Sun and Wind on the Weekend

This weekend my husband had a National Guard drill, leaving my son and me to our own devices.

Saturday we had beautiful sunny weather, and my son and I went to the Pentamere Regional Arts and Science Fair. In the Society for Creative Anachronism, many events focus on fighting, mostly sword fighting (using rattan swords).

(Or as I have been known to describe it, "The SCA is a place where you can hit other people with sticks without being arrested for assault.")

The Arts & Science events are a chance for the non-fighters among us to shine. Mead-makers like my husband, embroiderers, cooks, armorers, and other artisans and craftspeople have the opportunity to show off their creations.

In order to compete, something called "documentation" is required. In general, documentation means "Here is my evidence that what I have made could have been made in the 600 to 1600 CE time period that the SCA covers." So it involves doing research, making your item, and writing up the research.

I love doing the research and learning about 11th century fiber arts. I enjoy making almost anything I can make using string, thread, or yarn. But I don't like writing up research at all. I keep writing and re-writing it, trying to get it perfect, until I am so tired of looking at it that it looks stupid.

So what I did Saturday was look at all the pretty things people had made, sat and knitted in the shade on a lovely sunny day, and thoroughly enjoyed listening to a performing arts entry (a capella singing). I skipped the step of trying to write up research, and had an excellent time.

Note to self: Playing with string while listening to live musicians is one of the things I love doing best in the world.

Sunday we went up to Grand Haven for the Kite Festival. The weather report said it was going to be cold (high in the 50's -- that's Fahrenheit), so I brought my son's winter coat and mittens.

It was cold.

It was also windy. Wind ought to be good for kites, but there was too much wind for many types of kites. This woman did pretty well, and some of the stunt kites were able to fly. Three kite-boarders in wetsuits were out on the lake (water temperature around 40 degrees F), and they were just flying out there. But we saw strings break and kites go tumbling across the sand, sometimes into spectators, both little plastic kites, and big soft-cell kites.

We held out for two hours, as I dearly love to watch synchronized kite flying, and the Chicago Fire Kite team was supposed to put some kites in the air. We saw a little precision flying, but at 50 degrees and with the wind gusting around 20 miles an hour, we got too cold!

We went and watched from our van for a little while until my son got tired of that, and then headed home. Afterwards his dad asked him if he had any fun while he was at home with mom: "Medium," he said.