One Last Peep from Paradise

Jean and I traveled together, stayed together, and our booths were next to each other. Between us, we can cover just about any range of ages with books!

As you've seen before, she usually brings a chicken to help her sell her children's books about chickens. This time Peep came. Peep is a young silkie, and she's a hoot. She's very curious. She hopped over to my table a few times, and really is fun for people to interact with.

The lake was about the clearest I've seen there. That is Canada across the way.

The last musical act of the day was the Blue Water Ramblers. They were great! Definitely pro level. They did gospel, folk, and Michigan specific songs. One line stuck in my mind. "We'd rather go to Hell than New York City." If you are from Michigan, you'll get that. (Hint...Hell is even smaller than Paradise. If you are elite, you can say you've canoed through Hell. I have)

Marie and Diane arrived early afternoon. We left without any known glitches after the event was over. As far as we are aware, all the things that need to come with me to ND are in Diane's car, and all of the things that go home went with Bill and Shirley. Hopefully, we did it correctly.

We are now at friend Lorana's house in Marquette. We'll get pictures of us tomorrow. Too tired tonight!

See Around the Venue

A Chicken with No Name

Remember the knitting project I said I couldn't show you until after it was delivered? Here it is- new home with author friend Jean. And that fluffy brown lump in front of her? That is real live chicken, Mr. Millie, who came to the event today to help sell books.

Before the chickee could go live with Jean, she took a tour of my yard.

She liked the garden best.

And Mr. Millie does a good job of selling books. And the chicken I brought is supervising, but Jean wants help to name her. Suggest names and I'll pass them on to Jean. Or go to her Jean Davis Facebook page and post suggestion there.

It's been a long day- all good. I did quite well at the event. But now I have to place a book order yet tonight, and then I can rest.

See Previous View of the Knitting Project

Jean's Been Weeding

Since the last time I was at Jean's house a month ago, she's been doing a LOT of weeding. Lots of her garden hill now looks nice.

She has lots more room for large plants than I do. This is right near her front entrance.

Her garden space is also on a hill, and she has stone steps with an interesting creeping evergreen growing over them. Just ignore the hose. We didn't pose the pictures.

The color of these lilies is stunning!

And 'Stargazer' lillies are always good for a show. It's no wonder they are so popular.

Oh, you want to know how those chicks that had just hatched a month ago are doing? Sure.

Laya is being a good Mom to them.

Tomorrow we'll be at Holland's Art in the Park!

Did a morning road walk. Miles hiked in 2025: 321.6

See Jean's Hobbies

Jean's Hobbies

Day one of the Lakeshore Art Fair is complete. As I often do for this event, I'm spending the night with author friend Jean.

See link below if you don't remember Jean. She often takes a chicken to events. She mainly writes Sci-Fi, but she now has three children's books about chickens.

She has quite a menagerie at her house. This is Jack the India Runner Duck. If you are friends with Jean, you might remember when handsome Jack was just a fluffy duckling.

Jack is friends with Lucy Goose.

The big excitement of the day is that her chicken Laya, who often goes to shows, has been sitting on eggs. Two of them hatched this morning. This one may be an "ordinary" chicken.

This one will be a Silkie, with the naked neck and a sort of pom-pom hairdo.

Jean also has a flower bed she is trying to reclaim. These huge hostas got weeded, and they gained a woven fence since a tree came down earlier this year thanks to the wind.

And this border looks good. It's a huge job to reclaim a garden on a hill that hasn't been cleaned in a while. I know!

Tomorrow we go sell books again. I thought you'd rather see this than more pictures of vendor tents. I certainly don't find those very exciting any more.

See Bring Your Chicken to Work Day

Another Tidbit about Jack

 Today was better. I can stay upright for about 20 minutes, and then need to lie down for a while again. My brain doesn't feel like it's running on all cylinders yet. I can almost see enough to read.

I have learned a very interesting tidbit about Grandpa Leary (Dad'a adoptive father). You may remember that he was a second-generation Irish farmer.

This info comes from a book written about a settlement about 6 miles from where Jack lived, but this was apparently significant enough news that it made it into the book. On June 10, 1906 (so this was before they adopted my dad), "Someone stole all Mr. O’Leary’s fowl and chicks, Buff Orpingtons, a large English breed." It doesn't say how many chickens.

This is what Buff Orpingtons look like.

There nust have been a local chicken rustler since a week later, at a farm about 4 miles from the Leary's, another 40 chickens were taken. It's not like the sudden appearance of 60+ dressed chickens for sale in that rural area wouldn't be noticed. You have to wonder what happened to them. Were they butchered and quickly carted to a city?

Anyway... I think this is an amazing little detail from Jack's life as a farmer.

See The Jack that Built the House

Scenes from Authors' Alley

 The day started at 5 am. Not my best time of day. And after all the lugging of stuff, talking with people and whatever, I am pretty much beat.

We had 13 canopies and 23 authors in Author Alley at the Muskegon Lakeshore Art Festival. We did not have any rain. The wind tried to get a bit frisky, but then it calmed down again. No complaints about the weather.

Jean has really capitalized on the "chicken" thing. Today, she had Laya. You can see that the kids are fascinated. Lots of adults are too. Laya is in Kay-Kay's book (the first chicken book which Jean is holding), but Laya is writing her own book that will be available soon.

UFO? Nope, there was a lady down on the corner making bubbles. This wasn't even the biggest one, but it's the only one I got a picture of.

Our booths are right across from Hackley Park. I always think it's interesting to see what gets planted in urban flower beds. Stela d'Oro lilies, impatiens, and a hydrangea. It would be hard to get more standard than that. But it looks good.

I'm going to try to do a little bit of editing before I crash, but I'm pretty much done. I'm spending the night with Jean, and then we do it again tomorrow.

See Bring Your Chicken to Work Day

Just for Jean

 OK, this was just for fun, but how awesome is it to have a chicken-head friend? I mean I have a chicken-loving friend (Jean), and maybe a chicken friend (Kay-Kay).

Today was the second day of the vendor event. It went well, and on top of yesterday, I had a great sales weekend. This is going to be a very busy week.

See Bring Your Chicken to Work Day

Around the Venue

The Lakeshore Art Fair is held in and around Hackley Park in Muskegon each year. This is the central statue in the park, 80 feet tall, of "Victory." The park is to honor Civil War veterans.

These artistic sprinklers were being sold right across the street from us. Little kids had fun playing in the spray. I didn't price them, but they must have cost plenty since I think they rented three booth spaces to have room to set up the sprinkler.

There weren't any unusual plants in the gardens around Hackley Park, but they were nicely kept. Stella D'Oro lilies and Impatiens.

And the hanging planters had hot petunia colors. But they are nice and full.

On the other side of me was author friend, Michael Carrier, who writes thriller mysteries set in the Upper Peninsula.

And so that Kay-Kay could have a rest, Jean brought Laya today. Laya is an old hand at events and can be walked on a leash! I certainly never knew that chickens could be so calm.

The storm line held off until about 3:30. We all took down non-essential parts of our displays and held out until the last minute. None of us was willing to let books get wet! We all helped each other at the end. The only things of mine that got wet were the bare table and the canopy. I can dry those out this week. Many of us hadn't expected we'd even get as many good hours out of today as we did. The wind was gusty, and even with weights, we spent some anxious moments holding down our canopies, but all ended well.

I haven't added up the sales yet, but I did all right. Definitely some profit even with transportation and allowing myself that one junk food treat yesterday. Did I make enough for two days work and a day of prep? Hard to say. It takes forever to build up a reputation as an indie author. I did better than many. And I had some return customers. It's hard not to compare myself to author neighbor Michael, who is well-known, and who sells one or more books about every 30 seconds. But others had a poor sales weekend, and I feel bad for them. It's really hard when you don't even cover your booth space.

I do love the way our Michigan Author community tries to support each other.

See Bring Your Chicken to Work Day

Bring Your Chicken to Work Day

Meet Kay-Kay, a Silkie Chicken.

Not only did Jean bring her chicken to work...

...but she wrote a children's book about Kay-Kay!

So, it was yet another vendor event. How many pictures of canopies and stuff do you want to see? That's what I thought. I was sharing a tent with Melanie Hooyenga who writes young adult stories. I'll just show you this one.

Some authors did quite well, and some didn't do well at all. I did moderately well. At least I'm now in the black, so that's always a plus. The weather could be iffy tomorrow which makes me really glad that I'm out of the stress zone. One can never be sure from one event to another.

It's good to be back with my author friends, discussing author-y things... and chickens.

See How to Sell Books- Bring Your Chicken

Buck, Buck, Pluck

  I'm just letting the peace of not having a schedule rule while I am here. The day was a lot like the one linked below from 5 years ago. I really can't believe it's been that long since I spent time with these friends.

There were some chores, the most picturesque one of which was feeding the chickens and collecting eggs.

Pam went shopping, and didn't need me to come. That was perfect because I hate shopping. So I read books. After dinner we did some music- one of the best things about being with these friends, and then we played a game.

I'm sure that these laid back days sound very dull compared to my 385 days of hiking and seeing something different every day, but I am in sloth and recovery mode. This is just what I need right now.

See Harp