Our barony held its annual May event on May 10, 2014.  This event has the interesting distinction of being a team event.  Teams compete in a series of different events: rapier, heavy fighting, thrown weapons, bardic, and arts and sciences.  I was lucky enough to join team Pretty Ponies (each of us wore an arm band depicting the cutie mark of a different my little pony, and I was Apple Jack.  The A&S event was interesting in that clues were given ahead of time and entries matching the clues got additional credit.  The first clue is that the entry should relate to the hunt, and I immediately thought of the medieval legends of hunting unicorns.  After a lot of searching for something from my period, I found this fantastic image from the Harley Bestiary, which is a little late (early 13th century) but still very cool.  The citation is Harley MS 4751, image 6v.

A lady is holding a unicorn while three hunters attack it.  Kind of gruesome, but certainly meets the theme.  I decided to embroider this image using period stitches for my project.  I used a makeshift lightbox (a glass shelf from my fridge with a lamp under it) to trace the design onto white linen.  The background borders are metallic thread couched with cotton thread, and I outlined the figures with backstitch (I used cotton embroidery floss, which isn't perfect, but worked for me).  Here's an image of almost everything outlined.

The project was to have been completed at the event with a final clue which would be released there.  I started filling in figures (all done in split stitch) but also trying to leave room for adding in any last minute clues.

I had fun teasing my friends about this project.  Here's a photo of the back of the work I posted to facebook.

Teams got extra points at the event for having a child participate.  I teamed up with a good friend, seven-year-old Alexandra (that's her SCA name) on the A&S project.  I decided to applique the embroidery onto a cushion, which she could sew and stuff.  The final clue given on the day of event was that the project must incorporate birds somehow.  I asked Alexandra to draw a few birds on our piece, and I embroidered over them.  I didn't have time to fill everything in, but hopefully I'll go back later and fix the trees and the background.  Alexandra and I decided the project looked great as-is, and we did pretty well with the A&S, since we took first place in that (and our team took first in several of the other events), and our team won overall!  Here's the finished piece.  The pillow was sewed with some leftover green linen blend from my first dress and stuffed with sheep's wool.  See the red bird in the upper right and the blue bird in the tree?

The team got to divide a treasure chest of goodies with some glass goblets, jars, chocolate coins, and other goodies.  I got to take home a lovely metal candle holder (it was a bird, in honor of the A&S theme), and one of the goblets, which is a very nice size in my hand.

My husband and I were both honored with our first awards with the SCA, a baronial award called the Order of Yggdrasil, given as an award to new players who bring their fun and enthusiasm to the game and help others fondly recall their own beginnings with the SCA.  Our friend Baron Braden made us a beautiful micrography scroll for my husband and I, and we were also given Yggdrasil medals to wear.  I was so surprised and pleased (but totally embarrassed to be called up in front of everyone, even to be praised).  Here's the lovely scroll and medal (we each got one, but they look the same).  My husband's portion is written in red, mine is in green.  The queen gave my husband a ring to wear as a token and pass on to another new player someday, and the king gave me a lovely needle book made by a lady from the Kingdom of the West in recognition of my stitchery.  

I was really honored to be recognized by our Baron and Baroness, and by our King and Queen.  I have loved playing in the SCA, and this meant a lot to me.  Below is the text of my portion of the scroll, which is about 5x8 inches.

Our kingdom's largest event each year is Uprising War, held in the Barony of One Thousand Eyes (Idaho Falls area) every June.  In preparation for this, many members of our barony got together to make new silk banners to adorn our encampments.  Our baronial herald, Baroness Gilliana, purchased supplies through Dharma Trading co. and members could then pay her for the silk and use of gutta, dye, frames, etc. and get her expert skill with the process.

There are many tutorials available online regarding this process, and HE Gilliana's is one of the best.  You can take a look here if you're interested in learning more.

I'm a bit of a novice with this whole process, and I came to discover that 1) the gutta bottle I was using was leaky, dispensing way too much, and periodically dropping blobs everywhere and 2) some of the dye got mis-labeled resulting in some "interesting" colors.  That said, having spent $20 from my very tight budget on supplies, I wasn't about to throw in the towel.  Here's my first banner (with my husband's behind).

The portion to the left of my banner is our barony's unofficial badge, a moose head.  The background should have been purple, but apparently the black was mis-labeled.  I choose to think it looks neat, and since our kingdom colors are black and gold, it's okay.  Annoying, but okay.

To the right you can see my bear and garlic flowers in a slightly different configuration.  My banner (and device, for that matter), are pretty simple compared to many people's, but I'd rather have simple and recognizable than a complex mess for my first attempt.

The banner is a swallowtail shape, so I used the empty triangle on the right to make a little pennant which totally breaks the heraldry rules, as it is basically a "resume," with a ball of yarn, knitting needles, and a spindle.

This picture shows some of the gutta blobs and thick sections.  Even after steaming and two washes it is still a bit sticky.  I read online that you can dust the gutta with cornstarch to deal with that.  However, as they say, they look great twelve feet up and fluttering.  Stay tuned for photos of the banners in action!