again

so I did another 20 minutes where I added the green and the highlights with yellow (I think a white would be more dramatic as a highlight but I've no been told that in period what was used to create the green pigment had a bad reaction when lead white touched it so because I am doing this for A&S white would not be a good choice here........ I think I'm going to call it a night and I hope tomorrow I have time to do the shadows with brown..... or I might decide to focus on the embroidery for Neil's outfit..... it's sad I can't really do much with all the pieces cut out until the sleeves are ready because everything must come together at once if I'm going to get all the seams right

It's been really quiet with my other questers in fact I've only heard one other person really doing anything.... it's a bit frustrating since I still haven't heard back about my questionnaire and the checkoff list on the website show no changes so it's a bit sad..... anyone thinking about doing this is going to think it's impossible since it's been over 6 months and nothing has happened I keep posting to the list but I've heard no responses frankly I am beginning to think that I'm wasting my time doing this..... I mean it's great that I'm learning new skills and that I am doing all these fab projects but If I finish I feel I'm not going to get any recognition for reaching such a high goal and if I don't make it I will be viewed as just wasting my time..... I have posted all the write ups for y projects to our group and keep updating here but I doubt anyone is really looking...... I don't know.......... It's getting to a point I just want to throw my hands up in the air and say I quit but it's more then just the quest that is getting to me, it's this whole laurel thing as well....... I feel I've hit a wall and I'm asking for help and everyone keeps walking by..... I just don't know what else to do sigh.............. I also have what could turn out to be a huge personal issue that will come to a head I have no doubt when I go for the fighting category in fact I'm thinking of not attempting that category just so I can avoid the headache.......... grrr I don't know!

some more scroll and

so I've done another 1/2 hour on the scroll and it's begining to really pop for me!

I've also started dome embroidery on the sleeves for neils outfit I'm not sure if I will get it all done in time for the A&S tho

scroll part 2

so the boy is in bed so I put in about 30 miniutes of real work into it and I'm pretty happy with the look it's the first time I'm doing real shadowing and highlighting with colors instead of just whitework. Once I add the details and shadows I think this is going to look really good

well it's late and munchkin will be up way to early so I better get some sleep while I can

working on the scroll

so I've finished the documentation on the beadwork and I just have to back a couple of peices so that is pretty much done I can now focus on my next category

I recently took a class on doing small scrolls and I tried my first one last weekend and I must admit I'm hooked it looks like much more work then it is and truly it is a lot simpler then most scrolls I do

here is the scroll I did last week

and it is based on this

it is 4x5 and like I said it was a blast I've decided to do this A&S project on a manuscript from the hastings hours

So I did a little work and after about 3 hours of work, chatting, other projects, chasing my son this is what I have so far

it's also a 4x5

another update

added pics of sugar paste plates to cooking entry

working on decrotive arts and scribal (maybe clothing as well) for dragonspine A&S

I also might have a lead for my entertainment entry!

pics of sugar paste plates if you don't want to look in archives

another update

so queens prize is coming up but I can't find a sponser.... but I hope to enter a scroll and my beadwork and maybe my dress at the Dragonsspine A&S..... that would knock down my list big time... otherwise I've been busy with work sigh.......

sweet bag update

so I just found out my inlaws will be visiting in 3 weeks so I'm not sure how much I will be able to work on the sweetbag but I'll keep updating when I do work on it

I really wish I had a better camera my dark green stem work is done and I have the light green highlights almost finished -this is at 4 total hours of work

sweet bag

I've started work embroidering the sweet bag for the decoritive arts part of my quest

sorry for the fuzzy picture but this is 1 hour into the project

Travel and Shelter done

Where the queen goes, her court must follow. The chaos that followed Elizabeth's summer progress prompted one historian to write, "Nothing save war was more disruptive to the orderly well-being of court life than a royal progress." Elizabeth went on progress each summer, to maintain contact with her people and to get out of London during plague season. When the Queen went on progress "she was not content to be accompanied by a mere handful of courtiers and ladies-in-waiting; she took along a great multitude and a large train of luggage, furnishings, food, and other suplies". Burghley tried to get the queen to limit the number of people she took on progress, but she was unwilling to compromise on the matter. To maintain the level of magnificence expected of her, she expected both her courtiers and her household to behave as though they were in residence at one of her palaces.

In 1553 a travel guide described France as being twenty-two days wide and nineteen days long. Another travel guide of the same period put the distance at sixteen days long. William Harrison's The Description of England, written in the 1580s, does not count days per se but he does list the distances between places and the implication is that the traveler might stop at each for a meal or for the night. "The way from Berwick to York, and so to London" is accomplished in twenty-two stops. London to Dover has another six stops.

On foot, one might travel three or four miles an hour during the day. Few people wanted to be out at night, so travel was confined to daylight hours. There were rivers to ford, however, and mountains to cross, so this was not a pace one could keep up indefinitely. Those who could, rode, either on horses or mules. The one hundred twenty mile journey from London to Stratford upon Avon took three days on horseback.

English gentlemen thought it unmanly to ride in any vehicle or on a mare. They used small, hard saddles and rated their horses by color, bay being the best. Women rode astride (using a man's saddle) or apillion. A pillion was a leather or padded cushion on a wooden frame which was strapped to the horse's back behind the saddle. A footboard hung from the offside and the woman clung to the man in front of her. By the sixteenth century, the sidesaddle was also an option. It was popularized by Catherine d' Medici, who brought one to France from Italy when she married the king of France in 1533.

There were some vehicles available. Wagons and carts had been around for a long time. Ladies might also be carried in litters. The coach, however, was a new development in sixteenth century England. A far cry from later developments, these coaches were an outgrowth of the carriages used to transport artillery. The first coaches had no springs or window glass and little padding. They differed from the four-wheeled carriages and covered wagons used earlier in that they were closed and had seats inside for passengers. One seat outside held the driver.
The first coach was brought to England from the Netherlands in 1555. The first coach in Scotland came from France with Mary, queen of Scots in 1561. Because of poor roads, the conveyance did not catch on outside London for some time.

The cleanest was to travel is by boat on the Thanes River. Usually, traveling by boat is faster than carriages or wagons. If you don’t have a boat, you would hail one by crying “Westward (or any other direction) Ho!” , A water taxi would cost about a penny.

To cross the English Channel (also called the Narrow Seas) to France could take days, even weeks, or in perfect weather conditions, only an afternoon.

One map giving travel times from Venice indicates that it took ten days to reach Augsburg, sixteen days to get to Brussels, and twenty-seven days to go all the way to London. Overland routes made use of rivers and canals.


Briggs, Asa, A Social History of England, Viking Press, New York, 1983
Loades, David, The Tudor Court, Barnes & Noble, New Jersey, 1987
Orlin, Lena Cowen, Elizabethan Households, Folger Shakespeare Library, 1995.
Somerset, Anne, Ladies in Waiting, from the Tudors to the Present Day, Alfred A. Knopf New York, 1984.
An Elizabethan Progress by Zillah Dovey (1996)
John Leland's Itinerary, edited by John Chandler (1993)

update

Now when I update this page I will also post this little checklist

Checklist 5/10

Done
Courtesy and Etiquette- February 03, 2007
Introduction- April 28, 2007
Dancing- May 07, 2007
Food- June 16, 2007
Travel and Shelter-June 18, 2007

Calligraphy -in progress
Games and Pastimes
Clothing
Decorative Arts
Entertainment
Every Day Life
Habitat
Heraldry
Skills and Technology
Survival Skills