dizzojay | December Meme - Day 13 (Reply)

December 13 → talk about hobbies this year

I've managed to partake in all my main hobbies this year.

Art: I've done a fair bit of fanart for conventions and I've done some animal commissions. I also managed to do a couple of craft fayres over the summer and made some great picture sales!

This was a surprise birthday present for my fantastic Goddaughter, taken from a photo of her competing in three day event at regional level in New Zealand.

Having a permanent external home for my art has also given me an extra dimension in what I can do with it, and I hope over the coming year to expant the workshop and demo side of things.

Conventions and fandom: I've been lucky enough to go to several cons this year, I've been back to Rome and to Paris for Supernatural cons, plus the Crossroads con in the UK. I also got to go to a 'Boys' con in the Spring and that was a great event. It was a first convention for some of the guests and it was lovely to share the experience with them.

I also got to meet David Tennant at Comic-Con last month which was such a treat. He was every bit as delightful as I hoped he'd be!

Tomer (Frenchie from the Boys) was a sweetie!

This is still one of my fave con pics of all time :D

Fanfic: Of all my hobbies, this one has tailed off a bit. I think a large part of that is down to the fact that readership has tailed off as the Spn fandom has been dispersing over the last couple of years. Together wth my co-mods, I made the sad decision to close down the spn_bigpretzel community last month, as engagement had dwindled down to practically nothing, and a lot of my fanfic inspiration used to come from the challenges we ran there.

I'll carry on writing as long as the muse visits me, even if it's not to the same volumes as previous years. I don't as yet feel compelled to write in any fandom other than Supernatural, but we shall see!

Bunnies: I don't class the bunnies as a hobby, they're family!

However, having rabbits again has really got me involved back into rabbit protection and rabbit welfare matters, which I must admit, I've always been fairly militant about. I sponsor a rescue bunny called Dave (yes, Dave!) in a rabbit rescue sanctuary in Bangladesh, and I've got back in touch with a lady I met some years back at some of my art shows, who is a volunteer for the Rabbit Welfare Association and Fund, and we've been discussing ways my art can help the charity. I sold a print at their auction last week which raised £40!

As I'm sure you're aware, I've been posting lots of pictures across social media of my buns and their shenanigans, and I've been doing that mainly because they're adorable! However, I do have an ulterior motive, and that is that if, by posting pictures and videos of my buns running around, playing, being naughty and clever and providing endless entertainment and attitude, they can help to dispel the all-too-common belief that rabbits are boring, mindless little furballs that can just be chucked in a hutch and forgotten about.

That's the entire mindset behind their Insta page and their Youtube channel. Every time I get a comment like 'I didn't know rabbits could run so fast' or 'I didn't know they played with toys' etc, I'm just thrilled that my buns are doing their bit to spread the message of how complex, clever and all-round awesome rabbits are!

(Apologies if all my bunny pic posts get on your nerves!)