by Krista | Jun 14, 2017 | Winter
Our little house is quiet and still tonight after days of rain and wind. Bear and I had a big day working with our animals, weeding the carrot patch, and tackling a pile of work projects, and it was lovely to finish everything tonight and have corn chowder and grilled cheese sandwiches and just rest a while.
We’re still unpacking from a wonderful medieval event over the weekend. Wood smoke has permeated all my clothing, and it makes me smile to catch whiffs of it as I sort through boxes and baskets of cloaks, medieval garb, and linens.
It’s always so good to get away to these events, to get our medieval tents set up, make our beds with linen sheets and wool blankets, and light a fire in the campfire Bear modeled after one in the Bayeux Tapestry.
The fire is the heart of our medieval life. It’s where we gather before the sun is up to heat water for coffee, waiting to wrap cold fingers around a steaming hot brew.
It’s where we stand at every meal to fry up sausages and potatoes, flip pancakes, or simmer big pots of homemade soup, curry, or stew.
It’s where I boil more water to brew my medieval medicines and heat up whole milk to show people how to make cheese.
And it’s where we linger at night, huddled close in our woolen cloaks, clutching drinking horns or cups filled with mead, wine, beer, or homemade liqueurs, talking for hours with dear friends.
It’s those connections I treasure most, listening to outrageous stories, sharing heartaches and happinesses, looking around at beloved faces glowing in the firelight. Sometimes I stand back in the darkness and just watch, smiling at the cozy warmth of the scene, fixing it in my mind for those days that need a bit of warmth and light in them. I feel so lucky to be part of this crazy tribe, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. xo
by Krista | Apr 14, 2017 | Autumn
It’s cloudy and quiet this Friday morning, and things feel peaceful after much hustle and bustle the past few days.
We had toast and eggs for breaky, fleshed out our Master Packing List for medieval events, fed the pigs, let out the goats, and now we’re sitting and writing as we sip our hot drinks, chocolate for me, coffee for him.
I can hear the goats snuffling outside as they tuck into the grass we’ve let grow unhindered for several weeks. The dogs are sleeping after a rowdy night barking at whatever the neighbours dogs were barking at, and the geese, turkeys, and chooks are foraging in the undergrowth for bugs and worms.
Prepping for medieval events is always a bit madcap. Bear and I store 95% of the gear at our place, and weeks are spent hauling everything out for airing and organization before starting on mending and waterproofing tents, fixing damaged tent poles and wonky tent pegs, redoing frayed ropes, washing linens, sorting through all the kitchen equipment to make sure we have enough dishes, cutlery, cooking, and cleaning supplies, chopping and stacking firewood, prepping food, and making sure all our personal gear, armour, and demonstrations are in order.
It’s a lot of work, like setting up an entirely new household for 9 people, but honestly, we love it. Yes, we get tired, and in the beginning it’s all rather overwhelming, but when the lists are written, the plans made, and everyone has their own projects to tackle, it’s quite exciting.
This week Bear made new tent poles while I sewed a 10 metre by 8 metre floor for our Bedouin tent and mended the front doorway. Together we’re making new chairs, painting and staining, sewing, polishing, sharpening, and fixing.
The weather has been perfect for such work, sunny with cool breezes, and we’re so thankful for the gardens that keep us supplied with beans, asparagus, eggplants, chilies, and herbs so we can easily throw together meals in between projects.
Today we’re organizing all our gear according to the three tents we bring: a Bedouin tent for sleeping quarters, a tall Bedouin tent where we gather for meals and do all our cooking prep, and a Marquee where Bear and I have our sleeping quarters and display of 12th century bedding and Bear’s Ducal accoutrements.
If you arrived at our farm today, you’d find the ground covered with stacks of tent poles, piles of ropes, mounds of pegs, tottering piles of fabric, rugs, and tentage, wooden boxes galore, and more tables and chairs than you can imagine. It’s a wild medieval hodgepodge, but I love seeing it all together as I tick things off my list and feel more prepared and organized with each tick.
Soon we’ll start putting things on the trailer, getting a head start on packing, but first some quiet time with my hot chocolate, then a meander through my gardens to harvest a few things to go with the beef I put in the crockpot for dinner.
Wishing you all a fabulous Easter weekend. xo
by Krista | Jul 21, 2016 | Winter
My favorite time of day at medieval camps is early morning, especially at Abbey Medieval Festival. The sun casting shadows through the towering trees is sheer magic and never fails to stop me in my tracks and make me so happy to be alive to see such things.
I like getting up before everyone and brewing coffee, trying, yet never succeeding, to be quiet enough in our kitchen tent to keep from waking our friend Sue. Soon she’s up too, cute as a button in her elfin hat, spooning in mounds of freshly ground coffee, getting our cups ready “just so” – decaf for Bear, black for Sue and Vincent, white and one sugar for me – keeping water warm for Adam when he wakes up.
Soon enough the fire is blazing, water boiling, the blissful scent of wood smoke wafting through camp.
It is an exquisite way to start the day.
This year I did three demonstrations: medieval folk medicine, medieval Bedouin food, and medieval cheese-making.
Although I’ve made cheese at home plenty of times, I hadn’t done it over a fire yet, so made sure to practice before the crowds arrived to make sure I had the process down pat.
I hung thick yogurt to drain in cheesecloth and set milk on to heat for a simple fresh cheese just as the sun slipped through the tree branches and turned my cheese-making into a veritable fairyland of light and shadow.
I stirred the milk as it steamed into roiling billows of light, watching for telltale bubbles around the edges before drizzling in homemade cider vinegar, then a bit more. Then the magic happened. Whey separated from curds and I poured it into a cheesecloth-lined basket, letting it drain until nothing but lovely, creamy cheese was left.
I gleefully danced through the smoky sunbeams to Bear – “I made cheese!!!” He laughed and we cheered and I tasted and all was well.
While I’d been making cheese, Sue had made breakfast and we happily noshed on toast and eggs and sausages, topping up our coffees to warm our bones.
After washing up I went for a wander, delighting in the play of light and campfire smoke around the tents of our friends.
Sunlight streamed through the market stall of the Templars where our friend Farina would soon be selling her fragrant packets of spices and ripe oranges for mulled wine.
Sunbeams shimmered through the Viking loom near the camp where my friends Paula and Nikolaj were making breakfast. Paula is an amazing weaver, making gorgeous linen out of the finest of threads.
I love the Viking encampment with its forest atmosphere and the welcoming faces and hugs of so many good friends. I wandered from camp to camp, getting in quick talks between building of fires and stirring of pots as everyone got ready for the first day of Abbey.
With promises of pending visits to make me smile, I headed back to camp.
xo
by Krista | May 3, 2016 | Autumn
Sometimes the best laid and dearly loved plans run thoroughly and utterly amok.
This past weekend for example. Bear and I had been working hard for months getting ready for a medieval reenactor’s weekend with swarms of our best loved medieval friends. We were looking forward to it so much. Even when my left hand swelled up black and blue after being kicked repeatedly by a feisty lamb, and my right hand swelled up after being pierced by a stray wire that jammed in there, and Robbie cut open both shins when he ran into a rogue piece of iron, and I pulled a muscle in my foot – we were still so excited and hobbled along and got all packed up and arrived in time to get mostly set up before dark.
All was well…until the rain started falling…and falling…and falling. And bit by bit the dirt turned to mud and the tent pegs popped out and in the middle of the night, after a particularly thunderous torrent, the tent fell down on top of our friends, braining them with tent poles and dousing them with water. We woke to their cries of alarm and stumbled out of our tent to find sheer mayhem. Everything was down, drenched, and streaked in mud. Humph. We stood there in the rain wondering what to do and realized…nothing. Our friends took refuge in their van, we spent a sleepless night wondering how to get the camp back together before acknowledging, nope, we simply couldn’t. The sodden ground wouldn’t hold the pegs and the pegs wouldn’t hold the tents and with another storm on the way we knew we’d just have to pack up and head home.
So we did. And it was sad and disappointing and frustrating, but it was the right call. For the rains returned and didn’t let up until Monday. We would’ve been stuck in sodden misery.
Thankfully we had some lovely moments before we left. Starting with sunrise.
Even after a soggy, sleepless night, the sun rising through the trees, shimmering through wood smoke, glistening on the dewy grass, well, it can’t help but lift your spirits.
And when you get to take a break from folding waterlogged tents, tarps, ropes, rugs, blankets, clothing, etc and sit down at a table with good friends and have homemade medieval fruit cake slathered with butter, the world feels rather wonderful.
And when you add a cup of coffee and some good stories and hearty laughs and commiserations from friends stopping by to moan and groan with us and give us big, squishy hugs, all the rumpled feelings and stresses untangled themselves and we made peace with our mayhem.
We were sad to leave, but thankful for the few hugs and visits we were able to squeeze in before we left, for one meal cooked over the fire – is there anything better than hot stew on a rainy night? – and for the chance to figure out how to make our camp storm/flood proof for next time.
Bear and I have learned that when disappointment hits, the best thing is to feel sad then replace it with something good. So we did. And I’ll tell you all about that next time. xo
by Krista | Apr 26, 2016 | Autumn
It was a jolly and exhausting weekend with our good friends, Sue and Vincent, as we worked hard and played hard in preparation for our first medieval event of the season.
There was new garb to model with whoops and catcalls from cheeky onlookers, menus to plan, and a new tent to set up in the face of fearsome winds that threatened to send Sue and I sailing off over the trees like Mary Poppins as we clung for dear life to tottering tent poles.
We sorted and packed, unpacked and planned, debated and decided, filled out paperwork, and finally collapsed in relieved, happy exhaustion, ready for some ginger wine and fire-roasted dinner as the sun set through the trees.
I lit a fire in our cute little pot-bellied stove and put sausages on to cook. They are the Hungarian sausages I told you about last time, flavored richly with garlic and paprika, salt and black pepper, and they were absolutely beautiful charred and smoky from the campfire.
Sue brought corn on the cob and first we cooked it in the husks, then set it right over the fire to get a wee bit charred. Pure bliss smeared with butter and dusted with salt.
We toasted Turkish bread and poured more wine and finally collapsed into our chairs in the last rays of the setting sun.
With a chink of wine glasses and hearty toasts we dug into our feast and rested our weary bones.
We visited amiably as the sun disappeared and the winds died down, sipped our wine, laughed at funny stories and thought how there aren’t many things better than good food with good friends on a gorgeous night in the country.
This week we’re back to bustling, working hard to finish last minute projects and arrange caretakers for the farm while we’re gone. Bear finished our 12th century bed, I completed my Bedouin garb save for the silk ribbon trim that just arrived in the mail this morning from England. We made linen sheets and pillowcases and hauled medieval gear in to get packed away in wooden boxes for the trip. Today I’m at last starting a medieval quilt for our bed. It’s a lot of work but so much fun. We’re both excited to get to camp and have a good ol’ visit with our friends.
What are you looking forward to this week? xo
