December 17, 1977 was one of the best SCA days of my life. It was the first al-Barran Midwinter I had attended (one of the first of any sort, maybe the second), and it was at St. Joseph's College (now defunct). The Christmas singing group I had fallen into organizing and running in al-Barran sang for the first time with the matching group from Shadowskeep, and we sounded GOOD. All the music was done from memory, and none of it was very easy.

Ton and Elizabeth were stepping down. Koris and Leah were being crowned king and queen of Atenveldt. (The same evening, Heinrich and Lorene were made the second prince and princess of the Outlands.) In those days it wasn't so unusual for two such investitures to happen at the same event. And sometimes more than one person was given an award at the same time. Courts were shorter in those days.

I was called up in a batch of three people, I think. One was Sir Tadashi. We got Awards of Arms. "Lady AElflaed." It really did sound pretty, and I was sad when I lost the simple use of it. Very pretty, with that name.

At the time I got that Award of Arms, I was a co-founder, chronicler and arts officer of a thriving shire in Española. That evening I was made Seneschal of the Outlands, and was given an award of arms.

OTHER HISTORY OF THE WEEKEND:
The next morning there was a principality officers' meeting at Princess Lorene's house. The axe Thunderhead was there. It had been delivered the day before (to someone's house), but after people had already left for the event, so Gunwaldt was sad he had never gotten to hold it as prince, but he got to hold it as Warlord of the Outlands, many times.

The meeting the next morning was the meeting at which the White Stag Herald was directed to appeal for Outlands, or try to register "Outenlendes" or some form of Middle English "Outlands," and he said okay, but when the letter came back, he had submitted "Utanwayard," against the advice and direction of all the other officers. Bummer. Eventually it was straightened out, but for a year and some the official papers would say "Utanwayard," which most people pronounced "Outlands" (or "out and way out").

And later, in the Spring...

The only cool thing to come of Utanwayard was when the first set of principality law was written, the name of a court, were we to need to have one, was to be the Utanwayardenmoot. (The authors of that set of laws were AElflaed, Gunwaldt and Heinrich. They were signed by Heinrich, Lorene, and witnessed by AElflaed, I think; when/if I find a copy I'll scan it in and repair the previous statement if necessary.)