Weekly Update

It's amazing how this blog has almost turned into a weekly update of what I'm doing and where I'm going.  Let's see...last week was really crazy.  Everything happened.  Tuesday was three hours of dentistry where we took Emma to the ortho, got her wires off; took everyone to the dentist for routine cleaning and Emma had her broken tooth worked on a bit more; then back to the ortho to get the wires put back on.  There was only about an hour left in the school day, so I opted to take them home instead, and then take Cammie back for a Girl Scout meeting.  Wednesday was the usual early release and karate.  Friday was CF clinic for Ben, Cookie Rally, and driving to Portland.  Ben's lung function tests were pretty much off-the-charts good, so we have to keep up the therapies and hope that he maintains that good health.

Girl Scouts Cookie Rally was that evening--it was nice that they held it on Friday so we didn't have to worry about going to bed late and being tired the next day.  We partnered up with another troop that ran two booths and our combined troops ran three more booths for money management, poster making and cookie tasting.  A few of them got the chance to put on the cookie costumes and entertain the younger Brownies and Daisies.  They did great!  They even did the flag ceremony and rocked it!  I'm so proud of all these young ladies...despite how goofy the can be...

Right after the Cookie Rally ended, I hopped in the car and drove to Portland for 12th Night.  I thought it was going to take four hours, but given the lack of traffic and higher speeds I was able to shave 45 minutes off that time, arriving at Sharon & Jeff's at 12:15.  We sat and chatted and went to bed around 1:00.  We knew we had to be up and off to the site fairly early to sign in at gate and they needed to be at a 9:00 meeting.  I wasn't welcome at this meeting (for Peers only...I'm not there yet), so I went to the merchants area and looked at the goods.  While I found a few things I liked, there wasn't anything I needed.  I knew I needed to get some linen for upcoming projects, but I also knew I could get a better price online or from Fabric Depot on sale.  I ended up spending most of that hour chatting with new author, KateMarie Collins, a longtime friend of mine.  It was great catching up with her and sharing stories about kids and daily life.  She shared a recipe with me that I'm going to have to try...it's a tortilla soup, although I may modify a few minor things--there's a lot of "can of this" and "can of that".  I'd probably try to put in fresh tomatoes instead of canned.  It sounds delicious, though!

The rest of the event was great, although I didn't get any photos of anything.  I was sitting in a place that didn't afford a good view of a lot of the court proceedings--the Royals, the awards, the swearing ceremonies, the elevation of Laurels and Pelicans, a Knighting, and the Coronation itself.  (I borrowed this photo from Lisa Kelly...hope she doesn't mind since I did a little name-dropping there.)  The new King & Queen have decided to do a German Kampfrau thing this reign.  Funny thing is I was thinking about making some German Kampfrau...but now I don't want to look like a camp follower by copying them.  Maybe I'll stick with the Turkish stuff for a bit longer.

The knights swear fealty with their swords.  It's gotta be a rather unsettling feeling to have all those sharp things pointed at you...I guess it's a trust thing.

I had dinner with Ariel and her girlfriend, Sarah.  I showed her my binder of Costumer's Guild entries, which I was unable to present for the rank challenge; there was no official guild business done at the event.  Not sure exactly why, but I was told that nothing was organized or that the challenge officer had stepped down and wasn't replaced...in any case, there was nothing going on.  I left all the clothing pieces back at the house (where I was staying...not my house) and just carried the 1/2" binder around with me.  It was small enough that it wasn't a burden.  I was able to share it with a few people who were really happy to see it, especially when they got to the last page and the HOT SOCKS!  At least, that's what Duchess Hludwige called it when Mistress Isolde jabbed her and showed her the photo. Ariel was impressed, too!

We got back to the house at about 11:00 and settled down fairly quickly.  It was a long day.  The next morning, we had breakfast--it was supposed to be a breakfast meeting, but no one showed up for it.  Afterwards, Jeff was thinking about taking the dog out for a run, and I suggested that we go visit Fabric Depot.  Sharon eagerly agreed and off we went!  We found a couple pieces of linen for my Scholar project.  Now that I finished the Journeyman stuff, even though I will have to tweak the entries a bit and be ready to present it at Ursulmas (if it gets organized), I decided to start making Kelly a full set of Scandinavian clothes for him to wear.  I might base them all on the Greenland finds, which should be fun.  I have to teach and write a bunch and do about 20 hours of service to the guild...so it'll be a year-long project, I figure.

On the way back from the fabric store, we stopped in for a visit with Mike & Laura and baby Malcolm, and to deliver a special quilt for him, pictured on the bed behind this glowing couple.  I'm so excited!  He's due any day now, so I'm anxious to get news of the delivery.  It was a short visit, but Mike gave us a tour of the house and all the rooms and hallway they've finished up, the progress on the bathroom in the Garage Mahal, and the studio and music rooms upstairs.  It really looks like a comfortable home, and they're pretty much ready for baby!

I took Sharon back to her place, packed up the last of my things and made a deal with her to buy 11 yards of her linen at the price she paid for it--$4 a yard!  Two pieces are 5 yards each, and one is a 1-yard chunk.  She also gave me links to a couple of really great sites where you can get killer deals on linen in different weights.  One of the sites sells 1-2 yard pieces of bolt-ends, so I may be able to get some really great deals on end bits to make costumes.  This works out really well when making tunics--one yard for the front, one yard in the back, one yard for the sleeves...if you're using different dye lots, it doesn't matter so much...it's medieval!  The Bocksten man tunic had different color sleeves than the body of the tunic.  White is even better...no dye lots to match!

A few weeks ago, I ordered a Geomate Jr. to use for geocaching, and I took it out for a test seek.  Unfortunately it was too dark to find it and I didn't have a flashlight, but at least I know that one cache is going to be easy to find!  I thought I'd try to look for a few more today, but I ended up waiting over two hours for a new customer to come by with a quilt top.  It's a lovely fall-colored queen-size.  She wants a simple stipple all over it, which I will be able to finish up pretty quickly.  Tomorrow's weather is supposed to be equally nice, so maybe I'll go for a walk.

I pulled the loom out of the garage and wove a couple of feet of cardweaving yesterday.  It felt so good to work with the strings again!  I want to weave a couple more pieces before the event in 10 days, where I can sell them on commission with Gypsy Caravan and hopefully pay for my gas and weekends...and a bunch of linen I just purchased...  This is one of the weaving pieces that I started some time back and I'm debating whether or not to sell this one.  It was meant to be something for me, but I may go ahead and set it out for sale.  If it doesn't sell, it was meant for me.  If it does, I can always make another one.  Eh...I'll sell it.  I'd like to make one or two more to add to the four or five I have already.

Oh, and yesterday we had a handyman come out to give us a couple of quotes on work we need to have done.  The kids' bathroom needs to have the floor fixed...and we may have some mold under the floor after the flooding.  Kelly took him around and showed him some other things we'd like to get done over time, and while they were talking out front, he noticed that there were signs of water damage under the siding.  I think some of the weatherproofing might have failed on the sunny side of the house...ugh.  Hopefully it will turn out to be minor and inexpensive...but you know it never is.  I'm hoping to get hardwood floors this year and tear up all this worn out carpet.  It's 15 year old carpet that is really only meant to last five years.  Maybe I'll have to seriously consider getting a part-time job just to pay for home improvement and repairs.  I'm barely organized enough as it is...not sure how I'll manage that.

However, having people coming by today got me motivated to clean up a bunch.  I still have to clear off a table and the island, and I'd like to box up a bunch of stuff to take to GoodWill.  Maybe later this week.