Pins are shipping this week and we'll see how bad tariffs are for me. It isn't a full order but I will be receiving the following quantities:

200 ramen dragons
202 bao dragons (I didn't order 202 but I guess there were extras in case of defects)
40 taco dragons
170 black sushi cats
50 orange sushi cats
203 gray sushi cats
124 white sushi cats
180 ice cream dragons

This should cover all the orders mostly. I'll update what tariffs cost for me since I know several artists also backed and we're probably all curious what we're each getting hit with (or maybe I'm just curious and in a panic bc of my plush project lol).

I had some complications with ordering the keychains. Not sure how they lost the file I sent for the samples so trying to get that figured out and ordered. With everyone being swarmed with orders before a certain date, it's unclear when these will arrive but I already have your packages all set aside in a box ready to ship once everything has arrived. I mostly do that so I can sell extras without worrying about overselling.

Anyways, fingers crossed everything goes well for this. <3

I could rant about tariffs but instead, I will be productive about the updates that are relevant.

Keychains
I am going to start these finally. Between back to back conventions, taxes, and tariff concerns I just hadn't really gotten to it after the samples. I will be emailing them after I finish this post to get them started.

Finished Pins & Remakes
So I've been in communication with my manufacturer about a few things due to everything going on lately. My order was $6,200 (I only received $3,822.02 of the $4,747 it shows everyone on my front page). I definitely have/had (?) concerns about paying 145% in tariffs.

Seems like the Taco pins have the most defective pins of the bunch. Something happened with the plating process, so only 40 of them are any good. I need 41 to fill orders, sooo I guess someone will get their order later than others. I'll probably look and see if I can make it someone I know irl and go that route since my friends and family are super patient. Especially if they are local I can just hand deliver it later lol. This is assuming none of them are waiting on the orange cat. This train of thought may not even matter.

I will barely have enough black cats to cover all the freebies + addons. Waiting to see about the ice cream dragon still. If all goes well though, whatever is ready should be shipped soon.

Remakes
The Atlantic Salmon cat had to be completely remade so any orders with those will be delayed. Not sure how much of a delay, but they should come in with the custom sushi cat orders - assuming nothing goes wrong here.

The taco dragon, black sushi cat and the white sushi cat seem to need the most remakes. Only orders that need the orange cat will be affected by these remakes as that is the design that will be holding most up.

Sorry for the two weeks of silence! Hopefully I will have photos of pins in hand in the near future. Thank you everyone for being so patient.

PS I just want to note, I currently don't pay myself anyways so as of right now, any projects I have going forward likely won't have any substantial price fluctuations. At least for now. Just means I'll probably need more backers.

Alright so since the orange cats have to be remade - they are too small to get the enamel out without damaging them - I made a deal with my manufacturer that I will just make a new screenprint for it and keep them. Just getting a discount on remakes and we'll have some sort of fluffy garfield-esque orange cat pins as well. 

I'm rushing today for an event, but I will update with some pics later.

Cards were also charged today. 

Just a reminder cards will be charged April 1st.

I think the orange cats are fixed now? Maybe?

It's lighter so I'm happy. I don't think it matches the exact color I was expecting, but it looks fine to me so I am okay with it. I will drop some other pics below as well.

Some photos I was sent before they lightened it so you can see how there wasn't exactly enough contrast with the screenprint color. Should be better now at least.

And a dragon photo. Think the dragons just need screenprint really at this point so that is probably all that is left. I really need to get the keychains ordered so I can mail things once everything arrives!

I realized I didn't update about sushi cat progress.

Let's start with the good things! They look like they are doing well at least. My concern was the white cat since it's a mix of pearl and regular white (meaning two separate ways it's being handled). That ended up being just fine as of this point. These should finish up soon. 

For those unfamiliar with the process: Mold -> Raw Pins -> Enamel Fill & Firing -> Cleanup -> Plating & Polish -> Screenprint.

Now for the bad news! So I didn't expect to run into issues with the orange cat, but here we are. It seems extremely BRIGHT ORANGE compared to what I was expecting. Going to work on getting it fixed though. They asked if I wanted more white added to it, I will probably go that route but I asked to see the stripe print color next to the color of the cat itself first. 

I will say I have sped up my color selection process by using Pantone Connect + cross checking colors with my physical book. This particular color just happens to NOT be a color I have in my book and I was like "well they haven't steered me wrong yet" haha. Some of this could be a lighting situation. I think manufacturers take pretty terrible photos (and that's okay), but it makes it harder to actually make good judgement calls sometimes.

Either way, I am working on fixing this design, but feel free to panic with me in the meantime! :D

Custom Pins
I will actually be working on these when I get back from Awesomecon. I had some other things going on this month, so I never got them finished. I would like to start them in April and since they will be smaller quantities than the main order, they should not take as long to complete. Either way, thank you two for being patient with me. <3

I think that wraps up the updates for now! I do need to get the full keychain order into production as well so I can make sure to get everything out together.