Author: JP Dean

Presented by Auntie Charity Hystamine

Self Care as Spite. Achieving optimal mental and mental physical health through pure spite! Are you tired of seeing picture perfect self care routines?Have you ever been told you are wasting your potential by yourself or others? Join now to learn the basics of using spite as the ultimate motivator from taking our meds to being the best you can be. Some of the world best inventions were born of spite.

Charity aka Auntie Hystamine: Veteran ConMom and attendee of Steampunk and Book Cons across the country. Curator of Auntie Hystamine’s Kiki Room. Pop Culture and book connoisseur. I am very rarely an official volunteer, but the glory of my ConMom skills are legendary. Often seen helping guests and attendees with snacks and water whilst running through the halls for Quest Items.

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Calling all creatives, makers, artists and crafters: CSE is hosting a contest for those attending the Expo. Currently, we will have 3 contests: Flowers, Mushrooms and Airships!

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Presented by the Blood Sirens

Enter if you dare to the domain of the alluring Blood Sirens. Their cove may tempt you with desirable treasures and lush surroundings, but be wary of their magical form. The Blood Siren’s enchantment may prevent you from truly seeing what is right before you. So heed this warning do not fall for their captivating charms or you may find yourself as one of their eternal Dark Dweller servants. Or worse yet, become part of their prized bone collection.

Saturday afternoon, there will be an opportunity to meet merfolk for pictures, magical fun, and maybe even a chance to swim with them!

• Website: https://www.windycitymermaids.com/bloodsirens
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/blood.sirens/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thebloodsirens

Click on the banner below to learn more about the Sirens . . . 

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Presented by Auntie Charity Hystamine

Discussing Found Family as a trope in media with examples in many genres. And how to take these idea to the real world via growing support groups, con families, and RL friend groups. Found family is a powerful trope often used in the Heroines Journey. It has been used in almost all genres and emphasizes community involvement as a tool to reach the climax of the plot. In real life we often try and become The Hero of our own story and feel bereft when we cannot be the solution to all life’s problems. This panel will focus on HOW to build our own found family. My personal motto is “Be Extra, Be All The Way Extra and you will find your people”.

Charity aka Auntie Hystamine: Veteran ConMom and attendee of Steampunk and Book Cons across the country. Curator of Auntie Hystamine’s Kiki Room. Pop Culture and book connoisseur. I am very rarely an official volunteer, but the glory of my ConMom skills are legendary. Often seen helping guests and attendees with snacks and water whilst running through the halls for Quest Items.

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Presented by Brett King

Award-winning steampunk maker and costumer Brett King introduces you to steampunk through his fantastic mechanical creations and provides tips on making your own.

Brett King is a man of many hats – a costumer, prop-maker, gamemaster, game designer, presenter, Magic Lantern performer, and convention organizer. His life-long love of role-playing games and storytelling carried over into his steampunk panels, props, and costumes. He always aims to entertain, inform, and inspire at conventions, whether running steampunk-styled Dungeons & Dragons games, teaching about automata or prop making, entertaining as his troll-hunting alter-ego Gustaf Danielsson, or presenting Magic Lantern shows.

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Presented by Leanna Renee Hieber

Actress, award-winning, bestselling author and ghost tour guide Leanna Renee Hieber discusses how ghosts along roadsides have changed through the centuries, from tales of highwaymen to haunted histories of the modern motorcycle, by-the-wayside, roadside and “hitchhiker” ghosts continue to evolve but keep their startling hold on our collective psyche. Whether omen or warning, fellow traveler or cautionary tale, Leanna will share her own startling, deeply personal experiences with roadside ghosts and how those experiences shaped how she travels to this day.

Leanna Renee Hieber is a professional actress, playwright, ghost tour guide and an award-winning, bestselling author of fiction and non-fiction for Tor, Kensington Books and Union Square and Company. A Haunted History of Invisible Women: True Stories of America’s Ghosts, co-authored with Andrea Janes, was a Bram Stoker Award Finalist for Superior Achievement in Non-Fiction and their follow-up, America’s Most Gothic: Haunted History Stranger than Fiction, was an Instant USA Today Bestseller and is also a Stoker nominee. Her Gothic Young Adult novel Ravenfield Hall, inspired by the works of Daphne du Maurier, will release in 2027 from Union Square and Company. A 4-time Prism award winner, three of which were awarded to her Gothic Strangely Beautiful saga and a Daphne du Maurier finalist for Darker Still, Leanna’s novels have received translations into multiple languages, national book club editions and her short stories have been featured in notable anthologies while her non-fiction essays have appeared in Apex Magazine, The Deadlands, Haunted Magazine and more. Featured in film and television on shows like Mysteries at the Museum and Beyond the Unknown discussing Victorian Spiritualism, she lives in New York and lectures around the country on Gothic and paranormal themes as they intersect with women’s history.

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