Party Like a Goddess
Jun. 15th, 2009 08:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
threadwalkerA&S was fun.
Taking Friday off work is a must-do; sleeping in past 4 am, having time with the kids, and not being on a schedule is what vacation is about. Going down w/ BFF rocked. We were dazzled at the Berkeley Bowl - her by the selection of cucumber and me by all the foreign imported wine. I kept wondering.. how do you know if it sucks? Is it on sale because it's so bad they need to clear up the shelf-space? I don't want foreign vinegar.. Anyway, I made some guesses and had BFF rolling with laughter because I was sent off to find skewers and came back with several bottles of wine instead.
The Sushi/Sake party was fun. Totally unlike past parties - probably because we became the Friday night hang out, so the "man" quotient was higher than usual and there were a lot of guests. But it was fun fun fun.
The Goddess Party went very well. The gas grill was brilliant. The pot-luck items were yummy. HRJ made back-drops for the pavilion, garland was wrapped around pavilion poles, everyone wore a wreath, and many draped toga-like swathes of fabric over their clothing. It felt as though we were period people having a theme party instead of people pretending to be gods/goddesses. It was tremendously fun and silly. HRJ headed up the entertainment and I brought some "cheat sheets" for people to play with. We told/enacted stories, played "guess who I am", there was a hysterical impromptu "urn" dance, ... and we had a chorus in the pavilion spontaneously filking modern music, which, if you think about it, is perfect because I imagine that had we been medieval people throwing a party, we would have filked our own medieval bards for jest.
We waited-out the A&S competitions at the Tavern and then took ourselves to it. I love that Victoria has hosted/organized the tavern, so we brought our brand of silly to it. I had a great time, there, too. I sang. (gasp!) Hopefully I wasn't ruining things too much since (a) I haven't sung in a very very long time and (b) I have no idea what words everyone was saying, so I was trying to read lips. And I hung with friends for a while. I also found myself inspired to make an offer to make someone clothes.
And the classes were great!
The classes I got to attend:
I finally got to take one of Baron Antonio's "women's studies" classes. I have been wanting to take this class for years and usually I'm teaching or volunteering at the event and I miss it. It was informative, the class was engaging, and we got a fabulous bibliography. I can't wait to read some more.
I learned to make aglets and do finger-loop braiding with Vincent and Rene. I am pretty excited. It's not hard to do, but until someone showed me how to do it, I couldn't do it. Now I can. Wheee!
Sunday I took "9 Worthies" by Vlad. I think I was the only one there who had no idea what he was talking about at first; my focused education pretty much skipped all that history stuff and I'm working on that as an adult, but I have some pretty gaping holes. Once I was brought up to speed, though, it was easy to follow and I had a really good time. My only contribution was to accuse the referenced writers who added girls to the tales of the various "worthies" as creating Male Propaganda (i.e. whomever eventually added Guenevere into the Arthur legend was, IMO, creating an Adam-Eve tale inorder to weave into our cultural perception that women are the weak, undermining forces that hold men back... blah blah blah). We got off track, but Etaine promised to send me some book titles... (yay, more reading) And on the 9-worthies themselves, I'm inspired to find some more reading material on this. Coincidentally, one of the history channels ran a program on Alexander the Great last night, so F and I had some fun chatting about this. It felt like an extension of the "9 Worthies" class. It was a great class and now I must find out more.
Then I took the corset class by Sarah. The class and the teacher rocked. Something I hate about clothing classes is when a teacher declares "this somewhat vague reference in this unreliable source is the holy grail of corsets and now we all have to make them this way and if you don't you're deluding yourself." Sarah did NOT do that. She had a fabulous class where she presented her references/sources, discussed the different ways of interpretting them, and then discussed what she did and why she did it. I was able to pick up some new information (which is fun) and fondle corsets. It was made of win.
New Project Stuff
I am fueled by inspiration.
I made a costuming offer to someone who inspired me and they are taking me up on it. It won't be technically challenging, they want light weight tuics for Pennsic. However, the passing comment was, "I'd rather not look undressed when I have only one layer on." The Muse has been churning on that. Does it have to be machine washed? How much embroidery is too much embroidery? Even if it needs to be machine washable, there are things that can be done... My brain is fully engaged. I hope to pick up fabric on Wednesday and start immediately. I need a big enough frame so I can stretch the neck.
I don't make offers very often and less now than in the "old days". I put a piece of myself into everything I make, so it's a very personal thing. I am either inspired by someone on an interpersonal level or inspired by "that thing they do" that makes me want to be a better person. I really enjoy that fired up inspiration that drives me forward. And my offers are fueled by the desire to make something; there is no money, gift or reward that I want or need.
However, since I had Miss E, "got a real job" and Super N entered school, the offers have slowed down dramatically because I have to make personal sacrafices in order to meet SCA calendar deadlines. The time to work on projects represents a big chunk of my down time and I haven't figured out how to stop time yet... (but I'm working on it in my sleep and on my bike rides).
I'd been turning it over in my head; watching, waiting, measuring. Last weekend cinched it and I offered to help out a couple that inspires me. I wasn't sure they'd actually want anything from me (I have to assume that there are others who are tripping over themselves to help the couple out) and I wasn't sure that they understood that it really came without strings. But "she" seemed pleased and worked my offer into their plans to go to Pennsic. I had to do some small renegotiating ... I think I need to make "one more than requested" so that I can make something that's "dry clean only". But it's definitely a fun project to look forward to.
Taking Friday off work is a must-do; sleeping in past 4 am, having time with the kids, and not being on a schedule is what vacation is about. Going down w/ BFF rocked. We were dazzled at the Berkeley Bowl - her by the selection of cucumber and me by all the foreign imported wine. I kept wondering.. how do you know if it sucks? Is it on sale because it's so bad they need to clear up the shelf-space? I don't want foreign vinegar.. Anyway, I made some guesses and had BFF rolling with laughter because I was sent off to find skewers and came back with several bottles of wine instead.
The Sushi/Sake party was fun. Totally unlike past parties - probably because we became the Friday night hang out, so the "man" quotient was higher than usual and there were a lot of guests. But it was fun fun fun.
The Goddess Party went very well. The gas grill was brilliant. The pot-luck items were yummy. HRJ made back-drops for the pavilion, garland was wrapped around pavilion poles, everyone wore a wreath, and many draped toga-like swathes of fabric over their clothing. It felt as though we were period people having a theme party instead of people pretending to be gods/goddesses. It was tremendously fun and silly. HRJ headed up the entertainment and I brought some "cheat sheets" for people to play with. We told/enacted stories, played "guess who I am", there was a hysterical impromptu "urn" dance, ... and we had a chorus in the pavilion spontaneously filking modern music, which, if you think about it, is perfect because I imagine that had we been medieval people throwing a party, we would have filked our own medieval bards for jest.
We waited-out the A&S competitions at the Tavern and then took ourselves to it. I love that Victoria has hosted/organized the tavern, so we brought our brand of silly to it. I had a great time, there, too. I sang. (gasp!) Hopefully I wasn't ruining things too much since (a) I haven't sung in a very very long time and (b) I have no idea what words everyone was saying, so I was trying to read lips. And I hung with friends for a while. I also found myself inspired to make an offer to make someone clothes.
And the classes were great!
The classes I got to attend:
I finally got to take one of Baron Antonio's "women's studies" classes. I have been wanting to take this class for years and usually I'm teaching or volunteering at the event and I miss it. It was informative, the class was engaging, and we got a fabulous bibliography. I can't wait to read some more.
I learned to make aglets and do finger-loop braiding with Vincent and Rene. I am pretty excited. It's not hard to do, but until someone showed me how to do it, I couldn't do it. Now I can. Wheee!
Sunday I took "9 Worthies" by Vlad. I think I was the only one there who had no idea what he was talking about at first; my focused education pretty much skipped all that history stuff and I'm working on that as an adult, but I have some pretty gaping holes. Once I was brought up to speed, though, it was easy to follow and I had a really good time. My only contribution was to accuse the referenced writers who added girls to the tales of the various "worthies" as creating Male Propaganda (i.e. whomever eventually added Guenevere into the Arthur legend was, IMO, creating an Adam-Eve tale inorder to weave into our cultural perception that women are the weak, undermining forces that hold men back... blah blah blah). We got off track, but Etaine promised to send me some book titles... (yay, more reading) And on the 9-worthies themselves, I'm inspired to find some more reading material on this. Coincidentally, one of the history channels ran a program on Alexander the Great last night, so F and I had some fun chatting about this. It felt like an extension of the "9 Worthies" class. It was a great class and now I must find out more.
Then I took the corset class by Sarah. The class and the teacher rocked. Something I hate about clothing classes is when a teacher declares "this somewhat vague reference in this unreliable source is the holy grail of corsets and now we all have to make them this way and if you don't you're deluding yourself." Sarah did NOT do that. She had a fabulous class where she presented her references/sources, discussed the different ways of interpretting them, and then discussed what she did and why she did it. I was able to pick up some new information (which is fun) and fondle corsets. It was made of win.
New Project Stuff
I am fueled by inspiration.
I made a costuming offer to someone who inspired me and they are taking me up on it. It won't be technically challenging, they want light weight tuics for Pennsic. However, the passing comment was, "I'd rather not look undressed when I have only one layer on." The Muse has been churning on that. Does it have to be machine washed? How much embroidery is too much embroidery? Even if it needs to be machine washable, there are things that can be done... My brain is fully engaged. I hope to pick up fabric on Wednesday and start immediately. I need a big enough frame so I can stretch the neck.
I don't make offers very often and less now than in the "old days". I put a piece of myself into everything I make, so it's a very personal thing. I am either inspired by someone on an interpersonal level or inspired by "that thing they do" that makes me want to be a better person. I really enjoy that fired up inspiration that drives me forward. And my offers are fueled by the desire to make something; there is no money, gift or reward that I want or need.
However, since I had Miss E, "got a real job" and Super N entered school, the offers have slowed down dramatically because I have to make personal sacrafices in order to meet SCA calendar deadlines. The time to work on projects represents a big chunk of my down time and I haven't figured out how to stop time yet... (but I'm working on it in my sleep and on my bike rides).
I'd been turning it over in my head; watching, waiting, measuring. Last weekend cinched it and I offered to help out a couple that inspires me. I wasn't sure they'd actually want anything from me (I have to assume that there are others who are tripping over themselves to help the couple out) and I wasn't sure that they understood that it really came without strings. But "she" seemed pleased and worked my offer into their plans to go to Pennsic. I had to do some small renegotiating ... I think I need to make "one more than requested" so that I can make something that's "dry clean only". But it's definitely a fun project to look forward to.
