Renaissance

A couple days ago, I took a day off from my regular job to accompany the Queen and Rock Girl to the local Renaissance Fair that went on at Woodward Park in Tulsa. The Queen made Rock Girl a medieval looking (or as she likes to say, "renaissancesy") dress, and she did an incredible job on it too. Rock Girl also contributed some suggestions when the Queen asked and made some very appropriate choices as to certain items that would enhance the dress and make it look even better. Granted, I've always thought the Socialite to have an incredible handle on what looks good to wear, but Rock Girl isn't that bad either.

The day kicked off with some people from this aviary in Bartlesville, whose claim to fame is bringing the bald eagle off the extinction list. We saw several types of bird from a very small falcon to a majestic golden eagle, who only weighed six pounds (though one kid guessed 300, which made the guy thank them for believing he was so strong). It was impressive to see these creatures so close, and the overall demonstration of each of them was very pleasant.

As for this fair, it had its ups and downs. While they were all serious (some deadly serious) about what they did, some were more prepared to deal with children than others. Our most notable deer in the headlights was a lady who does mosaics. Now, her work on display there was quite impressive, and I'm sure she does an incredible job, but a teacher she is not. Our group gathered around her table while she was hanging out in her car, and when she approached, she looked like she had no idea what to do. Fortunately, their teacher had them sit, so she was free and clear for her chat. Her explanation of the glass mosaic process, however, was so jam-packed with jargon and industry terms that I doubt anyone understood her fully. And no, children are unlikely to know what to do with grout, and no, their parents are NOT going to let them swipe the bathroom tiles to make mosaics with.

Her downfall was when she commented that what she was showing them was hard to see with them sitting down. Queue 30 kids standing up around the table. Queue one mosaic lady going into shut down mode. Her bright idea? Let the kids cut the glass. She cut some strips, and had them line up. Although she cut her hand earlier that day on the glass, she was all about safety. Yikes! The Queen was quick to protect me when she commented as a kid held the cutter backwards that the glass could fly out the other end and put someone's eye out.

We had Rock Girl ask about adhesives they might have used in the Renaissance period. I won the bet there, because she didn't know. In fact, what did this have to do with the renaissance theme anyway? It was supposed to be Renaissance Art, but I guess that person didn't show.

They all weren't that bad, though. We saw a guy who played bagpipes. He also used a load of jargon that I understood most of as he described how to start into playing the bagpipes. He played a stand alone chanter before kicking into the pipes themselves. He talked about his buddies in the band, and how he normally plays drums because they need someone to do that too. But his winning move was his tale of the Scottish army that decided it was hot out so they took off their kilts and tied their shirts between their legs to go into battle. That wouldn't have been so bad, but he showed us all where his shirt tail ended by lifting up his kilt. Fortunately, nothing showed.

He was a talker, though. About the time the buses were leaving, he was just getting into showing off his ceremonial sword and razor sharp knife...and he just kept talking. Finally, the teacher had to cut him off and thank him for his time so we could go.

Earlier that day, we saw some better ones. There was a lady who spun her own yarn on a spinning wheel. She described the process and went over the whole thing in a fairly understandable manner. I initially thought she was a bit boring, but in the end, she wasn't so bad. She described life back in the Renaissance era, and passed around several items that she made in the manner of that period. It ended up being moderately interesting. Of course, she talked about modern life with so much contempt and disdain, it made you wonder what she really did with her time.

There was a station where the kids could write with quills. Now this one did scare us a bit because Rock Girl was wearing a light color that black ink might not come out of no matter how water soluble it is. However, she did fairly well and only got one little spot on her sleeve. The cool thing about that station was what she did on her paper.

You know when kids are given free reign to write or draw whatever they want, they tend to reflect some piece of themselves, or write or draw something they really love (inevitably their name ends up on there somewhere). What did Rock Girl do? She wrote "My family," had the name of her sisters, and wrote "sisters forever" at the bottom. We remain so proud of her.

The highlight, though, was the "Society of Creative Anachronisms." These people not only knew their stuff, but had the timing down to an art. They talked about spinning, clothing, weapons, armor, materials used, and even gave us a full contact fighting demonstration. It was fun to listen to and watch these people do what they love to do. It's easy to complain about stuff, and hard to go on about how good something was because you don't have anything to complain about. They just knew their stuff, and very much seemed to enjoy being in front of a group of people showing off what they loved.

At the end of the day, we were a bit worn out, but we had a lot of fun. While Rock Girl headed back to school, we found that we had a little more time before we had to be back and relive my mother of babysitting Sassy Pants, so we took a rare stop at Sonic for a drink -- just the two of us. We don't get much time alone, so it was nice to have a few minutes together away from all the chaos we normally endure.

When we went to pick up Rock Girl, we wondered whether she would have changed out of her dress (she was wearing a shirt and shorts underneath it) or if she would have kept it on. When she emerged, she still had it on, so I guess she liked it that much. And why not? The Queen did an awesome job on it. She knew how cute she was.