kareina

Today was amazing! One of my apprentices came to visit. I have really missed her! (last time we met in person was March of 2020, at her wedding, right before everthing shut down.)
We worked on projects (her rigid heddle band weaving has really improved), played a game, ate yummy food, and played music! Astrid is a real musician, so she helped me figure out the notes for the Children's song I wrote for the Norrskensbard contest, so I can learn to play it. She even played my moraharpa. We will try to meet every month.

Ten years ago, I visited Nordmark for the second time to attend the St. Cecelia’s music and dance themed event, and had no idea how that trip would change my life for the better. I had been living in Italy, and my first post-doc job contract was winding to a close, and, despite many applications, I hadn’t yet lined up a new job. I really didn’t want to go back to the US, and while I had a shiny new Australian Passport, I felt that I would rather go to somewhere with a better winter next. Therefore, I devised Plan A: travel around Scandinavia for the three months an Australian/American can be in Europe without applying for a visa and keep applying for jobs; perhaps something good will come up.

While at the event, I shared this plan with people there, and many of them said “I have crash space, come visit me”, but David said “I have crash space in the north”, which really got my attention. He and I then spent the next month talking over video call for 2 to 5 hours a day (and longer on weekends), and Plan A changed to “move to Luleå and live with David”, which brought about other changes as well.
At St. Cecelia’s I attended all of the dance classes, and tried one of the singing classes, but my inability to control my voice and change tone/pitch appropriately was a bit painful for poor Natfarí, who smiled and encouraged me, even as he winced (and was probably relieved that I could at least manage to remember the words and had good timing. But David sang in a student choir and the university which has only one entrance requirement “you must enjoy singing” and they welcomed me with open arms.

Ten years later my singing is still not up to professional performance levels, but I am singing regularly and often, my pitch/tone is far more reliable, and more often correct, and I have even gotten SCA awards for my bardic contribution. Thank you Natfarí, your event had much further reaching effects than could have been predicted in advance.



At that event, when the choir performed on the stairs I sat at their feet to sew to enjoy the sound. If we were to do it today I would be singing with them (though I might still be sewing as I did).

When I left off on posting mom had just died and my sisters and I (and Beth's dog, Max) went to go walk around Greenlake together. It was a good walk, with lots of good conversation, and just what we needed just then. That was Tuesday, the 4th of December (which I only know because I just looked it up, not because I am able to remember dates; I am not).

The next day (Wednesday) we sisters and our Aunt Barbara (mom's oldest, and now only surviving, sibling) went out to get pedicures. I have never had a pedicure in my life, and never wanted one, either. But when my sister explained that one sits in a massage chair while someone plays with your feet I decided that I was in. (I live for foot rubs! (among other things).) When we arrived we were instructed to choose a colour, and, of course, I picked a darkish blue. I considered going even darker, but Amber warned me that in her experience colours often come out darker than they look in the bottle, and I didn't want nails that look like they have been hit with a hammer, so I settles for only darkish. Of course, it turns out that this particular bottle dries a bit lighter, and when dry the blue has almost faintly greenish overtones, so it isn't nearly as pretty as it was in the bottle.

They didn't tell me till after we were done that if I had said something after seeing the colour on toe number one I could have asked them to take it off and do another colour, but that didn't occur to me, and I didn't want to complain when we are supposed to be bonding. I asked if snow flakes were an option, and they said yes. Amber suggested they might have decals. I don't know if they did or not, because the lady just took a bottle of white nail polish and drew snowflakes on my two big toes free hand. Unfortunately, she comes from a warm country (the Philippians I would guess) and now lives in Seattle, and somehow never got the memo that snowflakes have six-fold symmetry, so she drew them with eight arms, which meant that they are so crowded together it was hard for her to squeeze in the side branches and fluffy bits, but they look ok, and it is easy to tell that they are meant to be snowflakes. She did add a coating of glitter over the top of the flakes. While we were there Amber told me that she has some travel pads of nail polish remover that she would send home with me so I could clean the polish later, there being no point in buying a bottle of nail polish I will never need again. However, we forgot about that before she flew back to San Francisco. However, I kind of like the idea of just letting the paint grow out, and seeing how long it takes before the evidence is gone. It is only a little embarrassing to be seen with painted toe nails (and then I am more embarrassed if it is seen by strangers, who will be more likely to assume that painted nails are normal for me).

Later that day my friend Josie came to visit, along with her partner Lightfoot. He was hungry, so she and I accompanied him to a restaurant, where he had some sushi, and she and I just drank some miso soup as we didn't fel for tea with caffeine. Afterwards we went back to Beth's house, where I taught them a bit of acroyoga in the living room (and my aunt Barbara was very impressed to see me balancing on their upraised feet, etc. That was the evening my brother in law, Beto, had made a flann for dinner (which I hadn't eaten, as it was too late in the evening. However, there was a bit left the next day, and I had it for second breakfast, and liked it so much he promised me one for my birthday.

Thursday was a run errands and hang out with sisters and my younger niece, Lucia (11 years old, who had been given permission to miss a couple of days of school because she was so sad to have lost her beloved grandmother; her big sister, Anahi, at 14 preferred to distract herself with being busy, and went to school) day, including a walk in the dog park (where Lucia and I climbed the big tree on the shore of the lake), since it was the last full day we would all be together. Friday, we all went out to lunch together, and then Kirsty and Amber went back to the house to get their luggage and headed off to the airport, Kirsty to return to Melbourne, and Amber to San Francisco. I, on the other hand, met up with my dear friend and adopted cousin Jen and her husband Shelby for tea and delightful conversation at a tea shop, and a bit later my SCA sister Carrie arrived and took me out to her place in Hobart (we had no idea there was a Hobart in the Seattle area!) for dinner and to see the house and meet her dogs (which are tall, slender creatures with bit pointy ears that look more like deer than dogs). Then she brought be back to Beth's place in the U district. We did try stopping by Mat and Kay's place on the way home to say hi, but they weren't in.

On Saturday two more of my beloved friends came to visit. Shannon, whom I met when I lived in Eugene, and Paul, with whom I lived when I was in Ashland drove up to see me and take me out for an early birthday lunch/dinner. They arrived around 13:00 and we hung out and chatted for a bit, and then took a half a hour walk to a Thai restaurant (we had asked Beth for recommendations, but the Thai place she used to enjoy doesn't exist anymore, so she checked reviews on line, and that one was well recommended), which had very yummy food, with the veg perfectly steamed so that the broccoli wasn't overcooked. Then we walked back to the house, hung out for a bit, I showed them the movie The Arranged Marriage that my sister Amber made years ago (a documentary about our parents and how their daughters fixed them up with an arranged marriage) then Shannon got her massage table out of the car and gave me a massage. By then we were tired, so we went to sleep. Since Paul currently has both arms in a cast after having had a driver suddenly pull out in front of him when he was driving a motor scooter, he choose to sleep on the couch, where he wouldn't be hitting anyone with the casts during the night, so Shannon and I took the giant air mattress.

Sunday I woke up earlier than the others and did my yoga and had first breakfast, then when they got up I made some baking powder biscuits to share with them for my second breakfast. Then my SCA sister Clover and her husband Chris arrived, and we four went out to the same Indian restaurant that I had been to with Martin the day before mom died. The food was yummy, and the company delightful. After food we dropped Paul and Shannon back at the house so that they could return to Portland, and Clover and Chris went out to Woodinville for Tania and Mike's house concert with Felecia and William.

We arrived a good hour before the concert (even after stopping at a local distillery for C&C to buy some whisky), before the sun had set, so we got to see a glimpse of the the really pretty grounds before we went into the house (but it was raining, so we didn't do any exlporing). When we walked in the door the owner of the house, Alisaundre, was explaining to Tania that she recognised my name. Back in 2015, when I first ran Norrskensfesten I had asked on the SCA bardic list if anyone wanted to come to northern Sweden to teach a bardic class. Most people who replied said some variant of "oh, I wish!", but Alisaundre said "I could skype in". So she and her daughter did, and it was a fun class. She gave us a tour of the house, which is truly beautiful. They have a few rooms down stairs that they rent out as an Air BnB, and there is a little kitchenette there that the guests can use. They also have the gaming suite down there. The entry level floor is where the various living rooms and kitchen are, and there are bedrooms upstairs. I remember seeing her post photos of it to FB a year or so back when they were first purchasing it and planning on all of the things they would be able to do with it, including house concerts. During the tour she mentioned that the goal of having this amazing house and property was to make it a resource for all of their communities: Poly, Pagan, and SCA. After giving us the tour she introduced us to her husband, Leith, who hadn't joined in for that skype bardic class. However, he is also a bard, and, in fact, was the An Tir bardic champion the year Crian and I lived in Vancouver. I remember being introduced to him at Kingdom level event that year, though I don't remember what, if anything, we might have talked about during that brief meeting. I do remember his intense blue eyes and the fact that he was wearing the Bardic Champion's cloak.

Mike and Tania had told me that I would like Felecia and William, and they were correct. I chatted a little with them before the concert, and more during intermission and afterwards, and they are both delightful people I hope that our paths cross again. The concert itself was amazing, as I knew it would be. The four of them team up every winter to do a series of concerts, and it is so clear that they love what they do, and they harmonise so well together. I took the best seat in the house, the corner of the couch closest to the musicians, and sat down with my sewing project. Leith came and sat next to me, and a third person (Chris?) sat beyond him. During the first part of the concert, in between songs, I commented to Lieth that I have been in love with Tania since I was in high school, but when Felicia and William opened their mouths to sing I just lost my heart two more times.

The first bit of intermission Leith and I continued to sit on the couch and chat with one another, but then I got up to go ask to play Tania's dulcimer (we have the same kind) and visit with the musicians, and meet some of the other guests (it was a small crowd, and everyone seemed like interesting people I would enjoy knowing). When we sat back down Leith sat even closer to me than he had before, and asked to see what I was sewing. I showed him the viking coat in progress (just seam embroider left to sew, and I need to decide what to do in the way of clasps, but it was a good coat to wear during the trip). Then, after showing him the Ösenstitch (#b in that photo), though I do it backwards compared to that drawing) I am using on the seams I put down the sewing and he and I enjoyed the rest of the concert while holding hands and cuddling a little, which made an amazing concert even better.

After the concert there was time to visit more with the musicians, hosts, and guests for a while before they served dinner to those of us who were still there. They have one of those sous vide things, so there was a ham cooking the whole time the concert was happening, but it wasn't possible to smell it at all till they opened it. Even though many of my friends seem to be very happy with theirs, I hadn't really seen the point, since most of what I cook is something I can do quickly and keep busy with the whole time it is cooking so that being hungry while I wait for food doesn't bother me. However, for something like a house concert, where people want to focus on the music and not the smell of cooking food, it is perfect.

I, of course, wasn't hungry that late in the evening, but I happily sat and drank my water and visited with the others as they ate. Eventually Tania, Mike, Felicia and William had to go--they had a ferry to catch to get home. After they left Chris, Clover, Leith and I went out to the hot tub for a bit of bardic. I was kind of surprised no one else joined us (Alisaundre had a cold, so she couldn't join us), but just the four of us was nice too. Clover and Leith traded lots of songs, and I shared a few in Swedish. Leith has memorised quite a number of period French and other language songs. I would love to get him to Drachenwald to meet Kaarina! Then Chris and Clover had to head home to get some sleep before work the next day (they had an hour's drive), but I opted to stay. When we went back into the house everyone else had gone, or, in the case of the four or five others who live there, gone to their rooms, so we sat in one of the small living rooms and Leith played guitar and sang me some more songs, before showing me to the Peacock guest room and then retiring upstairs to his own room a little before 01:00. All of that music and good company after midnight made for a beautiful start to my birthday Monday.

I was in too good of a mood to sleep straight away, so I called David and we talked for a short while. Then I slept for almost three hours, and woke back up full of energy and joy, so I chatted with friends in other time zones on messenger for a bit, and went back to sleep and slept for another three hours, getting up at 08:00. I enjoyed breakfast with Leith and one of the housemates (whose name I didn't catch), and then I got a ride in with him to the microsoft campus where he works, arriving at about 10:00. My sister met me there and we ran some errands together, and then went back to the house where she made Beto's flann recipe for my birthday dinner:

Beto’s Flann

Ingredients:
3 eggs beaten
1 bar of cream cheese (8 oz, or 250 g)
1 can (12 fl oz or 354 ml) evaporated milk
1/2 can (full can is 14 oz or 397 g) or less of sweetened condensed milk
A bit of liquid vanilla.

Directions:
* Caramelise 1/2 cup sugar in a pan over medium heat
* Quickly pour melted sugar into the bottom of a loaf pan
* Cream cheese with 1 cup of warm water in the blender.
* Add the rest of ingredients and blend it all together.
* Set the pan in a larger pan containing water (not deep enough to get any water in the flann pan, of course.
* Bake (both pans together) at 350 F for one hour
* Let it cool for an hour before putting in the fridge
* Give it four or five hours in the fridge
* Invert onto a platter right before serving
* Garnish with fresh berries (we used raspberries!)

While that cooked and chilled we hung out together, I started some spaghetti sauce for dinner (containing tomato and kale with ground walnut, almond, sunflower seeds and she introduced me to her preferred cloud resource for project management and to-do lists (which I have since adopted for myself and downloaded the phone app).

Then she took the train to meet Anahi in the city center, where she attends school and accompany her from there to an audition, and I borrowed the car to pick up Lucia from school and get her to her Broadway Bound rehearsal (Beto was at work, so Beth was glad to have me there to help make the logistics work). Then I went home and enjoyed some spaghetti for my dinner early, and when everyone was home from work, auditions, and rehearsals they sat down to dinner and I jumped straight to desert. Good thing too--Lucia loves raspberries as much as I do, so it was good to get my share first, before she got to the Flann. Before they would let me eat Beth decorated it with candles (12 of them for my 5th 12th birthday), they sung to me, and I blew them out. I didn't even think of making a wish, and the first one that comes to mind as I type isn't possible, as we have this bad habit of living time in a linear manner.

After dinner, since I was flying out really early the next morning, I gave the girls Christmas presents. This is the first time I have ever given them something, since I live far away, am not a shopper, am too lazy to post stuff, and don't actually celebrate Christmas or give gifts to anyone. But it felt right to do so at this time. Beth told me that the girls love ear rings, and there had been much teasing back and forth between us for me being a geologist who loves pretty minerals, and them thinking rocks are boring and preferring organic stuff. Therefore we went looking for some nice ear rings with stones or minerals in them, so that I could give them something that would remind them of me and the banter. I knew that Anahi's favourite colour is yellow, since she had mentioned that when she found out that I don't really like yellow as a colour (but on that point there was no teasing, we both just accepted that the other has different taste--there is never any accounting for taste). So when I saw the bright yellow amber ear rings I couldn't resist buying them for her. We tried searching the store for ear rings that said "Lucia", but didn't spot any. The store clerk, undaunted, looked through the overflow stash, and found another pair of amber ear rings in a dark orangish red but in the same shape as the pair for Anahi. Lucia's favourite colour changes now and then, but she has loved that colour in the past, so I picked up both pairs.

Before giving them the gift I told them that I had considered giving them some crystals, because I am so fond of them, but since they don't like minerals I got them something organic instead. Anahi asked "what, did you get us food?", but when she opened the box she squealed in delight about loving the colour, and they both loved the joke. Lucia though her ear rings were nice enough, but she wasn't as enthusiastic as Anahi was, which was no surprise, but there hadn't been time to go looking in more stores in hopes of finding something better.

But now it is after midnight (oops!), and I need to do my yoga and get some sleep so that I can be at work at 08:00 tomorrow, so I will have to describe the trip home and the loot I brought back on another occasion (if I remember).

This morning I decided to run some errands, including buying some kitchen toys to replace ones that Caroline had brought with her that I liked, but then she took them with her when she moved to the apartment this month. I also needed to replace our broken staff mixer, which broke right after she moved in, so we have just been using hers ever since. We actually have two broken staff mixers, and both came with some accessories. Standing there in the store I was pretty certain that one of them was a Braun, and so I decided I would pick up one of that brand, but without any accessories, since we had some at home. But they had a variety of different ones in that brand, so after deciding what I wanted I decided to double check the display model to be certain that the one sold on its own still fit the attachments that come with the other. It did. Decision made I grabbed the small box containing just one mixer, on the shelf under the several different Braun mixers, paid, and went to the next stop for the day. Some time later, errands accomplished, I first went downstairs and grabbed the bag of broken mixers and accessories, looked inside, and was pleased to discover that my memory was correct, one of them was, in fact a Braun. Sadly, while my memory is functioning fine, my ability to actually read things in front of me or notice details wasn't, as the box I purchased was some other brand entirely, still starting with a B, but that was where the resemblance ended. I looked in the box, and it didn't fit either set of accessories. I didn't really want to head back out to the store, but decided that it was better to get it over with straight away, so I did.

On the homeward trip I decided that I had better get petrol while I was out, as I was down to a 1/4 tank. As I stood there, in the rain, filling the tank and nice looking young man came up to me and asked (in English) if I were by any chance heading south down the highway next, as he and his friend were trying to return to Germany after several weeks of hiking in the area. I explained that I was just heading home a couple of km away, and he asked if I had any suggestions for a better place to try to get a ride, as they weren't having any luck (indeed, mine was the only car at the station). My first reply was that I couldn't think of anything--none of the stations in the Luleå area are near the highway, and he agreed that they hadn't seen anything good on the map, and turned to walk back through the rain to join his friend, who had stayed with the packs under the overhang near the door. I thought about it a second, and then went after him and suggested that if they just wanted to get out of the rain for a bit, they could follow me home and have some food, and then I could take them with me to the station in Gammalstad a bit later when I went out for folk music and dance. They both thought this was a good idea, so they tossed their packs in the car, and off we went.

I had left over soup in the fridge, which I fed them with some home made bread rolls I pulled from the freezer, and then they helped me eat yesterday's nectarine and apple-walnut cobbler, which they liked so much they both had seconds. Then I packed up my dulcimer, dance shoes, and a sewing project and took them to the petrol station in Gammelstad, where I hope they had better luck finding a ride. They were happy as they were out of the rain for a while and got fed yummy, fresh, home made food (after three weeks of freeze-dried), and I got some pleasant (and cute) company and help eating the desert which was really a bit too big for just me to finish in a reasonable amount of time. And I got out the door early enough to actually attend the folk music session, for the first time in a very long time.

My first 1.5 years in Sweden David and I always went to music at 16:00, followed by dance (in the same room) at 18:30, and I loved it. But after we bought the house (and were thus closer to the site for music and dance) we started being so busy with other projects that we didn't make it on time for music, only dance. More recently David hasn't even had the energy for dance, so I am going to that on my own. But now that he is spending more time at Caroline's place than the house (which may change a bit once they finish getting stuff settled in there) I am free to do whatever I want, and I want to go to both music and dance. If I keep not bringing my dulcimer just because I don't know many songs yet then I won't learn more.

Tomorrow is nyckleharpa night, and this week I will bring the Dulcimer--it is already packed, and was in tune today, so it should be ok tomorrow.

Last night I managed seven hours of sleep, which was more than I might have gotten, but I had forgotten when I lay down that I had switched the dawn light from 05:30 to 06:20 the night before when I had stayed up rather later. So when I finally woke up at 06:15 and looked at the clock I decided that it would be wise to do only part of the morning phone app workout, so I could make it to work on time to meet my friend at the gym at 08:30 as planned.

Then, as I started my morning situps before getting out of bed, I turned wireless on my phone to read LJ, and saw a FB message from her, sent after midnight, saying that she wasn't sleeping due to a headache, and so didn't think she would make it to the gym. My first thought was "ok, I don't have to go". Then I thought again and decided that, no, of course I was going.

Then I got up, got dressed for the phone app workout (bra out the outside of yesterday's shirt, so that should I sweat, it isn't on the bra, and I can still wear it the rest of the day), went to the living room, opened the app, and discovered that it thinks today is a rest day. For all four categories of exercises. This was a bit of a surprise, since for weeks now it has been a rest day for three of the four at once, and the fourth gets a different rest day. However, having gotten dressed to work out, I deiced to do a little anyway, and spent 10 minutes moving. Then I got dressed for work, posted to the Phire FB group that even though the one friend couldn't make it, I would still be going to the gym if anyone wanted to join me, had breakfast, and spent 15 minutes shoveling snow till lord_kjar was ready for work, and then I rode in with him.

As an aside--the downside of yesterday's long day at work and then having fun with friends on campus is that meant that no one was home yesterday to do the shoveling when we got the first decent snowfall of the winter. Not that it was much snow this time, either, but at least it was deep enough that one wouldn't want to wear low shoes in it. To make matters worse, after weeks of lovely temperatures (read: -10 to -30 C, or "cold enough not to melt and get slippery), today it warmed up to 0 C, so after sitting in the warmth the snow was getting a bit heavier than it was when it fell. Needless to say, I didn't get much of the driveway done in the 15 minutes I had before work.

Arriving at work I took my computer to the lab, turned on the plasma on the ICP-MS, and then went to the gym, where I was met by another Phire person I had only seen one time before. We had a nice workout and enjoyed chatting while we did. I did only a short 30 minute session, as I wanted to be certain I was ready when my lab technician arrived at 10:30 or 11:00.

I was, and spent a couple of hours with him, as he looked at the laser and checked a few things, explaining as he went. I now understand why it was that when I asked for the laser to deliver a fluence of 7 J/cm2 it was only giving about 3.5 J/cm2, but if I asked for 50% output I could get 7 J/cm2. It turns out that when the laser was installed the technician opened up the sample chamber, turned off the safety feature that keeps the laser from firing when the door is open, set in a sensor, fired the laser on it, and took notes as to how many J/cm2 it delivers at each % of output. Then the computer looks at my request, compares it with that table, and sets the output level at that given by the table to yield the result I want.

Expect that sometime between installation and when I first noticed the problem something has gone wrong, so that it simply isn't giving as much energy as it did when that table was created, so now when I ask for 7 J/cm2 it uses the 40% output that it thinks ought to be good enough, but really, we need 60% these days.

Eventually the technician had enough information that he was ready to actually open up the machine and get to work, but first he needed lunch. He didn't really want me present for the opening thing up and changing stuff with the optics, saying that I wouldn't be able to help, and he didn't really want someone else in the room when the laser was unshielded. So, it being plenty late enough to do so, I went home for the day, enjoying a nice walk through a forest of snow-covered trees.

That gave me time for a short nap (~20 min), some food (baked a yummy cornbread) and a good book, running a load of laundry, and a bit more snow shoveling, before it was time to head to uni for the Frostheim social/crafts night.

I brought my dulcimer, which seriously needed tuning after the temperature changes this week, and made some progress on my tunic in progress. This week there were four of us for most of the evening, but a friend who can't eat gluten dropped by on his way to his martial arts session to try the cornbread, since I had told him I was bringing it).

We had my senior apprentice working on her wool dress, the friend from Phire who didn't make it to this morning's workout, working on her wool dress, me working on my wool tunic, and a really cute new guy, working on some chain mail project he started working on three years ago (he is so in the right place!) It was a lovely time, and I was quite surprised when the apprentice's husband returned to pick her up, as I didn't think it was that late.

As we were packing up to go I looked at my phone, and saw that my service technician had sent me a text message at 19:30 saying he was finally done for the day, having found the root cause and started the repair, and suggesting that I meet him tomorrow at 10:00. I am glad I didn't stick around till he was done!

From there I went over to the local grocery store to pick up my package, since I had received a text message earlier in the day saying it was in. But we also needed a few things from the store, so I filled a basket first. Then, when I had found everything I wanted, I looked at the line to deal with the one human on duty, and went over to the self-scanning station, and checked myself out. Then I hopped in the car and went home, and it wasn't till I pulled into the driveway that I realized that I hadn't picked up the package. Oops! I have now added it to the calendar for tomorrow, so hopefully I will remember.

However, the self-annoyance at forgetting the package was completely overshadowed by the joy at discovering that lord_kjar, who had stayed home from Frostheim to finish up a few things for work, had finished up the shoveling while I was gone.

Now I should do yoga, before lord_kjar puts down that nyckleharpa he just started playing...

Even though I didn't put anything into the rules about needing *written* documentation for the entries for the Norrskensbard competition (coming up on 14 November), I have still prepared a pdf to accompany my entries. Having taken the time to type it up, I though I would ( share it here, too. )

Last week was a busy one, with the Nyckleharpa group meeting on Monday (I bring my dulcimer, play along on the two songs I know, and spend the rest of the evening listing to lovely music being learned/practiced while I make progress on my current sewing project), Choir on Tuesday (this year's issues with attendance has continued--we had two sopranos, two altos, two bass, and one tenor. Therefore we have decided that since our recruitment attempts aren't working we will try plan B: bring along musical instruments and when there aren't enough voices to do parts we just sing and play, but when there are we can sing parts), Wednesday was Solar Wind Orchestra (the instrumental spin off group that is formed of (mostly) members of our Choir, Aurora, and which we are hoping will keep the choir alive a bit longer by taking the instruments to Choir), Thursday we flew to Gothenburg (as it is spelled on maps written by English speakers), and Friday we took the bus out to the site for the St. Egon Feast and Normark Coronet Tournament and Investiture.

The busy week schedule meant that I hadn't really properly recovered energy levels after the Australia trip, since I wound up staying up later than I should have on pretty much all of those nights. As a result I was so tired by early Friday evening that I wound up laying down for a two hour nap, and then getting up and being sociable again in the late evening. I think I went to bed again around 01:00, yet still woke up around 07:00 with enough energy to go out for a walk before breakfast (which was scheduled to be served at 08:00).

I wound up taking a side road up a hill past a number of farm and eventually into a forest, where the road ended at a gate next an old farm house that, these days, only grows old cars lying around the field in careless abandon. By the time I got back down the hill to the site it was just after 08:00, and I enjoyed my breakfast.

This was the first time I have made it to a Nordmark Cornet. They happen only once every nine months (give or take). The year that it was held here in Frostheim (in July, that year, which is why I say "give or take, since one can't get to March from July by counting nine months at a time) was the year I had to be in Australia, awaiting my visa to move to Sweden. I did call in and get to listen to the final rounds (one by a Frostheim fighter!), but it is not the same as being there. The subsequent Nordmark Cornet tournaments have been held far enough away during times we didn't have the budget and/or time to travel, so I missed them. We probably wouldn't have gone this time either, since we aren't in a habit of it, but C talked us into coming down for it--she has been up here three times to visit since moving away in October, and it was our turn to visit her.

The tournament was scheduled for 11:00, and there were seven fighters in the list, which was fought round-robin, with each bout being done as a best two out of three (the one time there was a double kill they went to four bouts to decide it). At the end of the day there was one knight who had six victories, and two fighters who had four each. So the two fought one another, and then the victor fought the one who was clean (and by clean I mean his lovely white silk surcoat with a damask fleur-du-lis pattern on it was still lovely and white despite the mud--he had been careful to not actually fall down during the (few) deaths he had had during the sub-round bouts). I was not terribly surprised when the knight won, and was pleased to see it--he and his lady are delightful people, and they like to make spiffy stuff, so will always look the part.

Lunch was scheduled for 13:00, and the tourney was over in plenty of time for us to be back inside (out of the wind, which was surprisingly cold, given that there is no snow at all on the ground that far south) in plenty of time for it, but lunch prep wound up taking more time than expected (or something--I didn't hear the details) so food wasn't served till 13:30. This gave us time to check out the two merchants on site and pick up some more linen thread since we were running low.

After lunch I changed out of my nice warm Viking boy clothes (normal version, not the man/muscles and beard that I use when actually trying to play a man at a Lajv) that I had brought along to wear Friday night and during the tournament (ok, I didn't actually wear the wool trousers or wool over tunic Friday night, they only went on for being outside, and whilst indoors I contented myself with my white undertunic and a black linen tunic I made years ago that used to belong to clovis_t, which his mum gave me when I was visiting Tassie) and into my blue/brown wool bliaut and added my braid extenders. Then C put on her new braid extenders, which had been inspired by mine. In her case it really is her own hair sticking out the bottom--she saved the hair that got cut off during a tragic misunderstanding of a hair dresser about just exactly what she wanted done. My extenders hang just to my hips, hers rich to mid-thigh. Need to re-do mine to make them longer...

We managed to get dressed up in good time for court, which was both the last court of Sven and Siobhan and the investiture of William and Isabetta. Having grown up in Oertha, where the new Princess have overnight to prepare for their Investiture, at first it sounded kind of fast to do the Investiture just a few hours after the tournament. However, it turns out to have been plenty of time for them to prepare, since, after their investiture and accepting the oaths of fealty from their officers, they actually had business of their own! They called up lord_kjar and presented him the scroll from his AoA (and the man who had been the Prince to give him that AoA happened to be the herald for this court, so he got to beam happily from behind the thrones for that). Then, when lord_kjar was ready to return to his seat they told him that he did not have leave to depart, and then presented him with Ljusorden, the Principality award for arts and sciences, in appreciation of the fact that he is playing beautiful music at every event he attends. They apologized for not having a token for him, but said to make it up to him they had not one, but two beautiful scrolls to commemorate it. Therefore, in one event, he managed to go from zero scrolls to one more than I have. Their new Highnesses actually presented several different awards, and each one came with a scroll. Now that is truly being prepared to hit the ground running!

(ok, so they had help from the outgoing royals, who had arranged a few award scrolls to be made for people for whom they would have been happy to be the ones presenting, and the calligraphy carefully didn't state the names of the Prince and Princess, so that either the incoming or the outgoing pair could sign the scrolls and give the awards, but still, it is quite impressive, especially to one like me, who grew up in a Kingdom with a huge backlog and who still doesn't have her AoA scroll, from 1985.)

After court was the banquet. I, of course, was long since done eating for the day, but we still put out a plate and bowl to mark my place next to lord_kjar and C. We were seated across the table from a musician with a violin, and adjacent to several other musicians and singers at the next table, so there was much music and singing happening in our end of the hall before the feast, and at random intervals during it. I sensibly did my yoga early in the feast, finishing up as the toasts were called (I like being at an event large enough that I don't need to make one of the toasts--as "just" a viscountess I really am fairly far down the OP, but here in the north I am the third ranked person, since we have only one each count and countess, and this is a Kingdom in which the toasts are made in order of presence).

They held a couple of mini-courts during the feast, mostly to acknowledge and thank people who had worked at the event, presentation of gifts from ambassadors from other branches, and other similar business. They also presented two awards to people on behalf of former royalty (in one case from several years back), that had been officially presented during court at an event in which the recipient hadn't been in attendance, so everyone kept the secret until they could get it at the next event at which both they and the royals were in attendance. There was also a performance of the Drachenwald Theater Guild--a very silly impromptu story, which had been written in advance in the form of a mad-lib: the Queen had been given a list of questions to answer, and those words were slotted into the story (The Princess and the Pea), to make for a very absurd tale, which was acted out by random members of the populace, chosen by guild members on the spur of the moment, while the (guild head? the countess in the jester costume, anyway) read the story aloud. Since the audience was participating the story held everyone's attention, and there was much laughter.

The feast, like lunch before it, was served about a half an hour behind the originally planned schedule, which meant that when it came time to depart to go catch our bus back to the city (at 22:30) desert had not yet been served. It took two buses and one tram to get back to C's apartment, and we arrived just at midnight. This meant that I had re-done the packing for the next day's flight home, and managed to go two sleep by around 1:30 ish, and slept till around 07:00. We had to depart for the airport at 09:40, and were landing at the airport in Luleå around 14:00, since we were lucky enough to get a direct flight home (the flight down involved a change of planes in Stockholm, and then getting off that plane when something in the door broke when they went to close it, so we passengers were re-booked onto the next flight, which meant we took off from Luleå at 18:30, but didn't make it to C's apartment till midnight).

Despite the weekend of adventures down south, we still managed to make it to dance on Sunday evening, which was fun. Today I walked both to and from work, since lord_kjar wasn't able to come home for lunch, and someone needed to be here from noon to accept the piano delivery. Yup. We have a new piano. His sister called him recently to ask him if he wanted a nice walnut wood piano. Never mind that we already had an old school piano in the living room, of course he said yes. It cost about 4000 SEK to ship it up from southern Sweden (almost €430, or $550 USD, or $615 AU at today's exchange rate), but that isn't bad for a nice instrument that sounds so much better than the one we already had. It will need tuning, of course, but even so it already sounds nicer.

As it turned out, they didn't deliver till almost 15:00, so he was able to be here and help the two delivery men get it up the stairs and into the front door.

We have nothing special on tonight's calender, which is a delightful change (and probably why I am finally finding time to post something), but tomorrow is Choir, and Wednesday is Solar Wind...

This weekend was the big Frostheim SCA event, Norrskensfest. The King and Queen came up from Germany, the Prince and Princess came up from Stockholm. Our erstwhile housemate, C, came back up from Götteborg, some people came from Sundsvall (six hours drive), more from Umeå (three hours drive) and others from Skellefteå (two hours drive). There were around 70 people total, which is not bad at all for a little shire on the far northern edge of a rather spread out Kingdom.

On the Friday night I ran a class on the History of the SCA, starting with reading out loud the story of the first SCA event by Dorothea of Caer-Myrddin and then sharing a timeline of which Kingdoms and Principalities formed when (and thus how many of each existed during any given year), which Kingdoms and Principalities are descended from which, and even a graph showing the change in the number of paid members over the years. If anyone actually wants to see the handout I prepared for that class let me know and I can convert the pdf to photos and share in a separate post.

We also did some dancing that evening, and there was a silk banner painting workshop. Now, because of the dancing and my class lord_kjar and I didn't actually start work on our banner till around midnight. Even so we managed to finish the banner early in the day on Saturday, so it was hanging on the wall to decorate the hall for the feast. We even made time to soak in the shire hot tub (on a trailer in the parking area) before crawling into bed around 02:00.

Even so we managed to get up around 08:00, so we could be part of the musical procession carrying breakfast to their highnesses, who were sleeping in the upstairs room. My beloved minion (who got his AA later in the event!) was kind enough to carry the dulcimer for me, so that I could walk and play. I am so lucky to have a minion!

Saturday during the day there was a tournament outside, but I had agreed to do a hand sewing class inside at the same time, so instead of going outside myself, I made my fur hood and muff available for HRM and HRH if either of them wanted it, since winter hasn't really arrived yet where either of them live, and we were having good weather on the weekend, with temps ranging from around -5 to -10, the snow we had had the week before holding on nicely, and frost crystals decorating the trees.

My "class" was more along the lines of sharing a printout of my favourite sewing web page (created by hrj), as well as printouts of a few others I found that looked useful on the day I was doing the printing and chatting with the other people sitting around working on their own projects. However, many of us had never seen Eithni's Magic Veil Stitch (the link goes to a .doc file with instructions for the stitch), and C was making a new veil, so she gave the stitch a try, and we were all delighted with how well it works. Thanks eithni!

After the tourney and before the feast there was more dancing, and then it was time to get ready for the first performance of the Solar Wind Orchestra. lord_kjar and I got permission from the people in charge of decorating the hall for feast to set up instruments just to the side of high table, and we had our place nicely claimed before the hall door re-opened to permit people to set their feast gear out. The other band members arrived in good time, and we got them set up with feast gear and we settled in to enjoy court before the first half of the feast.

A good number of the people I had recommended for awards actually got them, so I was feeling quite pleased with court, when suddenly the King's herald called me up. I so did Not expect that! I already have a good coverage of awards and didn't feel I was lacking in any. (I had even said so over on FB--some weeks back I posted to the local shires' group pages asking everyone to please list their full SCA names plus any awards they had in the comments so that people could recommend them for awards--to be fair I had also listed mine, and said that there was no point in recommending me, I already had them covered.) However, I don't think the King was privy to that conversation (what Crown would have time to read all the group pages for the various branches in their realm?), and so they admitted me to the ( order of the Lindquistringes ) The photo (behind that cut) shows the scroll, made by the ever so talented Bridget Greywolf, whose name was said for a great many of the award scrolls given, all of which were stunning. One can see that she has actually met me looking at the scroll--it is so pretty I love it.

After court was the feast, and after the first round of servings were done and they had gotten to the first desert our band got up and performed our seven songs, which was much fun, and seemed to go over well. One of the songs is a dance, and the music speeds up with each repeat. The dancers, of course, got up to dance while we sang and played that one, but took part of the song trying to get all the dancers up to speed as to what the steps were, so when we ended the dancers asked us to do it again. We, of course, obliged them. (Though it was hard to sit and play the dulcimer while there was dancing happening!)

After our performance there was lots more food served (since I never eat in the evenings I have no idea what was served, but the people around me seemed to be happy, so I assume it was all good), and there was more court, too. At one point their Highnesses called to their court one of the guys running the event, but he was outside soaking in the hot tub, so we opened the window and called him in. When we said "you are summoned to court" his reply was to stand up, stark naked in the cold night air, and shout back "you have got to be kidding me!". When he realized we were serious he wrapped a towel around his waist and came in. There was much laughter at the banter between the blushing, flushing Princess and the towel-clad man, as their highnesses thanked him for his part in the event and presented him a token of their appreciation.

During the feast one of my friends asked me "So, how many scrolls do you have now?". His eyes really bugged out when I replied "Two. I doubled my collection tonight." Drachenwald is so good about giving scrolls with the awards that he had assumed that "having an award" = "having a scroll". I had to explain to the others about the concept of a backlog...

However, despite having only two scrolls, I do have, as mentioned, quite a number of awards, and this is the third time I have received a Kingdom service award for dance (ironically, I have never gotten a mid-level Kingdom arts award, but skipped straight to the Laurel).

After the feast we settled into a evening of singing, dancing, and merriment. At one point lord_kjar showed one of the guys in the brewer's guild his experiments involving some of our home grown black currants and alcohol, and suddenly there was an impromptu meeting of the brewer's guild, which lord_kjar is now a member of.

All in all it was a lovely event, full of hugs, cuddles, dance, art projects, music--in short everything I could want in an event. I look forward to our pot luck Yule revel next month. I am also resolved to attend the Known World Dance Symposium in Germany in April. There are just a few details that need working out, like how to get there, and can we really afford it. Therefore I have started a FB group to coordinate the travel to that event for those of us who live in northern Nordmark. With luck that will convince some of our friends to head south with us for that event. With more luck I will succeed in talking those of us who could do so to teach a class at the event.

Sadly, our beautiful weather of the weekend didn't last, and Monday morning it warmed up to rain a bit. Then it cooled back off a tiny bit and we got some very wet, heavy snow. This morning it warmed up again, and the snow started melting like crazy, and it rained again. My poor winter--it has barely started, yet it is already suffering from the same health issues that plagued last winter.

A week or so ago I learned to play the Swedish Folk song, Ulven, Räven och Haren, by just looking at the sheet music and working out which strings to hit on my hammer dulcimer--I skipped my normal step of writing out the letters so that I could look at the letters while trying to learn it, and it worked quite well, but then, it doesn't have very many notes.

Today I just printed out the sheet music for Bacche, Bene, Venies, and was able to hit the correct strings for that one, too. Not yet in the right timing, of course, but I am managing to go direct from sheet music to hitting the strings if the music isn't complicated. This delights me so much I had to delay yoga long enough to tell someone...

The weekend has been full of acquiring supplies for working on the walk way and earth cellar in progress, and the walk way is now 3/4 of the way complete (it was only 1/3 of the way done when the snow started falling last autumn and we had to stop work for the winter. I truly enjoy working on these project, and finding good stone cheap and free bricks is happy-making. Would love to elaborate on how things are going, but it is pretty much time to get ready for folk dancing tonight, and tomorrow night is nycklharpa, Tuesday is choir, Wednesday is our traditional spring choir performance for spring, Thursday the choir members who feel for it come here to do instrumental music (+/- singing), and I many not get another chance to post with all that going on.

But I am probably soon done with my Swedish for Immigrants Course--my teacher wants me to take the National Exam to end it on 13 and 14 May. I am looking forward to that, since I love tests, and I would like the extra time I will get not going to school, but, on the other hand, I am enjoying the classes, too...