East Kingdom Spring Coronation

A few Easterners gathered outside the Armory
Photo by Jenn Surabian Bachour

It's been a while gentle reader, thank you for hanging in there. Today I'm going to tell you a story:

Once upon a time in the beautiful Kingdom of the East, there was a little Shire called Quintavia, and in this shire was a wonderful place known as Higgins Armory.

It was a collection of all things knight - weapons, armor, and period references. It was much beloved by the people, but tragedy struck and on December 31, 2013 it closed. Much of the collection was auctioned off, some went to the local art museum, and the lights went dark in the big steel building on the hill.

I live around the corner during this time, and watched on my nightly commute as it got darker, and darker. One night all the lights were on, and then they never came on again. It was heartbreaking.

Until recently! A developer purchased the building, renamed it the John W Higgins Armory and is working on renting it out. One of my Shire, Perronnelle de Croy, was brave enough to approach them about using the space, and they took a chance on us. We were the first group to rent the great hall as it's now called.

Boyar Aleksei Dmitriev put in the bid for Coronation and asked me to be his deputy. He assembled a team of cooks and staff heads from the Shire and we set to planning. There was a very slight chance that Aleksei would have to be handling issues with his father and we put in place that Siubhan Wallace would be my deputy should that happen.

The site walk was bittersweet. What used to be still echos, but we started to see what could be.

My first site walk in January

I set up a volunteer sign up through volunteersignup.org which is a GREAT tool, highly recommend, and a couple other tasks.

Then a week and a day before the event Aleksei, who had been away handling issues with his father, stepped down formally.

I swear I spent that entire day sending emails. I scheduled a staff meeting Sunday and we went over the plans and any open issues. At that time we had 36 pre-registrations.

Siubhan became by mobile secretary and made any calls that needed doing during the day and checked in with the food folks: Aethelhawk Keyfinder and Cassandra Böll von Bayer. We had cooking nights Wednesday and Friday that I'd previously scheduled in the commercial kitchens of Camelot and Mosaic. I got to work printing site booklets and signs.

Friday was prep day at Higgins from 9-3. Brokk brought the Shire storage trailer (for which we are eternally grateful) and our wonderful Seneschal Matthias Grunewald had gotten the royal thrones and banners for us to prep.

The Barony of Stonemarche lent us their 90 heraldic banners they use in the Armory at Birka (Thank you Master Harold von Auerbach and Mistress Aine Callaghan!) and my wonderful household member Syele von Heidelberg who drove up to grab them from the Seacoast. Perronnelle did an amazing amount of work soliciting other banners and working with the Kingdom Chamberlain to get any kingdom banners to site.

We came armed with ladders but discovered (thank the gods) that the site had a scissor lift which Perronnelle swiftly mastered, marshaled troops, and set to decorating.

Our rental delivery came from Paul's Rents in Leominster (great service and great prices) and the guy running our delivery was as in awe of the place as we were. He kept saying how this had been his favorite place to go on school field trips and how glad he was that the site was being used again.

Perronnelle and Team did an amazing job

This was the first time Siubhan and Aethelhawk had gotten a chance to walk through the building and we quickly realized that the reality of the layout. There was no way we could serve dayboard in the main hall as planned. This had been an ongoing discussion and Aleksei and I had come up with an alternative prior, but until we were in the space with half the chairs set up did it become quite apparent we had to go to Plan B. Beyond that, Plan C, and eventually Plan D.

So this is around 12:30. Aethelhawk, Siubhan, and I walked through what was going to be our prep area and realized the only thing making it the prep area was one sink, which we could live without. So prep moved to the first floor, dayboard and dining to the second, and all my wonderful maps went straight out the window.

Suffice to say I tracked 20,000 steps on Friday, and we got an extension on our set up time and the volunteers which were left quickly got the tables and chairs set up. I then left to go check in on cooking and strategize the new layout at around 7pm. The outcome of that meeting was someone else was going to be running the dayboard service, Weehafoc (Aethelhawk and Siubhan's son) stepped up. (and did a marvelous job)

Matthias, our Seneschal, was there helping food prep. Well, he was running a meat slicer the rest of us were scared of and I may have joked with him that losing a finger is a knightly virtue. When it came out that pre-reg was up to 310 he joked with me that we might hit 500. At this point, gentle reader, I might have said some very unkind things to Matthias, and we all laughed, and laughed at this possibility. I then went off to reprint and redraw all the maps, have my household bartender Tho make me a drink, and sleep.

The shirt I wore all Friday said "Blessed" and I truly felt I was. I cannot say how much I appreciate the work of all our set up volunteers, event staff, and especially Siubhan.

Saturday dawned bright and cool. I tricked my friends into getting up early by promising them a great breakfast at a local diner and got to site. We swiftly and efficiently loaded in and got straight to work. 10:30 I got the news we had hit 475, after last court (first court of the day) started I got the news that we were at 510, and we ended the day at 667.

I only made 14,000 steps Saturday, mostly because I stayed in the dayboard area. Kudos to my parking staff led by Andreiko and ably assisted by Duchess Thyra (the most beautiful of traffic cones) who found places to park everyone, and to our Theresa Giani and our gate staff who swiftly and efficiently checked everyone in.

There were a few fires that needed putting out, but honestly, it went very, very, smoothly. Our shoppers Bianca Anguissola and Elvira Ballesteros found every rotisserie chicken in the area and other supplies to supplement our dayboard intended for 400. We never ran out of food.

I'd also like to thank here Master Malcolm Bowman, the herald for last court. It went on for 3 hours, about twice as long as estimated, which was a good thing. It meant most people snuck out and ate during court and we never had the massive tidal wave we braced for all day. At most people waited 5 minutes for food. That's a miracle with 667 people. A. Miracle.  

I got this shot while running around

Also to the folks who cleaned up at the end of the night. I was along the gallery watching the Great Hall empty. It was like watching piranhas devour a cow. A flurry of activity and it was clean. My clean up rock stars were Sir Colin and his wife Baroness Margaret of Lochleven. They work so well as a team and they just kept going.

I'm still in awe of my team. Such a success!

Jenn and Joe at the site were so wonderful to work with. Anything we needed they worked with us. They truly felt the love of the East Kingdom in how welcoming and respectful everyone was.

I'm sure I'll update this with more pictures and names as I recover mentally. In my mundane life I work in finance, so we're a little busy with the tax season tornado.

And as I said on the East Kingdom page- thank you to each and every one of you who came. Again, I feel blessed to have been able to make this happen.

Thanks,
A Very Grateful Fortune

The Post Birka Post: Mostly Event Pictures

Well by now I'm sure you're wondering "Fortune, how did Birka go?" and "Fortune, do you ever want to sew again after Birka?" 

Well, gentle reader, Birka went well, and I did eventually want to sew again. 

Lady Fortune St Keyne as Lotso from Toy Story 3

Here is my finished dress. 

I even smelled like strawberries (a character feature of the villainous Lotso). Thank you Bath and Body works and your Fresh Strawberries Hand Cream. 

The fashion show went amazingly well. We had over 40 entries and many of them for the Pixar Queen's Challenge. Lady Syele runs the challenge and does a wonderful job. We had some very tough judges (Lady Elena, Mistress Albreda, Mistress Amelia Venture, and her Majesty and her advisors) and the wonderful Mistress Alys Mackyntoich volunteered to MC. 

My household members Gritta won an award for her amazing Crannach "Ham" (she's been in the SCA less than a year locally!) and Lady Bianca Anguissola won an award for her late period "Bo Peep". The overall winner was the most amazing WALL-E early Tudor by Lady Astrid. 

I somehow never got a full picture of Partysaurus Rex in his tunic by himself, but I will share construction pictures. Tho and I are still working on how to get his pants to be comfortable and stay up. 

Pictures of the event: 

Most of House Strangewayes: Lady Bianca Anguissola, Lady Cecily Windham, Gritta,
Lady Elvira Ballesteros, Mistress Iulia Agricola, Lord Fearghas Randonneur,
Lady Lysken die Wayer, Lady Syele von Heidelberg, Lady Fortune St Keyne,
Erdene Qadijin, Jacquemine van Bel, Lord Thothreker Ogaefa
Jeremy (Mr. Syele)

And we've reached punchy o'clock.
Lady Simona bat Leon, Lady Syele von Heidelberg, Lady Lysken die Wayer
Lady Fortune St Keyne, Gritta, Lady Elvira Ballesteros, Jacquemine van Bel, Lady Bianca Anguissola
Lord Hermankyn, Lord Thothreker Ogaefa
And once again: Jeremy. Who loves our darling Syele. 

Lady Syele ran the fashion show and had a lovely German gown that looked like Jesse from Toy Story, her loving and patient husband Jeremy had a Buzz Lightyear houppelande. 

Lady Simona and her husband Hermankyn were the green claw machine aliens from Toy Story

Let's just say family picture time this year was chaotic. 

We also have a tradition of taking ankle shots as a household: 

Mistress Iula refuses to show her ankles as she is wearing her work boots.
Mistress Iulia is a spoilsport of the first order. 

The other tradition we ladies indulge in are selfies in the executive ladies washroom by the Armory: 

Simona and I 

Selfie time!

 Actually walking in the fashion show:

I borrowed Master Ekkehardt's cane to complete the look. 

And the twirl!

All in all it was yet another wonderful Birka!

 

Shire Yule - Adventures in Event Stewarding

Lovely singing sotelte by Toi de Poisson
The fruit are all marzipan!

I had the blog post about Autocrating/Event Stewarding all ready in late November and then.... well. Quintavia Shire Yule happened to me, and just about everything that could go wrong did go wrong. So while I'll finish that post at a later date, I'm going to go over what happened (and how the issues were resolved)

Our Shire hosts a very informal Yule event each year. It's a potluck, donation-only, garb-optional event. It's a great time to encourage newcomers to come check us out and hang out informally with each other.

We also give out our Shire awards known as the Keeper awards: The Keeper of the Light, Keeper of the Chalice, Keeper of the Torse, Keeper of the Silver Rapier, and Keeper of the Golden Arrow. Each Keeper has a physical token for their award, for example: I was awarded the Keeper of the Light of Quintavia in 2012 and took the lantern with me to events until it was my time to pass it on to Lady Rosina von Shaffhausen.

So in the early summer at a business meeting when asked if anyone would like to organize this event I volunteered. We've held the event at the same church for about 4 years that I have been to, and it runs relatively the same way each year. Should be easy.

The church where we hold it has a new admin who is in the office for a half day once a week. Emails were exchanged months beforehand reserving the space and requesting contracts. When running an event I very much like to drop off paperwork in person, but the admin insisted I send it by mail to the church's PO Box in town. So I went off to the Post Office near my work and dropped it off.

The Sunday before, after a business meeting where another event steward complained about having issues contacting said church for another event, I emailed her about getting into the space an hour earlier than we'd agreed and found out our contract and check had never arrived and she'd given the space away to a church member for a function. This was Wednesday morning. The event was on Saturday.

I had a moment of blinding panic and then starting making calls.

Thankfully, my protege sister Lady Simona bat Leon lives in a co-housing community with a large hall and commercial kitchen. She was able to get us in for a slightly shorter duration but it was free. Her neighbors are also geeky and made more space for us and moved their bi-weekly gaming session. It was only once I'd found a new site that I contacted our new Seneschal Mathias Grunewald and let him know about the changes. I also emailed our Exchequer to stop the check. This goes back to my philosophy of always having a solution when reporting a problem. Had it taken me longer to find a site I would have alerted my Seneschal at that point, but there is no sense inciting panic in more people if it's avoidable.

Then I set to work changing the Facebook events, emailing the lists, and updating the Shire Facebook. I had to wait until I was at a desktop to change the event announcement on the East Kingdom site. Our Chronicler changed the Quintavia website for me. But within two hours I had updated all media I had and let everyone know.

I celebrated with a Job Well Done Iced Caramel Macchiato.

I had also been working on site tokens for the event inspired by the lovely Morgan Donner. She had made woodcut paper crowns based of this painting:

Peasants at the Hearth by Pieter Aertsen 1556

Mine were faux woodcut because as much as I love my hobby I'm not investing $50 in block carving tools for a free event, instead I invested $2 in a couple felt tip pens.

I started out with a sketch:

The sketch

Finished panel #1

Finished crown

I colored over the sketches with a basic felt tipped pen and included marks to make it look like mistakes in the carving and variations in the width of the lines. I made the panels fit on standard 8 1/2 by 11 paper with about a half inch overlap, 3 panels per page, alternating our Shire heraldry and a jewel. Then I used the magic of the photocopier and made about 50 of them.

I think they came out great and we had a great time coloring them and putting them on.

Lady Bianca Anguissola

Lady Elvira Violante Ballesteros

Archer Dave (Lord Mikail) and I 

Bianca and I 

I also made little star ornaments for the occasion out of air dry clay with the help of my household member Lady Syele von Heidelberg and her amazing tiny cookie cutter collection. The star cutters were intended for bento boxes or fondant icing similar to these. The stamping was done with a cookie stamp kit.

We meant to make like.... 40. We made 100. Thankfully I only stamped them with the word "Yule" and not the year so we can use the additional ones next year. I may paint them, as the clay did not dry as white as I would have liked.

How Syele and I left them until I got creative at 1 am and decided they needed stamping!

I used a cookie stamp kit I had to make the impressions and then baked the clay for about an hour in a 150 degree oven. 

Finished ornament, mine now hangs in my cubicle. 

Oh yes, and of course during set up I locked my keys in my running vehicle while putting up signs and had to be rescued by the good people of the Berlin Police Dept. That was the icing on the cake. AND YET I would love to run this event again.

But it all turned out beautifully.

The tablescapes using a mix of Shire servingware, House Strangewayes green glass collection, and festive red ribbon. 

Shire members enjoying the wonderful food

The kid's table. Where I ended up sitting somehow. 

Toi's gorgeous sotlete, which moved, chirped, and later sang 1950's classic hits.
I am trying to figure out how to upload the video I have of it. 

It was probably the best Yule we've had in years, we all sat and talked with each other and the shortened time meant we could all be there together. Lady Toi de Poisson outdid herself with the most amazing dessert, and she truly is a treasure. 

So remember - whatever can go wrong, will go wrong. But you will survive it. 

Sportsmanship and Laughter: Palio di Stonemarche 2015

This year's War Speech!!!!

The 2015 Drappone, or Palio Banner that is awarded to the winning team.
By Lady Fortune St Keyne (me)

Based on the inauguration speech by JFK. 

My Baron,  My Baroness, Games Master, Lady Angela, Lord Frostolf, reverend guests, fellow SCAdians:

Let every Contrada know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, roll any barrell, meet any hobbyhorse, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the success of this Palio.

This much we pledge- and more.

Let all sides explore what victories unite us instead of belaboring those defeats which divide us.

Let both sides seek to invoke the wonders of these games instead of its terrors (barrel roll). Together let us explore the archery and thrown weapons fields, conquer the cheese roll, eradicate the dayboard, tap the bardic depths, and encourage the arts and commerce.

All this will not be finished in the first one hundred minutes. Nor will it be finished in the first one thousand minutes; nor in the life of this Palio; nor even perhaps in our lifetime in this Knowne World. But let us begin.

In your hands, my fellow Ferrari, more than mine, will rest the final success or failure of our course. Since this Contrada was founded, each generation of Ferrari has been summoned to give testimony to its loyalty. The brave deeds of young SCAdians who answered the call to service surround the fairgrounds.

Now the trumpet summons us again - not as a call to bear arms, though strong arms we need,  not as a call to battle, though embattled we are - but a call to bear the burden of a long daylight struggle, "rejoicing in hope; patient in tribulation,"² a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, dehydration, Hippocampo, sunburn, and Sole itself.

Can we forge against these enemies a grand and glorious Contrada, North and South, East and West, that can assure a more fruitful life for all SCA kind? Will you join in that historic effort?

In the long history of the Knowne world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility - I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other Contrada or any other Palio. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our Contrada and all who serve it. And the glow from that fire can truly light the Knowne World.

And so, my fellow SCAdians, ask not what your Contrada can do for you; ask what you can do for your Contrada.

Palio di Stonemarche: 2014 War Speech!

The Barony of Stonemarche holds a renaissance Italian Games Day each year in June. There are three teams or Contrada - Contrada Hippocampo for water, encompassing the Seacost of NH, Contrada Sole representing fire, the northern region of NH, and Contrada Ferrari representing earth, with the central region.

The Triumph of Venus - Allegory of March Fresco in the Salon dei Mesi in 

Palazzo Schifanoia by Cosimo Tura  

1469–70

I have been the Contrada Captain for Ferrari for the last two years. Last year we decided to add war speeches to the docket. Mine was the best. Now, I'm the only one who actually showed up with a war speech, but that's beside the point.

The look on the Contrada Hippocampo Captain Baron Harold von Auerbach's face when he realized what I'd done was worth the weird looks practicing this back and forth from work on my commute.

Lady Fortune St. Keyne's Contrada Ferrari War Speech

(apologies owed to Winston Churchill)

Even though two previous Palio have been won by Hippocampo, and one by Sole, last year was won by Ferrari and we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in cheese roll, we shall fight in the lists, we shall fight on the archery and thrown weapons ranges, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the barrel roll, we shall defend our Contrada, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on these fair grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender!

And even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this Contrada, or a large part of it, were to become scraped and sunburnt, then our Allies beyond the borders, would carry on the struggle! Until, in God’s good time, the newcomers, with all their power and misguided enthusiasm, step forth to the rescue and bring us to victory!
Let us, therefore, brace ourselves to our duties and so bear ourselves that, that if Ferrari and her people last for a thousand years, men will still say 'This was their finest Palio.'


This year's war speech is inspired by JFK's inauguration speech.

Pics or It Didn't Happen: The Viking Sailor Senshi at East Kingdom University

We set a goal of trying to get a lot of these dresses done by EKU in the Barony of Endewearde this past weekend. We are all mostly together and we had many of the Senshi attending.

A few of House Strangewayes:


From left to right: Lady Bianca Anguissola as Sailor Jupiter, Becca as Sailor Mars, Lady Fortune St Keyne as Sailor Moon, Jacquemine van der Bel as Sailor Mercury and Lady Cecily Windham as Sailor Neptune

And the very important shot of the bow!
 

Yeah, we are even more fun in person.

I taught a class on viking garb mostly using resources from previous classes on the apron dress and "Vigdis" style underdress. I also included a tutorial on wool felt applique and the Eura underdress.

It was a fantastic day as most East Kingdom University's are, full of learning, fellowship and laughter. The autocrats are super heroes, as the location changed less than 24 hours beforehand and aside from the map in the guidebook being wrong YOU COULDN'T TELL. Lady Yzabell du Perche the event steward and her team did an amazing job and Baroness Isabelle de Montreuil sur Mer who heads the EKU effort pulled off a miracle.


And a huge shout out to Morgan Donner and her 16th Century Sailor Moon! I had to pick myself up off the floor when I saw that you'd been inspired by this project. Full on swoon I tell you!