My local SCA group has been involved in a weekend demonstration held at the Mapleside Farms in Brunswick, OH for a number of years, in fact I believe this was our fourth. Imagine a weekend of arts, crafts, fencing, fighting, and other foolery.
My role changed slightly this year, but we took it upon ourselves to ensure the baronial tents arrived in a timely manner on Friday for setup. I was supposed to drive the truck, but M. was able to get off work to make it for the 5:00 delivery time. Upon arrival, we found the site to be in less than ideal conditions, namely a few tons of work trucks from a project up the hill parked in our general setup area... and our setup area a construction site.
 |
| A wide-angle view of the demonstration grounds and crowds. |
We made the most of this by asking the farms to bring in some tree litter (leaves, branches, etc.) for the fighting area, and the remainder of tents set up in other less chaotic areas. Museum Von Aachen is a favorite destination for all medieval fest attendees. We had armored combat, archery, rapier combat, dancing, glass blowing, medieval oil painting, medieval life, weaving, spinning, calligraphy and illumination, wood working, and so much more!
 |
| The lovely Lady Seonaid inghean Ghriogar. |
Our fledgling demonstration coordinator Eve took about 300 amazing photographs and documented them on Facebook. (
Well worth a visit to the group to check them out.) One new feature this year was an information booth manned by the Northern Oaken regional chatelaine. She had a lovely "Finding your local group" map, color coded, with website and contact information for all of the local chatelaines. I can't believe someone didn't think of this earlier. After the weekend was done, she advised there were over a hundred names on her information request list, and some well out of Kingdom.
 |
| The Sisterhood banners representing! |
Since I had no particular art I was looking to display, I volunteered to hand out wrist bands at the top of the hill on Saturday since our usual den mother was at a wedding. To make the most of the eight hours by myself, I brought a collection of basket weaving supplies, some banners, and table cloths to decorate the space. (With the trusty old decorated 10x10 pop-up I painted in my apartment back in the day.) What I didn't quite realize, although I was warned, is it became a perfect point to talk to steady stream of members as well as the general populace northeast Ohio.
Ginevra and I had talked about demonstrating basket weaving this year, but she had fallen ill with some projectile plague and was unable to make it, but I decided to bring my supplies anyway and display them, if not work on them. As it turned out, another SCA member (Thora) kept me company most of Saturday and, since our hands were generally idle and she was game, we acquired a gallon or two of water and put to good use the basket weaving supplies on hand.
 |
Honoring Katharine
through sharing her
love of weaving. |
Rather than try to teach with one of the more complex patterns included which required some forming, we each made a small berry basket without handles. This fascinated all of the people passing by, several of which stopped to chat or asked if they could be involved in this arts and crafts demonstration or if they could buy something. We politely answered all questions they had, then gestured towards the gentle hill down to the actual displays.
When we wrapped up on Saturday, the baskets were mostly constructed and tucked, but just needed the final edge treatment. I moved the display down to the general demonstration area and worked on that throughout the day. Not nearly as much traffic or interest with so many other amazing arts and crafts displays going on, but that is perhaps my own fault for setting up next to the glass bead maker.
