Armour Coiff

For almost a year now I have been getting tension in the muscles of my back, shoulders and neck. This tension causes tension headaches which mimic migraines. My shoulders and lower back hurt almost constantly. The tension in my neck is in the outer muscles; the outer muscles are doing more work than they should which has lead to a weakening of the core muscles in my neck which results in more pain and a weakened neck. I could no longer support the weight of my helmet with a chain drape on it. I have been to chiropractors, physiotherapists and remedial massage centres all these remedies relieve the pain for a short time and have helped to minimally strengthen the core muscles in my neck. I still could not fight; I just could not support the weight of the helmet and drape. So one painful afternoon I set to removing the heavy drape which left some unsightly holes along the rim of the helmet. With the help of Master Count Sir Stephan a strip of brass was added to the bottom to make the helmet presentable again (I need to take a photo). The problem with this however it the unweighted helmet was not hitting my metal gorget which made a really annoying clicking sound all the time. So I made a coiff.

A long story short I made a coiff out of white drill. Due to continued illness I have only worn it once so far when I was determined to test my new gauntlets no matter how much my neck hurt.

I plan on making a purple one to wear to tournaments; I will add some extra triangles to the neck piece next time so it sits correctly on my shoulders; it turned out pretty good for a quick job adapted from an internet pattern that was only A4.

Second Tudor Dress

One Tudor dress is never enough they are just sooo pretty although totally impractical. On my last tip to Canberra in February (I know I'm soo slack). I went to Sunday training in Polit only to find out it was Baronial day and everyone was in Garb. Bart who was going to put on Armour had completely forgotten and looked the part in Armour anyway so it didn't affect him. Me in my bright purple shirt, black jeans and bright while shoes felt sooo embarrassed and like a total newb. I've been in the SCA for 6 years and here I was at an event in mundanes. Then something out of the blue and completely unexpected happened (I had a friends tunic thrown over me which didn't do a great job in covering the mundanes) a lady came up to me and said "You are about the same size and age I was when I made this dress" this middle aged lady who I had never met was holding a gorgeous blue German velvet Tudor. She believed the dress would never fit her again so she got me to try it on; it was a perfect fit. I had gone from mundanes to high court. The biggest surprise of all was she was not just lending it to me for that afternoon she gave it too me. I was over joyed. It cost me $20 in excess baggage costs to bring it back to Brisbane with me. It needed a little work; it was missing some pearls on the forepart and some were discoloured. The fore sleeves were also missing so I made some to match the forepart.


The Dress as it came. A beautiful blue velvet with fur look sleeves. These are the the sleeves I knocked up from some white drill I had lying around and some 3mm blue ribbon I brought for $2 (for the first roll of 5 meters) and $1 (for the second roll of 10 meters; I ran out)

I added lacing rings to the inside of the sleeves so the fore-sleeves could be laced on and it means I can make different sleeves to change it around a little if I want. The lacing rings were the hardest thing to get; I had to drive to the other side of Brisbane to buy solid brass rings from a fishing and tackle store. Here is a close up of the sleeves attacked to the dress. Amazing how you can dress up the wrong side of drill with a little ribbon and a heap of little pearl beads.