Dear Ice & Fire Con Fam,

I have been struggling to write my annual love letter to this convention even more than usual, because I truly don’t know how to put the way I feel about Ice & Fire Con 2018 into words. In the past I talked about how Ice & Fire Con went from being a goal, to being a reality, to being a lifestyle (for me, anyway), and last year I wrote an ode to this family of ours. I keep thinking, what else is there to say? How can I possibly explain the immense amount of happiness that this event – and the people who attend it – bring me?

The truth is, I can’t. Not really. Anything I write is going to fall short of describing the crazy combination of stress and excitement and anxiety and love that I feel for and about Ice & Fire Con. I’m only human, and sometimes words fail even me.

This year marked our sixth con and our second location change, and with the latter always comes a huge learning curve, one that didn’t exist in 2014, 2015, or 2017, and one that we have hopefully now conquered, as we are returning to Deer Creek in 2019.

Another big change this year was that it was the first time I was the sole organizer of the convention, and I’ll be honest, that was scary as hell. From 2013 until 2016, we were three organizers with an additional four people on the Small Council, while in 2017, it was K-K and I and five Small Council members. There are a lot of pros and cons to being part of an organizing *team* versus being a single organizer with a six-member Small Council to at turns discuss big, important decisions with and go to for back up, and I swear I experienced every single one of those pros and cons leading up to Ice & Fire Con 2018.

The point of spilling my guts about how difficult location changes and organizational upheavals can be – no matter how positive the reasons for them – is to lead into one big ol’ “THANK YOU, all of you.”

Thank you for being understanding when there were little hiccups here and there.

Thank you to the person who gets my vote for Newbie of the Year, Nate, for your invaluable help when we were struggling with the new sound system.

Thank you to Sarah for the use of your iPad to record when we ran into a snag with ours.

Thank you to Australian Chris (gosh I hope I’m not using the wrong spelling there) for the pizza Saturday when I was running on fumes.

Thank you to Aibhril, RJ, Arthur, British Kevin (sorry, gotta distinguish from other Kevins!), and all the other people who bought me drinks just because. (I wish I could remember every single one of you who did but my memory isn’t great even when I’m *not* drinking 😉 )

Thank you to the people who danced with me at the Flea Bottom Fete, because I am a damn silly dancer and have no shame about that and you let me be my ridiculous self.

Thank you to the Fandom Faves for plugging us throughout the year and for running some great panels and activities at the con.

Thank you to Beth for the photos…and to Beth AND Andrew for putting up that darn backdrop.

Thank you to the volunteers, because without you, the con itself wouldn’t run.

Thank you to the Small Council members for the extra level of work you guys put in, because without you, the con wouldn’t happen.

(And thank you especially to Chloe for being the closest thing to a second organizer that I had. If anyone can imagine what I look like both with steam coming out of my ears and when I’m craughing like an idiot because I’m so darn hexcited, you can.) (Craughing = cry/laughing; hexcited.= happy/excited)

Thank you to Brian for the musical. While it wouldn’t have been quite what it was without Dom’s lyrical help and a great group of people willing to record themselves and then stand on stage in front of almost the entire convention, Brian was the heart and soul of the production and he’s the one who truly made it what it was…which was, in a word, AWESOME.

As I write this, I keep thinking of new things to add, but if I keep going no one will ever read the whole thing and then what’s the point of having written it at all? Suffice it to say that if I didn’t thank you directly, it’s not because I’m not thinking of you, but rather because this was our biggest year yet and if I listed every single thing and person I was grateful for this would take me ten times longer to write than it already has.

The bottom line is that as much as Ice & Fire Con is my baby, all of you – the Small Council, the volunteers, the fandom faves, the attendees – all of *you* are what make the planning and the work worthwhile. Several times during this year’s Flea Bottom Fete, I found myself stepping off to the side to just watch all of the people dancing together, and I know this is cheesy but to me, it was beautiful. As someone who was (difficult as it may be to believe, if you only met me in recent years) a shy, quiet, bullied little bookworm for most of my life, in my opinion the most important goal each year is to make sure everyone who comes to Ice & Fire Con feels welcome, that everyone goes home having met at least a few new friends, and – hopefully – that you all feel like part of our weird, silly, ASOIAF/GoT-obsessed family.

Obviously it’s next to impossible for me to meet and/or talk to everyone while I’m running around like a chicken with my head cut off at the con, but whether or not we did meet one-on-one, whether or not we had any sort of conversation, please know that my inbox is always open. I know we have room to improve and I’m always willing to hear people out…but hey, if you just want to tell me you had a good time, that sort of shit makes my day 🙂

In my humble opinion, this was the absolute best Ice & Fire Con since our very first one way back in 2013, so again, thank you, thank you, thank you, to everyone who was a part of it.

Yours,
Tara