Glass Projects

I have found blogging regularly when I'm not travelling has been a bit of a hardship in the last year - I'm either too busy to write, or so quiet there is nothing of interest happening to write about :). But I've been working pretty steadily on a number of glass projects for SCA Arts & Science competitions lately. I hadn't entered any Kingdom level competitions for ages, but luckily the topics recently have lent themselves to glass work. First there was the Rosary project, which I mentioned in my blog a few months ago. The documentation and photos are also up on my website. Then there was a viking jewellery category, and this weekend a competition for board games. Thanks to an SCA friend on Facebook, who drew the Viking Tafl games to my attention, I produced the game pieces pictured below.

I also have some plans for new projects, hopefully to be finished before Festival at Easter. I took the first steps on a major project today. I have planned for some time to work on making face cane for Roman portrait beads. I spent 4 hours today making components, eyes, nose etc and made my first Roman style face. I will post some pictures tomorrow. I'm not happy with the final result, but I can see some areas where I need to do things differently - I have some ideas to try tomorrow, but it's not a bad first effort I suppose. I thought I might blog along the learning curve I'll be undertaking as I attempt to master this new technique.

Canine Update

Life rattles along at a great pace as usual, leaving little time for Blogging. The dogs are changing a lot - Monty basically looks like an adult now, although I do have a few pics of 'Teen' Monty to show as well. The boys are inseparable, Mojo is Monty's little shadow 24/7, when he isn't following Jason around the house. 'Daddy's boy' doesn't begin to cover it. :) I haven't had a lot of time for torching lately, but I did spend quite a bit of time working on some Medieval Rosaries for an SCA Arts & Sciences Competition. It was fairly tedious making so many small round beads, but the research was interesting, and the results looked good. I have my market again this week, and Jason is coming along to learn the ropes, so he can run it for me while I'm away OS next month. My trip is getting closer and closer - time to start some serious planning and to get really excited!! I will be taking my laptop to keep in touch with people, so I will be blogging regularly while I am travelling around the USA.

Contradiction: Time honoured crafts meet cyberspace

The wonderful world of the Internet presents frequent contradictions. As a member of the SCA, a Medieval recreation society, I have long felt it ironic that a very large part of society life unfolds online. Every SCA group seems to have active email lists, forums abound, a wonderful depth of research is available online, and almost any manner of medieval products can be purchased online. The way the Internet has made the world smaller enriches how we play the game on many levels.

I also find it interesting how many people have managed to turn skills in producing handmade items into a self funding hobby, cottage industry or fully fledged career, often largely in part to benefits provided by the Internet. Inexpensive, high quality 'advertising' through websites, an International audience, easy payment methods like Paypal, the opportunity to educate a wide audience, access to high quality materials and supplies... the list goes on.

One of the venues online that caters specifically to handmade crafts is Etsy. I set myself up with an etsy store yesterday, Solar Flare Creations. For the moment, I will h, ave the same items up as I have on my webpage, as there is a ready made, interested audience at Etsy. Its just a trial to begin with. There are all sorts of intricacies about the system I don't know yet - its also a Social Networking site of sorts, with messaging, 'friends' etc, and they have a system of 'Treasuries'. I don't really understand the ins and outs yet, but I do know I was lucky enough to get myself entered into two treasuries on my first day, so apparently that's a good thing. :)

May Crown

ok, here are some photos as promised. I have a couple of hundred photos from this event, but I dont like to posts peoples photos online without permission, so.... (the fighters dont count - they are fairly well hidden under those helmets :) ) So, first to set the scene - a shot of the beautiful site. Politachropolis did a wonderful job of setting up the site - it looked fantastic Then there was a bit of a warmup melee....

And here is a few shots of Jason fighting (he's the one in black).

We couldnt have asked for better weather (I actually got sunburnt!) and it was a great day. Yummy feast that night too.....