Well, I have to say. This weekend was not how I envisioned it but it was really good. Seriously good in some respects. I managed to fit in lots of projects, got to spend some good quality time with family and friends and got to hit people with sticks. Not too shabby.

Today we were not rained out but Mel was feeling less than stellar. public_shaylan, Benton and I went to Joe's for breakfast and had a really nice time. We relaxed, had nummy food and then got home to pack up for various and asundry. Mel stayed home and Benton and I went to War Practice. I had arranged child care and it was a good time. Ben had an awesome time with Aelina and Asteria and I had a really good time fighting. I stopped before the last scenario when Magdalen had to ask me a land question and I realized the world was kinda spinny and that I was DONE. So I did the land thing and then got changed out of armour, got soup from the soup kitchen and then got everything packed up and loaded before picking up Benton at the playground. Some notable things: Caolin, Aelina's Sister got her AOA, Anya was offered her Laurel and little Duncan who I've known for years from gaming conventions got offered his knighthood. He will be the shortest knight in the kingdom and that is awesome in so many ways. He's such a sweet guy and an amazing spearman. He is pretty fearless too. Anya, well, seriously, if you haven't been paying attention to the awesome, well, sorry...start now! So happy for my deputy...wait, I'm her deputy now! LOL!

Got home and ickaimp was painting away on my banner. Its spectacular! While she was finishing up I got the Laurel banner traced out and got public_shaylan's sketched out too. We managed to get her's all base painted and ready for detail work before we called it a night.
( Banner Pictures )

Mel was very glad he stayed home but he's feeling somewhat better. He's already in bed..course I'm going to be heading that way shortly. I'm tired, sore and I took a knee shot that I had ice on for quite a while that is just starting to ache. The buy apologized but still it hurts. Really happy with the weekend. I know things SCA-wise in Atenveldt are still a bit squiffy due to the BOD but there wasn't much any of us can do about the situation but wait, be patient (I know, its hard) and keep on keeping on until the March 6th date.


Also on Friday night I finished up "Blameless" #5 of the year and started #6 "Heartless" in the Parasol Protectorate. So much steampunk fun!


In the words of my SIL, fibergeek Go make stuff.
It seriously helps with your mood.

We came, we saw, we kicked some ASS. Well, or had our asses kicked. I'm never sure how that goes. LOL.

Friday was crazy. Mel woke up at 4am with his back tweaked. We had benton at home with us due to him having goopy pink eye eyes. He didn't have viral/bacterial pink eye, just the allergy kind but we have to keep him out of daycare. I had sewing to finish and packing and we managed to get it all done and hit the chiro for both of us since I had a chair explode underneath me at home on wednesday that threw me to the floor violently. I'm not kidding...it effing exploded. So as a whole, we as a family weren't doing so hot physically by friday. Mel drove us to phx while I finished stitching up the present for mariamist. Who happened to have her little girl that DAY! Woot! We had dinner with most of the college crewe at Santan Brewery. The little boy decided he liked lemons and he ate really, really well. We were surprised and knew we were finally turning a corner on him being sick since his appetite was back to ravishing.

Mel and I were exhausted and I got sent to bed shortly after we arrived back at Kevin's. I was tipsy and that was good but Benton was restless and I was up off and on most of the night and finally had to dose Benton with some pain reliever for his poor teeth. I finally fell dead asleep somewhere around 530-6am. We got up at 8ish since Benton was up and wanting milk. We got dressed and headed to breakfast at CupznCrepes. Food was good and Benton stuffed himself on a ham and cheese crepe.

The Franchise Bomb (tm) was thrown and Hrafnheim looked HOT! I'm not sure if pictures got posted or video was done but us walking in en masse was awesome. I spent most of last week working on making sashes for our initiate members and the kids and I'm really, really happy that I did. I even made Benton a cute little tabard with Hrafn Raven on it. Mel received the Commander of the Pilgrim of the Desert (Grant level authenticity) woot!

Mr. Benton would not take a nap on Saturday. Asa was awesome and finally got him settled down and sleeping after we all walked Thomas into court. Thomas and Ilora looked resplendent in their Byzantine clothing. Please see my album Coronation of a Hrafn King.

After that we had exactly 1 hour to have the kingdom calendar meeting. It went okay but things didn't quite get all of the way worked out. If we had had 30 more minutes I'm sure we would have done well. I was given a lift to where most of the house was having dinner (Santan Brewery again). I was exhausted, headachey, thirsty and starving. Our waiter was the best I have had in recent memory with a large rotating group. He kept me in water, was awesome with all of the kids, kept checks straight, got food quickly and was smiling about it all. He also didn't slap on the Party of 8 standard gratuity and he I'm sure made out like a bandit.

We got home a bit later and got to bed pretty late after chatting with Kevin. We got up in good measure and had a better nights sleep but mel woke up with a cold. Benton was hungry and we had a nice breakfast at an irish pub in Chandler. Benton gorged himself on fruit including the rinds (I guess he ate and entire lime with rind the night before...lol). I had a good breakfast and we got going late but we had just enough time get dressed, finish getting set up and into court thanks to our awesome household.

I fought in queen's champion. I had a good time doing that. I'm still getting used to the new shield and my left leg paid for it. oof. The shot that almost took me out of the tourney early onwas one on my shoulder. I ended up winning the bout off hand single sword. I'm pretty happy about that since that was my only win the tourney but I was happy none the less. But by the end of an hour bear pit (with a 20mins break between the halves to run the sword and shield side of king's champion). I was toast when we were done and then I chased Benton around for a while while he policed the field of every bit of debris and blade of grass he could find. He would pick it up and hand it to me and most on to the next thing...very cute. He again would not take a nap but when we got him into the car he was out after court.

BTY did awesome and we won everything! King's Champion is Sir Justin, Queen's Champion and Bard of the Sun is Lord Odde, HE msgolda won as Populace Choice at the Artisan Display, Lady Clarice won the Laurel's Choice and Lady Anya won the Queen's Choice! YAY!!!!

We headed back to kevin's and changed clothes and then hit Sonic and drove home. We got home just a bit before 9pm. The cats had gotten into the trash and made a mess but there was no other bad behavior evident and they were getting along. We made the decision to let butterfly out and it seems to have worked. They are on good terms and back to the cats we remember pre-November. We shall see if it lasts but wow it was nice to not come home to pissy and spitting hissy cats. Butterfly was a snuggle bug again and that was awesome.

So, its monday in all of its glory. Paperwork is crazy and it seems never ending.

Last night I headed up with HRH Thomas, Sayyida Mariyah, Lady Aeryn and m'lord Reinhardt to meet with m'lady Ariana (Kissa), m'lord Herger (Lee) and Lord Storvarr to have a Hrafnheim prescence at the BofA Novice tourney. Aeryn, Rienhardt and Herger fought the novice side while Mariyah and I fought the non-novice tourney.

The novice side ran round robin and the non-novice side ran double elim. My first fight was good. I managed to kill m'lord Kale from Inverted with a slot. My next fight was from Micheal Kilkenny (who won the tourney) and he punked me in the face with his inverted great sword. I so missed that...gah. So dumb. My next fight was with Mariyah (had to fight her since the list was adjusted) and that was okay. I need to have some patience but eh I ended up loosing. After that I headed over and did some pickups with Baylor and had a good time with that. I'm leaving me sword arm out..something Ed noted at practice but I'm not sure why....gotta look at that. I was so worried about using the new shield I think I kept it way out there. I do like the new shield. It was nice to use, not too heavy and the handle was really comfy. Just need to work on the sword work.

After the tourney we headed to the Armadillo Grill and had some nummy food. I was starving. The conversation was good but it was midnight when we left. Tom was awesome and I was inside the house, hitting the shower at 2am. I was in bed by 215 or so and asleep very shortly after. I managed to sleep most of the way home from Chandler Blvd so I'm doing okay for now. We shall see when Benton and I need to hit Costco after work. We need diapers and some other stuff so we shall see.

Well, work was kinda crazy and I've been working on reports. Exciting no?

Got home with the Benton and he was tried but did not want to nap. He played for a good while while I made corn bread and played angry birds. Mel was winding yarn and we were very domestic. Had dinner and then got all ready for FP.

Mel was teaching Viking Accessories and I was hoping to fight. Mel figured he could keep the boy occupied since the boy should be asleep. Well, the boy was asleep when we got there but woke up shortly after getting put in the stroller. Oh, well. He was a good boy though and stayed snuggled up watching people and listening to his daddy talk. Such a good kid.

I fought and had a pretty good time. My blocking wasn't great and I'm sporting some pretty bruises right now that do not hurt....which is probably not a good sign. Oh, well.

We got in the car at 930 and were on our way home. I was shutting down and tired. I could have just curled up in the truck asleep. Got in and got the cats fed and mel put the boy to bed who was so out he didn't even wake up for the diaper change. I got some protein and then a shower and then an ice pack. Read for a bit and then was out. Woke up this AM and felt pretty good minus tired. I'm really thinking its weird I'm not in pain from my leg. It looks AWFUL. Very weird.

I'm going to do a bit of core work and then run/walk for my workout tonight. Then get cleaned up and head to the officer's meeting. That should be good for my legs and make sure they don't stiffen too much.

Work was pretty productive. I'm almost caught up on my big project. We have to do statuses every 2 weeks and each status ans X amount of tasks that need to complete...last status I was uber behind, this status, almost caught up. Should finish one of the big tasks today and then its sit around and wait for suppliers. I'm okay with that.

I wore my cute heel's yesterday and that was a mistake. They aren't quite broke in and neither are my feet for wearing them and I walked all over plant site. I didn't get any blisters but it was close. I got to watch a demo of a cool laser cleaning system and that was cool...how it was implemented is still up for debate on usefulness, it looks great on paper thus the debate.

Got home about 340 and was just gonna take a small nap...yeah, I got cat attacked and slept for over an hour I think. I got dinner worked on the new crochet project where I had to frog back two rows and do the stitch properly. I got it working and replaced the two rows I frogged and got another one on before it was time head to practice.

I had to dig all of my fighting stuff out of my armor bag where it has been since crown. I had planned on fighting warlord and it was all packed for camping. So, it took me a bit to go out and grab things, get dress and out the door. Only did pickups with Justin. Melees were fun as were the drills. Got to fight with lots of different groups. Was pretty tired and armored down before things finished up but I was okay with that. Any further and I wouldn't have been able to sleep...which is important. I need me some sleep. Obviously considering my nap with the kittens.

Course we got home pretty late from practice, mel needed me to put his shoulders, collar bones and hips back in and by the time I got a shower and was reading to turn the brain off it was pretty darn late. I slept good though with only once up to hit the potty but I fell right back asleep. Butterfly is liking the cooler night time temps and has been curled up on my side during naps and night sleeping. I woke up with her snuggled in this morning and it was really hard not to stay in bed. But here we are.

Well, yesterday was exciting. I think I found a correlation in our data behind our failures. We shall see how that pans out but it might be one of those statistics where don't buy a car built on Monday or Friday type of things. Not sure. Got home a bit late than the regular time. But mel was in a tail spin and had to replace the cooler pump again. Not a happy guy. I finished cleaning the grill and got dressed before he got home. We got things loaded up in both vehicles and mel pulled out while I waited for richard to come and pick up the grill. Got to the park things were setting up and everything fell into place. It was a muggy night, no wind to speak of and quite warm. Lots of fighters on on three erics were auctioned off.

I didn't do too bad on the list at least in my opinion. I legged quite a few, killed two and paid attention to all of the good things we've been working on. Morgan and I got to talk after our fights and I was much improved from my zombie performance last week. About half way through the night my eyes started bothering me from the sweat and then they got all allergy icky from me rubbing them. I stopped after taking a stout arm shot, being given my arm back and then getting hit there again and across the shoulder by Sir Gavin. My eyes were done and after trying to cool them down, drops etc they were not happy. If it was normal FP night I'd have just packed up and gone home but the tourney still had about 20mins and then there was court. I got my stuff packed up and chatting with folks and was miserable.

I left very shortly after court ended. I drove home one eyed and blurry, got home, took the contacts out and things were kinda better. Got the girls fed, got a protein shake and then got a very nice shower. Got out of the shower and marveled at the glory my arm/shoulder is gonna be and then crawled into bed. Mel got home while I was trying to read...btw, Assassination Vacation is marvelous. I went straight to sleep when he climbed in the shower. My eye pack wasn't working very well.

This morning things were still blurry and its hard to focus using both of my eyes. I'd have stayed home but I have charts to make for tomorrow's meetings. It will probably be an early day though...I'm not sure how much I've got in me when I'm not seeing clearly...and another few hours of sleep would have been much more curative I think. We shall see.

The last 2 days have been mondays at work and so many things are going wrong that I really want to throw up my hands and scream "MULLIGAN" at the top of my lungs but I know it won't help. I'm just going to nod and accept the fact that things are odd right now and I need to take it in stride and just work hard and not stress about it.

Got home yesterday after 11 hours. I ate dinner and relaxed in front of the telly watching Warehouse 13 quite pleasant that one...neato stuff. Then it was time to get dressed for fighting and I managed in not to long of time. Got to the park and started getting into gear. I was slow at that but got help from Ruteger on punching more holes in my straps so the body harness fit much better...but I have no more room for taking it in without moving the straps. Sighs...loosing size is nice but maintaining armor and SCA clothes is getting to be a hassle. Its almost to the point where I need to make all new stuff for this current size and take it in from there. Sighs. I know I'm complaining but man, its annoying.

I fought Ruteger, Justin and Baron Sir Morgan. Ruteger and I tangled pretty well, I killed him from his knees pretty easily. I was happy about that. Had some stoopid moments with Justin..I'm still not happy in my own skin so I'm stiff...course that could be more of not picking up a stick in the last month. Sighs again. Fought morgan and was getting frustrated about my inability to get into my A and B range with him...he's wiley and my timing was way off. Things to work on. course, everyone always tells me I'm thinking too much, how the heck do you stop that? I still haven't figured that out. The only thing right now I can turn my brain off for is crochet or painting or calligraphy...fighting just isn't there yet. I guess more practice will make things fluid as anything else. I gassed out and was dizzy by the time I was done with morgan. My nasal passages have been irritated and my lungs weren't happy either (lack of exercise is making the asthma come back). So, I got out of armor and talked with a few people. Met up with Argyle to get potter transferred from his house to our car. April has a faboo workshop. I've got to take pictures for her on the pieces and get them delivered to Mons on Saturday. I also need to put gloves in my gauntlets so I can fight at the tourney. I'm actually kinda excited since I've never fought in this one due lack of gauntlets.

We got home latish and I was sore and tired. Got a shower and I read for a while. I thought I was going to have trouble sleeping but I didn't. So, I'm hoping today is not so long and I get to head to knit night and then to kung fu. I think I'll grab my knitting needles, my book and a ball of yarn and have a good time...if I make it.

Thursday was pretty good. I got home after a kinda frustrating too many meetings, my main productivity program being down and having to deal with security paperwork gah kinda day. So I relaxed while listening to pod casts, made my call to Dropio for Stitchit! Soar Knowledge and then worked on embroidery while watching NCIS and Burn Notice. Got dressed for Victory Hall and we headed out. I forgot the bug spray and I luckily had a thermal shirt in the armor bag and wore that. Even in the heat it was comfortable and I only got one bug attempt to get me on my neck...though I did find one later in my cleavage when I went to take a shower. Tee hee.

The night was nice. I figured out how mel does his fake to off body but I can't figure out how he doesn't get slammed in the head all of the time. He doesn't either so I'm going to have to watch him and see. We talked a lot of philosophy and for once I was up for it. That was good. I'm remembering very well the placement of my foot during an off body and that it very good. I had to knee trouble at all all evening. Though I really need to build a new sword in the next few weeks. The handle on my current one is annoying thin and my hand gets very sore from holding it. I have a sword blank I bought at Southern that I really just need to get out and work with. Hoping next friday that will work.

Got home from the Hall and sat down to work on more embroidery. Once I switched over to the red I didn't have the dexterity to use the needle. My hands were too tired. So, I got the afghan out and did two or three rows and then called it a night. Mel was up late finishing up the warping board. Its really nice. Slept way in this am and now slurping on good Tir Ysgithr Coffee and getting set to work on more embroidery while mel find yarn for warping up the big loom. Should be a nice day. Gonna hit ups to send off quite a few packages and also hit grandma's for the afternoon happy hour. Then mel has a horseman thingy and I'm going to catch my friend mike's band at Nimubs...all good. I'm about working on projects this weekend and hitting the bike saturday and sunday mornings. All good. We both were a bit sore this morning to bike but tomorrow is a new day. A day of rest after 5 days of work outs is also a good thing.

So must drink coffee...get food and embroider.

So, yesterday's comic I posted couldn't be more apropos, more on that later. Got off of work yesterday after a crisis was kind of averted. I managed to get the hardware to work but it will require my ladies to re-tap all of the hole in a connector since our vendor seems to either have 1)a worn tap or 2)tapped it from the wrong side making our screws bind up. I'll call them today and discuss with them. But there is a work around, though not to pretty.

I headed out and got my sewing machines picked up at Cathy's and then I headed off to bookmans and picked up Plum Lucky, and 2 JD Robb books I hadn't yet read (the 2 before the book I bought at costco yesterday) and then I trundled off to Joann's to pick out the yarn I needed for my first afghan. Now, you'd think this would be easy...yeah, not so much. I wanted something that represented me and since I'm making it for me I wanted something pretty, and cozy and comfy and snuggly. scribe_ari and I discussed wooleze and that is what I went with but the color choices were hard.
I finally got the following: ( yarn pictures )

Its gonna be pretty...not what mel was thinking for colors I would pick but honestly...the color selection wasn't as broad as I wanted but I'm coping. Its gonna be nice. Though I'm gonna do a little bag first since that will be more transportable but still good and a bit easier but eh. Got home and mel was awesome and had dinner ready. I ate and then worked on my plarn bag. I'm a bit confused about when I need to start decreasing the stitches to start making the bag go "up"...anybody who does circular crochet please ( read here )

Got ready for the hall and had an interesting time dealing with bugs and thinking to much. Not sure how I stop that...its always been my problem and I never know what to do when someone tells me that. My hands and knee and back were all screaming at me which was not helping. My muscle memory doesn't seem to work like everyone else and none of the movements are linked to what they should be...and I don't remember the nomenclature and I get lost pretty easily. I need more drills and outside practice to get through this but I'm very slow at learning. I think the allergy head is not helping. Ended the night with my contact being slidey around my eyeball and then by the time we got home both of my eyes were starting to swell shut. I took some benedryl and put cold packs on my eyes and I think I fell asleep that way cause mel woke me up to tell me to go to sleep. So I rolled over, took the packs off of my eyes and was out some more.

Pretty bleary-eyed this morning. Things are just not happy in the eyeballs...but the swelling is down, especially after I got the gunk out of them. Which I had an ice pack now though. My morning meetings keep expanding and that is annoying...and I have a meeting this afternoon, after I leave that I have to stay for. Sighs. I'll be getting to grandma's late but I will also be asking the above crochet question there too.

I teach tomorrow and will need to get things packed up before I go to bed tonight. Course checking the schedule..I teach both classes tomorrow..oops..rats, will need to pack everything. Course if I'm feeling like I am now, I'm not going to drive by myself up on sunday...course looking at the class list...I think I will stay home. There is nothing that I want to take that I can't ask some one for their handout later..which will be nice. I want a sunday at home with my hubby. Course that means my basket o' doom will be very heavy tomorrow eh. Got a lot to remember too. Course since I don't teach until 11am it might be nice to get there latish. We shall see.

So, time to stop babbling and get on with the engineering. Bleah. I think everyone I'm trying to get a hold of is gone. That sucks.

Well, work was a lot of work. A lot of brain drain and then I got home and worked on research until it was time to go to VH. I had a hard time getting things ready for the hall...couldn't find this, forgot where I put that but we made it on time and then I kept putting things on in the wrong order the normal bubbling me.

Drills were good and it emphaises to me that I need to get a new sword...I need to recut my handles...the current stick isn't great...I'm gripping too hard which causes things to be too tight in areas they shouldn't etc. So, gotta go through the rattan stash and make a new stick. The drills were good as well, I'm starting to get the muscle memory and getting to know when I'm doing things wrong and I know how to fix them.

The next set of drills was fun (well, it started out that way). It starts with a set 3 shot combo and progresses through the line to 4, 5 and then 6. I made it to 5. I had finally started to relax, was breathing good, trying to be fluid and I got to the 5th shot which was an off body. Alessandro and I had been working on my angles to throw that shot for the first time in slow work so I thought I knew what to do. And I did, with my body and my arms but I didn't set my feet correctly and when I went to throw the off body I felt my knee pop...well, actually I thought justin had hit me in the knee and I forgot to put my knees on and then I was on the ground not in a happy place. Got me settled off the sidelines after a bit and justin figuring out that things had just popped due to the angle and I was okay but I'd be sore. I'm thinking I was very tight in the legs from kung fu and then I had relaxed and just did something wrong and the body wasn't happy about that.

This has blown many of my plans for the weekend out...I was gonna ride the next 3 days and see a movie but I'm gonna do research and sleep I think. I'm able to walk but slowly and I can't put too much weight on it but I think that will get better as long I keep stretching it out today. I'm gonna call glenn and see what he says too so all should be good.

Well, I think a nap is in order. Very tired.

What sucked though is that things were clicking into place finally and then I go and hurt myself. Oh, well, I won't forget how to make it better.