I go to the Arizona Ren fest every year, last two in full harness. It starts in February, which would probly be cold where most of you live but here it's usually close to 80 degrees by February. They allow real weapons as long as steel isn't visible (ie: peace tied swords in scabbards).
My hope is that I can arrange to go to some events further East some time to meet up with some of you guys, but to coordinate work time off and family stuff will take planning ahead. I think something like DOK would be awesome but traveling across the country to camp out for several days with total strangers in living history conditions is a bit intimidating. I've done WW2 living history before and it was great though.