Cable Beanie

Eureka! I have found the perfect yarn for my cabled beanie. Jennifer and I went to the yarn store after lunch yesterday to play with some of their yarns in an attempt to locate that elusive gauge. And we found it when this lovely alpaca blend jumped at me. Okay it was more like we had determined the other yarns wouldn't work and tried the next step up.

I was so impatient to begin that I've already started. My poor bearskin has been put on the back burner. Hopefully I finish the hat so I can get the bearskin done in time to enter the Brothers Grimm contest.

Traditional Crafting

So I've found yet another craft I wish to learn. It's called luceting. What you do is use this nifty little device called a lucet and some yarn of your desired weight to do this little braiding technique. The end result is a cord. I saw this lady using one at the rendezvous and did a wee bit of research on it. It's actually not hard!

I came across people on the internet using their fingers or modifying a plastic fork to create the lucet. So crafty! Me, I'm going to make my own (or perhaps convince Daniel to make me one). It seems easier to use a cord than to make ribbon for my costumes.

I also decided today to compile of list of traditional crafts and figure out which ones I would like to learn or have already tried and passed over.

• Knitting
• Crochet
• Tatting
• Irish lace
• Luceting
• Spinning
• Braiding
• Weaving
• Sewing
• Embroidery

Feel free to add some crafts to my list.

Old NorthWest Territory Primitive Rendezvous 2012

The End of the Line

My vacation all started on Thursday, July 6th with me attempting to secure my duffel bag to Saoirse' back. For those of you with motorcycles I wouldn't recommend  bungees! That duffel listed to the side and about 80 miles into the trip I had to pull over onto the side of 71 to straighten it. Standing beside semis going 80 MPH is a bit nerve recking. I also had my camera bag slung on my back and thanks to the size of the duffel I couldn't sit up straight. I had to lean forward the whole 2hr and 45min ride it took to get to the Rendezvous.

Once there however, I had a blast. The weather wasn't cooperating, what with it being 102 degrees on Sunday. Still we JEWETTs are a tough lot and pushed through to a much cooler Monday. Uncle Ken took it the hardest. I guess the heat can cause ones sugar to rise and it definitely sapped his energy. Then it gave me a wicked migraine and I took a 2hr nap. Uncle Greg, Philip and Kyle seemed perfectly fine if very sweaty!

We were given a reprieve from the heat thanks to Ram Rod. Everyday he made a batch of ice cream. My favorite was Maple and Honey. Yummy! Once we arrived at his camp he'd start mixing everything and allow us to crank. Turns out it's not so hard to make ones own ice cream and it surpasses what one could get at a store or shop. Not to mention healthier!



Cicada

We had many visitor throughout the day, everyday. Even though we were 'the end of the line'. Including this little tom. The uncles chased him off but I found time to give him a good scratch under the chin when I ran into him by Cactus' camp. The Colonel's camp also had many visitors of the flying verity. Mosquitoes, horse flies, dragon flies, cicadas and a gorgeous hawk who had her nest near by.


I learned many things while there. 1stly I'm a decent shot with a riffle and muzzle loaders are kind of fun to shoot. I got my tan shirt dirty thanks to the black powder though I hit a bulls eye for the trouble. 2ndly I should practice more with the hawk and knife. Also, don't shoot with someone elses bow. You always get better scores when you use your own. However, my recurves can't be used at rendezvous for some reason. I can only use a long bow so I'm going to see about trading one of my recurves for a long bow. I already mentioned the ice cream:  so lastly I found out I'm pretty. It seemed like everyone had fun teasing me about it. Perfect strangers flirted. It didn't mater if they were married or single or dating. If a lady's feeling self conscience or unattractive and they enjoy reenacting history they should totally go to one of these events. ;3

Not me best side but hay I'm shooting a muzzle loader!

There was a marquee tent and awning for sale or trade. I believe it was $1200, but I could be wrong ... it could be more. Either way I'm thinking of investing for future years if I continue to reenact.  It would prove so much easier to dress, bathe ... and well that's just about it. It does have a divider so I could potentially use if for multiple people and maintain a modicum of privacy.




Thanks to my revealing chemise I managed to get a nice tan. Its really cleared up my acne, which is bloody awesome. However, in return I may have gotten Prickly Heat a.k.a Miliaria (creepy). That last bit might not be reliable. Anyway, Sunday after having awaken from my heat exhaustion induced nap I noticed little bumps running up and down the inside of my fore arms. Uncle Ken had me visit the camp 'Dr' for a cure or at the least find out what it is. Apparently it could be a number of things:  allergic reaction, poison ivy, or heat rash. So to cover some bases he got me some Benadryl and Poison Ivy cream. Neither worked! Though by the next day everyone in camp knew what was wrong and asked 'How's your rash?'. Camp gossip, I swear!

The boys got to chop fire wood with their wee tomahawks! Poor things!

Philip's 'surprise' attack!

Such a cutie! I loved photographing the wee ones!

Paige showing off for the camera or my uncle ... not sure which!

Of the junior and sub junior contestants these two sisters won their own muzzle loaders! Go them!

All the wee ones 18 and under!

I went to urgent care when I got home ... after a nice, long, cool, shower and a short visit to Daniel at work (not in that order). Dr Tsai was a wee bit puzzled. Poor man. Doesn't look like poison ivy, never mentioned prickly heat, but settled on a contact reaction (even though by this point it had spread to other locations, the back of my ear and neck to be brief.). So I was given a cure all (Prednisone) and told to visit my family Dr if it persists. I just wont tell him he's cheaper!

PC Failure and Other Disasters

So Friday there was a wicked storm that came through. If not for a coworker my poor little Saoirse would have been laying on her side. As it was we moved her right up to the building so that she was blocked from the wind that so wanted to damage her. Sadly I had to leave her here at work until Saturday after noon.

The storm itself was fun! The power failed at around 4:45pm and so the customers and staff ended up sheltering in the building, complete dark, and playing cat games with the little children. :3

Of course I had to leave my bike at work and the next day walk 2 hours, in 88 degree weather, toting a messenger bag and several books to go pick it up. Not a fun walk and lucky me our security was just locking up so I was able to retrieve my helmet and thus ride home in stead of walking back.

Then Sunday disasters strikes again. I woke up early (8am-ish), made myself some hot tea and set to work finishing up my clients logo. About 2pm it was done in 5 different styles and saving on my thumb drive to take and show her Monday. Well ... freeze. Okay so I walk away and give 'er time to think. When I come back ... Boot disk fail! O.o Deep breaths! Right?! I restart ... same message. I shut her down, pray the files saved and go read a book before I pick up the tower and throw 'er out the second story window. Monday I show my client the designs and they didn't save correctly. All funky colors. I get upset but she's like it's all right I won't need them for a few weeks yet. (She knows I'm going on vacation come tomorrow) I pray my second HD is untouched. Then later on Daniel calls and says my pc is fucked ... an over sized paper weight! T.T I had a break down. It wasn't pretty!

However, when I got home and played around we realized that, no, she isn't dead but having problems. All my files and programs are there and looking proper but my machine just doesn't want to operate. So I'm going to go in and play with my settings, perhaps over clock it and see were that puts us. In the mean time I'm going to enjoy my experience in the Old Northwest Primitive Rendezvous with my family for a whole week. When I get back then I'll drag my secondary HD to my mothers, install Illustrator and fix the logo to give to my client. That's the plan. Please pray mother nature doesn't decide to add more catastrophic to my life!