If I Had My Own Blue Box:

I have such a mix of thoughts on this past weekend that they really are a muddle of thoughts. This weekend was Hull Family House’s candle-light tours and living history. It also combined into the mix the final of my 1830s travel at GCVM.

Before I get into all those muddled up thoughts, I do want to say I absolutely loved how the weekend was for Dan and I. I really enjoyed my husband and our time together this weekend. It was so very nice. We didn’t have any spats over any of the things we normally do like packing, setting up, arranging. We relaxed, spent time together, chatted with friends old and new. Somehow this may be a favorite time for me.

One of the prevailing mixes of thought is while I’m doing something I love, I’m tired of feeling lousy. This whole season I’ve had problems with being able to sleep and feeling utterly miserable by early afternoon. I get this feeling like every bit of energy has been drained out of me along with either a headache or inability to focus. This weekend did me in for both the sleep and the feeling awful. I wasn’t able to sleep at all Saturday night despite my husband being in the same tent as me. For the life of me I couldn’t get comfortable on my cot where I used to sleep oh-so soundly. Without my ticking and being on an incline I slid down to the point where my back was right on the seam across the cot where it was repaired. Oh, does my back still hurt from that. The drainedness was accompanied by down right nausea through most of the day. There were points where I think the only reason I stayed upright was because my corset held me up. This whole thing is so disconcerting to me. I don’t know how much is me health wise and how much is the way of doing an event is so very different for me this year. In years past, I was ready for an event well in advance right down to the food heavy with vitamins and water. During an event I had a comfortable home base that was mine or mine and Jackie’s either at a home or under Jackie’s fly with our tents attached. We watched out for each other food, drink and activity wise. She often had to play mom to make sure I didn’t drop because I don’t always know when to stop or when my face gets too red. This season I haven’t had the right water pitchers and glass out; I haven’t had my tins and crocks with pre-planned food; I haven’t had that deep night’s sleep; I haven’t taken my infamous battle-time nap; I haven’t know every minute of the day what activity I am going to be doing; I also haven’t had that much of a purpose. So, obviously I have to get myself back on track.

One would think having the weather turn out to be simply beautiful, warm and sunny, rather than the cold rainy weather predicted would be a good thing, right? I know, it should be. It helps with attendance. But, I have to be honest I was counting on cold weather because cold weather would prompt people to buy warm clothing like hoods. I had three hoods up on Etsy over the weekend and two in Pat’s tent in hopes that they would sell so we can pay for storage due and Sprint due this week. With the sunny warm weather, no one needed a nice warm comfy hood.

This one might make a few people upset. Leaving the museum, I drove as quickly as I could to Hull House thinking I would be doing a guide roll. Not the case. This isn’t a big deal on a personal level; I was fine with not having to be a guide. I do think there were some major communication problems. To be honest, I don’t think it was on the side of the Hull House. They had this great system down. I was very impressed watching and listening to the women and men doing the great many things they pulled off. (Yes, even when I’m a physical wreck with myself completely tuned out I still can’t help observing these things.) They volunteers of Hull House went above and beyond making reenactors comfortable for this weekend. I really feel sorry for the organizers on that end because I got the sense information on the tours was not given to them in a timely fashion either. Seeing what the HH volunteers do for the reenactors makes me want to be able to bend over backwards for them including giving them an outstanding level of pre-planning.

As I said this weekend was also my last travel program for GCVM. I’ve enjoyed talking with Bevin and Matt about the visitor experience in such a focused way. I’ve definitely determined I prefer an interactive program to a presentation mode program. It is very beneficial knowing the diversity in audience/visitor preferences. With my own muddle of thoughts, I can only imagine what Matt has to sort through. In between performances I was able to finish up the set of carpet bags, getting their handles on. They really do look nice with the handles on, finally looking like bags. As nice as they look, as functional as they will be, I don’t think I will ever make bags out of real carpet again. (I hope to do a post about my thoughts on carpet from this experience.)

I guess that completes my muddling of thoughts, or at least the ones I can put together enough to communicate. This week I’m planning to get a good chunk of the hood pattern together. There seems to be a good deal of desire for that based on the FB responses I received. I have a few other things to do as well that I’m hoping will be doable if I get enough gas money together.

Finally after two years away for me and eight years away for my husband, we were back at the Genesee Country Village’s Civil War event popularly called “Mumford”.

The weekend was wonderful. I spent the whole weekend in Jones Farm, a house regularly depicted as an 1830s farmhouse. In the dining area, I led a sewing circle where we worked on sewing cases. Some of these were donated back to the museum for their interpretive use while others were given to the sewers’ soldiers as housewives.

The sewing circle was a wonderful time to talk with old friends and new.

We were both quite pleased with our slippers. They were made with left-overs from the new carpet bags, lined with wool and leather soles from my friend Gail. They were perfect for around the house as well as runs to the out house. I found the soles of mine held up very well to a good amount of walking as I wore them most of Friday evening and all day on Monday.

As I stayed in Jones Farm for the weekend, I was able to see the event from a different angle than I usually do from the central village.

Somehow the whole weekend passed without the opportunity to take the photos I had intended to of our slippers, carpet bags, Dan’s shirts and my new dress. I didn’t even get a single photo of my husband and I.

This past Saturday, Dan and I got dressed and attended an event at Fort Stanton here in NM. I should say we Finally got dressed and attended an event. More importantly, we finally got to dance together as husband and wife.

The event was much smaller then we are accustom to in NY. The site is a large fort begun in the 1850s and working through WWII I think. The buildings cover a very wide range of time. Most of them are arranged around a center courtyard. I like this arrangement. It allowed for a good presentation area, instructional/interpretive spaces in and infront of the buildings and a side yard for the modern food venders. The walk ways were a huge plus as well since it rained on and off most of the time we were there.

After the social, we talked with one of the local reenactors about educational oppertunities. The fort really is an ideal space for a full weekend of instructional workshops and presentations. It looks like we will be doing some of that while we are here.

I fretted all week about what I did and didn’t have with me for the event. I am usually an obsessive planner for events with a packing and a to-do list each made weeks in advance. Most everything is out and sorted, ready to be packed the weekend before. That certianly didn’t happen this time. I didn’t even try on my dress until Thursday evening. This resulted in a panic run to the W store I hate to buy fabric I couldn’t believe I was buying. Then I started sewing. It is a good thing I ended up making a cotton dress as the rain and dirt would have made a mess of primarily white plaid silk.

When Dan and I were driving, we stopped and he picked me flowers. Isn’t he sweet?