A hat, a dance, a fair and lots of snow

Did it again, didn't I? *sigh* Took an unplanned and unintentional blogging-vacation...
So what have I've been up to these past weeks? Honestly, not so much, hence the sparse posting. To begin with, I spent one week searching for a paper note. One week! It was a small note that had the vital information about the hat my brother had chosen and I was going to get for him for his birthday. After I got that note, I've moved and... So in the course of The Great Hunt of the Note I turned appartement, drawers, shelfs, bags and moving boxes inside-out. And no success. In pure desparation I winged it, thinking "How hard can it be?". I knew the brand, had a memory of the charachteristics of the model and guessed the size, and I was right!

Joakim, very out-of-charachter, agreed to model the hat for me and even let me post the pic here! Doesn't he look just like a 30s reporter? Keen for news, pen and paper all ready, glasses and hat in place =)

I was in Stockholm for a weekend, teaching dance at a medieval event. Lots of fun! Met some great people, learned a couple of new dances myself and had the rare oppurtunity to dance to live music in the evening. The musicians were amazing!

A snap-shot from a class.

I came home to a very cold Umeå, before it had been covered in snow, now it was almost buried. I love sitting by the table at noon, looking out at frost and snow. Even the windows becomes pretty! =)
2nd of Advent it was The Christmas fair of Gammlia, always a good fair to get in the mood of Christmas. Extra good this year, with all the snow! (We always get lots of snow, but sometimes it melts just around the beginning of December to come back later with the true cold).


The camera didn't approve of the cold, though, so only these two photos from that day. Look a bit closer at the snow on the trees, it's almost hanging beneth the branches!


All from the winter up here!
Report on the creative side of my life: the darkness and work has left me with little energy for sewing these past weeks. This quiet weekend has rekindled it, though! I've taken a break with the coat, figuring it's not going to be done for Christmas anyway and I need to sew something I can finish quicker, just to feel that I have finished something. What better than a Christmas dress in a lovely red eco double-knit? =)

I hope that you're all having a lovely 3rd of Advent! (Can you belive it's already 3rd of Advent?!)

Love, Erika

Medieval vacation part 2, tents, dresses and a dog

To continue the tale of my adventures in Visby during Medieval week, I give you the second part of the story! The first can be found here.

We stayed in the SCA-camp, which is a strictly medieval camp, no modern tents allowed, no modern stuff visible (like shoppingbags, sleeping bags etc). Of course there are exeptions; like baby strollers, glasses etc, but we try to let everything that is visible be at least medieval inspired.

We lived in a tent made by me (I made a tent, can you believe it?). I sewed the fabric-part myself, and a friend made the wooden frame. Some measurements: at the base it's 4 metres in diameter, the wheel is 2 metres up from the ground, the center pole is 3,5 metre tall. You can see a bit of the table and the curtain we used to conseal our sleeping-bags =)

Our neighbours. Their tent, furniture, carpets, it was just beautiful! I love this picture of Anna, sitting down for some quiet sewing (they had two small children, so there wasn't much sitting down for them =). The children were adorable, though).

A typical part of any SCA-event: court. Who "rules"/wears the crown is a complicated affair involving fighting in heavy armour but also a bit of politic, and I'll refrain from analyzing it here =) One might say it's a mix of role-playing and reality, for the people ruling do a lot of work during the months they rule but at same time it's of course a game. It's suppose to be fun, after all =) If nothing else, court is a great time to admire everyone's garb, as most people like to wear their finest then.

Dancing! I only attended one day, we had a lazy vacation =) It was fun to dance a bit, though! Esp as I, for once, didn't have to lead the dance, but could happily just bounce along to someone else's directions.

In this photo I'm wearing part (the cooler part) of my flemish gown. I left the split overdress (wool interlined with linen) at home. I love this outfit! It's so versitile, I can wear it from -15 to +30. The shift is in white linen, a t-dress. The grey dress is linen as well, the bodice is two-layered for stability, the skirt is pleated. Then there's a partlet on top of the whole thing. The bodice is one of the most difficult pieces of fitting I've ever performed, it only worked because of mom's expert help. See, they didn't use darts at the time. Nor princess-seams. And... ah, well, I think I'll geek-out about the sewing in a separate post later on =)

Ehrm... isn't it pretty? ;)

Mom and Elsa in front of a shop in town. On Gotland they're big on lambs, so of course there's lamb's fur-stuff everywhere in the tourist-district. Note the small lambsfur dog in the displaywindow. Then note Elsa. Sometimes small children mistake her for a lamb... Lol!

Last picture for today: Elsa in the tent. I might have a candy in my hand... =)

In the next post I'll take you on a small tour of the lovely city of Visby, plus share some of my favorites from the market. I had planned for that to be my last report from Visby, but I might make a separate post with just geeky details about sewing and outfits =)

Love, Erika

Medieval vacation, part 1: wedding #1 and a bit more

Friday 6th of August I left the safety of Umeå for the second time this summer. Last time the goal was quality time with the family, this time it was all about two weddings and the medieval week in Visby, Gotland (an island in the middle of Östersjön, it's a part of Sweden, but it'd be hard to find a gotlander admitting that =) )

Now, I have a confession to make: Lindy hop and vintage sewing are not my only hobbies. Before I discovered them, I was a total medieval geek! I still hold lessons in medieval dance once a week in my local SCA-group, but I haven't had time for sewing new garb or going to events (too much lindy hop...). ; ) But this year me and mom wanted a vacation together, and it was ages (5 years) since I was at the medieval week in Visby.
During my stop in Stockholm I had a cup of tea with my brother Joakim. He's leaving for a year in Japan soon, and I'm going to miss him something terrible!

Having arrived in Visby, we spent the evening at Edits place, preparing for the wedding the following day.

Edit had finished the 13 000 (!) pieces puzzle she's been working on a bit on-and-off the past 10 years.

Of course she discovered that there's one piece missing. The company offered to send a new puzzle, but lay the whole thing again just to find the missing piece? Probably not =)

We were a bit nervous, it rained all night and all morning until noon on Saturday, but then the sky miraculously stopped pouring down rain! Malin and Henric were beautiful in their viking clothes. They'd made their outfits themsleves, and everything was handmade. Henric had even made the gorgeous trim on his jacket himself! Impressive!

Between the ceremony and the delicious dinner, we entertained ourselves with viking games. Archery is so much fun! I hadn't held a bow for 5 years, due to the muscle inflammations in my arms, and I had forgotten how much I like shooting. I was quite good also, striked out two peolpe before my arms gave up and my hit-range went from 4 inches in diameter to about 20. But it was fun!

Tug of war, but a version where you don't end up muddy if you loose. Me and Edit went a couple of rounds.

Our battles all ended the same way...

... with me on the ground. But it was fun to try it!

This I was really bad at! It took some physical strength in the arms, and I don't have that. At all. But I like the pictures! =)

This is a good shot of the overdress I made for the wedding. I'm usually more medieval or - even better - renaissance, but now I also have a viking outfit. The buckles and the pearls were borrowed, though. The tricky part with viking dresses is that they're not supposed to have any closings, no buttons, hooks-and-eyes or lace binding. (One can add it, but there's no archeological findings to support such a construction, that I know of). The dress is just a tube, that one wiggles into. I was wary of making a dress my curves could be wiggled into, but that wasn't a tent. It worked though! Partly due to the nice, thin wool that stretched a bit too much on the bias to be a pure wool...

It was a wonderful wedding, everybody cried, the bride and groom were beautiful, and the company the best. A great start on the medieval vacation!

Coming up: the pavillion I've made, more tents, more clothes and a cute dog. So if you liked the temporary medieval theme on this blog: Stay tuned! =)

Love, Erika