http://goldcoastfestivals.com/vistapirate/vistapiratefestpg1.html

I am so excited to see Gold Coast adding the Pirate Faire to our neck of the woods and I hope it is a huge success! We've been waiting nearly two years for it to come together and i am really excited! I've been to the Civil War event at the site and it was awesome! I can't wait to see how they use the expansive space of Guajome Park for this faire!

Black Spot will be there, but we'll be missing our captain as she is a retail slave this time of year!

Captain you say? Yes, despite the fact that we planned our group around not having a captain, fall ESCO faire sort of put a kink in that plan... but in the process we had a great time with all the role playing with the court!

You see, it was like this...

We finally decided it was time to have the queen visit our encampment and we planned out all these things we could do to interact with her and her court...knowing full well we'd not get through half of them!*chuckles* However, the last thing we planned on was the way things unfolded.

If you know our group, and I believe I have mentioned it here, our morning "gig" is the drawing of the straws to see which unlucky soul will have to be Captain O'Day. As fate would have it, the day of the queen's visit it was the tavern mistress, Regina Wentworth (my hubby's cousin Jacquie). When the queen arrived, Regina was re-introduced to her as Captain Regina O'Day...and the queen decided that she liked the idea of a woman captain and that Regina should be our captain for a year! Our first thought was... there goes that gig! *laughs* our second was... Ohhhh Noooo! Not Regina! Not for a year!We even tried to get out of it by telling her magesty we had no ship and were land bound pirates! Her answer was to have Sir Walter give us one of the three ships he had been given the previous day... the good ship Dorothy! She also ordered us to set sail for the new world and bring her back Tabac.

We had a blast teasing Regina all day that day and then we all headed to the Privy Council the next day as ordered. We had the men dressed in aprons and serving the ladies of the crew... we even brought our own table and chairs... and the next thing we knew we were on the spot... or rather Regina was and having to defend her right to be captain and prove her ability to control our outspoken crew!

We left the Privy council with Captain Mistress Regina Chastised O'Day and with the grudging approval of the court that we go forth as ordered with Lord Leicester's finacial support to the new world and to prove a female captain could succeed. We were told we must bring back letters from at least one captain showing his supprt of Regina.

The week between faires we were busy and having a blast coming up with a plan. We had high ho[pes to make the year go by in the span of a week and returned to visit the queen with several props and ideas... and as always, only got to a few of them!

We arrived at the royal camp with bags of Tabac for the queen, a rather heavy box of treasure for Lord
Leicester, letters from several Captain's including Captain Morgan, Caveman, Planet, Sparrow, etc... which the queen made Leicester read. We never even got to our play on the name of the ship being the Dorothy, but the lolly pops from the lolly pop guild were tasty! By the time we had divested all our weapons and the queen thinking we might need time filler (not the Black Spot!) had us all re-introduce ourselves... and we had listened to Lord Leicester read the letters it was time for the queen to go to the battle and so we were asked to esscort her there... which left Regina our Captain until  spring faire!

I can't wait to continue the story and see if we can get through all we have planned and to see what new twists her magesty will add to our plan!

What a great faire this was and wow did we have fun!

I seem to only post when it's faire time and forget all about posting in between times too! Granted it has been a rough year and I am only just geting my mind on all things faire!

Beware the Black Spot... All those that bear it seem to have had something dire happen this year!

I'm only just recovering from cancer surgery. They got it all this time around and there will be no lymph removal, radiation or chemo for me! It gives me a lot to be thankful for I can assure you! It's been 6 weeks and I am still healing, which makes geting ready for faire all that much harder. Add to the fact that my husband sees a surgeon the day before Esco set up to schedule his hernia repair... and we just lost his Grandfather last month. We're not the only ones dealing with stuff in the spot though! We have 2 others who have had or are having surgery, another relative who passed, and several health issues and injuries.

I look back at my post at New Years and have to chuckle...

~~~~~

I have instead of resolutions, my 2008 "bucket" list . You know... a list of things I want to do before 2008 kicks the bucket*giggles* Those items as they apply to the Ren Faire world are as follows...

I want to make more road trips to other faires outside San Diego area. Jacquie and I even pre-ordered our tickets for Southern yesterday!OK... so we only made it to Southern this year... and Ragna, Maera and friends went to Oceanside Harbor Days... We'll make it up next year!

I want to make Spring Esco Faire a huge success just like Fall was. Even better by getting a chance to do all the great things we have thought up to do in camp to entertain the crowds.We had a great Faire! There was still a little settling in as we tried new things, but I feel confident it will all come together nicely for Fall!

I want to give more attention to the Black Spot web page and renspace .*just hangs her head in shame*

I'd like to see Black Spot at San Diego Faire as well as Esco.Not my fault! *Laughs* San Diego was postponed this year, but I can't wait for the new faire in Vista in December!

I want to keep the feel of Black Spot going... both at the faires we attend and with our gatherings. I love getting together just because we miss each other and having all the good food and conversation we do... oh and taking care of any business we need to while we're at it! I love getting the calls and emails from the other members saying "I need a pirate fix!!" Wow... We really have nailed this one! We were only missing 3 adult members at our last Gathering, and 2 live in Vegas!

I want to concentrate on the meals at faire I am responsible for and sit back and relax again as the other awesome cooks in the group do their thing. It was such a great feeling last faire to be "taken care of" and fed the yummy spaghetti that the crew made for me! I'm so so glad we have made it so everyone takes on a meal for faire! I'm still not 100%, but I am done with most of my pre-faire shopping already! I'm making 1 breakfast and a dessert, and geting the drinks and supplies for the camp... that's it! I can't wait to try one eye'd Jack's Carribean Shrimp and Secret's best chocolate caramel cake ever!

I want to add to Blaze's costuming with the help of my awesome seamstresses. Thanks to them I have two new chemises, I can't wait to update the rest of my costume! Weeell... I have another new chemise thanks to Maera!*beams* The rest will have to be for next faire.

I want to see us work on bringing music into the Black Spot encampment... we have several talented musicians...I want to see them show off their talents! We'll see if we can get them playing this time around!

I want to spend more time getting to know the Ladies of the Spot better and growing those friendships. Love my Ladies of the Spot! They all took such good care of me whith the Cancer surgery!! Thank you ladies!

I want to road trip to Vegas Faire and take over Mac and Gaston's place for the weekend!! *Whines* OK... so I was recovering still and couldn't go... Next year boys, watch out!

OK, so the list is simple... but it is only the one aspect of my life after all :) Mostly I just want to have fun and for those around me to do so as well... and for us all to be happy and healthy while we do it!" This is the part that made me chuckle! Happy yes, despite the financial climate and health issues... we've all been prett happy. We have had fun in all we do, so it's all good!

~~~~~

SO... Less than two weeks to faire and I can hardly wait! I love the time with the Spot and geting to see all our faire friends! I can't wait to see Tsurara's(can't spell it but i can finally say it!) new encampment set up as they too go through changes! Tink rocks at puting together a little pavillion! I'm so glad Teddy was able to help since that was the day Lance's grandpa died, so he was gone... and I sure wasn't much help!

See you all at Esco!

Blaze