Renaissance Faire 2010

I meant to post this sooner, but I have to be honest with you, hubby and I have been sick. His has been brought on by stress, and I'm pretty sure mine has been brought on by being slightly depressed. I'm not suicidal or anything. I've just been feeling blue (we all have those days, mine just seems like it's been a week of them). Anyway, I'm feeling better today and wanted to share my adventures with you from these past two Saturdays.

The Royal Family, Lady Grace with Lady Bailey, and our Hobbits

Every weekend in May, Muskogee, OK is transported back to the 16th century. Nestled off the main highway running through town is a castle that is home to the village of Castleton (I kid you not, that is what they call it). King Henry VIII and his sister, Queen Margaret, descend upon the little village along with their retinue, some pirates, gypsies, and other assorted inhabitants of 1539.

Seamus, Angus, and Pandora

From jousters to jesters, peasants to pirates, courtiers to chessplayers, there's something for everyone to enjoy. I'll admit, the food is never that great (at least any of the food I've tried), but you're really not going there for the food anyway so it all works out. For me, the shows are always the highlight of the day. I always end up missing something that I wanted to see when I first got there, but I also always end up seeing a show that I never planned on and ended up loving (dirty pirate shows are hysterical).

A wooing knight, Pirates, and a Dancing Bear

Need to take a break from the heat of the day? Why not try the Queen's Tea? For just a mere $8, you get an array of dainty finger foods along with a show that will make you think you're going to wet your pants from laughing so hard. How about a carriage ride through the village? Or maybe you would like to pet a Highland Cow? Are you under 12 years of age? Why not go ont he queen's quest to retrieve her lost ribbons? At the end of the day, you'll become a knight or lady of the court.

Carriage Ride and a Hairy Coo

We always make new friends when we go to the Faire. This year, my little group of friends got intitated into a group of bandits. Led by the infamous Sancho and his silent brother Pancho, the bandits required an oath and then a promise. With right heand held high, we had to yell out, "Bandits!" anytime we crossed paths with our new friends (of course this was after the two proposed marriage to my hubby's 15 year old sister, declared me their sister, and the hubby as their niece...they don't recognize men, only women).

Sancho y Pancho, the Spanish Bandits

I can't wait to go again. Maybe next year I'll become a volunteer and become a part of the 16th century for real.

Hubby's youngest sister after becoming a Lady

Rennaisance Faire

I've been working on a post for something I'm making for my dad's birthday next Saturday, but since he reads my blog now, I didn't want to spoil the surprise. Instead I'm going to talk about the Ren Faire in Muskogee.

My sister and I decided to spend a couple hours out at the Castle. It's only about a half hour drive down the turnpike from me. It was beautiful outside with a chance of showers later in the afternoon (we got back to our car just in time too).

One of the great things about our Faire is how in character the workers are. We tried to walk into a gift shop and were stopped by two Scotsmen. "The queen's in there. We just need ta make sure ye donna have any weapons on ye." My sister and I exchanged glances, and being the doofus that I am I said, "Just my cell phone." Both kilted-men looked at me dumbfounded. "Wha..?" Of course! He's not supposed to know what a cell phone is. I'm in his world, not mine anymore. "Nope, no weapons." The big guy let us pass, eyeing us suspiciously. Sis looked around and whispered, "The queen's not in here." But just to the left was the queen, and thankfully she didn't hear her (they will put you in the stocks or make a fool of you in the jousting ring for such offenses).

Mostly we scoped out the Faire, looking at handmade weapons, period garb, beautiful jewelry (I got myself a very pretty ring). Really we were looking for food. Everyone knows that when you go to any kind of outdoor festival, you're really there to try all the fun food. Turkey legs, jugs of beer (literally, JUGS!), roasted corn on the cob! Just the smell is like Heaven! We each decided we were going to get walking tacos (hubbs is the turkey leg fan; neither of us care for dark meat).

Walking tacos are crushed Doritos with all the fixins of a normal taco on top. Lettuce, cheese, ground beef, salsa, sour cream, jalapenos. It had it all. They were decent, nothing to really write home about, but good. The strawberry lemonade on the other hand...WOW!!! It was just the right amount of sweet and bitter to quench our thirst (although we did try to get a second cup; they were out of strawberry though).

We stopped to watch the show put on by The Jolly Rogers. These guys are funny! The show is PG-13 (with the exception of one song that is labeled PG-31; don't ask, you have to see it for yourself). The show is bawdry and clever, the singing is really good, and the set is a pretty cool pirate ship.

Walking past the Celtic Quarter and the Gypsy Encampment, we came across the king himself, Henry VIII, escorted by a French knight and several other liveried gentlemen. The entire time we walked around, my sister kept saying under her breath to me, "Well I didn't vote for 'im." Needless to say, she was none too happy to come across her least favorite monarch (she didn't know that Henry and his daughter Elizabeth are the royal figure-heads for the Faire. Somehow I managed to get her to sneak a picture of him while the frenchie kept giving us curious looks as if to say, "What is that strange contraption you've got there?"

I wish we could have spent more than the two hours we got, but very dark clouds were rolling in pretty fast followed by increasingly more threatening thunderclaps. It's still open through tomorrow, so who knows. I may just make a second trip out this weekend.