CATEGORY: JURI

Juri and I decided to have a dancing party.  Juri built a 28’ x 28’dance floor out of 4’ x 4’ plywood.  He had some left-over red and gray paint, so he painted half of the squares one color and half the other and put them together like a checker board.  Then we decided it would be a “Through the Looking Glass” party.  We invited all the Poulsbo dancers, and told them that, if the spirit so moved them, they could come dressed as chess pieces.

I had met Juri’s Estonian born ex-wife, Mall Peake, before I met him.  She had re-married Tom Jay, a sculptor and writer who lived near Port Townsend.  She was a talented artist and sculptress.  She volunteered to help make Juri’s costume.  He was to be the White Knight and she made a papier-mache horse that would fit around his waist and hang from his shoulders.  With stuffed legs at its sides, it would look like he was riding it.

There is no way to describe the horse that Mall made.  It was exquisite–unbelievably magical.  It was about six feet long.  It had an Arabian Horse’s head with flaring nostrils and an abundant yarn mane and tail, both festooned with beads and ribbons strung on and braided into the fibers.  She painted its body a dapple gray.

I made all the trappings.  There was a hint of a saddle with English type stirrups, elaborate saddle blanket, stuffed legs and feet.  I made a Middle Ages era mantle and reigns for the horse out of white sateen with crenelated edges trimmed in black, and with a matching tunic for Juri.  Under the tunic was “chain mail” made of heavy gray cotton yarn which I knit with large needles.  His real legs were hardly visible.  He also had a silver helmet.  Mall made the helmet’s dome using a head-sized beach ball as a form for the papier mache’.  I made a neck guard out of cardboard which we attached to the back of the dome and spray-painted the whole of it silver.

I also wore white.  I had a peasant-type dress, a silver crown and Chinese shoes, perfect for Alice.  But it was Juri who was the star of the show.  He galloped and reared his horse all around his spacious back lawn.  When he wanted to dance, he hung his horse from the branch of a tree.  Not every knight who rides a prancing steed can do that!!!  The Poulsbo musicians played.  We danced.  Everyone brought food.  It was a fabulous party!