Happy St. Nicholas Day!

This is a special day, not just because it is the name day for many of my good friends, but because it is also the anniversary of the first official event for the College  of Saint John of Rila!

That was back in 2011, although it seems like yesterday!  Here are some photos so we can remember!

                                                               

              

Saint Andrew's Day

     November 30th is Andreevden (St Andrew’s Day), also known as the Bears’ Day (Mechkinden) in Bulgaria. It marks the start of the winter cycle. In Bulgaria, St Andrew is traditionally the master of the bears.

      In Bulgarian folklore the bear has the power to heal, protect from illness and bring fertility but it is also a symbol of great physical strength. So to ward off attack, on Andreevden, people symbolically feed the bear by throwing a little boiled grain up the chimney, ...saying “Here you are, bear. Here’s some boiled corn so you don’t need to eat raw grain or people or animals.” (From Bulgarian Folk Customs by Mercia MacDermott)

 

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Autumn day in Varosha

The Wolf Days are over and winter will soon be here, but for now it is unseasonably warm and sunny and we are all taking advantage of the weather!

Saint Clement of Ohrid

November 25 is the feast of Saint Clement of Ohrid, a disciple of Saints Cyril and Methodius. In 893 CE, Clement was elected the first Bishop of what would come to be the Bulgarian Orthodox Church.

 

 

 

St. Clement would have been important for Tamara for several reasons. First, he was a local saint and was the bishop for the region, albeit some years before she was born. Here's a regional map of the Kutmichevitsa administrative district for reference:

 

 

 

 

Today this area is in Macedonia (FYROM), not Bulgaria. Tamara and her family would have been influenced by Clement's teaching, since he was a founder of the Ohrid Literary School and was revered as a patron of education. He was an important writer in Old Church Slavonic and wrote the oldest church service dedicated to saints Cyril and Methodius.

 

 



Saints' Days, Fast, and Feasts

     Both today in Bulgaria and historically for my SCA persona, saints' days and church fasts and feasts would be very important. I'm going to try and record the ones still celebrated here in Bulgaria which would also have been important for Tamara.

     November 14 is an important day in the church cycle. It is Zagovezni, the day before the start of the Christmas fast and, like Mardi Gras, is a day to eat meat, eggs, and dairy products and feast with your family. A chicken was traditionally served and I will do the same tonight for dinner. Many families also serve sauerkraut and roast pumpkin. I think I'll do a pumpkin pie instead.

Today is also St. Phillip's Day, the apostle who was martyred while preaching to the heathen. Честит имен ден to all my friends names Phillip or Phillipa!

Home and garden updates.

We've been here for four years now. Four years of construction rubble and upheaval and moving boxes. Things are finally getting done and I have pictures to prove it! These are just for you, Genny!

Living Room/Dining Room

 

And the garden is coming along too. The last section that needed leveling was the front courtyard, which abuts the driveway. It's now leveled and ready for grass, a cherry tree, and flower beds. Before we plant, the builders are finishing the stucco on the front wall and completing the well cap. You can see there are just a few more days of work and we'll be planting spring bulbs in the new flower bed and planting the Japanese cherry tree that's being delivered on Saturday!

 

 

 

School's in Session!

     The academic year opened this week and the students have returned, so the College is also back in action. We had our first organizational meeting today and set schedules for fighter practices and A&S sessions. What a difference from last year! With so many returning students in the College, there is so much energy and we're actually going to have two fighter practices each week and A&S on Wednesdays and Saturdays! We've also got a new Castellan, who is really excited to work with the first year students who signed up to join the College at the club fair during Orientation Week. There were 32 of them and if we get a third of them as regular participants, it will be great. We've got other returning students stepping up as Web Minister/Social Media officer and Exchequer, which will take a burden off some of the non-student members.

     We've got the College's birthday coming up next month and our first group projects will focus on getting garb finished and banners and other decorations made for the event. Lord Guy is coming in from Insulae Draconis to serve as our archery marshal and everyone is excited to get back to shooting. A number of people got bows over the summer and several more are waiting for equipment to arrive. We've also got an event on the Kingdom calendar for April 2016 - Bows and Blows II. It will be concentrating on archery and heavy fighting, but there will also be A&S classes and maybe a surprise activity. I'm quite proud of our students. They are really interested in heraldry and six of them had names and devices registered over the summer. Six more have names and devices submitted and they should hear by January if they are registered by the College of Heralds.

     All in all, it bodes well for the College and its activities for the upcoming academic year!

Let the planning commence.

I've currently got 6 new  banner/other heraldic display commissions post-Raglan to finish by Yule,

When those are done, I've finally settled on what I want to make for myself in the way of SCA clothing - proper Slavic dress for the 2nd Bulgarian Kingdom in the mid 13th century. I'll be working from fresco portraits in various churches and monasteries, beginning with the portrait of Boyarina Desislava from the Boyana Church in Sofia, which dates to just that time period.

 

I have an enlargement of the full portrait (got it at the church) in my home office, so I can see the details well. I'm starting with the cap, circlet, and veil. The project may take all year!

In case you were wondering

why I go back to Raglan Fair, year after year, this photo by Lady Agnes des Iles should say it all.

 

 

 

The banners are the work of Lord Nicholas de Estleche dictus le Tardif. (and they are huge - 2 meters wide or so!)

Post Raglan musings

     I really enjoyed Raglan this year, despite being busier there than ever. I was reservations steward and I found that as much as I love talking to everyone and meeting new people, I have to schedule in a little down time away from the registration  tent. Plans afoot on that for next year.

     I loved participating in the fencing prize-playing as a time keeper for both the Free Scholar and Prefect bouts. I got the best seat in the place and could really concentrate on the fighting. It was my first time as time keeper and I hope it will not be the last.

     I taught a class in making basic thread-wrapped buttons that seemed to be well received. I also took a basic naalbinding class (for the third time) and this teacher was really good. Mistress Rogned actually made sense and now I can naalbind. I had a private lesson in sprang from Jahanarabanu and I think that may become a favorite activity. Her lord, Eldgrimr, made my sprang loom and it is a lovely thing.

     Our first student heavy fighter from the College of Saint John of Rila came to Raglan this year and after jumping right in and helping to set up around 10 encampments, he was authorized as a heavy fighter. He fought in the bridge battle and the Oxford Roll, as seen here.

 

He got his first two archer scores with his longbow.

And watching him become Lord Samuil Simeonov was just great. Good job, Sam!!!

 

More musings to follow...

Okay, Raglan's over and it's time to try and post a little more often...

So, back in March I posted some photos of a pile of black and white fabric in my living room. This is what it looks like now*.

It was the center of the Linden Manor encampment at Ffair Rhaglan XI, which just ended on Monday. I am so pleased at how it stood up to wind and rain and am planning many, many updates before its next use! 

Also in this photo you can see a few of the banners I made for various household members and friends. I completed 12 new ones for the Fair and have commissions for 6 more for next year. Lord Samuil made the wonderful banner stands, which greatly improved the look of our encampment. Vivant for Linden Manor!

* photo courtesy of Sophie Sherwell

Once again, catching up

It seems as though I can DO things or I can blog, but not both. I don't quite know how to find a balance, but I need to try a bit harder or things just won't get recorded.

To catch up a bit, we had our first official SCA event at the College in quite some time. It was called Bows and Blows, and needless to say featured archery. It was our first attempt at the sport and fortunately, one of the Kingdom Archery Marshals, Lady Constanza, was willing to fly out from the UK to run things for us. We had 16 first-time archers and the hardest part of the day was getting them to pause to eat lunch. When the archery finally finished, we  headed to my house for crafting and feast, after garbing up. It was too cold for the kids to shoot in garb, since most of them are in poly-cotton starter kit. Here's a selection of photos, beginning with one of Constanza and her longbow.

 

 

It was a really good day and the kids committed to another event in October, again featuring archery. They're also planning Bows and Blows II for April 2016.

 

 

This is what they looked like after shooting and fighting. It was a long (but very good!) day!

 



Spring is really coming!

My tomatoes have sprouted! As have the indigo and the foxgloves! 

Any guesses?

Can you tell what I've begun this weekend??

There is a 4-seat couch under there!

So ready for spring to arrive!

I have a terrible case of spring fever, so I gave in to it and started my seeds for my vegetable garden and the long-awaited herb garden today. The vegetables I started today include various heirloom varieties of tomatoes, peppers (sweet and hot), eggplants, pumpkins, gourds, asparagus, and melons. I have lots of other seeds ready for things like beans, carrots, beets, and corn, but those will be seeded directly into my raised beds when spring is really here.

For the herbs (and dye plants!) I've got indigo, false saffron, lady's mantle, sweet woodruff, sweet marjoram, German chamomile, lamb's ear, St. John's wort, rosemary, borage, thyme, wormwood, rue, chives, spearmint, sweet basil, catnip, parsley, sage, bee balm, fennel, celery, and rhubarb. Again, there are more, like dill, which will be directly seeded later.

Not that there's much to see, but here are the first planted seed trays. You can certainly tell which ones have been watered already!

 

Not that you can tell from that picture, but the trays are actually in the conservatory, so they will get lots of proper sunlight. I need to take some daylight photos of the conservatory, so I can show off the lemons and kumquats on the trees and also the lovely blooms on the camellia and azalea! 

 

Most of the new flowers I'll be planting this year will also be directly seeded, but a trip to the garden center is in order, to get more seed trays for the ones that do need to be started indoors. 

Small projects underway or finished

I finished up a small embroidery project this week. It's a portion of a large wall hanging for Insulae Draconis. Constanza started it, but hated it after finishing the gold portion, so I did the black for her.

I would not want to do another - so boring!

And another run of household badges is started. I need to have those done to distribute before Raglan Fair. These, on the other hand, are quite fun to stitch!

The patterns are made for Samuil's tunics, too. Emma and Snezhana are going to do an assembly line of basic tunics for him, based on the prototype I made. That will guarantee he has enough for long summer events (10 days or so).

Taking a step backwards

I never posted any photos from Yule Ball/ Kingdom University in December 2014. But I promised I would, so here we go.

This is where the event was held. Not a bad little castle! To give some perspective - that banner is 5 x 15 feet in size!

 

The weather was fine enough to have court outside in the knot garden. This is the induction of the new Kingdom Artisan, Jahanarabanu Vivana.

 

 

Here's a nice little picture for the Heralds! This was the backdrop for court.

 

 

 

Feast photos. Yule fun with the best of friends!

 

This picture is special. It's all the titled Kingdom Heralds of Drachenwald (Schwarzdrachen, Albion, Edelweiss, and Aurochs), except Posthorn, and he's here in spirit. See the little heraldic tabard on the red panda?

 

 

Heralds do get silly! Albion and Edelweiss loved this gift from the Holly King. It's a puzzle of heraldry!

 

Here's almost all the household of Linden Manor.

 

 

And here's how they really behave!