Tent Roof

 Greetings

I have been doing more decorations on my tent roof.

I have previously painted the dagging and have now completed the arcading and decoration of the spoke holes and storm-guy spacer.

Here are some pictures of the arcading. I will post pictures of how it looks with the tent up after the next event.

I chose blue for the arcading, as the tent came with a blue finial knob.t

Until next time

Adieu

Mitre Tent Flag

 Greetings

I have been spending some time enhancing and decorating my tent.

This is the flag I painted for the finial. It shows the bishop's red mitre badge.

Until next time

Adieu

Chalke Valley Festival

 Greetings

A few weeks ago I went to my first post-lockdown re-enactment.

Teddy volunteered to cover my visits to my father and I made sure that I had done a quick covid test( which came out negative)

I packed the car on Friday morning and drove down to the site (Just beyond Salisbury) after lunch.

The event had moved since the last time I had been and was a lot easier to get to.

Once I got there, however, I had to follow the magical mystery tour getting on site and wait until they could form a convoy led by a guide ( who should really have been issued with a red flag).

We then had to empty our cars and form another convoy to the car park, so I had no opportunity to leave modern packing boxes, golf bags etc in the car and, as the carpark was some distance away, it was not practical to take them there after set up.

Consequently, I had after the tent set up so all these extra bits were concealed.

I had come up with a quicker way to rig the yellow curtains  by threading and fixing them on to a rope that could then be hung from the cartwheel and tent sides using 'S' hooks. This worked very well.

I then threaded the rings of the purple curtains directly onto the cartwheel spokes.

Here is a picture of the campsite with all my flags flying, which I took on Sunday morning.

Saturday started out looking like perfect re-enactment weather, as it was sunny , but cloudy.

Unfortunately, it soon became clear that it was quite hot and very humid.

Luckily, the organisers had not arranged for any battles or tourneys and, despite the fact we had had to put only a modest fight area to the rear of our encampment ( and this was on quite a slope) , we each spent some time there training in jacks, helms and gauntlets.

I then did an Arming of the Knight in the afternoon ( with young Rupert squiring) and did a circuit of the site in full plate. It was hot and humid enough for me to be quite glad to disarm once I got back.

Here are some more pictures of the encampment,

I set up my awning next to my tent and sang mass under it on Sunday morning.

There was minor fly in the ointment when we were told that one group had all gone to the beer tent and come back to find their tents had been ransacked and stuff stolen ( despite site security).

Luckily, we had had people in camp that night , but we arranged camp guards from then on.

We had a moderate number of punters, but,as in previous years, they were mostly good quality punters.

Most could recognise a bishop and several translated the Latin motto on my standard.

Sunday was wet- occasionally very wet.

We were initially told we might be allowed to pack up and go early, but this didn't happen and we had to form up a convoy in the carpark at 6.30.

I had closed the tent after lunch and began to pack down, which speeded things up- a little.

I then had a horrendous drive home through downpours which sometime reduced visibility to fog conditions and got home about 10.00.

But-taking one thing with another- it was generally quite a good show and I''m glad I went-. It certainly proved that me going and Teddy covering works.

Until next time

Adieu

New Calligraphy Commission

 Greetings

I have just completed a new calligraphy commission.

The brief was for the quotation and a border with lots of weapons and a small Hawkwood shield.

It turned out a bit more colourful than previous ones and I used acrylic gold for the background, as that much leaf would have pushed the price up quite a lot...

Until next time

Adieu

Jedi

 Greetings

Here is a drawing of two cute Jedi boys from my sketchbook

Until next time

Adieu

Sanctuary Screen

 Greetings

A  few years ago, for various reasons, my husband stopped coming to re-enactments with me.

Consequently, I bought a smaller tent and soon found that a camp bed took up rather a lot of it.

My husband said he'd look into the problem.

My next birthday gift was a Boer War officer's bed. This is canvas stretched on a concertinaing wooden frame, which meant I could fold the bed up during the day to increase space in the tent.

Unfortunately, the canvas was not in good shape and soon began to show signs of strain where it was attached to the frame. I spent some time ( and some experimenting ) fixing this and it it is now serving me well.

A biproduct of this was a long piece of canvas with eyelets all round it, but with raw edges where a failed  wire strengthener had been removed.

I decided I would find a use for it.

When I closed the front of the tent( as I sometimes have to do during an event) It is sometimes a bit of a faff to have to fully lace it closed. I therefore decided to rig a privacy screen that could be rolled up and suspended on the inside of the door.

I cut off the eyelets on the two long sides of the canvas and bound all the edges with twill tape.

Then I added two ring eyes to the end of a piece of dowel and bound it to the base as a weight and to aid in rolling it up.

I, of course ,decorated it appropriately.

When rolled it looks like this(the strings are for attaching it to the cartwheel spokes of the tent)

When unrolled it will look like this from outside the tent.

Hopefully, the Latin script I have painted will be visible through the inverted V of the tent door.

It translates as ' Now you don't see it.'

Until next time 

Adieu

 

Mage

 Greetings

Here is a rough sketch of a painting idea from my sketch book.

This may well become a painting at some point.

Until next time

Adieu

Raising the standard

 Greetings

The first flag I painted up for my reenactment character, the bishop, was not his banner ( his personal flag) but his standard.

This is the flag that his soldiers follow and rally to. 

Hence, it would be 'trooped' before his soldiers, so that they would all know what it looked like.

The banner has the bishop's arms on it; his standard has his badges and livery colours.

The bishop's bages are the devil climbing a hill holding a pearl ( a cant- or heraldic joke- on de Velmont... devel mont, or the devil climbs)  and the red mitre

His livery colours are black and white- so his soldiers would wear surcoats black on the right and white on the left with a red mitre on the left shoulder. His officers would wear  the demon and hill badge instead of the mitre.

When I painted the flag, I was concerned that the devil badge would not stand out if I used the black livery colour as well as the white, so I edged the banner in black instead.

It looked like this

The bishop has an Italian see and was made a knight by the pope, so has the insignia of the papal states in the hoist-rather than the cross of St George(for England)

The motto is the more acceptable of the de Velmont Mottos - their warcry "seize the prize".

(Their other motto is " Habemus Fortuna Diaboli", which translates as "We have the luck of the Devil" )

I have posted previously about painting the dagging on my tent roof. I alternated the dags black with a white mitre and white with a red mitre- Thus I have added a white mitre on black to the bishop's badges.

I have recently been to my first post-lockdown re-enactement( which I will post about later) and decided that I would update the banner.

It now looks like this.

I think it is greatly improved and I also replaced the support strings with a better crosspole support

As you can see, my fears for the devil not  being visible were unfounded.

I plan to reveal it a the next reenactement at Hever Castle in August.

Until next time

Adieu

Jack In The Green

 Greetings

Here is a drawing of a ballet dancer from my sketch book 

The image I used for this was only a few centimetres tall.

Until next time

Adieu