November 2025: Testing Becomes Reality
November Goals
Garb:
Try to figure out my hairnet issues
Start cutting and sewing my Pad Stitch Test Dress
Classes:
Start outlining and researching Spanish Women’s Undergarments improvements
Research: Tracing Local Production and Agricultural Trade: A Multi-Analytical Study of Roman Amphorae at Conímbriga by Buraca et al. and Cultural and Religious Boundary-Crossing in Early Modern Spain by Miriam Bodian
November was a weird month. It started out with a week of travel but that turned into a week of research. I finished both papers in my goals and really enjoyed them. The first, Tracing Local Production and Agricultural Trade: A Multi-Analytical Study of Roman Amphorae at Conímbriga by Buraca et al. was much more about the chemical composition of the pots than the trade that may have happened. It was very cool, but I as a non-potter was less prepared for it than I would want to be. Cultural and Religious Boundary-Crossing in Early Modern Spain by Miriam Bodian is an intro to a journal volume, but my favorite part of this paper was a fascinating assessment of the Venn diagram of how the multiple cultures of the Iberian peninsula shared experiences in unique ways that I wouldn’t necessarily have thought of.
I did also get to get started on a book that I bought a little while back called Family, Work, and Household in Late Medieval Iberia by Jeff Fynn-Paul on the same trip. This book follows two families in Manresa, Catalonia, and some of their economic transactions. The book also covered the marriages, deaths, and other interpersonal relationships that can be tied to economic transactions in a very cool way. My favorite parts were the ones that explained how women maintained economic agency both in and after marriage.
Also on the research front, I got to attend the Virtual West Coast Culinary Symposium and take some excellent classes:
The first discussed food culture, cultural appropriation, and how the SCA interacts with it. It was a roundtable discussion and had some great points about how the SCA can and should do better on food culture. It did really get me thinking about how the SCA struggles to separate feasts and food research.
Max Miller’s keynote speech was thought provoking about assessing the quality of information and how we can be better about that. He also had some great thoughts on following his passions to keep himself motivated and focusing on the project that currently brings him joy.
Probably my favorite class of the day was about salt production. It was such a good example about how science and experimental archaeology come together in the SCA. The class discussed historical methods, the finds that support them, and documentation of historiographical resources, as well as the teacher’s own experiments with extracting salt herself. One of her methods uses solar evaporation and could be recreated with solar grow lights and fans. The next time I’m at the beach, I will 100% be pulling up some seawater to give it a shot myself!
I got to take a class I’d missed at an Atlantian University recently on street food and the legalities surrounding it. It was super cool to see how things like weights and measures and accurate advertising were just as important in period as they are today.
The last class was on recipes from Francisco Martinez Montiño’s cookbook that contain ingredients associated with the modern Thanksgiving meal. Recipes covered a roast turkey, a turkey giblet empanada, stuffed squash, and a chestnut soup.
I did make some good progress on both my hairnet and the Pad Stitch Test Dress.
Hairnet in progress
The hairnet is just about ready to be wearable- I just need to fingerloop a cord to draw it over my hair. I made it in blue, so hopefully it’ll look good with the Pad Stitch Test Dress at either 12th Night or Highland Hearthglow. It’s not the traditional headwear with this dress, but I think I will feel very pretty with it on. I’ve still got to get better at the initial pattern, because I’d like to have a more regular grid pattern for the embroidery stage, so that will be the next hair net I make.
The Pad Stitch Test Dress is becoming a dress! By the end of the month, the bodice was constructed and the left sleeve was attached, with the right sleeve ready to be attached. I have two weeks off at the end of the month this year, so I expect to spend them working hard to finish the dress. I’ve made my design decisions on the skirt, so that should come together quickly. The bodice will be ready for its lacing rings shortly after. I also acquired the buckram for the stomacher this month as well. It’s very interesting fabric. I think I’m going to do two layers, basted together, then cover with black wool and line with linen. I’m not quite sure yet how I want to do the shaping and how wide to make it but we’ll figure that out.
Pad stitching in progress
On my classes, I did ultimately decide not to give a class at the Tri-Kingdom University. The University of Atlantia is requiring the use of the University Zoom, and I am not comfortable using their platform for my classes. I will hold off for Summer University! I did not get much done on the Spanish Women’s Undergarments class predictably with this in mind. But of course, going to the West Coast Culinary Symposium gave me another class idea that I’d like to explore- Food Is More Than Feasting. The focus of this class will be on food as a research subject, not constrained by the needs of feast budgets and being pleasing to the general populace.
The last things for November were wrapping up edits on my Compleat Anachronist. I have received the proofs for that, which is super exciting, and we’re finishing up the changes necessary to get that to print. Working on the final edits was great in that I got to revisit some of the things I had previously cut from my sources list. It’s now got six new citations and some expansion on latifundia that I am quite enjoying. I can’t wait to see that in my hands!
December Goals
Garb:
Finish Pad Stitch Test Dress
Finish the first hairnet, maybe make a second.
Classes:
Keep outlining and researching Spanish Women’s Undergarments improvements
Research: The Artifice of Beauty by Sally Pointer
