Boar's Head Hunt and Feast 2012

Once again this event was the same weekend as Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival. :-( So I didn't get to attend it. Yes, I could have tried to get over on Sunday, but I had other chores that needed to get done. A lot of my friends weren't going to be there on Saturday, so I didn't feel as bad about missing this year as last year. Honestly, my yarn and fiber stash really don't need any additions, and I didn't have any money saved up.

I had hoped to have my Cranach dress done to wear to this event. Definitely need to have it done for the December events!

My household is on a budget and Brandon and I looked over the proposed feast menu and decided that there was too much that one or the other of us wouldn't eat that it didn't make sense to spend $10 per person on the served feast. The other ladies couldn't afford the $10 per person so went with my feast proposal.

The theme was a German feast, so I thought it would be nice to do a Sauerbraten. I was doing well with that idea up until the added numbers of people eating with us climbed to nine adults and three children. Oh my! I can't eat pork, but others can. Thus I found two three pound bottom round roasts and a couple of pork shoulders (what I usually get to make pulled pork sandwiches). In case you didn't know, sauerbraten needs three days of advance prep time before cooking. You marinate the meat in wine, vinegars and spices for three days. Turning a couple of times each day.  (This takes up refrigerator room!!)

With the number of people serving, I couldn't afford the $9 a bag for the spaetzle noodles at Fred Meyers. I found these Mrs Weiss egg noodles at New Seasons that I thought would be a good substitute (they were!) Honestly, have never cared for the oily feel of spaetzle noodles. Maybe the Rheinlander and Gustav's are doing something wrong?  I also had salad greens with bacon crumbs and dressing, a couple loaves of bread and some roasted root veggies (carrots, turnips, gold beets, onions, garlic tossed in olive oil seasoned with sea salt and thyme) for the dinner. Dessert was a Pumpkin Stout Gingerbread recipe I had found - yummy!

For those that were going to be there all day, I had also picked up some crackers, antipasti meats, cheeses, olives, dried figs, almonds and cashews, Fuji apples and some bottled ice teas. I charged $7 per person that were eating all day and $5 for dinner. I did end up with floating the cost of some of the meal. I figured I was going to bringing any leftovers home, so I was still benefiting from the excess. People did take home their own leftovers of the sauerbraten and noodles and Dawn-Marie took a chunk of the the gingerbread too.

I had late requests to join our feast (night before is a little short notice!), but had to turn them down because I was worried about having enough food. I should have let them join us! Of course not knowing until halfway through the day that one adult and child weren't coming didn't help.

Golda's Kitchen on Scouter's Mountain, people arriving and setting up

Bardic Champion prize. Brandon made this! He carved the seat back, it has a  Boar's Head and is a nice folding period chair. Lady Helena was VERY happy to receive this as the Bardic Champion. 

My dear husband likes his boob shots, so why the silly grin and the blushing chest. This is the basket of largess I  gave to the Barony. Contains six skeins of handspun yarns, two handknitted shawls, three knitted period pouches/bags, four felted bowls that are great for holding little things like sewing supplies or beads, and some handmade soaps at the bottom.

Our feast area. You can see some of the lunch items out. I think I was still busy labeling the largess items at the other table.

Queen Astrid lives just south of us, so she was able to attend and looked lovely! This is Osanna receiving her Award of Arms, finally. It was originally presented at July Coronation.

Lady Lissette, Lady Aemelia and I receiving a Baronial recognition for largess - Ring Giver. We had to wait a week to confirm the name of the recognition we were all muzzy brained up their listening to the Baron explain it. I had torq'd my knee so wasn't kneeling.

Another lovely picture of Queen Astrid giving Lady Iuliana and Lord Jose their  Goutte de Sange and Jambe de Lion respectively. (Last year, flip the awards and that's what they received together.)

Queen Astrid was moving during this but I loved the picture of Lady Eulalia receiving her  Arts and Science Championship mantle and scroll. Love  Baroness Svava's pose!

October brings St. Crispins with the Shire of Mountains Edge, another A&S Championship and Ithra with the Barony of Glymm Mere (their feast was awesome last year!) There's at least an embroidery class and either one or two cooking classes in my plans. I'm tempted to do the St. Brigit's Cap, but think that one of the two cooking classes offered at that time might be more useful. Which would you pick? Then there's Honor Feast with the Barony of Three Mountains, Queen Astrid is slated to attend again too, so should be an action packed court!

November will be a quiet eventing month, with nothing more than attending the weekly Revels planned. This will allow for us to prepared for the busy month of December with three Yule type events to attend. We didn't attend the Barony of Stromgard's Gledilig Jol last year, but could see us attending this year.  Queen Astrid has picked Three Mountains Yule to attend out of the three, so we'll get to see her again there. I need to come up with a largess item to make six of for our Yule Feast. Little competition the Baroness came up with. The winner gets to take one of each that are submitted and the rest goes to the Barony to further gift. I haven't decided what to do!  Suggestions?

Acorn War 2012

We've gone for the last three years. First year, Jose was the autocrat and I worked gate and it was up on Chehalem Mountain. Last year, I was asked to teach drop spindling and knitting. It was 90+ degrees and out in a field with no wind. I had no one take my class. This year it was back up on Chehalem Mountain and while 85+ degrees, there was a very steady wind.

J'nati took my drop spindling class and it was interesting getting her going with all that wind. I had the wind blow my fiber at one point into her spindle. It made it a bit of a challenge, but we were able to get fiber spun and then I taught her how to ply it. So she ended up with a finished yarn to take home as well as fiber left still to play with.

There was battles going on while we were spindling, but didn't get to watch much of it until later:

Lady Havoise was teaching a beginning embroidery class after mine. I ended up taking it too. After all it was only $1 and I walked away with a nice practice cloth, DMC floss, the hoop, and instruction pamphlet:

She had it nicely finished to keep from unraveling while we worked with it

She had gotten the hoops for free, so she passed it along to us. Plus she has tons of floss, and happened to have a pretty purple. ;-)

The top is a running stitch with a running back stitch, the middle is a back stitch and the bottom a stem stitch

The stem stitch, you can see that keeping the tension even on the floss is important, the middle is satin stitch and I was playing with turning it so it was mitered and then just did kind of a daisy. The bottom is a herringbone stitch. We have it on the sewing machine, but now I can do it on my own!

The blue arch is so we can practice our satin stitch. The leaf was the  split stitch. I did the outline and then , bisected it, then again. I want to play with this one more. It's often used to fill in areas where you aren't using satin stitch.

Well worth my $1!! J'nati was talking about having a second embroidery class at Boar's Head Hunt and Feast in September, so I'll have to do that one too. 

I stayed under day shades for most of the day and was out without shade for a very short time, but apparently, long enough that I came home and after an hour or so, found that I had a very red chest. After the embroidery class I sat and knit on Brandon's Boneto hat and socialized. 

The wind really kept the day bearable and it was lovely day. We're going to try to take a day and go to the beach this next weekend with the dogs. Then later in the month we'll have a day of classes at an Ithra. I'm going to take the fingerbraiding and cooking classes. I'll actually have a full day of classes too! The classes will be held at WOU, so a drive down to Monmouth.