25th Anniversary Party

In preparing for our 25th Anniversary party I was going over my kit and realized that the pole arm I have been using had seen its last battle. I put together a halberd while I was cooking a soup Friday night. The halberd turned out well and I like the looks of it but it didn’t perform as well as I would like in combat. While using it Saturday I discovered it’s a little too heavy and I am frankly out of practice with pole weapons. I will use it a couple more times in practice before I remake it with a lighter pole of rattan to make sure its not just my lack of practice.

Professional Heraldry!!!

Thanks to Baron Edward of Effingham, I now have professional looking heraldry for use on web pages or as avatars for e-mail forums. You too can have spiffy looking artwork. Follow this link and you will not be disappointed!! http://www.sengokudaimyo.com/avatarbiz.html

Well that’s the end of my commercial plug for Baron Edwards site. I was very happy with the results!!!

Looks like a new Helmet!!

Ervon brought his helmet over the other night and we removed the existing Aventail. He bought a new one at war and wanted to replace the one on his helmet. After looking over his helmet it was decided to drill a new set of holes and to place the new Aventail higher on his Bascinet. I offered to help so he market off the locations for the holes and left me with his helmet. On Tuesday night I drilled the new holes but while looking at the helmet I thought it would be a nice gesture to polish it up a bit. I took it into work to use the high speed air drills. It took a couple hours but I was able to put a nice shine on his helm. It should be a nice surprise when he picks it up!!! Now I need to take my legs and gauntlets in and make them look nicer.

Getting Back to Work!!

Well things are getting back to normal around Skalla’s Steading. I have been able to get back to some of my projects. I have finished the Banner Stand promised to Eron!!! I will have to review my list for the next project.

Fighter Practice 9-2-2007

Because of the holiday weekend we had a small turnout. Those attending were Thoromir, his two daughters, Rodney, Scott (a first time attendee) Daryl (an old time stormvaler like Thoromir).

Thoromir has nearly completed his armor!! He has made his knee cops but not finished the leg armor. So he wore padding and taped on his knees so we could fight. Thoromir did very well for not having fought in many years. He is developing or remembering techniques he can use as a lefty to be very effective. We fought several rounds until we became tired. I don’t believe Thoromir will have any problems getting back up to speed and re-authorizing to fight.

Daryl borrowed a helmet that I had previously loaned to Thoromir and we had a discussion of what it would take to put him in armor. He lives in Holland MI and so will not make it out locally very often. I will try to put him in contact with the local group and between that, Thoromir and myself we should be able to put him in armor sometime this fall. He begged off putting on armor on Sunday claiming allergies. I think he really just didn’t want to put on someone else’s sweaty armor.

Scott was interested in watching the fighting before deciding if it was something he wanted to do. As the practice ran long I did not get a chance to put armor on him or even ask if he was still interested after having seen Thoromir and myself fight.

Rodney attended but was the only fencer. I am not sure if he was disappointed or not. It has been nearly a year since he has last fenced and he needs to attend a practice or event to keep his authorization current. If next week we get no fencers I will put on my fencing gear and go a couple rounds with him for the practice.

This coming Sunday Sept. 9th we are on for fighting but I must cancel Sept. 16th. It is both the day of the revel and I have a previously scheduled appointment that will take most of the day.

Fall Guild Schedule

For anyone not on the Stormvale e-mail list here is the fall schedule for the Artisans Guild and Youth Fighting hosted by Lady Terryl!!!

We met Tues eve and came up with the following. First of all, youth stuff will be on every other Tuesday night with a little fighting and a little crafts. Youth and adults are welcome on every Tuesday, but youth nights have things aimed at kids. All are most welcome to come play - particularly our older fighters who can help train the young uns. If adults wish to fight those nights, they are more than welcome to do so, but it would probably be wise to send out a call to get others there to fight with. The crafts those nights will be aimed at kids, but all who want to craft can come. If you have an unfinished project, or are working on something else, you may bring it to any craft night.

Artisan's guild schedule -

9/4 Finish glass and boxes. Glaze clay pieces. Anything not finished at this point will be put to the side. Youth combat will happen from 5 - 7. Guild will be from 5 - 9.
9/11 Viking wire weaving, 7 - 9
9/18 Youth night
9/25 Calligraphy 101 - teacher pending on the various volunteers and how they split the tasks
10/2 Youth night
10/9 Period Embroidery - Lady Eron
10/16 Youth night
10/23 Breadmaking - Carrie - I assume you can use my kitchen ok?
10/30 Youth night - this is the night before Halloween - any possible conflicts?
11/6 Decorating Russian enamel boxes - boxes will be painted ahead - just the decorative painting will occur
11/13 Arrowmaking 101 - Lord Erevon, Youth combat as well, since we will be taking a break on Thanksgiving week coming up
11/20 - Thanksgiving week - break
11/27 - Illumination or calligraphy 102 - see notes for 9/25
December to be announced
Unless otherwise noted, guild nights will be 7 - 9. Youth, I believe is 6 - 8. Some classes will need "reservations" because we need to know approximately how many supplies to bring. Note also, if kids are brought to adult guild night, some crafts are more applicable than others. I believe most teenagers can handle anything an adult craft night would throw out - unless otherwise noted. Next week, we will be discussing what crafts the kids want to do, so let the kids know to think about it. Unless I hear any objections, I am going to send an invite out to those groups local to us to let them know this exists and they are welcome to join us if they so choose. If you want to object, do so soon - the invites will go out t his weekend.

We also very briefly discussed the event. Gerard was going to notify the Pale that we were not going to have a formal event since we would not be having a meeting in time to advertise it. So, we will be having a Founder's day - that will hopefully be a tad fancier than normal. Plans to be made at September's revel. I don't remember the upcoming schedule, but since at one point, the post event party was to be at my house, I offer my house again. A thought to be put out there - and considered or ignored - is to have an overnight event with pavilions, perhaps, a fire, drumming etc. Maybe no one else will be into it, but I would like to do something a tad bit more memorable than a regular feast for our 25th anniversary. Just a thought.

In service,

Terryl

Thank you Terryl for all your hard work with this!!!! You Rock!!! to steal Sarah's expression.

September Fighting Schedule

Depending on the local Revel scheduling the fighter practice should look like this for September:

Practice from 2pm till 5pm.

Date: Class: Practice:
Sept. 2nd Basic Sword and Shield work Open Sparing
Sept 9th Slow work and targeting Open Sparing
Sept 16th Cancelled due to prior obligation
Sept 23rd Melee Conventions/Differences Open Sparing
Oct 7th Melee Shield Work/Teams Teams (if we have enough fighters)

The above classes are subject to change depending on what those attending need to learn. Any volunteers to teach or suggestions for topics are welcome.

We still have enough armor to make that in the event of bad weather I would like to work on armor instead of going to the Roaring Waste practice.

Skalla

Fighting Practice 8-26-2007

The Sunday Fighting Practice kick off consisted of 10 people.

Torashi, Balian, Thoromir, Raven, Connor, Robert (Hicharu?), Rodney, Alyssa, Jordan (?) and myself.

The practice started out with a 30 minute discussion on Fighting stance, Shield types and the 10 main sword blows. Thoromir, Hicharu, Alyssa and Jordan were very polite in setting through my class. I would like to continue something like this for our practices. Please let me know if you would like to attend a specific class or if you would like to give a class.

We did not break up into groups to practice the topics covered in the class but instead decided it was a better opportunity to work on armor so we could put more people into the field. The next 90 minutes consisted of working on various armor projects. Thoromir padded the helmet he is constructing. Hicharu with Balian’s help strapped and edged his shield. I fixed my helmets hinge and removed Pennsic rust off of my legs.

It was decided to not let the practice end without some actual fighting so Torashi and I donned armor and had several rounds of sparing. Many thanks to Torashi for once again pointing out, through force of arms, that I need to get in better shape and practice more. My stamina gave out before I thought it should have and as a penance I let Thoromir and Hicharu use me as a pell for the rest of the practice.

Thoromir put on a helmet and tried out his new sword and center grip shield while I attempted to block his shots. He has an interesting technique of hiding his sword behind the shield that he is working on. We also worked on blow calibration, both hitting and being hit. By the end of this it was getting difficult to hold my shield in the ready position and I had to do some “cheating” by resting the shield on my leg for last few minutes of working with Thoromir.

Then Hicharu wanted to try out his 2/3rds completed armor kit so he dressed and I took a boffer weapon (he had no arm armor) and he worked on blow calibration (only giving). He then began sparing with me and I mostly blocked (or tried to block) his attacks. I would occasionally take a swipe with the boffer but more wanted him to become comfortable in his armor and in throwing a blow. At the end of this I could no longer hold up my shield and had to let it hang by my side and I blocked single sword style. Of course I did not admit that to him, instead I told him I wanted the shield out of the way so I could watch his stance and technique better.
It was nice seeing Rodney again and I believe he and Connor discussed the possibility of running a fencing practice at the same time as the heavy weapons.

Also during the practice Raven expressed an interest in trying heavy weapons so we discussed the required armor standards and weapons needed. I hope to see her in armor at some point in the future.

The next practice should be September 2nd!!

Sunday Fighting Practice

Well War was a blast but I was sorely out of shape for the event. I don’t propose to be in the same condition next year!! I have started to exercise again and will be hosting a fighting practice Sundays from 2pm till 5pm. Once a month this will conflict with the local shires Revel and I hope to take the fighting practice to the Revel site if at all possible. I would like to start the practice right away but need to finish a couple extra shields and weapons so I will be kicking this off on August 26th. I will also start looking around for an indoor site for the winter. If a site cannot be found then I think I will switch between Roaring Waste and Cinnabar this winter. They both currently have Sunday fighting practices.

I would like to have a little more organization to this than we have used in the past. Instead of just strapping on armor and going at it, I would like to have a training schedule covering a different weapon each week. Also include melee tactics, shield walls and work together as a small unit. Stormvale has an Artisan Guild which meets weekly and has a guest lecturer covering some craft. I wouldn’t mind having a similar situation for the training sessions. People can volunteer to cover some aspect of fighting and as we grow we may even get guests from outside the group. I envision us all taking turns at some point in the training.

After the lesson portion was over it would be nice to practice the topic and try to refine some of the moves. We could break out groups or run some small melee’s as further practice. This would also allow someone who did not have their armor yet to work through and learn some of the basics. Then we will have our open practice as we have always run them. I would like to see the practices turn into 60 minutes of training and 120 minutes of fighting. This would fluctuate as the mix of attendees changed. If we have a lot of newer people we may train more and if everyone is pretty experienced then we may train less.

I would love to have Fencers show up as well but would need someone else to take charge of that portion of the operation. It will take enough time setting up the heavy weapons that I would rather not be responsible for Fencing. The best solution would be to have a fencing marshal who would like to take over that aspect of the training.

If not enough other people have complete sets of armor it may be necessary to use the first couple sessions to help people work on armor so we can field people to train and fight with. I have enough gear to equip myself and 1 and ¾ fighters. I need to make a set of arms and a couple swords and shields to be able to equip 2 other people at the same time. That will be my next priority and I hope to have it finished before the practice starts on August 26th. I have already committed this armor so it will only be available for loaner armor if they should fail to attend the practice. I need to make or scrounge at least one more set so I can guarantee to have loaner equipment.

Skalla

Pennsic 2007 Report

I attended Pennsic for the first time in a couple years!!! While it was fun and I enjoyed War, this was the worst year weather wise than any Pennsic that I remember. I arrived about 3pm on Sunday the 5th and left at 11:30pm on Friday the 10th. It rained for at least 20 minutes each day I was at War. It was so humid that even when it wasn’t raining if often felt like it was. I did not have a problem with water in my tent, many others in the Stormvale camp did have problems including several inches of water in some of the tents. Next year we will have to trench next to the road to prevent the water running down the road and dumping on that side of our camp.
I fought in a couple of the battles and had a blast!! The resurrection battles really wore me out. When fighting in the resurrection battles I needed the next day to help recuperate. My goal is to be able to fight in all the battles next year. I liked the fact that the battles for heavy weapons all started in the morning and avoided the worst heat of the day.

Rebuilding Armor

Well I managed to replace the buttons I lost off my Gambeson. They had come off over a couple fighting practices and it was looking pretty sad. I sewed them back on using four times more thread than was strictly required. I wanted to make sure they would stay on this time.

Next to replace rivets on my coat of plates.

Equipping Robert

Robert is one of the men at arms in my household. He has approximately eight months before he reaches the age of 18 and we are putting together his armor kit. We are hoping that he can authorize in heavy combat when he turns 18.

In the effort to get his kit together I have taken one of my old helmets and have padded it for him. I put a coat of silver paint on it to cover some of the rust and expect him to repaint it when he picks some livery colors. He has also been gifted with an old gorget. My old coat of plates needs a couple plates replaced and we will both work on this to get it ready for him. His sword is done and his shield has been pressed and needs to be finished.

We will need to work on legs and arm armor to get him fully equipped and also add gauntlets. That should prepare him for his first practice and see him through to his authorization.

Part of the agreement we have in the household is that He will have to make at least one piece of armor for those following behind him.

Another Standard Stand

Erevon’s standard stand completed!! Only 5 more to go!!

Gift of Chairs

Also in the last 6 weeks, I worked on two of the gothic camp chairs. They are complete except for the armrests which I still have to make. I thought that Eron & Erevon should have these chairs after all their years of hard work and in appreciation of Eron going to War and being camp master. At the recent Friday Populous meeting at my home, I presented them with the chairs. I believe they were well received. Arm rests have been added to my SCA to do list!!, also Mark II of the chairs. I failed to take a picture so I will have to track them down when they are being used and get one.

Shields

In the last 6 weeks, I have pressed several shields. Three very light shields for Balian deBrionne, Two shields for members of my household and one for a potential member. One for Drogo (that’s was several weeks ago and I still need to get it to him) Also 3 more loaner shields in addition to the rest. I made a couple extra shields as I am about to take the shield press out of service.

It is about time to make a new shield press as the one I am using is starting to show its age and wear and tear has taken a toll. One more item to add to my growing list!!! I think the new version will need a base to catch the dripping glue so I don’t have to either put down newspaper or scrape glue off the floor.