Ren Faire

Had an OK day at Faire yesterday. We weren't sure what time the handfasting was to begin, so we arrived shortly after Faire opened at 10:00. Found out the handfasting was at 5:15. Sigh. Hadn't really wanted to spend the entire day there, but oh well. Ran into lots of friends & had nice chats with them. The handfasting itself was a bit hectic; apparently the Food Network was there taping the event, so at the last minute the bride decided to make it more "wedding-y." The groom had already changed out of his Faire clothes & borrowed a doublet from JM, the head of the band (if you could call us a band; more on that later). The cake was gorgeous but I wasn't able to get a shot of it, more's the pity.


Didn't really hear any of the ceremony, as we were waaaaay in the back. At one point JM shouted out "Project!!" Being closest to him, I of course smacked him with my recorder. One of our friends said later that he overheard someone saying, "Only at Faire would you have someone heckling a handfasting."


The band consisted of JM on sopranino & shawm; Ralph on sackbut (type of trombone), MLS on bohdrain (pronounced "BO ron, it's a type of drum), myself on recorder, and a late-arriving DH also on sackbut. I felt the music was rather poor. It's been a long time since we've performed together as a group, and it showed. My recorder was well in tune with JM's sopranino, but not the shawm. Flubs were made, and I had to drop out of many songs because I didn't know them well enough to play at speed. Some I had never played before & didn't even bother to try as a handfasting seemed a bad place to give them a whirl. It would have been better if we'd had a chance to practice at least a few minutes beforehand, and if there had been a little less beer going around.



Today's pictures are all shots I took at the Faire. The first is a very large dragon puppet that was hanging in a tree. The eyes were lit up, and on occasion it would growl and/or smoke would come out of its mouth. Even though I don't like anacronisms at Faire in general, this was cool enough to make an exception in my book. If you watch the video at the end of this post, you will hear it growl right at the end of the movie. Second we have two sacked out children in the "Friends of Faire" environmental area. Taking a nap at that point in time seemed a wonderful idea and I was more than a little jealous. Third is a little gosling by the edge of the lake. I had to use the zoom for this & I'm pleased with how it came out. Lastly is one of the stages; take a good look at the side walls. Notice anything strange? Yup, you got it--they put the left wall on the right side & vice versa. Kinda gives the "castle" a crazed, cock-eyed perspective.