So, since I did not go to the big SCA event up in Cleveland today, due to the evil bug that is still causing me trouble (see I’m not going to Regular Event, after all…), I have a “free day” in which to do as I please.

So what did I decide to do?

Iron linen!

LOL–no, it’s true! I have all this linen waiting to be turned into new garb for the spring and summer. It has been washed and dried, but it needs to be ironed before I cut out the pieces and sew them together.

First up today: ten yards of linen, five yards of medium weight ‘Marigold’ for a Viking apron dress or smokkr and five of light weight ‘Firecracker Red’ for an under-dress to go with it. This outfit is what I’m going to wear for Spring Coronation in early May.

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Marigold medium weight linen and Firecracker Red lightweight linen.

I also have five yards of a lightweight very pale blue for an under-dress and five more of an ultra-lightweight bleached linen for a chemise that I plan to sleep in and/or use as an under-dress on extremely hot days while I’m camping out at Pennsic.  See Hoping for Pennsic this year!

Then I’ve got five more yards of a really cool (and expensive) medium weight natural linen with a woven blue stripe for an apron dress, plus a cotton that passes for a lightweight wool for either an apron dress or a shawl. I do need a shawl, which I learned from Jen Johnson at Festival of Maidens. See Festival of Maidens 2018  

I don’t have a photo of the cotton, but here are the other fabrics, the linens I’ve mentioned, plus some silk habotai I will use to trim the smokkr.

By the way, I got all this linen from Fabrics-Store.com. They have a great selection and almost daily sales on various weights and colors of linen, which is almost exclusively what they sell. I just returned a bunch of linen that I didn’t like the color of once I received it, and they were excellent regarding refunding my money (minus shipping both ways).

The silk I got from Dharma Trading Co., which has other products as well, including dyes for silk. I got some dyes and some white silk to play around with. 🙂

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New linen: ultra-lightweight bleached; lightest blue lightweight; medium weight natural with blue stripe.
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Silk: 8 mm habotai in persimmon and firecracker red.

Here is Jen at Festival of Maidens last weekend in her shawl:

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The shawl is attached at the turtle brooches and mostly hangs down the back. After Jen told me of the necessity of a shawl, based on Viking iconography, I went back and looked at my book, Viking Clothing, by Thor Ewing, which is a very authoritative work:

Sure enough, shawls seem to be de rigeur. I checked some of my other Viking books to look at women’s outfits, and arguably they are wearing either shawls or else cloaks that fasten at the turtle brooches and go down the back. Not that I will feel it is mandatory to always wear a shawl, but it’s nice to know of its existence and to have the option of wearing one.

Illustrations from Thor Ewing’s book that show what he calls “back cloths:”

OK, now I must get back to the ironing board! 😛