PERSONAL REASONS

heidi08 Festival June 23, 2018

T minus six and counting. We’ve entered the “Cancelling for personal reasons” grisly period. In the past two days I’ve had three people I was counting on tell me they couldn’t make the festival because of various personal reasons. I can only imagine more will follow. There is a certain time before the big day that I don’t even want to answer my phone or check my email because I know it will be about somebody cancelling.

Let go – Let Beaver I always say!

Yesterday we brought down all the items for the silent auction and made sure they were indexed and had bid sheets. What a lot of beautiful things we have been given! And how insane it feels to try and count them all. Just try to imagine the conversation where one says “Wait, do you mean the print of the beaver ballerina or the beaver on a sled?”.

Today Ben stops by to pick up some of his books and tomorrow Deidre and Leslie come over to tag everything for the silent auction. In the meantime there are last minute details to take care of, like making a sign for the old park saying “Hey you came to the wrong place, drive 8 blocks south up Castro Street for the Beaver Festival!”

Jon is checking the weather like a madman because we vainly hope that it will not be higher than 85 because of Amy’s very important job. Fingers crossed.

FEELING FESTIVE?

heidi08 Festival June 19, 2018

Let the media promotion begin! The hard-working salmon spends an awful long time banging into the rock before it finally succeeds. And that is exactly how I have felt about getting attention for our whopping festival this year. Well, let this be the first sign that the tides are changing.

Beaver Festival gets new home at Susana Park

MARTINEZ, Calif. – After 10 years of annual appearances at a downtown area that became known as Beaver Park, the Martinez Beaver Festival is moving to Susana Park, organizer Heidi Perryman said.

It’s date has been shifted to the end of June, as well.

And in a fortuitous coincidence, a family of beavers have moved into the creek that runs near the park, she said.

“The 11th Beaver Festival will be full of surprises,” Perryman said.

“The improved venue has boosted interested in the festival, too,” Perryman said. This year’s edition will have more than 50 nature exhibits, making it the largest event since it was begun as a way to celebrate,. rather than condemn, the beavers that had been building a dam in Alhambra Creek in the city’s downtown shopping district.

Why is the festival so much bigger really? Is it just the nicer park? Is it the cumulative effect of being around for a decade finally making people feel like you’re for real? Is it because it’s earlier in the year and fewer people are on vacation? I just had to notify chairs for affairs yesterday that we’ll be needing twice as many tables as usual!

But the beaver dam and the nature exhibits aren’t the only things eventgoers will see.

Amy

Amy G. Hall, a noted chalk artist, will be creating a beaver-themed illustration on the concrete in the park.

Hall is a lifelong fan of beavers, and her home town, Napa, has some, too. Her chalk painting will be of a beaver pond, and it illustrates how beavers benefit other wildlife.

Children attending the festival will be invited to pick up some colored chalk and create their own artwork in spaces near where Hall is working.

HURRAY! Great job plugging Amy. Honestly in September I was worried that she and I might be the only one in the park that day. Now I’m starting to think that might not be so bad.

Ben Goldfarb, an award-winning environmental writer who covers wildlife conservation, marine science and public lands management, will be launching his book, “Eager: The Surprising, Secret Lives of Beavers and Why They Matter.”

He will read excerpts on the festival stage, and Chapter 6 focuses on California, beginning and ending with the story of the Martinez beavers.

The book is published by Chelsea Green, and will be released at the end of the month.

No more pre-orders. It’s out. I just got a notice from Amazon that its on its way. Hurray!

The festival also has inspired the west coast premiere of Sara Koenigsberg’s documentary, “Beaver Believers,” which looks at the animals in light of climate change.

The premiere will take place before the festival, Thursday, Jan. 28, at the Empress Theatre in Vallejo.

Koenigsberg and her students from Whitman College came to Martinez in 2013 to interview Perryman before filming the festival that year. The documentary also looks at how beaver damming could help prevent water loss in the west in addition to telling Martinez’s beaver story.

TAfter the article there is a nice section of how to buy tickets for the premiere!

While many new things are happening this year, those who have visited the festival in the past will see many familiar and popular things, from a day-long musical lineup that includes bluegrass and Dixieland bands, a nature-themed silent auction, the return of beaver tours and special activities for children.

This year, the first 100 youngsters to arrive at the festival will get to build a “beaver pond” of their own, by collecting wildlife stickers from exhibitors and learning how beavers help other animals, Perryman said.

This sticker adventure will mirror Hall’s beaver pond mural design, she said.

While Perryman praised the previous venue as a park that “served us well for a decade alongside our original beaver habitat, she said, “This new home is ideal for the everything we’ve become./” And since the new venue comes with its own dam a short walk away, she added, “it’s like the beavers showed us the way!

The Martinez Beaver Festival will take place from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. June 30 at Susana Park, at the intersection of Estudillo and Susana streets. Admission is free. Those interested may visit the website www.martinezbeavers.org/wordpress.

Whooohoo! It used to weirdly bug me when reporters used my wording from a press release with their name as if THEY had written it. Now I love it. That’s growth, right? There are good things in the works and hopefully the East Bay Times article will follow soon.

Oh and just to keep me feeling relevant, I got a distressed email yesterday from a woman looking for help defend beavers to her HOA in a very large, notoriously unfriendly beaver state. Because of this website my beaver rolodex is large and growing every day, so I was able to introduce her to a local ally who agreed to help her going forward.

Put THAT in a mission statement.

A BEAVER HEAD FOR DETAILS

heidi08 Festival June 17, 2018

The other day we suddenly noticed that there was ONE more interpretive panel stand in the park than we had counted before. How is that even possible? The same way last minute details constantly keep surprising us. We ordered another one of these and it will surely come in time. It will be a great reminder of why everyone’s gathered there in the first place!

Crazy last minute changes abound. One exhibit suddenly needs a table. One exhibit thinks its unfair of us to “rent tables” (we don’t). One exhibit suddenly announces they don’t see themselves listed on the brochure and wonder why? (Because you never told us you were coming, dear.) Exhibitors seem strangely to need a little hand-holding. I remember that from my JMA days when I had to bring snacks at Earth day for a certain group of musicians who will remain nameless. Usually Cheryl does all that because she thinks I’m less patient (ha!) but this year she’s dealing with a ton of things and it’s fallen to me to do it before hand. She can have it all on the day.

Now I’m just hoping that there will really be room for 55 booths in the park after all. Fingers crossed.

Oh, and happy Father’s day!

PICKING UP THE PACE

heidi08 Festival May 26, 2018

Yesterday was a blur of beaver festival riches, to begin with Folkmanis made an amazing donation of puppets to the silent auction, which Jon picked up from their wonderful office right across from Pixar. 937 dollars worth of puppets including some breathtaking wonders like this bobcat which I just adore. Do you know that makes 11 times they have donated to our yearly beaver festival?

Then Amelia sent me her work in progress for the brochure. It still has some tweaking to come but she is off on much needed vacation now and will finish it when she gets back. There are so many exhibitors to list this year that we’re actually increasing the size to fit them all in. Here’s a shot of the front and back.

I am beyond grateful for her patient, yearly help. Doesn’t that cover make you want to go? I do too! It looks so inviting and delightful. (Somehow I always feel as if I’m so busy I miss it, but you’re lucky you can just enjoy it.) I especially like the inside where she promotes everything we have going on but since that has the most tweaking left to do I won’t show you for now. Suffice it to say It’s going to be wonderful.

Then as if all that wasn’t enough, Cheryl stopped by with a donation from photographer and the hero of our Ranger Rick article Suzi Eszterhas! Her friend volunteers at IBR so it’s a great way to bring in a donation. She generously donated a framed premier quality print of this lovely photo. And a handful of delightful wildlife photograph children’s books. I think she took that photo in Moss Landing on one of her weekend excursions that meant she couldn’t be at the beaver dam.

All of which might be enough good news to make me nervous, but for now I’m just soaking it in. NPS rangers from John Muir are joining the festival, which they haven’t done for many years. I’m not sure why there are so many more exhibits this year. Is it because of the new park? The new time? Or just the fact that having crested the 10 year mark we appear to be sticking around?

Whatever it is I like it! Maybe it’s true what they say. You can only walk halfway into any forest,

The other half you’re walking OUT.

Finally here’s another very positive news story from New Mexico, which is really catching on to the whole “Beavers save water” thing.

Forest officials take cue from beavers to improve wildlife habitat

Oh yeah, good morning from Tulocay Creek where Rusty was able to snap this. Memorial day weekend is a great time to see beavers!

Adult beaver visible underwater: Rusty Cohn

BIPOLAR EVENT PLANNING – PART XIV

heidi08 Festival May 14, 2018

For the past 6 months I’ve been alternating between two states of mind. The first is a panicked alarm that moving the event in time and space will make it unattended. I call it the “What if no one comes” song and of course I sang it frequently and often in my sleep.

Then there’s the equally unsettling but more recent refrain that has been added. I call it “What if everybody comes?” with fifty exhibits, a newly published book launch, a famous chalk artist. a magazine article and a possible movie premiere I have developed a corresponding ‘fear of success’. We only have stickers for 120 children. We only have an acre of space. We only have so much parking. You can imagine how that goes.

And then there are the last minute dramas. I was crestfallen to learn that the bats couldn’t come again this year. And Thursday I awoke to an email saying we would have no SF Scottish fiddlers either. !!! I panicked a little and hit the mental rolodex. I remembered how much fun we had the year “Extended Roots” joined us and sent out an invite. They were interested but had a performance that night so needed an earlier time slot. There was shuffling to do and a bass player on a European vacation to confirm. and then VOILA!

It all fell into place. Well temporarily in place. It’s like juggling really. The key to success I’m learning is to be willing to keep the plates in the air.

Extended Roots

“Extended Roots” is an acoustic band comprised of 13 women from the East Bay Area. We have come together from many diverse professions with one common passion, love of music. Our repertoire, which includes both instrumental and vocal numbers, is predominately traditional music from the roots of America. The music the early immigrants brought with them, now called ‘Old-Time’, ‘Celtic’ and ‘Bluegrass,’ is kept alive by Extended Roots.

Plus I received final confirmation from the Alhambra Valley Band this morning that they will start the show, which is always a great way to kick off the day. They were virtually almost entirely sure that most of the members could be there – but you never know until that final signal.

I never doubt the joyful Spirit of ’29 will join us because they have never wavered and I will love to hear them on that stage.

Or that the wonderful Unconcord will close the day of good feeling as magically as we have come to expect.

At noon our trustee Dave Kwinter will lead the children’s parade with his bagpipe and at 1:30 we’ll have an exciting reading from Ben Goldfarb’s book which I hope the whole world will be talking about soon.