Burning Man Part 3

With our structures setup, Tk and I began working on setting up the yurt for the week. While we were working on this our first camp mates arrived. Elle & Jeffro wandered into camp asking if we were the Sparkle Pony Corral, which Tk & I confirmed. After hugs & introductions, they went to get their car & began setting up their tents. Eventually they did some wandering and then sleeping.

Tk and I were still waiting for Karina, Mary, Kate, Jason & Jess to arrive. We had a time estimate between 3-4pm, so we setup our camp chairs under the shade structure to watch the neighborhood and wait. Eventually a dust storm arose sometime in the early evening.

Tk in the beginnings of the storm.

Neighbors begin to disappear into the dust storm, and no more campmates have yet to arrive. I began to wonder if I remembered their estimated time wrong. As it got darker, a van drove up the street, slowed down & I could see the passenger pointing at my SUV & the yurt. The van stops & the passenger asks if this is the Sparkle Pony  Corral. I say yes & out jumps Mary shouting as she recognizes me to give me the longest hug. She mentions something about dropping off Kate at the airport (?!?!?!) and I point out all the room we have that they can choose from to camp in. Quickly she, Karina, Jason & Jess get the van parked & they begin setting up their tents before all the light is gone. Not the easiest thing since the dust storm is still running strong. Tk & I hide out in the yurt & ponder where Kate is. We wonder if something has gone wrong & Kate is flying back to Portland or if for some reason she went to the BRC airport. After a while we hear noises indicating Kate has arrived. We find out she has been greeting at the BRC airport and that the whole group had been running late because Mary’s flight had been delayed.

I help Kate setup her tent as the last of the light fades. Everyone that was supposed to arrive that day had, camp was partially setup & it was time to see the city. Kate, Tk & I went out to the walk the Esplanade. Not far off the Esplanade & 4:30 we found the Flame Thrower Shooting Gallery.

It was already crowded, so we just watched a group shoot the flamethrowers for a bit and continued down the Esplanade towards 10. Eventually we found one of my favorite things, the CUBATRON!

And you could finally lay underneath it and look up! We’d always wanted to do this but it had been in a different configuration before, closer to the ground and wires on the ground. Cubatron from below is different from Cubatron from the side. I really love this thing. I want one in my house. Of course we had to stop and lay underneath for a bit. We eventually lost Tk to tiredness and Kate and I continued on alone. We stopped at Roots then turned around and headed back towards 2. We went all the way to Opulent & of course had to stop and dance. It wasn’t until we got to Opulent that Kate really noticed the costume I had on, my purple shimmer snakeskin print outfit. Kate tells me then that my outfit is made out of the same material used to decorate our corral. Both Kate & I had bought the same fabric several years ago and had not figured out what to do with it until now. Neither of us had ever mentioned the fabric to each other or sent each other any pictures of it. Kate & I claimed a platform & danced until we realized it had been hours and would soon be morning. 

We had only just arrived and still had a whole week ahead of us. We headed home and were lucky enough to discover the Black Rock City Diner was still serving. Delicious grilled cheese was soon in our hands, and once we had warm full tummies we walked the last few blocks to home & bed.

Burning Man 2009 Part Two

I woke up in semi darkness. Semi darkness because there was a giant truck in the middle of our camp and an rv at the front. The land grab had begun. I beat on the rear window with no effect. Unfortunately you can’t open my tailgate from the inside. I wake Tk, and move a bin and jug of water on top of her legs so I can open the rear passenger door. I get out of the car and talk to the guy driving the truck. The greeters had said B was open, but I explained we were the Sparkle Pony Corral and are registered and placed. He gets it and is cool, just asks if they can stay there for a little while so their friends can find them, which of course is fine. Old guy in the rv had a harder time getting it, but he was a virgin. After a short beer chill out session with the truck driver, he ended up leaving with them. I returned to the back of the car and replaced the bin & water.  I slept a bit more on and off through the night. I had to drive a few more groups off our land, but it wasn’t that bad. Once I realized the sun was rising I got Tk up so we could start setting up camp. At least that way it would be a bit more obvious we were a camp.

First thing is the hexayurt. We unloaded it the same way we loaded it, removing one piece of plywood, then the yurt and last the other piece of plywood.

We prebuilt some of the yurt before hand so that it would be moop free on the playa and so we wouldn’t have too much building to do. On playa we taped the 6 roof panels together. Since the seams are so long for the roof panel I created a device to make this easier, called squeegbroom, which is a broom with a bathroom squeegee taped to the top. This really helped get the tape well stuck to the panels.

Once the roof cone was built we unfolded the walls and
taped the 2 final seams. Then we got 2 guys from the Seed, our neighbors across Biology, to help us put the roof on top the walls. Booster, also from the Seed saw that Tk and I still needed some help – the roof didn’t want to stay in place for taping. He and Tk held it in place while I used small pieces of tape to hold it in place. Much thanks goes to our neighbors the seed for helping us out. All that was left after that was a ring of tape connecting the roof to the walls and another ring of tape connecting the walls to the floor tarp. After that Tk worked on unloading the car while I pounded rebar, then she worked on tying the yurt down while I finished pounding rebar. I think that all took us about 3 hours max. We only needed help for about 10 minutes, and just because lifting the roof was awkward with only 2 people. It wanted to collapse in on itself.

While building the yurt some more people stopped and eyed our land. Tk worked on unloading the car and I worked on laying out the pieces of the carport I brought. I placed it in a central area towards the front of camp. While working on this a nice guy named Trespass came by offered to help me. And it was a good thing too, cause that carport ended up being a bitch to build. Next year the bolts are all being replaced with quick replace pins.

Burning Man 2009 Part 1

Don’t ask me how many parts there will be. This is just going to be my best attempt to log what happened in whatever chronological matter my mind assigns events.

Friday, August 28th I worked a normal full day and made sure this year I remembered to change my voicemail message and set my email out of office assistant. I drove home to Santa Cruz and I finished packing. I had already been packing all week, so this was the last minute packing, the things I had to continue to use and then also take to Burning Man.

Saturday I finished remaining packing and took care of my last minute purchases including my bed for the week. This was my first year not in an RV/trailer and not on a real mattress. I was feeling inclined towards an air mattress, but what if it failed during the week? In the end I went back and forth between Target and Big 5. Big 5 was having a sale and I got a cot for $30. At least I knew the cot wouldn’t deflate and leave me on the ground. Then I waited for Tk to arrive from San Luis Obispo. Once Tk got to town it was time to deal with the remaining orders of business to be ready to head out. We went grocery shopping, after comparing grocery lists of food we already had. We returned the food home and went out for dinner, which was sushi and was delicious. On the way home we stopped at Home Depot and picked up 2 pieces of plywood to protect the hexayurt on our journey to the playa.

Once we got to my place we immediately began loading my car. This has pretty much gone according to plan thus far. A month earlier, when we got placement, I came up with the idea for Tk and I to be the early arrivals for camp. I was all over the eplaya, just about anything on the internet, to get my Burning Man “fix.” So I was aware that due to the decreased city size, 130 theme camps did not get placed. Areas usually reserved for theme camps until Wednesday were only reserved until the gates opened to the public. The land grab that occurs at 12:01 am Monday when the gates open would be far worse than usual. And so far no one in our camp could for sure be there before Monday. So emails were sent, I convinced Tk that we could do this, she agreed, we talked to camp mates, namely one Rockstar Librarian, and Tk and I became the early arrivals for camp. So we packed the car on Friday, leaving out only the food and the bikes. The most difficult part was the hexayurt. We couldn’t lift the plywood and the yurt as one package above our heads, it was too heavy. So we put on the roof of my car in sections, plywood, then the yurt, final piece of plywood and then tied it all down. By this point in time I believe it was around 11pm, and we stayed up for some time talking. Then we slept, because I knew I wouldn’t sleep much and would get Tk up at the crack of dawn.

Sunday I was awake by 7am. Tk and I packed the food in the cooler and in bags if it didn’t need to be cooled and into the car. Last we packed on the bikes. In the end the car looked like this:

There’s not much room left and we still need to stop for several gallons of water in Reno. Then we went to Samba Rock Acai Cafe for an acai bowl. I seriously love that place, they serve some yummy deliciousness. We made one last stop for ice for the cooler and then we were on our way to the playa. We noticed a weird noise in the Santa Cruz mountains that we resolved by stopping and buying more bungees to secure the front of the plywood/hexayurt sandwich shut. And then the trip was really smooth. We didn’t have to stop for gas as often as I was used to after several years of towing and an RV trip. Tk and I kept talking to each other about how we weren’t having any problems and how easy this trip had been compared to previous trips to the playa. Our drive up the 50 to avoid the I-80 construction was smooth and beautiful. There was little traffic and we had lovely views of Lake Tahoe coming out of the mountains.

We became worried we wouldn’t make it in time to be placed – we had to be on the playa by 8:30pm and it was getting to be close. We planned to make our Reno stop as short as possible, figuring out the exit we needed to take in Reno, I would drop Tk off in front of the store, she would run in and buy the water while I parked and removed the bikes from the back of the car and figured out where to fit the water. I think we managed to finish that water stop in 15 minutes, it was pretty amazing and coordinated team work. We got gas and were zooming to the playa. We made one more gas stop before the playa, and then we knew we had made our Reno stop so short that we would make it to the playa on time.

Once we got to Gerlach we could see vehicles lining up everywhere preparing for the land grab. We were just so excited – almost there, in time to be placed and of course ALMOST THERE! And then we had reached our destination – the entrance to the playa.

Oddly enough, the art car in front of me was one of only 2 that I rode on all week. Many of these vehicles are also lining up for the land grab.  The deeper we got on the playa the windier and dustier it became. I opened my doors to the dust so the ticket checkers at the gate could shove their arms into my packed vehicle to see if there were any hidden pockets where people might be. Then we were sent on our ways to the greeters. At the greeters station we got our packets and hugs. And I got a back massage! The greeters laughed at our camp’s concept and name and they called over someone with the placers to get us marked down as having shown up. He radioed our placer, laughed about our camp and stated that they were wondering if we were going to show. We were to drive in and meet our placer at Genome and the 4:30 plaza.

Eventually he pulls up in a golf cart and takes us to our location on Biology past the Mistikal Misfits and Animal Control. I park on the side of the space we’ve been allotted. Tk and I know we won’t be getting camp setup tonight. We’ve already discussed this exact situation – arriving with little daylight, in wind and dust. We take a trip to the nearest portos and get our first glimpse of the neighborhood. We determine what can be removed from the back of my car, to give ourselves a small place to shelter and maybe sleep some for the night. It was a small cramped space, but it was better than sitting in the front seats. We watched as people went out for the night, amazed at how much of the city was already built. And then we slept for a short time.

More Costumes

I made this green and black outfit in 2007, but it always felt too revealing to me. I decided to make it more modest by adding in the sheer black panels. Which makes me laugh because sheer fabric usually doesn’t equal modesty. I also changed the skirt and top from being tie closure to snaps.

I made this outfit this weekend. I almost had it all done in one day, but I also needed to eat and clean. I finished up the top this morning. The skirt is a zipper closure and the top has snap closures.

For some reason the color got all funky in this picture. I don’t feel like taking another one or fixing this one right now. I’ve got a week before Burning Man and with a little inspiration I can make some more costumes.

The Purple Fur Outfit

My latest creation is this purple fur outfit. Of course, since I had more purple fur I had to make furry purple leg warmers. The skirt came next. First I created a zipper for the skirt. I didn’t want to worry about fur catching in the zipper, so I put a lapped zipper in the purple satin and then attached the fur to the satin around the zipper.

Once the skirt was complete I made the top. Then the arm bands, which are essentially the same as the skirt. Last came the kitty ear hat. It can be difficult to get the ears to match. I had to seam rip the left ear out twice before I got it right.

The Purple Snake Print Outfit

This is my latest creation – the purple snake print outfit. I got the material on clearance in 2006 or 2007 but couldn’t figure out what I wanted to do with it until now. This outfit started with me wanting to make arm warmers. Next I thought up the skirt. Once that was almost finished I figured out what I wanted to do about the top.

There are some imperfections, but I did make my own patterns as I went. And some pieces have no pattern at all – I just cut up material and sewed it together.

And Sewing was Begun

I am going to attempt to blog my sewing more, but thought I would start with a small introduction to some of my past projects. I have created many other things than what is shown here. Today I am going to focus on what I have made for myself for Burning Man.

My first creation was the blue outfit, made for Burning Man 2005. I found shiny blue silver fabric and long blue fringe.

Recently I decided the pants weren’t working for me, so I remade them into a blue skirt. I call this blue outfit v1.5.

Of course, no Burning Man costume stash is complete with a neon fur outfit with furry leg warmers. In 2006 I decided on green fur.

In 2007 I decided to add to the fur collection with blue fur. And a fully lined pea coat.

More furry leg warmers, never can have enough of those.

 

And my most recent creation, still untouched by playa, the purple fur coat.

  This was made out of about 7 yards of purple fur and is fully lined in a purple satin type material. It is ostentatious and heavy as all hell, but super cozy and large enough to cuddle in with two friends.. It’s like a blanket coat hybrid.

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