Fort Edmonton Park Dress Rehearsal Roundup
Dress rehearsal at Fort Ed Park today! Quick, point-form entry while I'm still awake. It is now almost 11:30pm (past my bedtime!), and I've been up since 6am... and it was a busy, but wonderful day.
-6:00am: wakeup call, shower, breakfast of champions (AKA cereal and tea, in separate containers, presumably), pick up carpool buddy, head to the fort.
-8:00am: get stuck in traffic on the Whitemud, final five minute stretch takes 25 minutes to traverse. Luckily, I leave ridiculously early for many things (the whole "If I'm not ten minutes early I'm late" impulse), so we got there precisely in time.
-Wore one of my Métis country wife outfits. I would have loved to wear the new fancy dress - Nancy Harriott née Rowand's outfit - but when you're Nancy you're limited to Rowand House, and can't wander around elsewhere. In fact, I spent much of my day everywhere BUT Rowand House, teaching one of the new wives, my new pretend Fort sister, to do beadwork, hanging out in Married Men's with her and training another new interpreter there, did a few train tours, did some work in the trade store, did beadwork in the sunlight...
-Oh yes, and what was going on, and who were we interpreting TO? The dress rehearsal is like any other day at the park, except it's a trial by fire of new staff, I suppose. Thousands of students from disadvantaged areas are invited out to the park to experience Fort Edmonton for free, while we hone our interpretation skills on them, brushing up on old lines, refreshing our history and acting, etc. This year we also extended an open invitation to refugees from the fire at Slave Lake, and it looked like some families independent of the schools took us up on that offer, so there was that. :)
-The dress rehearsal began an hour earlier than we normally open, 9am, and ran until 2pm. Hoards of children, kind of exhausting... but exhilarating. It's good to be back in costume and talking to folks! :)
-In the last hour today, I took the last 10 minutes of my break during a lull in the number of visitors to change into my Nancy outfit. It was lovely. I needed help getting the back buttons up, but I figured out a lovely braid-and-bun combination for my hair. My other ulterior motive? I wanted to wear the nice dress when all of the costumed interpreters from all eras of the park congregated under the gaze of our lovely costumer and her assistants for photographs. Adele likes to photograph all of us in her creations when we begin the season. :) It's always interesting to see everyone's familiar faces in costume. You see, the fort is very isolated, so we don't see as much of the rest of the park as the other eras do. In fact, the 1920s and 1905ers share a lunchroom, and those two streets share a change room with 1885. So gossip spreads amongst those groups very fast. We 1846ers change in the fort itself.
-I also was recognized! The awesome people who run the Fort Edmonton Park blog and twitter feed, who also follow me on twitter and my blog, here, came up and said hello! (I would link them, but unfortunately Rich Text posting is acting up on me, and I am both tired and a luddite, so I can't fix it at the moment. Will link them later?)
-Free barbecue after work! Huzzah for free food! There were also delicious, delicious chocolate cupcakes. :D
-Fort staff party... at the fort! Those are always awesome. It's an awesome atmosphere to hold celebrations and get-togethers. It was a spur of the moment thing, only decided a few days ago. Kudos to the social committee organizers for organizing it so quickly... and shaking us down for enough money for the rental! ;) It went really well: lots of awesome conversations and general excitement. Many Fort Ed alumni attended, too, which is always awesome! Even if you've moved on to big kid jobs, it's always nice to come visit us. :)
Anyway, I'm quite tired now (didn't drink, as I drove, but I've been up for far too long today). I'm going to end with the best question posed to me today: "Are you a ghost?"
-6:00am: wakeup call, shower, breakfast of champions (AKA cereal and tea, in separate containers, presumably), pick up carpool buddy, head to the fort.
-8:00am: get stuck in traffic on the Whitemud, final five minute stretch takes 25 minutes to traverse. Luckily, I leave ridiculously early for many things (the whole "If I'm not ten minutes early I'm late" impulse), so we got there precisely in time.
-Wore one of my Métis country wife outfits. I would have loved to wear the new fancy dress - Nancy Harriott née Rowand's outfit - but when you're Nancy you're limited to Rowand House, and can't wander around elsewhere. In fact, I spent much of my day everywhere BUT Rowand House, teaching one of the new wives, my new pretend Fort sister, to do beadwork, hanging out in Married Men's with her and training another new interpreter there, did a few train tours, did some work in the trade store, did beadwork in the sunlight...
-Oh yes, and what was going on, and who were we interpreting TO? The dress rehearsal is like any other day at the park, except it's a trial by fire of new staff, I suppose. Thousands of students from disadvantaged areas are invited out to the park to experience Fort Edmonton for free, while we hone our interpretation skills on them, brushing up on old lines, refreshing our history and acting, etc. This year we also extended an open invitation to refugees from the fire at Slave Lake, and it looked like some families independent of the schools took us up on that offer, so there was that. :)
-The dress rehearsal began an hour earlier than we normally open, 9am, and ran until 2pm. Hoards of children, kind of exhausting... but exhilarating. It's good to be back in costume and talking to folks! :)
-In the last hour today, I took the last 10 minutes of my break during a lull in the number of visitors to change into my Nancy outfit. It was lovely. I needed help getting the back buttons up, but I figured out a lovely braid-and-bun combination for my hair. My other ulterior motive? I wanted to wear the nice dress when all of the costumed interpreters from all eras of the park congregated under the gaze of our lovely costumer and her assistants for photographs. Adele likes to photograph all of us in her creations when we begin the season. :) It's always interesting to see everyone's familiar faces in costume. You see, the fort is very isolated, so we don't see as much of the rest of the park as the other eras do. In fact, the 1920s and 1905ers share a lunchroom, and those two streets share a change room with 1885. So gossip spreads amongst those groups very fast. We 1846ers change in the fort itself.
-I also was recognized! The awesome people who run the Fort Edmonton Park blog and twitter feed, who also follow me on twitter and my blog, here, came up and said hello! (I would link them, but unfortunately Rich Text posting is acting up on me, and I am both tired and a luddite, so I can't fix it at the moment. Will link them later?)
-Free barbecue after work! Huzzah for free food! There were also delicious, delicious chocolate cupcakes. :D
-Fort staff party... at the fort! Those are always awesome. It's an awesome atmosphere to hold celebrations and get-togethers. It was a spur of the moment thing, only decided a few days ago. Kudos to the social committee organizers for organizing it so quickly... and shaking us down for enough money for the rental! ;) It went really well: lots of awesome conversations and general excitement. Many Fort Ed alumni attended, too, which is always awesome! Even if you've moved on to big kid jobs, it's always nice to come visit us. :)
Anyway, I'm quite tired now (didn't drink, as I drove, but I've been up for far too long today). I'm going to end with the best question posed to me today: "Are you a ghost?"