a new shield in progress
Oct. 4th, 2023 06:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kareinaOn 24 September I noticed that Crown Tourney is coming soon, and started doing 100 sword blows a day again (on the premise that any training helps). This prompted me to actually make the new sword that we cut months ago, using the plastic basket hilt that Jon had given us when we were in Germany for Spring Crown because it was cracked, and Keldor has plastic welding equipment at work. He had done the fix months ago, but we've been busy, so it took a while before we put it on the rattan. Oh, my, is that light! My old sword has the same steel cuphilt that my knight made for me in the 1990's, and while I have replaced the rattan at least once since then (but not often, since I sometimes go a decade without fighting), it still counts as the only sword I have ever used, so it is a little odd, but in a very good way, to have a lighter sword.
For a couple of the recent "just swing the sword" practice sessions Keldor and I played with boffers and shield in the living room. He made a round center grip shield last year that is much lighter than my heater shield (which is made out of an aluminum computer case that my Knight's boss was throwing out in the early 1990's, and is kinda heavy), that I have been using, but Keldor commented during the last boffer session that he thinks I need a slightly bigger shield, so I will pick up more shots with it. At the time I thought "yes, sounds nice, someday".
Yesterday he came home with a chunk of scrap wood big enough to do one of those elongated round shields about the size he had been thinking of, so while I sat at the computer and continued working on my thesis, he went downstairs and cut it out, and then glued some fabric on it (I did pause long enough to iron the fabric before returning to my computer.
Then, at 19:30 I stopped working on my thesis, took a photo of the shield and measured it, then imported it into CorelDraw and traced the shield shape. Then I took the old drawing of the knot work kitten that I used for this old larp shield years ago:
Since that shield is round, and the new one is elongated, I needed to tweak the drawing a fair bit to fill the space nicely, but I managed to get it done enough to hurry up to the library before their doors locked at 22:00 to print the design out (tiled onto six sheets of paper). Then I taped them together, and colourd in the bits of line that don't print as these days the program prints the pdf with the lines all the way to the edge of the paper, but the printer don't print the bit at the very edge of the sheet, so I tape the sheets together edge to edge and draw the missing several millimeters of line by hand. For decades the program printed it with the lines only going to the edge of the printable page, so I had to cut away the white bit on the edge of one of the pieces of paper, and then carefully overlap them to line up the lines correctly. Since I am used to the old way, the new way seems odd, but it is also much easier.
After I got that ready I packed food for today, gathered up my gambeson and other things needed for fighter practice that wasn't already in the box, packed my computer and water bottles, did my yoga, lay on the lacrosse ball to massage my back and hips a bit, and got to bed at midnight.
This morning we loaded up the car and drove in to Skelleftehamn to his Dad's house, where I have painted the first coat of white on the shield and set up my computer to work today. After work we will have Reengarda's first armoured fighter practice in... months. But Crown is coming, and it is smart to be in armour at least once, several times if we can manage it, before then.
(Spoiler alert: I am not in the tourney with hopes that I will win by my own hand--I am content to die gloriously on the field whilst participating in the ritual and pageantry to choose our next King/Queen/whatever titles they choose for themselves)
Can I just say how happy I am to have such a wonderful partner? I like having someone who says that a thing is needed, and then makes it so, while I am busy working on other things. He's wonderful.
For a couple of the recent "just swing the sword" practice sessions Keldor and I played with boffers and shield in the living room. He made a round center grip shield last year that is much lighter than my heater shield (which is made out of an aluminum computer case that my Knight's boss was throwing out in the early 1990's, and is kinda heavy), that I have been using, but Keldor commented during the last boffer session that he thinks I need a slightly bigger shield, so I will pick up more shots with it. At the time I thought "yes, sounds nice, someday".
Yesterday he came home with a chunk of scrap wood big enough to do one of those elongated round shields about the size he had been thinking of, so while I sat at the computer and continued working on my thesis, he went downstairs and cut it out, and then glued some fabric on it (I did pause long enough to iron the fabric before returning to my computer.
Then, at 19:30 I stopped working on my thesis, took a photo of the shield and measured it, then imported it into CorelDraw and traced the shield shape. Then I took the old drawing of the knot work kitten that I used for this old larp shield years ago:
Since that shield is round, and the new one is elongated, I needed to tweak the drawing a fair bit to fill the space nicely, but I managed to get it done enough to hurry up to the library before their doors locked at 22:00 to print the design out (tiled onto six sheets of paper). Then I taped them together, and colourd in the bits of line that don't print as these days the program prints the pdf with the lines all the way to the edge of the paper, but the printer don't print the bit at the very edge of the sheet, so I tape the sheets together edge to edge and draw the missing several millimeters of line by hand. For decades the program printed it with the lines only going to the edge of the printable page, so I had to cut away the white bit on the edge of one of the pieces of paper, and then carefully overlap them to line up the lines correctly. Since I am used to the old way, the new way seems odd, but it is also much easier.
After I got that ready I packed food for today, gathered up my gambeson and other things needed for fighter practice that wasn't already in the box, packed my computer and water bottles, did my yoga, lay on the lacrosse ball to massage my back and hips a bit, and got to bed at midnight.
This morning we loaded up the car and drove in to Skelleftehamn to his Dad's house, where I have painted the first coat of white on the shield and set up my computer to work today. After work we will have Reengarda's first armoured fighter practice in... months. But Crown is coming, and it is smart to be in armour at least once, several times if we can manage it, before then.
(Spoiler alert: I am not in the tourney with hopes that I will win by my own hand--I am content to die gloriously on the field whilst participating in the ritual and pageantry to choose our next King/Queen/whatever titles they choose for themselves)
Can I just say how happy I am to have such a wonderful partner? I like having someone who says that a thing is needed, and then makes it so, while I am busy working on other things. He's wonderful.
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Date: 2023-10-04 02:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2023-10-04 04:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2023-10-04 05:44 pm (UTC)