548. Have a sword fight

 Last year, Bergstrom-Mahler Glass Museum did a Renaissance Faire themed Art After Dark complete with sword fighting. I wanted to go so bad but life got in the way and I had no one to go with. This year they were doing it again and I was bound and determined to go. Danielle put it on her calendar and I was going to be in training. Work got all messed up and I had to take some PTO so I could go but it worked out. 

It used to be once a month but now it is once a quarter, Bergstrom-Mahler Glass Museum hosts Art After Dark, a themed experience to see the museum after hours. The event is usually the last Thursday of the month and is free to the public. Food and drink are usually available for purchase. It usually runs 5:30-8:30.  I have attended a couple events over the years.

All I could talk about was getting to sword fight. I was going to be seriously disappointed if I wasn't allowed to participate. We got to the museum in time for a sword fight demonstration. That was pretty neat. They were quite talented.

Then we headed towards the back of the lawn to where WHFA Appleton (Badgers Den Sword Academy) was going to let you practice your sword fighting skills. After signing my life away, I donned my helmet and grabbed a sword. 

At first they gave me a long sword and my trusty opponent had a shorter sword. I felt this was a disadvantage so they found me a shorter sword.

The goal was to "behead" your opponent by hitting them in the helmet. I was not very successful. I was beheaded more than I was able to get behead my opponent. 

I was expecting more of a pirate sword versus a Medieval type T Sword. I wanted to swashbuck my opponent. Oh well. It wasn't a real sword but more heavy of form type sword but it felt very well. 

Needless to say I was not a very good sword fighter. Good thing I didn't need to pass that test to get knighted. 

After my attempts at sword fighting, we wandered around, sampled mead and beer, browsed the shops, and eventually completed all my missions to become a knight.

It was a fun evening. Hopefully they continue to have this particular Art After Dark. I'm sure Danielle would tag along with me again.

Now that I found out I'm not very proficient at sword fighting, maybe I can find out if I can master joust.  

Celebrating Festivus

I heard about Festivus, even though I'm not a Seinfeld fan but I never celebrated it before. The Bergstrom-Mahler Museum of Glass was celebrating Festivus as part of their Art After Dark series. I told Danielle to mark it on her calendar, we were going. Between work and sickness, we almost didn't make it but the Festivus Gods were in our favor and we were able to celebrate Festivus.

What is Festivus? Well as I like to say "Airing your grievances so you can be joyful and thankful at Christmas". Festivus is more than that. According to Wikipedia "Festivus is a secular holiday celebrated on December 23 as an alternative to the pressures and commercialism of the Christmas season." Apparently it's been around since the 60s but really has gotten popular since Seinfeld in the 90s.

There are many aspects to Festivus:

There is the Festivus Pole which is just an aluminum pole in the middle of the room. It's actually kind of boring. I guess it's supposed to represent the lack of commercialism in your life. There were songs you could sing around the Festivus pole such as "It's a Pole", "The Festivus Song", and "O Festivus".

Then you have the traditional Festivus dinner which is meatloaf and mashed potatoes. We had meatballs and M&Ms. Close enough. It was still tasty. It is difficult to put mashed potatoes on a stick.. maybe next year they will do potato puffs.

One of the parts of Festivus I was looking forward to was the airing of grievances. After my bad day at work, I really needed to air some grievances. I probably was a little too specific but I really liked some of the grievances people aired. Next year I'll have to be more creative.

The last part of Festivus was Feats of Strength. There were several feats of strength that the entire family could partake in -- staring contest, thumb wrestling, and arm strength. Gavin totally beat me at the staring contest. However after a slows start, I managed to take two out of three in the thumb wrestling competition. To find out who won the feats of strength, we held out paper weights in each hand. The goal was to see who could keep them outstretched the longest. Even with Danielle cheering Gavin, he tired out quickly and I was named the Feats of Strength Champion. Not quite sure how fair it was since there is a 30+ year age difference.

The Festivus celebration was a lot of fun. Besides the Festivus Celebration, we got to check out some really cool new glass creations in the museum.

I hope to be back next year for another Festivus celebration. Who knows maybe I will inherit an aluminum pole myself and I can host my own Festivus celebration.

The Big Boohaha -- Art After Dark

Last year, I enjoyed several Art After Dark events at the Bergstrom-Mahler Museum of Glass and was looking forward to more this year. They open up the museum up after hours and usually have a theme -- usually with characters or a special exhibit/event.

This month they featured a Halloween theme which is fitting for October. They said there was going to be haunting music and readings of Poe, Hamlet, and Harry Potter. Either Danielle and I got there super early before the party got started or there was a shortage of volunteers since I only saw a few of these special guests and no readings that I heard except when the person that was playing Poe or Hamlet was practicing.

Although we didn't hear any stories, we were "stalked" by a creepy old lady claiming this was her house back in the day.

She pointed out the hidden devils in some of the paperweights that was fine then she followed us upstairs and tried to get the glass to glow in the dark. Note to future self.. arrive later so can avoid creepy old ladies.

Besides we didn't need any help finding the creepiness of the paperweights upstairs. I pointed out that I found this paperweight a bit creepy....

Danielle proceeded to inform me that the roots of these flowers/trees/plants were actually humans. Apparently they brought out all the scary paperweights for this event.

As we moved back downstairs, we did see some cool glass pieces including a Chulily Piece. I love his work.

Very Dr. Seuss-like

Chiluly

More Dr. Seuss-like art

Another piece reminded me of Macaroni and Cheese.

On a whim, I decided to pose as the work of art and did it for a few pieces. Poe wanted to know how I was going to do the horse... I stopped when I got to the horse... too many people.

Now don't get me wrong. It was nice event. I just wish all the characters were telling stories. The museum did a good job at highlighting the creepy and scary pieces in the museum. I am not sure if they have always been out or if they just pulled them out for this display.

I am sure I will check out another After Dark Event this year.. hopefully without creepy stalker dead women.

Fire and Art

I got a text this morning at work from Danielle

Danielle: Did you see? Fire Demonstration at 5:30!
Me: WHAT??? I like fire
Danielle: At the Glass Museum tonight -- the kids are doing a demonstration

We talked about going to the Art After Dark at the Bergstrom-Mahler Glass Museum but since we were there on Saturday and saw the exhibits, I figured I'd skip out on it since the hubby and I had plans to go to Neenah Library for a history talk tonight.

After figuring out logistics, Danielle and I were headed to Art After Dark to see some fire demonstrations. The latest exhibit at the museum featured area students glass work projects and area high school students were demonstrating making different types of glass art.

It wasn't the large scale fire demonstration with outside fires Danielle was expecting. There were several students demonstrating in the downstairs classroom how to make glass animals and one was demonstrating bead making. The only fire came from the blow torches they were using.

The glass animals were a bit hard to distinguish initially as the students were using 2 clear pieces of glass to shape the animals. As the process continue, we were able to see the animals take shape. As their animals took shape, the students added colored glass to them.

The glass beads were quicker to make and a lot cooler to watch. The student started with a color glass rod and heated it up until it started to melt. Once it get got liquidy, she "dripped" it on a metal rod while rotating the rod.

The exhibits by the area high school students were fascinating, imaginative, and creative. There were fused glass pieces, tile pieces, glass animals and other glass tube art. Each piece was very well done. It made me kind of wish there was a glass art class when I was in school.

Once we finished watching the fire workers, we headed back up stairs. Since we already checked out the exhibits, we grabbed a bit to eat (again) before donning fun hats for a quick photo shoot.

Despite not having a massive amount of flamage, it was interesting to see how some of the pieces were created. I would have liked more flamage but since the students worked with glass fusing and not glass blowing, the amount of fire was big enough. Besides at times the flame coming off the blow torch was quite impressive. I am glad that we decided to go check out the fire demonstration as it was a fun diversion to my evening.