Traveling Hats at Harvest Days

My meager display of hats.

The Fellowship of the Traveling Hat recently held session at the Midrealm Harvest Days in South Oaken (OH).

When Crispin and I decided we were attending Harvest Days, I reached out to the event steward to see if I could secure location indoors to hold session, despite the classes being themed after games and we were quickly scheduled! Shortly after arrival Mistress Aveline showed me the space, I set out a meager display of items in advance of the class. Little did I know that throughout the day people would stop me and ask when we were starting, which started to make me a little nervous. 

Thankfully, Lady Miriana was in attendance and was gracious enough to be my assistant during class. Because we needed it! We had a much larger group of people in attendance than expected! We were able to make between 25-30 hats in the time allotted which was incredible, considering I only had one iron! (Insert a very long story about my new steam iron missing a part.) 

I consider this a learning experience - one iron is definitely not enough! And in order to not limit the size of class, an assistant is definitely needed. I cannot thank Miriana enough for being such a rock star! And thanks to Raziya al-Zarqua' for photography!

Shaping hats.

Blessing of the hat.

Traveling Hats at Mounted War Games

The Fellowship of the Traveling Hat held the inaugural session at the Midrealm Mounted War Games in Constellation (IN).

The class session was held in the main populace building near the far back corner of the room and was our first official outing as the Fellowship. Duchess AnneMarie and I were trying to figure out the best method to present the class materials as well as get the hats created for the attendees.  (And holing up in the building with air conditioning was certainly a perk...) Ultimately, we led a class of around ten people in making hats, including a gentleman at his first SCA event! 

Thank you to all who attended and cheered us on and through this session.

A collection of hats.

A collection of embellishments.

Distraction

I have spent the last several months thinking of ways to best utilize the space within our new wall tent purchased this year. (There's a story behind that, but best discussed elsewhere.) I've had a tent with a similar foot print before, but in speaking with any number of wall tent inhabitants, one of the frequent points brought up was lack of privacy when the doors are for ventilation.

I hatched an idea about a privacy screen... but not just any privacy screen. The one that took the most time! In June, Ginevra and I traveled to the far off lands and visited Drachenwald embassy in Middle Marches (IKEA) to barter for supplies, namely three IVAR side units and later I sourced the hardware at the local Menards. A few years ago, I picked up this lovely printed cotton that had aged to perfection in someone else's stash and backed it with fustian, bound the edges with a cotton twill tape to complete the project.

Overall, the screen took about ten hours, not including dry time for the enamel paint on the wood pieces, casually intermixed with other household tasks.

Reference: IKEA IVAR Folding Screen

The completed screen.

A lady hawking.

The lord lurking.

Aubergine Dreams

The second needle felted hat was created using a wool felt body/cone from Agnoulita Hats (Greece) in the purple colorway. The hat blank was a demonstration model during a private hat making session with a friend and has an exceptionally proud beak (point) to it and was sized to fit over a cap and veil.

I expanded the color selection of wool after a quick trip to Joann's where I picked up four different colorways offered in a commercial brand that were slightly heavier weight in some standard heraldic colors. (Gold, red, green, and a turquoise blue in lieu of a standard royal blue. See also: a project about half done for later!) The pattern is a simplified version of a sleeve found online, so I take no credit.

The interesting thing learned in this hat creation - the small fill areas are deceptive! It takes far less wool to create the accent turquoise centers to the petals than I expected, perhaps a half inch of material, tightly packed to integrate the loose ends of yarn.

I am overall satisfied with the hat and can't wait to see what's next!

Adventures in Needle Felting

For my latest hat-related project, I used a wool felt body/cone from Jedrzejko (Poland) in the Dark Turquoise colorway. Mistress Milesent Vibert inspired me to try needle felting after she used the technique on a hat blank-turned-bycocket created during the Gulf War Widows experiment earlier this year. She briefly explained the technique then recommended a beginner set from Grey Fox Felting (36T, 38T and 40T) with a Needle Felt Support Block. 

I initially tried needle felting with a more fine skein of embroidery-weight wool which didn't work as well as I had hoped. I moved on to a yarn weight in ivory/white (which I think I picked up at Pennsic for nalbinding.) I wanted to add additional color, so I checked my available stock of yarn that has aged greater than 10 years and found the soft pink color to accent in a two ply merino wool.

Overall, I feel this is a beginner project. It's even easier if you have a background in scribal, since my inspiration/design came from an illumination. I spent a series of lunch breaks laying out the spiral pattern(s) with tailor's chalk, then came back with the 40T ultra-fine needle to tack down the yarn. I doubled back when I was satisfied with the placement to more firmly attach the yarn.

Arts & Sciences 100 Day Challenge - March 2018

1. Mar 2 - Non-SCA watercolor paintings.
2. Mar 29 - Non-SCA glass fusing class.

Not the most amazing of months, but it has been exceptionally busy on the job and home front.

Twenty four down, seventy six to go!

Arts & Sciences 100 Day Challenge - February 2018

1. Feb 5 - Tacked more seams down in the grey wool tunic. Perusing digital manuscript archives for upcoming scroll assignment.
2. Feb 6 - Continue perusing digital manuscript archives for upcoming scroll assignment.
3. Feb 7 - Illumination and calligraphy for Award of Arms scroll for Masque of Courtly Love. Research for Red Company scroll for Winter War Maneuvers.
4. Feb 9 - Red Company scroll layout, design, and calligraphy. Tack down more seams on the grey wool tunic.
5. Feb 10 - Red Company scroll painting. Finished tacking down seams, finally!
6. Feb 11 - Research for an Norse-themed Dragon's Heart. Yikes.
7. Feb 22 - Layout of Dragon's Heart.
8. Feb 23 - Round 1 of Dragon's Heart.
9. Feb 24 - Round 2 of Dragon's Heart.
10. Feb 25 - Some non-SCA watercolor paintings.

Twenty two down, seventy eight to go!

Arts & Sciences 100 Day Challenge - January 2018

1. Jan 5 - Ground almonds and black walnuts and almonds for a period-inspired nut cake.
2. Jan 6 - Baked black walnut, Icelandic chicken, and locally grown honey cakes for the Northern Trotheim Yule cooking contest.
3. Jan 8 - Drafted new pattern for early period tunic that Katalena (Ivaniaia zhena Shishova) introduced me to prior to NOWM as my old patterns no longer fit correctly.
4. Jan 11 - Laid out and cut the pieces for the grey wool tunic. 
5. Jan 12 - Continued working on the grey wool tunic, piecing together the side gores and the arms. I admitted finally that this project is taking longer than it should because I didn't want to use an existing neckline pattern that I had. So, I broke down and drafted a new one loosely based on an existing neckline from another pattern.



Regular Event Special Tokens
and the unfortunate star of the
project -- reading glasses. :|

6. Jan 13 - Master Oliver and I began working on the painting portion of the leather site tokens - specifically painting a base silver coat over the section that will be white and painting the blue portion. Finished working on the grey wool tunic to wear to Winter Wassail.
7. Jan 14 - Master Oliver and I worked on painting special leather site tokens - specifically white, touching up the blue, and adding the gold. Took the neck facing pattern from Jan 13 and added additional length to the front to bring it forward just a bit. Resized early period pattern. Research for AoA scroll assignment for Regular Event, layout and calligraphy.
8. Jan 15 - Completely redid the AoA scroll assignment for Regular Event. I didn't care for the kerning of the letters and the uneven gait, if you will, of the freehand text. Calligraphy laid down, quote added, and painting completed. I think there's enough personalization in it for the recipient; I hope they like it. More research on my second scroll assignment for the event... a Sapphire.
9. Jan 16 - Completed calligraphy, outline, and painting of the Sapphire.
10. Jan 25 - Completed research, calligraphy, and painting of the promissory note.
11. Jan 26 - Research for mystery scroll.
12. Jan 27 - Illumination of mystery scroll.

Twelve down... eighty eight to go. It just looks less overwhelming when you do not use numbers. ;)