Since my last post, I have entered the Golden Seamstress competition twice more, only at the Advanced level. After sweeping the Novice category twice, I was informed by one of the coordinators that I, personally, was banned from the Novice category, no matter how I adhered to the rules in terms of other participants (as the rules are written, if less than half of your group has never won the division, you may enter as novices). So, I moved up. In 2012, my mother and I put together a Viking-era kit for her. We learned a lot of new techniques: herringbone stitching, nålbinding (a sort of one-needle knitting), tablet weaving. We had a lovely time, got everything completed (mostly) and were beat out in ranking by a group whose outfit wasn't as well-fit nor as historically appropriate as ours was, but their documentation was better. From this, I learned that the Advanced division requires proper WRITTEN documentation.
In the spring of this year, my mom and I brought my sister on board and we made a set of clothing for me to reflect my personal armory as used in the SCA. Having learned from my previous year in Golden Seamstress, I took a stab and writing my first Arts & Sciences Documentation. This was all completed before the actual event, of course. It included notation on why I chose this style of dress to reflect my armory and what changes I made from what the research indicated. The only thing the judges could find fault with was my bibliography. I, foolishly, didn't keep track of my resources AS I USED THEM, so when it came time to write everything up, I came up short. That being said, it was an excellent first attempt at documentation. Our team of three achieved nearly as much as the groups against which we were competing, and they all had six members. So, we won the "late period (1200-1600)" Advanced division.
Now I'm trying to decide if I'd like to enter my own team in 2014, or if I'd like to try learning from someone else's vision.
