Couple general notes:

these are not vital for concept, but I thought might be worthy to note as far as what is happening in our life.

First a supply note:
Joshua and I picked up some Gambesons (coats that normally go under chain mail armour) from the link that I have listed on the right side of this blog.



These are the coats, they only coat $50 each. We didn't get them in black. I thought my son tended too often toward black and Celtic Knights of Canada should have Red and white, so ours are red with a white cross.

The sabres we also bought from there are well.



These are not what one would call a "functional sword", but a training sword (same type Olympic atheletes use).

The Celtic Church of Yahweh requires that their knights become masters of Self defense as well. I have struggled with this, but right now have ordered some instructional DVDs of Krav Maga (from e-bay), which I hope we will use to start this training. I have not settled on how one becomes a Master, but this is at least a start. Perhaps we will have to win a tournament in MMA, or perhaps we will have to be registered Black belts someplace. I don't know, but I think I have a couple of years to work on this.


Although I did not deem it necessary yet, I decided to buy some chain mail armour. I bought from e-bay. I have measured Josh and might buy some for him as well, but I thought I would buy mine first and see if this is the right decision. The cost was not terrible. $100, and make sure if you do this you measure over your gambeson for size. Also I have been told don't under estimate (or pick tight) this stuff doesn't stretch well.



I have also planned to make a shield. I have rough drawn an image for the shield.


Finally, I had planned to make a long serious time before Josh could move to the Squire stage. This seemed most consistant with the Celtic Church of Yahweh's position before the web sites crashed. Unfortunately, this meant that there were things that we really couldn't train for and were not at the right stage for us. While reading The Age of Chivalry by Bulfinch, I became convinced that I was thinking wrong. The criteria for becoming a squire was...age. A squire would be 14. It was expected that the character would come, and the squire stage would last longer, not the stage to prepare to be a squire, so in light of this we are planning our pilgrimage next week. The walk is about 44kms. It should take us over 8 hours. We are planning on starting at about 3:00am, and friends and family will meet us there around lunch time. I hope the weather holds out for us. We will wear our "rough clothing of the brother", (burlap robes) and exchange it for the gambeson.



I will hopefully get some good pictures to share. God's grace to you and yours.