(left to right: Katie, my sister Katharine, me, Charlene, and Charlene's mom. Photo courtesy of my mom, taken with Charlene's awesome and gigantic camera)
A renaissance faire is probably one of the best ways to spend a Saturday. Costumes, knights in armour, tons of cool stuff to buy or just look at - sounds like a fun day to me.
My mom, sister and I just got back from a day at the New Hampshire Renaissance Faire in Kingston, NH. It's 3+ hours away, and with stops for coffee and other necessities, the drive took about 4 hours. Seriously, what is it with Vermont not having ren faires? We've always had to drive fairly big distances to get our fix. Though the roadtrip part of the day can be really fun, and there are much worse places to drive through than New England. We had walkie-talkies, too, which made things fun. As is tradition with our ren faire trips, we stopped for breakfast at McDonald's on our way out. This tends to get us a lot of stares and other strange looks (which makes me think "Yeah, you wish you were this awesome."). Geeks have more fun.
As you can see above, we had costumes. Katie had made hers for the last faire we went to, in 2008. Katharine used parts of a Shakespearean outfit she had made as a school project, and she borrowed the bodice from me. Charlene and her mom got their lovely dresses off ebay.
For me one of the most fun parts of a ren faire is making the costumes, so in the 5 or 6 days between getting home from school and going to the faire I made the bodice and blouse above (the plan had been to make a green overskirt but I ran out of time and used the tartan instead - which I really really like, so I'm glad I did that). While I was making this outfit, I had in mind an old Scottish ballad called 'Tam Lin', in particular this part:
Janet tied her kirtle green
A bit above her knee
And she's gone to Carter Hall
As fast as go can she.
She'd not pulled a double rose
A rose, but only two
When up then came young Tam Lin
Says, 'Lady, pull no more.'
The bodice is from fabric I had bought to make the black skirt last year. I think I'm going to buy more grommets to put in the front, though, to give it a tighter fit. The green blouse was actually a huge old curtain that my mom let me cut up. And then the tartan is just a big piece of wool plaid that I found in part of what we call "mom's store" - a collection of fabric and other crafty supplies that my grandmother left to us. The wool had a tag on it from the 1950's, and it both looks and feels lovely. Thank you, Mom! I attached the tartan with a Celtic pin I bought at a little store in Chester, VT last summer, and to go along with the ballad, I carried a rose around with me.
Anyways, enough about costumes. Compared to the faire we'd previously gone to (the Northern Catskill Mountains ren faire in Cairo, NY.), this faire was a pretty good size, though I know compared to most others across the country it's still pretty small. A nice size for a wandering around and hanging out without getting lost. What made it really nice in comparison to the Cairo faire was how it was in the midst of the woods - my mom and I even found a trail and went for a nice walk in the woods. When we got to Kingston we went deep into the woods to find the faire. They had it set up in two general locations with a short trail in between. Much of the main area was filled with vendors selling all the beautiful things that are usually found at ren faires, while at the other end of the trail, a historical reenactment group called Neville and Company had set up their camp. This group is amazing - we saw a duel that two of the guys did, and they told everyone at the beginning that the fights they do are not choreographed. It's the real thing. These men in full suits of 15th-century armour really are fighting, not pretending, and yes, there are injuries from time to time.
The knights of Neville and Company, before their duel.
Other small episodes that took place that day...
A familiar ren faire attendee was there that day, a fellow called Rufus who we've seen before at the faire in Cairo. There he's always appeared as a mud wrestler, but in NH that day he was a jester. Man of many talents, he is. He stopped me and Charlene as we were walking through the faire.
Rufus: Oh look, someone got you a rose.
Me: Actually, I bought it for myself...[it was a fake rose, too]
Rufus: (very serious face) That's sad.
Me: Yeah, it is. You know, you could buy me a rose...
Rufus: (looks in his satchel, pulls out a short rose stem with one or two withered leaves on it) There you go. It used to have a flower on it too, but I ate it.
Me: Aw, thank you Rufus.
That is Rufus, playing the two recorders with his nose.
We also struck up a conversation with a guy who was carrying a bodhran around on his back. He's in a band called the Granite Men that does gigs throughout mostly Massachusetts and New Hampshire, and sometimes in Vermont.
All in all, a wonderful day. We all came back with fun stuff - I found a booth that had a rack of woven trims, some with beautiful Celtic designs (which I haven't seen on trim anywhere else), so I bought a yard of black and green Celtic knotwork trim to sew onto the collar and cuffs of my shirt. Charlene got chain mail earrings for the three of us girls, because they're awesome. And Katharine bought her first sword, a claymore, which she is very proud of.
I can't wait til our next faire, whether it ends up being later this summer, or a year from now.
