019⁴, and then the tags themselves stopped working entirely in 2020⁵. another win for capitalism and e-waste!

well, not if there's anything i can do about it. the QR code on the back was entirely useless, but the NFC chip inside wasn't write protected (!) so i was free to wipe the tags and put my own links on them. i tried thrice to to remove the design and logo with isopropyl alcohol, acetone, and finally a piece of sandpaper, but as far as i'm aware they sublimated the ink into the plastic and as such was beyond my capabilities to remove...

...but not beyond my capabilites to cover up! ten coats of acrylic paint and three coats of spray-on topcoat made for... acceptable blanks. they wound up a little rougher around the edges and bumpier than i intended, mostly because i was stubborn and refused to let all the layers dry before putting more on. (granted, i had a strict deadline and if i waited the full time, it would have never gotten done before i had to leave for the con). it was fun to do, but it's way more effective to just find blanks from online retailers.

painting these things SUUUUCKED, but in the end i had blanks. i had plans for quat for one of them, so i left that blank for him, but i stuck an ebu sticker cut to fit on the second one and it turned out... really cute actually!! so my plans are to possibly remake this at some point, but using actual blanks, and instead of using poorly-binding acrylic paints that take several layers, design vinyl stickers to fit to the surface. i'd imagine you would get a much cleaner result, for only the cost of the blanks and the stickers.

the very night before leaving, my friend crocheted me a fursona keychain attachment and a set of fingerless pawgloves!! i wore them all throughout the con (excepting when it got hot and sweaty). it was an incredibly nice gesture of them and the gloves are easily my favorite furry accessory.

day zero (Wednesday)

i had originally planned to carpool in with some local furs, but unfortunately the carpool plans fell through, so i just decided to fly in instead of driving solo. on the flight in i discovered a tiny Walter White in my wallet that i completely forgot about from back when i had inkjet sticker paper⁶, so there's that.

one thing i wasn't expecting when arriving: they had FWA banners hung up in downtown on the blocks around the conspace. i knew FWA was pretty big but i wasn't expecting event decorations in the city, even if it was confined to the couple of blocks immediately around the hotels.

we arrived with absolutely no food plans. i hadn't realized that things pretty much closed up in downtown Atlanta in the afternoons, so we decided to take a trip to the CVS that was right next to the train terminal and grab some essentials (namely peanut butter, bread, and granola bars). the CVS had a grand balcony curved staircase for absolutely no reason making it by far the fanciest CVS i've ever had the pleasure to spend far too much money on food in. after that, we headed back to our rooms, ate really expensive peanut butter sandwiches, and slept.

day one (Thursday)

official first day of the con! of course, first business upon waking up was breakfast and pup time :3

once fully awake and and pupped up, we decided to hit up the conspace early! we only got a little lost trying to enter through the Hyatt -- it took us a bit to find the correct skybridge, but we eventually made our way to the Mariott. there was already quite a mass of furries there, so we wandered around for a bit. i met up with BP (@GayBluDog) and Cheevey (@CheeveyBear), two furries from my local area, and made a couple new friends as well, including one Lycan Wolf (@lycanwolpup)!

the first thing that actually opened up was the board games and miniature painting. i had brought a little Lucario miniature from a local comic-con, and brought it to paint in ebu colors :3

they had shelves of board games you could walk in and check out. BP and Cheevey checked out Apples to Apples and started a table game that slowly grew to eight players!

after that, we mostly just wandered the conspace until registration opened up at 3. there were already masses of people amassing where registration lines were going to start, so we decided to hold off on hopping in line until at least 4. there were plenty of sticker boards around to put stickers onto, and i made it a point to get an ebu sticker on each one i passed by. they were mostly empty at this time, but towards the end of the con they were absolutely stuffed with stickers overflowing out to the edges.

when we did hop in registration line, they had balloons with words like "gay" or "queer" on it that people bounced up in the air while they waited. all in all, we got in registration at 4 and had our wristbands by 5, so in terms of efficiency they were keeping pretty much on top of things.

once we had gotten registered, i went to the early bird meet and greet panel while quat hit up the photography panel. i got to exchange socials with a couple new friends! after that, we decided to take a little break and head back to the hotel -- something that would become a consistent thing each day for us as it gave us both a chance to get off our feet (as well as a chance for me to wash my hair).

now that my hair was nice and clean and somewhat dry, there was a panel on cut content in video games i wanted to hit up hosted by Rick Fox! it had sounded fascinating before but i had no idea the panel was being run by a TCRF admin, which was neat.

i got invited by two other furs i know, Leo (@la_leo5) and Muddy (@The_Muddy_Tiger), to come up and make candy friendship bracelets! i made an "ebu at FWA" bracelet :3. in return, i promised to take pics for Leo and Muddy's character Neon while they suited, and you can see that photo dump immediately following.

after this... well, i crashed, and crashed hard. i hadn't eaten much of anything beyond peanut butter sandwiches and granola bars all day, and at 11:00 at night entering into two really loud rooms in a row just destroyed me mentally. i tried to leave and find my way back to the hotel, but got totally discombobulated and wound up lost downtown. i nearly lost my paws when they fell out of my pocket and i didn't even notice. fortunately i found them on the sidewalk when i doubled back and retracing my steps, but by then i was a total emotional wreck. i had to come quat to come get me and let me cry it out before walking back to the hotel.

pro tip: if you feel a sense of crippling loneliness paired with a sense of impending doom... make sure you've eaten something of actual substance at least sometime in the past couple hours. because it might just be that

either way, i made it back to the hotel safe and sound (thank you quat, please give him a headpat and a couple chin scritches for me next time you see him).

day two (Friday)

first order of business was resolving the food situation. for one, we didn't have enough bread and peanut butter to make sandwiches for the rest of the trip, and for two, we were getting really sick of peanut butter sandwiches. i decided to wake up (relatively) early in the morning and made the mile trek over to a Publix and get some produce. of course, i got about twice as much food for two thirds the price at an actual grocery store. note to self: if i'm flying in, find an actual grocery store and make it a point of getting there first.

once that was taken care of and we had our breakfast, we headed back to the conspace! we booked a spot for the dealer's den, but that wasn't till 12. i decided to hit up the Pokémon panel, and got to meet a bunch of other pokemon, including a Charizard! :3

since we both wound up in the Hilton, we decided to go downstairs and check out the gaming room. turns out, it was an entire SUBFLOOR with wall-to-wall arcade cabinets, dance cabinets, pinball, console tables for casual and tournament play, VR setups, and quite a few game developers who had live demos of their games to sit down and play! it was WAY bigger than i was anticipating and honestly it would definitely be possible to spend an entire day here.

after that, we hopped into the dealer's den! (for some reason, FWA pages, sites, and signage called it the "vendor hall" despite literally everyone, staff included, calling it the dealer's den. come on, it comes with alliteration! for free!!) once we had been and i had spent maybe a little too much money, quat needed to decompress back at the hotel, so i went to get my badge re-keyed at registration since it wasn't letting me tap in in places. once that was taken care of, we met back up at the Truist Plaza. it had a little food court area that was amazing for lunch -- we ate at the Garden Deli. highly recommend if you need a quick bite for breakfast or lunch, but as we learned later, it's only open on weekdays -_-

BP had gotten "Hugs OK!" and "DTF" badges at the dealer's den, and i was a bit jealous... so i made my own out of printer paper, sharpies, and scotch tape. they lasted all con, but i've got a couple plans for an improved version (especially since i now own a laminator).

in the afternoon, we met up with Saix (bigstinky.dog), one of quat's friends, who was kind enough to let quat try out a drone hood. in return we all pupped out for quite a bit. we got back to the hotel to unwind a little and i took the opportunity to prep my notebook for the after-dark sketchbook swap at 1:00 AM. i was planning to go all the way till then, but we wound up only hitting the pup play psychology panel, meeting back up with Lycan and a new friend, pup Sunshine there!

we crashed hard after the pup panel and decided to just hit the hay. all in all a very good day :3

day three (Saturday)

i started my morning heading to the con floor to float around a little bit. it was slowly drizzling all day, so having an umbrella in the backpack helped a ton. quat took the slow lazy wakeup option which was definitely a valid choice, especially for day three. i met up again with BP and Cheevey and hung out with them for a bit waiting for peeps to get up and moving (and to kill time waiting for our timeslots).

at noon there was an unofficial Pokemon meetup, and of course i had to go. i was hoping for at least one other Lucario suiting but there were in fact four, to my count! i headed up a floor to try to get a photo of everyone but stood no chance of capturing everyone with just my phone.

i met up at the trinket trading place, traded a keychain stuffie for a cool lanyard, and then finally it was time for my slot at artist alley. i didn't stick around there for long -- in part because there were too many people, and in part because i had already spent all my money at the dealer's den ¯\_(ツ )_/¯

we all met back up at the Peachtree Center food court. i wanted something light, so i got a tofu poke bowl from Bull Gogi there and it was really good, highly recommend.

me and quat had made plans to go on a putt-putt adventure at the Puttshack in midtown Atlanta in the afternoon. we alotted time accounting for the possibility that MARTA would be late, but even still we just barely made it to our slot in time. pro tip: give hefty leeway if you're relying on public transit, like 45m to an hour. (guess that's not really news to anyone living in Atlanta...)

i got invited to a room party and had a very good time... playing Mario Party! and other activities.

finally it was time for the Moonlight Festival, the AD event. no photos inside, of course, but it was neat to pop in and see all the stuff going on in there. BP and Cheevey beelined for the rave, but i learned my lesson and stayed out the music-too-loud room. but it was definitely a fun way to cap off the day~

day four (Sunday)

today was the big lazy day for me. there weren't really a lot of events i particularly wanted to go to, so i took my morning nice and slow. i visited the con store to nab a cute Lucario lanyard i completely missed last time, and then after meeting up with BP and Cheevey yet again, we took a second, slower pass through the video game room.

we got lunch at the Peachtree Center and i immediately had to bolt over to a Blue Dog Squad meetup to represent the Lucarios of the world. there was a massive cuddle puddle already in progress and i was tempted to join, but lunch came first! it was neat getting to see the blue in the crowd slowly congregate and take over :3

i met River Heeler (@riverheeler) there who was super nice, but my gods his suit was immaculately done. i asked who his maker was, and he said it was Fursa Major Studio... fingers crossed hat in a couple months, i may have a suit from them~

i met back up with Leo and Muddy and spent the rest of the afternoon with them for the most part. it was nice to have a chill time after all the hectics of the past couple days... but that didn't stop me from crying pretty much the entire walk back to the hotel because i wasn't ready for it to be over.

at the last possible minute, a couple of Lucarios, including Monado (@monadoart) had found my stickers and reached out to me to meet up at midnight! we played a game of smash and then it was definitely time for me to go to sleep. something tells me they also took the opportunity to add something extra to my stickers... >:(

after the con

quat took a Lyft back to the airport because his flight was earlier and he didn't trust MARTA. mine was several hours later in the day, so i decided to brave the MARTA once more. having TSA pre-check saved my ass a little since the regular TSA line was an hour plus.

i got through in time to meet up with quat at his gate. we got subway and i cried yet again... i might just be a crybaby. i had an uneventful flight back myself.

the con haul was pretty good! i got many stickers, prints, trinkets, and lanyards. my room was pretty barren before and it's nice to have stuff up on my walls now, especially that it fits a theme :3

18+

the next con i plan to be at is Tails and Tornadoes in Tulsa, Oklahoma in September! i'll be going up with local furs again and no doubt you'll hear about it here as well :3