Roz gets armored

Bummer.I should have moved on the lamellar plates sooner (dang pouch is WAY too light just now-- money, you can always make more but it does take time). White Mountain Armoury is out of plates, and there is no telling when they will be back in stock.Time to go to plan B.I have been doing even more research on cuirboulli, for the gloves and for elbow and knee protection. Duke Cariadoc has two excellent articles online on his hypothesis on how cuirboulli was made in period. The first, titled The Perfect Armor was published around 1991, and has several ideas and patterns of things to make, as well as instructions on the process using wax.The second, The Perfect Armor Improved: Water Hardened Leather, was published more recently. Most folks use wax to harden the leather, but why would it be called cuirboulli?? He points out that the period term for hardened leather is "cuirboulli," which translates as "boiled (or cooked) leather." That is not the natural way of describing the wax hardening process. Indeed, I have to agree with him on that.But these articles have opened my eyes to a couple other things. There is no reason to not cut the lamella out of leather, and use the water hardening process. We already have a stash of 8 oz leather (which he says will shrink up to about 10oz during the process) for gloves and stuff. Once we cut out the big pieces, we will have tons of scraps big enough for the lamella.I think this is really going to work for us. I can see several advantages to using all leather, except for the helm. Lighter weight, it should breath a bit better, and we can make all of the pieces ourselves. I can see that we are going to have to be careful when we get finished fighting for the day... leather, being organic, is going to mold if the conditions are right. So, we are going to have to make sure that conditions are never "right". heheThat article also includes instructions on how to make bazubands - arm/elbow protection. Master Geoffrey carries these, and the ones he has are very well made, it is just that at $140 a pair..... I am going to have to figure out a way to make more money, or at least more money faster. And I think I can make them besides.I started carving the positive form pattern out of a 4x4 tonight. I started out by gouging a negative form, but darn it, the 4x4 didn't have enough circumference for my forearm (a bazuband made in that form might fit David, for another couple weeks anyway). At least, once I get one bazuband done I will have the negative form to use for the others.