Oh, hello there!

It's October and I'm back as promised!!

Not only am I back but I'm back with a few photos from the faire!

The faire was last weekend, September 26 & 27and in case you're new to this shindig - I'm the owner/director lady and most recently - Daniella Noir the Gypsy Queen!

This year the faire went smoothly enough that I was able to finally contribute to the entertainment. But because of the heat and many many layers of clothing I only danced about four times - but that's still four times more than I ever have in the past!

After getting myself a concussion last month I was unable to continue practicing Russian style gypsy dance. When I recovered from that I pulled something in my back that landed me in the ER (they did nothing to help). So after healing up from that - I had about a week to loosen up enough to wing it (yoga helped!).

At the faire I just tapped into memories of past dance experience, all my belly dance knowledge and all the YouTube videos of authentic gypsy dance I've ever seen.

 Below is my "Gypsy Court" well some of them - featuring beautiful dancers from Little Goddess Trybal belly dance troupe from Dallas and a few local volunteers who also dance, drum or act.

Under my pavilion my "throne" was made of a dining chair, pvc pipe, two folding TV trays, bed sheets, old saris and table cloths. The wind blew everything out of place during this shot but I think it still looks ok yeah?

This year, I wore no hoops, no crinoline, no corset, no girdle... I was all natural under there and I felt great!  I could move! The edges of the velvet ghawazee coat kept rolling in on itself (right under the ties) - I predicted it would happen and intended on sewing the front closed but darn it, the night before the faire, I was just too plumb exhausted to care about preventing wardrobe malfunctions. 

It wasn't until I saw the photos that I realized I was a perfect rainbow from top to bottom! 

Outfit details:

Headdress - handmade by me last year with added 99 cent scarf and $2 necklace from eBay,

Purple Tunic - my own

Blue velvet ghawazee coat - Tribal Bazaar

Green over skirt - Etsy $5

25 yard skirt - eBay bought with Swagbucks

White hip scarf, yarn belt, beaded belt - old

Most jewelry - dirt cheap eBay finds.

Trying my hand at sword balancing! It's tricky! I'd like to get my own sword and practice a bit.

And back where I belong! I love drumming soooo much. The man who taught me how to drum boasts that I am one of the best drummers in Texarkana (high praise indeed but there's only like four drummers in town.) I haven't got to drum in ages but when I picked up the drum everything all came back to me. It  was like riding a bicycle... a bicycle that will make your fingers swell so bad you won't be able to remove your rings that night but... a bicycle indeed! 

Stay tuned for more photos!!

I've still got tons to do to wrap up all this faire stuff so I probably wont have time to visit your blogs until next week. 

Until then, see you all laters!!!

oh my my my

This is you right now:

No, a tornado did not hit our bedroom and this is not the result of negligent home care.

We're cleaning up and cleaning out!!

HARDCORE

 We've been living like this for a few days and it's a little irritating but it's a beautiful vision of progress!

So what's up with all this cleaning out stuff?

Spring cleaning? 

Er... sort of...

We're more kind of spring cleaning... our lives.

oooohhh... deep.

 We're looking for a travel trailer to live in.

Yeah, we're downsizing from a trailer to a... well, a much smaller trailer.

We're looking for a trailer in complete working order but the cosmetics inside and out, we're not too worried about because we're going to do this to it... or something like this:

Yeah, this one pictured below was awesome but waaaay out of our price range.

Who the heck needs an outdoor kitchen??

Just smile and nod and listen to the nice lady's sales pitch.

 This one was way more affordable with a wonderfully outdated interior that I would LOVE to destroy! But still out of budget. We didn't find what we're looking for but that's ok. We don't have a deadline or anything like that.

 So here's the plan:

I'll keep this brief since there's really quite a lot of details that goes into an adventure like this -  So here are just the main points of the plan.

#1 Clean up and get rid of stuff! I'm going through each room and selling off stuff we don't want, donating clothes we don't wear any more, etc. Even if we change our minds about living in the trailer, this is still something that really needs to be done.

#2. Get the trailer and spice it up.

This isn't quite what were going to do but something like that.

 #3. Move what we can into the new trailer and place what won't fit into storage (that way we'll have it when we buy or build our new home later).

#4. Borrow some land in town to park on. There's plenty to be had with all the farmers and rural friends and family we have around here. Also, we need to stay in town right now so Caleb can continue his job.

#5. Park and live, travel on the weekends.

 But why?? Why would I want to live that way???? What about this kids?? The faire?

No worries, that's all been considered:

First of all, this isn't permanent. We're downgrading and living beneath our means so we can save money for land for the faire. Yup. We're trying to make it a permanent faire with real buildings and all that jazz. 

Trying to turn the city's fairgrounds into a 16th century village kinda sucks... and honestly I hate the way it looks. We need to build a real faire, that runs for more than one weekend and will  generate a real profit and steady income. Also at the faire I can finally open up the bohemian and gypsy thingies shop I've been wanting to open for the past eight years! 

Oh yeah, on the land, we're also building an event venue for weddings and shows to rent out during the off season... there's been talks of a gothic circus but I have zero circus experience so we've kind of put that on the back burner... ok, really it's off the stove completely for now. We'll also host our own non-renaissance festivals during off season too. I've got some awesome ideas for some super groovy festivals I just can't wait to try out!

And the kids? Well from what we saw while looking at trailers, just as long as the trailer has a "bunk house" there's actually plenty room for two kiddos. If they start getting too wild, just send them outside! That's where they belong! I mean just look poor Cedar - she's a vampire! A little sun won't hurt her...

Wait. Or will it? 

I want to travel.

I want my children to see America.

I want to have my faire, my store, my venue and host my events.

I want  my husband to do what he loves and climb mountains and trees and shoot snakes or whatever else people do outside...

I want out of this stupid trailer park.

"I want I want I want" doesn't work well for me.

I'm a doer.

I can only "want" for so long until I snap...and force my family to live in a tiny travel  trailer.

OK BYE!

Oh yeah, I gots me a new fancy phone (for $20!) and I'm finally on Instagram... whatever that is.

Come see me and pictures of my food and stuff...

 

who the heck is Daniella Noir?

Do a quick Facebook search and you'll find that Daniella Noir is a stripper... perhaps a porn star... even a ghetto fabulous fashion model. But this Daniella Noir I speak of is the director of the Texarkana Renaissance Faire and now officially, the Queen of the Gypsies.
She's me. Er, well kind of.

Even though I am the director of a renaissance faire, I'm not what you would call a "rennie". A rennie is person who is obsessed with faires and all things renaissance. They visit every faire they possibly can, spend thousands of dollars on costuming, accessories and weaponry every year. They listen to renaissance music, play themed RPGs, themed video games, study the history, read thy novels, attempt to speak the lingo, they learn to play the instruments... they're soaked in it!
Good people though. Good folks, I say.

People say to me, "Um, Hollie. You direct a faire. You're like, the ultimate rennie."

And I say to them:

"Nay. I just like dressing up and throwing massive parties that attract hundreds of people and earn thousands of dollars (none of which I actually get to take home after bills and stuff)."

With all that being said, during the planning of last year's faire, I began to get a lot of friend requests from faire participants, merchants, entertainers and the likes. But I only like to be friends with  people I actually know (that includes bloggers I regularly follow).

So I did what all rennies do, (I'm not a rennie)... I created a character and a name.

Thus, Daniella Noir was born!
Daniella from my middle name Danielle and Noir from my maiden name, Black.

Daniella got her own Facebook profile and by doing this, I was able to befriend 886 folks in the industry without flooding my personal profile feed with the latest book about Anne Boleyn, Tudor tailoring and pics of hot guys in kilts (I don't mind that last one so much though).
My 886 "friends" includes about a dozen Jack Sparrow impersonators, even a female Johnny Depp impersonator. About twenty mermaids, well over two hundred pirates, dozens of professional belly dancers, some faire kings and queens and even a few Hollywood pros.

So what about the Gypsy Queen thing?

Yeah, I made the announcement a few weeks ago that I am joining my own cast as the Gypsy Queen.

That was actually supposed to happen last year and it was going to be a big fun surprise but I was unable to finish my costume due to financial issues.

The headdress wasn't finished, the bodice wasn't bejeweled and I couldn't afford the skirts. No biggie really, it felt good to be hoop and crinoline free.

So here's what's to be added to the costume:

This 25 yard silk skirt...

.

Over this 25 yard dyed skirt tucked in at the hips...

Over this massive 6-bone hoop...

With lovely Indian and Turkoman and other tribal doodads on the bodice and headdress (the one with the flowers and feathers at the top).

At the faire, I will have a pavilion, really just a decorated popup canopy like below and even a throne! 

Maybe one day I'll have my husband build me a pimped out vardo complete with wi-fi and an espresso maker. Well, I don't think gypsies had wagons like this in the 16th century (or espresso makers for that matter), but it's my faire and I'll do what I want.

Ok, well now that I've bored you all to death with talks of becoming a gypsy queen, I'm going to go have a drink. A wasp landed in my hair earlier and thinking it was a harmless grasshopper a grabbed him and threw him to the ground. He stung my hand and now I'm grumpy, with a headache and a achy hand.

If you'd like to befriend Daniella Noir on Facebook you can find her HERE.

To like the Gypsy Queen's page click HERE.

See ya!!