Travelling Time and Space

Done, done, done !

Tomorrow is Coronation (well, the events starts today but I'll only be daytripping tomorrow) and all scrolls are accounted for. Yay scribes! I even have a few nice AoAs extra, just in case, thanks to Iain. Now all that is left to do is take care of the Laurel food (baby laurels get to feed the others at their first official meeting) and get everything I need to bring into the car.

My biggest worry were the county scrolls for the outgoing crown. Mistress Hyrrokin had painted the illumination on two sheets of her awesome handmade paper and I was a tad ...apprehensive about putting pen to paper. What if I messed up ? That wouldn't be funny at all ... worse even, the little bits of paper for me to play with she'd sent along did nothing to put my mind at ease. The ink spiered some, not much but just enough to make the letters look blurry and messy ... ugh. God (and Finneadan for the hint) be thanked, some fixative took care of that issue. It's not looking too shabby, even if gothic quadrata is not my 'thang' - I tend toward secretary hands and have been playing too much with the predecessor of the German Fraktura lately ... oy :o)

Next question is what to wear ? Temperatures are expected to be in the low 80s during the day so I'm thinking probably the new blue and green linen German Renaissance dress I made. Simple and cute with the slashed design in the applique guards on the skirt but light and comfy. I'll be doing much running around between all my meetings so this sounds about as practical as it gets.

Sunday I'll have to put finishing touches on the scribal display I created for the demos since Cara will be picking it up on Monday for the UNF Worldfest later next week. Sheesh, and here I was hoping for some quiet time ...

No rest for the wicked. 

Next Friday, 4th of April, you know, I will not be available to anybody in the evening :o)

That night is devoted to the Return of Battlestar Galactica and nothing short of death can stop me !

Jus' thought I'd mention that :o) 

Today, Finndragon came home from school with a ducky basket filled with colorful candy-filled Easter eggs and can't wait until Sunday for more of the nifty treats. It's true - Spring and Easter Holidays are only a few more days away and again I'm stunned how time manages to pass by so quickly. What happened to all those weeks between now and Christmas, eh ? 's very very strange indeed ...

Speaking of Easter, I got my own little Easter treat and just a moment ago I received confirmation that it had been shipped (Phew!). Since our last trip to New York and its phenomenal bookstore "The Strand" the facsimile of the Book of Hours of Stephan Lochner has been on my mind. Truth be told, I wanted it so bad I could taste it :o) Monday I decided that it would make the perfect kind of Easter egg for my basket and placed my order. Now, the Strand is a used bookstore and if you've ever been to Chamblin's here in Jax you can somewhat relate to the order of such an astonishing wonderful heavenly place as a gigantic used bookstore. It also usually means that their inventory might not be 100% German standard uptodate. I was a little nervous that they would not be able to confirm my order but yay, the Easter Bunny appears to have been rooting for me :o) I can't wait to get it in the mail !

Back to the Scriptorium - I've got a few scrolls to take care of:o) 

This past weekend we went on a family trip :o)

After a nifty and very tasty Japanese-Korean-Chinese dinner with friends on Friday we headed south for Plant City to visit Dinosaur World and to spend the rest of the weekend with Finn's Uncle No 1. We all had a blast :o) Dinosaur World is the Valhalla of Preschoolers : picnic amidst dinosaur dioramas, fossil digging with friends and a boneyard with a life-sized Stegosaurus skeleton to dug out from underneath the sand with little shovels and brushes. What more could you possibly ask for ?  

Finndragon was utterly mesmerized by the boneyard and we spend most of our time at the park there watching him unearth bones and spine plates. It was quite stunning to see him so focussed and serious at work, carefully brushing and chipping and digging until he found yet another piece. We got him a dinosaur play set (yes, another one) and a dig-it dinosaur had plaster cast which he has been working on for the past two days. After making a nice plaster dust mess he finally dug out all pieces to the skull and we glued them together so he can now proudly display his own T-Rex skull :o) Funny that he is more interested in the dirty work of a paleontologist than the muscles and the roar of a dinosaur...

Saturday evening and most of Sunday was spent at BIL's place with more Chinese food, lots of talking and catching up and playing with Finn before we tackled the drive home again. Now it's back to the Scriptorium for me and I'm eagerly awaiting instructions for Royal Court at Coronation next week.

PS: For those who;re curious, my Belbello Angel got a perfect score 25/25pts at Gulf Wars :o) So did Bres' illumination - way to go ! 

Today started with the discovery of a life opossum marching through our backyard, obviously happily oblivious (or trying very hard to ignore our existence) of our happy and excited squeals from the upstairs window. Finndragon thought it was the coolest and I had to agree since we don't get to see an Opossum everyday (add to my excitement the fact that I grew up in a country where Opossums just didn't walk through your backyard unless they'd escaped from a nearby zoo; Florida wildlife in our yard amazes me every time. Mention the magic word "racoon' to me some day :o)].

At first sight Opossums look like an incredibly mangy ugly cat. Then your brain realizes that there's something else really weird about that 'cat' and that's when you notice the oddly elongated pink snout and the cable-like tail. It's fat and rat-like, but not quite. Odd creature, I tell you. It vanished under the house in the 1800 sqft crawlspace and is surly driving our downstairs neighbour insane by now making funny noises. Heh :o)

After work and school Finndragon and I headed out to find a birthday present for a friend and ended the day with our weekly trip to the library to stock up on good-night story books for Finndragon and some medieval music for me. It'll keep me entertained during the painting sessions this week :o) Last night I finished special scroll assignment no 1. Now it's on to special assignment no 2 and once I'm done with that both outgoing and incoming Crown should be back in the kingdom to ask about scroll requests for Coronation at the end of this month. No rest for the wicked, baby :o)

Got the business cards for my hospitaller duties in the mail today and they are nice! Found a deputy in my email inbox which is even nicer and tomorrow is the first of many new members meetings followed by our regular Shire meeting and I'm having way too much fun with that :o) Even the whole demo coordinator schtick isn't all that bad although I still wish for somebody to step up and be deputy for this responsibility. I'll keep my fingers crossed. Maybe that'll help.   

To all those traveling to Gulf Wars Godspeed !

May you all have the greatest time and return to home and loved
ones safe and sound and with plenty of heroic tales to brighten the
bardic circles at Coronation ! 

The scrolls for Gulf Wars are all ready and packed to go waiting for me to deliver them to the Jinxes wh have graciously offered to take them along for the ride so I don't have to worry about the postal system :o)

Coronation is next !

Last night I managed to finish the linedrawing and inking for one of the special pieces for Coronation and I can feel the paint spirit stirring. Yay :o)

Tonight is Shire business meeting; who'd have thought I'd have to attend those business meetings regularly again so quickly ? I do have nifty new member packages though, business cards are in the making and I'm having too much fun with this. God help me ! 

So the plague is going strong in the Gibbons household holding Finndragon and me firmly in its clutches. As long as I'm keeping myself busy, however, I don't have time to wallow in the feeling of clogged sinusses alternating, resulting headaches and a loss of taste made all the more fun with the occasional coughing fit and after delivering a few items for Gulf Wars to the wonderful household of the Jinxes who had graciously offered to take the delivery with them I joined Milica for a girl-trip to Chamblin's Bookmine.

Now if you ever get to Jacksonville, FL, love books and have some spare time on your hands you've got to swing by at Chamblin's. It's the Mekka of booklovers. The place is huge and just when you think you must have reached the last shelf in the last row another aisle of bookshelves reaching to the ceiling opens up in front of you. I'm pretty sure they have long passed the 1 Million books in store mark, and they are in the process of opening a downtown store as well, a mere 5 blocks from my home. Eeep ! *L*

Milica and I traded in a few books for store credit and then dove into the history section first and branching out from there. After finding a book about the New York Times for hubby and a book on dinosaurs for Finndragon I scored a family book on boardgames with game pieces for the three of us (and anybody else who wants to play) and two more books for myself :

Venus and Mars: The World of the Medieval Housebook

and the very entertaining

"Medieval Home Companion: Housekeeping in the 14th century"

 I'm thinking about writing up a book review for either for our local newsletter. Once I'm done with the second part of the A&S competition explained series, that is :o) Today we'll be going over to Fighter Practice to say hello. Hubby is thinking about getting back into Heavy Combat and me as the new Hospitaller promising to be there at least once a month is a good enough motivation for him to tackle it now. I have brandnew flyers to give out if needed, a few current newsletters and a possible deputy to talk to while Finndragon will get to run around and blow off some of that amazing preschooler energy on the adjacent playground :o)

It's a good weekend, plague or not :o)