Welcome back to my (semi-)weekly storytelling adventure. I'm learning not to apologize for either the length of my posts nor the length between posts, and I hope you're enjoying the tales. This one is REALLY long, so pull up a toasty, yummy drink and enjoy.

Fri Jan 19: Arye's Welcome - Arye (David) is the newest member of our household, and to welcome him into the fold, we threw a great big party at Lot and Cat's house. David and Juliette were there, and even Liz managed to carpool down with them. Of course it was at Jeff and Adrienne's, and she overdid herself with the cooking, including homemade ravioli's and homemade lasagna noodles, on top of everything else that filled the tables to groaning. In fact, the house was one gigantic long collection of tables, in order to seat everyone else who made it: Lilya and Nate hadn't left yet for their big tour so they were able to attend, Matt and Tamara, Eric, Alan and Theresa, Sarah, Melissa and Tom, and myself -- making 16 people at dinner. And there were household members who weren't even there, like Gary and Miryam and Chiara, Gabriel and his lady, Josh and Sam of course because they live out of state, Raz and Maggie... And even as I list all the names, we're finally noticing that so many people in the household have extended family now who are welcome and yet who aren't exactly household themselves: Juliette, Tom, Tamara, Liz, Miryam, Maggie, Chiara (obviously, since she's not even 2 yrs old yet)... so we're all starting to recognize that the household is MUCH bigger than just the household. But it was a TREMENDOUSLY wonderful dinner together, and family or household, it was fantastic.

As Mina sang Cask and Crew, I took photos of each of us during our verses, including the three Petes. So here's much of the White Star, as we hung out around the Villa.


Sat Jan 20: Angels Melee - Getting to the event on time was a bit of a stretch since we'd been up so late the night before. I overslept my 5 am alarm, but managed to finally wake slightly after 7. I still had a handful of awards to do the calligraphy for, and just raced out the door with my hair still wet and no extensions braided in, and the awards packed away but pens at the ready. I arrived on site with plenty of time to work on the calligraphy for the awards, so I was able to calm down and stop racing so frantically. It was *really* cold on site, so that was a surprise, but otherwise it was a really well run event. Doku was the autocrat, so it was nice to volunteer and help him out, especially since we had to have everyone off site by 5 pm.

Their Majesties had forgotten the medallion box (amongst other typical things to bring to an event), so I was thrilled to offer my Crescent award medallion when Mariam received her Crescent in opening court. I think her shock and tears at being elevated to a Grant of Arms, "Her Ladyship," had as much to do with the personal touch of my medallion as the award itself. It was truly moving.

The event was to designed for practicing melee (group) menuevers for war, but I really only got photos of opening court.


During the event itself, I worked on selling raffle tickets for two fund-raisers in the Kingdom: The suite at Estrella where you can have a cabin on site with heat, AC, water, showers, beds, a fridge, etc. where the raffle is for the chance to purchase the week in the cabin/suite; and a hand-crafted artisan knife from one of our most treasured artisans, Master Oso. Both of the fund-raisers help support the "Travel fund" to help our King and Queen afford all the traveling required by the position. I managed to sell $193 worth of tickets, if I remember correctly, which I'm quite proud of.

Once I'd scoured the audience thoroughly for all the raffle ticket sales I could muster, I spent a little time hanging out at the Inn of the Crimson Spade, chatting with two "newcomers" -- one who truly is new to the Society, and one who's returned after about a 25-year absence. The latter also ripped out the seam of his slacks that day, so we found a way for him to change out of them and retain his privacy, while I quickly whip-stitched them back together for him. But that aside, chatting with newcomers and explaining the SCA is something that comes so naturally to me and that I enjoy so much, I'm beginning to form a long-range plan for exactly when I'll pursue taking this to the next level, to possibly serve in this function at a Regional level.

After the event, nearly a dozen of us went to a restaurant together where we juggled seating arrangements all throughout dinner, although we tried not to confuse the servers too much. Meala, Cormac, Ace, Svetlana, and I ended up chatting for nearly another half hour or more in the parking structure, and then I finally had to head home exhausted. It's really been nice getting to know Cormac better lately.

Sun Jan 21: Quiddich Practice - Originally we were going to have a Planning meeting for this year's Fiber Retreat, but Bjo was sick so it was cancelled. This freed me up to go play Quiddich with friends in the park, getting lots more exercise, too. If anyone who's in the So Calif region would like an afternoon exercise on the occasional Sunday afternoon, you simply HAVE to give Quiddich a try with us!

At the end of the game practice, I managed to snap a few photos of Quiddich practice.


In the late afternoon, I drove north to get some of the straggler mail I still haven't moved to my down-south mailing address, and had the great pleasure of enjoying dinner/coffee with True. We chatted for just hours and hours about everything under the sun, and it truly was a pleasure. He teases me that I'm just a bundle of explosive energy and sunshine, and I'm happy to try and see him smiling and enjoying the world again. It can be easy to be frustrated with some things in politics and relationships in a group, but it's up to each of us to decide what we do in response: Give up, Give in, or Make things better. I'm certain you all know I'm in the "make things better" camp, as often as possible. And if that can rub off on other people, I've done my job right.

It reminds me a lot of the parable of the sower -- which, those of you from a Christian upbringing may remember. The sower sows his seeds, and they can fall on four types of ground: the hard-packed clay, the rocky ground, the shallow ground with weeds, or the good soil. When they fall on the clay, birds come and eat the seeds. When they fall on the rocky ground, the plants never establish any roots and wither in the sun. When they fall on the shallow ground, the plants spring up quickly but are choked out by the weeds. When they falls on the good soil, the plants take root and grow strong, bearing fruit. The parable, as I see it applying to me, is more than just what you might have learned in Sunday School. My job in life is to sow sunshine and love everywhere. True even asked me, "What would you want said about you at your Memorial Service?" And it was easy to reply. I would want people to say, "She made me feel welcome, she made me feel like I belonged." If I can make someone feel like they belong, like they matter, like they're worth my time and attention and affection, then I've done my job (in life) correctly.

And I may never see that take root. I may never see the fruits of my efforts. But it matters to me, and so that's the driving force in my life -- to bring love and sunshine into people's lives, especially when they feel like they're on the outside and no one cares whether they show up or disappear. Of course, there's a personal and deeply religious reason why I care, but that doesn't matter as much as letting people know that they matter for just being who they are. After that, then it's worth doing what's right in the world, but first, it matters just to care about someone for just who they are.

My goodness. Wherever did this soapbox come from? Mind giving me a hand down from here? I'm not good with heights. *wink*

Mon Jan 22: Estrella Planning - Ah, back to the narrative. Meala and I got together to go walking after work, and managed another nice 45-minute clip in the afternoon. It's finally staying light longer in the day, which makes exercising that much easier. The cold weather and early nights made exercising in December really unattractive.

Monday evening I spent several hours with Erika, planning out all our meals and costs for Estrella war -- a week long camping trip coming up in Arizona, in mid-February. This year, our group has grown beyond the dozen or so friends from last year to approximately 20+ people. It's a little bit daunting, to see the size of the task before us, but I managed a dozen on my own last year, and there will be two of us for the 20+ this year.

Tue Jan 23: Coffee - There's still no band rehearsal, so I worked late on my computer and around my house until it was time to drive up and join friends for coffee. I was hoping to join them in the park earlier, but I just kept working on paying bills and mundane tasks until really late. I also managed to sort all our Estrella plans into a spreadsheet with automatic formulas calculating the number of people in attendance, the cost per meal and per person, etc.

Wed Jan 24: Practice & Sewing - I'm still trying to finish all the final touches on my 12th Night wool overdress, and so I brought that with me to the park in the evening. The heavy weapons fighters are all starting to show up in force again, and so the practice was filled with friends. Even Lorccán made it up for practice, which was a treat to see him again. I didn't recognize him at first, without his Irish cloak folded over his armor.

Meala also brought back the rest of my golden wool that we used to trim Raphael's red coat, and it was cold enough on site to stay wrapped in the wool all evening. I'm still not certain what I want to make from it, but ideally I'll come up with something that can be completed before Estrella so I have something woolen and warm to curl up in at night around the fire.

Fri Jan 26: Deliverance RPG - I have no idea what I did on Thursday, but Friday's pretty easy to remember. The Dudley's were sweet enough to invite me to Shabbas dinner, since we were gaming at 7 pm and if I didn't join them, I would have missed Shabbat (which would have made me sad). But they were darling about it, and I got to join them, even with arriving late because of all the nasty Friday night traffic. I had picked up two loaves of challah at my favorite deli, a decadent chocolate mousse for dessert during gaming, and butter along the way when Raphael called and asked me to stop at the store for him. The funniest thing about Shabbat with the Dudley's was just how markedly different the tunes for the prayers were, compared to Jeff and Adrienne's house. I've been enjoying Shabbat for over a year now, with the same prayer tunes every week. The words were the same, but the melodies were completely different, which just made me smile -- I really am a product of Jeff and Adrienne's family, aren't I? *grin*

Gaming itself went really well. We had everyone there: Noah, Saul, me, Erika, Ben, Eric, and Laura (Aliskye). We hadn't been able to enjoy a gaming session since September 15 -- a big surprise to all of us, who hadn't realized it had been that long. If you've ever seen the TV show Firefly or the movie Serenity, our role-playing game is based on this Joss Whedon universe. Noah runs the show (he's the game master), and we treat it like it's a TV show with comments like "...and cut to commercial" or "fade to the credits rolling." I take notes on every gaming session, and when I have time (hee hee!), I type them up like it's a TV script narrative or synopsis. The ship we're flying on is named the Deliverance, so that's the name I associate with our game, not the movie by the same name (which I've never seen). I had missed playing and it was really fun to see everyone again.

Sat Jan 27: Unbelted Gyldenholt - This event was AMAZINGLY fun. Back in mid-November, I'd gone up to the China Lake area for a Saturday event called Frost Dragon. I was sitting with the Queen and one of Her ladies, when Lorccán asked the other lady-in-waiting if he could fight for her on the field. She declined politely since someone was already fighting for her that day, and so he asked me. Now, I only really knew Lorccán in passing up until then, but I was incredibly honored and of course consented. He was pleasantly surprised that I had a token for him to wear on the field, but I take my job as a consort rather seriously. It's my job to have a token for my fighter(s), to watch all their fights closely, be ready with observations if they ask my opinion of their fighting on the field, have water ready so they can be refreshed after the fight, and even take photos of their bouts since so few fighters really have pictures of all their efforts on the field.

Well, after having a lovely day watching Lorccán in November, he asked me again at Unbelted if he could fight for me. Of course I was again incredibly honored, and after having spent an evening with him over dinner and sewing and chatting recently, I felt like a dear friend was fighting for me this time, rather than just a dear acquaintance. I had my camera at the ready, as always, and there was an added bonus surprise on Saturday. I knew he was planning to be squired to Sir Grim at Estrella. But something came up for Grim and he wasn't sure if he was going to make it to Estrella. So he was planning to surprise Lorccán and squire him on the field after round one. I happened to overhear Grim telling one of his man-at-arms while the fight was still going on, so I intentionally stuck around and took an EXCESS of photos for Lorccán, of his surprise squiring ceremony. I felt so incredibly honored to be his consort for the day, on such a special day, and it thrilled me to no end to have something awesome to give back to him. I still need to burn all the photos to CD for him, for his knight, and probably even a set for him Mom (see the next recap on Sunday).

On top of his squiring, Lorccán also went to round five at Unbelted. He fought extremely well in all the rounds, and it was amazing to see how many opponents naturally decided to match him with "single sword" for their fights. Lorccán has an injury in one wrist right now, and so he's fighting only single sword with his good hand for the time being. He was an absolute gentleman, telling me on bended knee what an inspiration I was for him on the field (whee!), and he was very appreciative of a consort who knew how to take care of a fighter. After twenty years in the SCA, 14 of them full-time, I know a little bit now about taking care of fighters. And finally realizing I'm not taking up the sword, I know my job full-time is to be permanent support staff, and I enjoy every minute of it!

I know I've mentioned that there are more photos from all the events in this journal entry forthcoming, but I do have Lorccán's photos done. Enjoy!


Out of armor, Scott (Lorccán) had to hurry off to be in his best-friend's wedding, so I just helped get all his gear to the car quickly so he could get out of there on time. Back on site, I spent the remainder of the event working on more calligraphy, as Their Majesties had several more awards to present both on the field and in closing court. This is one of my favorite tasks, to be available to do calligraphy on-call for Edric and Faizeh. I chatted briefly with Master Giles about heraldry and scroll presentations, and I may have another long-term project to work on this year.

After the event, Marcos and Meala and I met up to go see a young man (6th grader) in his drama presentation. Mitch (aka in the SCA: Drake) was playing in a musical called "Honk," based on Hans Christian Andersen's "The Ugly Duckling." Mitch had given Eric a ticket to the show, and Eric invited me to join him. Melissa couldn't make it through traffic in time to join up with a local comic convention, so she also joined us for the play. It was really fun, and Mitch did a great job as the lead Bullfrog, and we giggled through most of the dialogue and lyrics of the play. Afterwards, we introduced ourselves to Mitch's parents, John and Allison, and they were *thrilled* we came to see the show and support the local theatre arts. Drake comes out to our fighter practices on Wednesday nights, and apparently he races to get all his homework done in time to be allowed to join us. It's so nice to see a young person so interested in the SCA, that we felt really pleased to support his other extra-curricular activities like drama.

Enjoy a small album of Mitch's photos.


Sun Jan 28: Moving Lorccán - Scott got a promotion at work, and took a new job 3-4 hours drive south of where he used to live. You may remember that he was living in a hotel for January, which is why I made dinner when he came over so I could help him sew a coat for some new armor. He finally got a new place to live, and so I had volunteered to help him move in when he arrived with his U-Haul. Since there were no other volunteers, he called and asked if I could scrounge up any other helpers. Both Melissa and Eric answered my call for favors, and so the three of us joined up for the second evening in a row, and headed down to Scott's new place. His Mom, Jeanette, was the only other person helping, and the five of us managed to move everything into his place in just under two hours or so. I'm *so* glad that Melissa and Eric were able to join me, because there's no way Scott, Jeanette, and I could have done the work so easily or quickly without the other two. Afterwards, he took us all out for dinner as part of our payment, and we had such a blast chatting and relaxing together over a meal.

Mon Jan 29: Walking, Sewing Tabard - Once again, Melissa and I managed to go walking for some exercise. I seem to be good with exercising once a week, and I need to start moving that up to 2x or 3x sometime soon.

At Angels Melee, Cormac was getting ready to go out on the field, and he was going to put on a tabard. Unfortunately, it has seen better days, and I confiscated it from him to be replaced with something new and shiny. I spent my Monday evening sewing the new tabard, and I'm really quite proud of it. In the process, I figured out some construction issues I was having with Lorccán's coat, which makes me really optimistic about getting back onto that task. Then later that night, Cormac and I chatted for about an hour, catching up on life and getting to know one another a little bit better.

As I promised, here are the photos of the old tabard, the new tabard I made, and the reveal at Festival of the Rose.


Tue Jan 30: Lunch with my boss, Sewing cleanup - My modern job is working as a sub-contractor for a Navy/Marine Corps contract, and I have the advantage of being able to work from home most of the time. By necessity then, I have two completely different bosses -- my direct-report on the contract, and my "signs-the-paycheck" kind of boss at my actual hiring company. The latter is Jim, and he's a wonderful boss to work for. He likes to check in with his employees on a semi-regular basis, so he occasionally drives up from San Diego to take me out for lunch and chat about how things are going on the contract. Currently, things are in complete upheaval as they re-sort the organization charts for the next week or two, and no one is certain who I work for right now. But there are ways to enjoy the downtime at work, and I enjoyed keeping my boss in the loop.

Back at home, in the evening, I had lots of clean-up from the tabard -- stray bits of cloth and string and thread, strewn about the living room. After the initial clean-up, I sorted through the box labeled "scraps" and finally tossed out some scraps that I never should have kept in the first place. Finally, I patterned the dimensions from Eric's favorite fighting shirt, although I just didn't have the energy to finish and cut-out the new shirt. I'll try and do that Wednesday afternoon/evening before fighter practice. I did manage to finish collating some of my scribal reports for the past month, and updated the scribes inventory on line for Their Majesties.

Wed Jan 31: Practice tonight - So, tonight I'll be headed up to Baronial practice. I wanted to have the Kingdom rapier army arm-bands cut out for anyone else who'd like to help finish them, but instead I finished getting Scott's photos on CD and on my photo website. He won't be making it to practice this week, but I'll deliver the CDs to him next week.

Tomorrow is the Shire meeting up north, Friday is probably Shabbat dinner with friends, Saturday is an event in Palmdale and staying over in a hotel with friends, and Sunday is Kingdom Rapier War Practice in Palmdale. I'll bring lots of sewing handwork with me for Sunday, and I'll catch you all later in February.

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Today's Blessing That I'm Thankful For: Lorccán (Scott), for a deepening friendship. Cormac (Zach) for such an encouraging phone conversation. And Mateo (Andrew), for some very silly encouragement in a very nervous part of my life. You rock, gentlemen. You make me smile, every day.