Pennsic 43 - Recap

Whew, what a week we've had. Or really, what an intense last 3 weeks it's been! I wanted to throw together a quick post to let you all know what I've been up to all this time, and well, here it is.

Let's start with the last week in July. It was the last week of my first semester of Graduate School, and I was finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. But with a final due on Wednesday and a final due on Thursday (both reflective papers), it was a busy week indeed. I finally got everything turned in on time, and I was done. Nothing left to do except wait for the grades to come in. Oh, and start packing for the week-long insance camping event that we were leaving for on Sunday. Finals = done, packing, not so much.

I went to a party that Thursday night that one of my co-workers threw at her (beautiful little) house, and we all played a rousing game of Cards Against Humanity. Let's just say I heard a few things I never thought I would hear coming our of my coworkers mouths! (It's a fun game, for terrible people)

Friday I worked, and then we took the day on Saturday to get ready for our week-long camping trip. I know, packing for a week's vacation in one day is really smart... Anyway, we got everything packed up and ready to go for an early departure on Sunday morning.

Okay so, before we continue, I should take a minute to tell you where we went. Remember like a million years ago, when I posted about going to some crazy event called Pennsic? Yup, we did it again! Actually, my husband's only missed 1 year in the last 10, but this was only my second time going. And we both had an absolute blast!

We got to spend time with old friends and (to me at least) new friends. I got to meet a lot of the people that I've been hearing my husband talk about for years, and they were all exactly as I had imagined them. Wonderful, fun, funny and charming people.

I could go through a day-by-day re-cap of everything that we did at Pennsic, but I don't want to bore you. I've already put my family and friends through that kind of torture, and I don't want you nice folks to have to suffer through it as well. So let me give you the condensed version.

Sunday: Un-packing, setting up the tent (which leaked the whole time, greeting people, then a night of amazing performances.

Monday: Field battle, then our first classes of the week (including one by a teacher who I remembered well from 5 years ago). Then we actually got up to the archery range to shoot our War-Points.

Tuesday: It was a fast day, so we planned ourselves a long schedule of classes, which we more or less stuck to.

Wednesday: We went to a bit of East Kingdom Court (it ended up lasting 4 hours) and then: two words, Midnight Madness! Shopping at all of the merchants! We had a blast wandering around all of the different stalls and buying way more stuff than we needed.

Thursday: More classes, then cooking all the things back in camp (including Creme Brulee on the open fire). We ended up staying up until 2 in the morning learning how to make a bow-string.

Friday: Our last day in camp. We went to a class, then packed up and helped take down the camp site. Drove home, and that was all she wrote.

We had an amazing time, hung out with friends, attended some very interesting classes (Like: Historical Uses of Poisons, for one), and made some cool things.

Not to mention got some cool things. Check it out:

A bunny fur and some beautiful hand-spun yarn

All these leather scraps for only $2!

And some lovely linen to make a few nice projects out of!

Pennsic was a blast (I think I've said that before!), and I honestly can't wait to go back next year. But in the mean time, life moves on. Back to the grind!



I'll be back next week with another Librarian's Corner, so stay tuned!

Travel Plans for 2014

It's only March, but I'm already feeling overwhelmed about everything that's going to be going on this coming year. So I thought I'd take a moment and share our travel plans for the year, and then maybe I won't feel so overwhelmed? Maybe? Please?

Now the funny thing is, I always say that I don't particularly like to travel, and that I don't do it very often. Now don't get me wrong, it's not a fear of flying or anything like that. I actually love to fly. It's airports that I hate. Long lines for security, body-scans, rushing to get to your gate seconds before the plane takes off, only to discover that the $5.99 coffee you just purchased in the terminal can't be taken on the plane... Ugh, and don't get me started on the fees associated with flying these days.

Anyway, despite my claims to not be a big traveler, my husband and I have already made three big trips in the 7 months we've been married.

• In August we went on our honeymoon, driving first the the Toledo Zoo, then to the Mutter Museum in Philly, then to New York to celebrate with family and relax in the country.
• Then in November, we drove 10 hours down to Baltimore to celebrate Thanksgiving with my aunt and uncle and cousins.
• In January, as you might have noticed, we went to Washington D.C. (which is the best trip of 2014... so far)
• In May we'll be flying up to New York again to celebrate our niece's wedding (and hopefully meeting her fiance at some point before the ceremony).
• In July, we're off to fight in the Pennsic War, or at least to watch the fighting. And don't worry, I'll be posting about the prep for this trip, as it promises to be interesting.
• We'll probably head back down to Baltimore in November, as Thanksgiving tends to happen once a year, and celebrating with my aunt and uncle has sort of become a family tradition over the last few decades.
• And finally, in December, my husband and I are hoping to take a trip to Israel, as I haven't been there in about 8 years, and that's a sad thing.

So uh, yeah. I think that's it. 7 major trips in a year and a half. That's not crazy, right? Right?
Okay, maybe it's a little insane, but what can we do? We've got wandering feet, I guess. Or, just a lot of family celebrations all over the country!

See why I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed? I swear, I'm such a homebody... Oh well.

Stay tuned for more madness, and I promise to blog about all of these amazing trips as they happen!

Project Sunday 2-23-14

I know it's not Sunday anymore, but I was simply too exhausted last night to possibly post this, and I'm going to tell you why.

Sunday is usually the only day of the week that both my husband and myself have free time. So we try to spend almost all of our Sundays working on the myriad of projects that we're occupying our time with. Thus we have dubbed the day Project Sunday. Catchy, right?

So what did we do this past Project Sunday? I'm so glad you asked.

First, since we're planning on going to Pennsic this year (yes, that again) I'm going to need something to wear. You might remember that last time I went to Pennsic, I had to make a bunch of funny looking cloths for myself... Well, I don't know what we were thinking, but they all came out way too big. Over the years, we took in one of the tunics and made it wearable, but nothing else really fit me. So yesterday, we went to a Garb Workshop in our Barrony and fixed up the other two pieces! I'm so excited that now I'll actually have garb that fits me! We spent the whole morning measuring and cutting and sewing and surging, and it was so much fun. There's still a lot of work to be done. One of my tunics needs to be hemmed, and I still don't have any pants, but oh well. Such is life.

After the Garb Workshop, we headed over to my mom's office so that I could do some work, and so my husband could provide some tech support to her. No matter how old your children get, they will always be your precious little IT people.

Next was a trip to my in-law's house to have "dinner" (at 4:00pm) with some friends of theirs, and then to work on a really special project that I can't tell you about now, but that I promise I will blog about as soon as it's finished!

Now you might think that we packed a lot into our Project Sunday, but we weren't done yet! We had the most important project of all waiting for us at home.
We had to finish our thank-you notes! Yes, I know that we've been married for over 6 months, and we haven't done our thank-you notes yet. But guess what? They're all done now! It took about 4 hours of solid work over Saturday and Sunday evenings to hammer out all of the details and write some of the ones we had been putting off. But it got done. I'm going to head out to the post office today to mail them! (then I just have to worry about my grad-school apps... yay)

And that was really the end of a very long, yet very productive Project Sunday. What will we get done next time?
Stay tuned and find out!

Pennsic Pics... Finally

Okay, I've been saying for awhile that I'm going to post a few pictures (postcards) of some Pennsic battles, so here they are:

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• Plus, a picture of my elephants:

• I don't know why, but I love to collect elephants!

• - C

Where Have I Been?

Okay, I promised to tell you all where I was for my vacation? I was here:

In the Current Middle Ages!

I was at Pennsic XXXVIII!

I'm not going to try to explain Pennsic here, it would take too long and I'd just get myself all worked up. Let's just say it was the most awesome two weeks I have ever spent pretending to be 400 years ago... Confused yet? Try this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsic see if it helps.

Basically, it's somewhere in the neighborhood of 10,000 people. They all dress up like people from the real middle ages, and some of them even fight! There's tons of stuff to do, and don't even get me started on the shopping! (More than one person advised me to set aside money for the trip home, otherwise I might be tempted to spend it!) There are 'mock' battles and we even got to go to the East Kingdom's Royal Court (I'm not joking, you have to bow to these people...) The entire thing was an amazing experience.

Anyway, I had an amazing time, met the coolest (read weirdest) people and went to some awesome classes! I think tomorrow I'm going to post a few pictures from the battles (I didn't take them, I bought post-cards) and talk a little bit about the classes I got to go to.

The entire thing is mind-blowing. If you're ever looking for a very very strange (but fun and exciting) vacation, try Pennsic!

Also, I'd like to thank my boyfriend for 'dragging' me there, kicking and screaming! Thank you Puppy, I had a wonderful time!

- C

I'm Baaaaaaaack!

• Ah!
• Just a quick post here to let you all know that I'm back!
• I should have posted before I left, but I'll make up for it tomorrow, I promise!
• I've been on the weirdest possible vacation for the last two weeks, and I can't wait to tell you guys all about it and share some pictures!
• I'll be here tomorrow posting about my crazy vacation!