A month later

I almost want to say, "Meanwhile back at the ranch" I keep meaning to update my blog, but time just gets by me. Then a month later I realize all the things I wanted to blog about but never got around to :)

So I guess we will start with cooking. I'm the head cook for the Shire of Phoenix Glade's http://phoenixglade.org event Daggers and Hemlock. I sort of fell into this. A portion of the menu is posted on the website. We had a great weekend of successful cheese making. Although Greet http://szarka.typepad.com/sca/ did request that more live cultures be added to assist those with lactose issues. Will do that in the next batch (especially since someone who will remain nameless gluttoned herself with nearly a pound of cheese in a matter of 3 days! Oh but it is SO good!) We also had a good turn out on the lentils I'll be cooking, although we've decided to ditch the eggs. Eggs cooked ontop of lentils that have had saffron added to them tend to turn a funky color if not consumed immediately. With all the meat that will be served we aren't too concerned about our guests not having access to protein.

Mead! We finally cracked a bottle of the mead we put up last year. I know I didn't talk about this, but last spring we put up many bottles of some ginger honey mead using two different kinds of honey. One was using honey from Aethelmearc and the other was using honey that Lavena purchased at Sam's Club. While we liked the pre-fermented "syrup" better, we found that we actually prefer the fermented mead with the cheap honey better. Who knew? They also tried the red hot cinnamon cordials as well, but I forgot to get some (too consumed in cheese making and mead tasting).

Garb and Grub was fun on Sunday. We ended up with a small tent city of 5 "EZ Ups", a table groaning with food, and lots of fun discussion. I think every group should have a monthly Garb and Grub just to get together, eat a bit and have it easy. The fighters did armor up in the blistering heat and Sulva had a few heat issues herself (mental note, don't take Sulva to Fighter practice in her heavy Italian Ren in the future.)

Sewing. Ive been doing quite a bit of sewing in the past month. It all started with Lavena saying, "Oh Melbrigda, you need a new dress of Kingdom Art Sci." So I put scissors to cloth and made a dandy (if I do say so myself) Flemish Working Woman's Kirtle complete with apron, chemise and kerchief. It actually wasn't as hot as I feared it would be and the kerchief kept my hair off my neck and allowed for breezes to pass through. It's heavy though and I've got the fabric to make another out of a lighter linen (currently it is made from $1.50 a yard clearance twill, but hey, it was $1.50 for all cotton!) I'm also in the process of making Cato some "fancy garb" because he wants to look cool. Reminding him that I just made him some cool looking garb last month with a hat no less he responded, "But I've already worn that to one event." He's turning into a real Garbie Doll. Speaking of which I really need to get the words to the song Garbie Girl that the girls have parodied from Barbie Girl. So I'm cutting out his tunic and hand embroidering the trim for it. I also have fabric to make Sulva a lighterweight Viking Apron to go over her plaid Viking Dress. I think the gray flannel is going to be too hot to wear until, oh, January!

Scribal stuff. I'm still working furiously on doing original scrolls for Their Majesty's scroll cases. I was so proud to be part of the first court (we think ever) in Meridies where all original scrolls were handed out. That was just so cool! It's no secret that I am not a fan of "pre-prints" or "paint-by-number" scrolls, so seeing all those original scrolls being handed out was ultra cool! Hopefully we can get more scribes doing original scrolls as they are just so nice! I sent up a batch to TRM last week as I had promised I would and have 4 finished and 2 lettered scrolls that I hope to finish today. I also need to mail THL Simon's Grant scroll to him now that I've got it finished. That's a "today project." I'm hoping that I will be able to at least take pictures if not scan this set of scrolls before they go out.

OK, all for now. Got a huge list of things to do that I put off yesterday since it was my birthday and I decided I really didn't want to do those things. :)