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The 2013 Earth Day Parade—-in the Grand Traverse Bay area, began publicly, with a Community Sing on March 20th and ended with a lovely parade on a sunny-snowflake of a day, on April 20th, 2013.

But we are not finished yet.

Here are pictures and a few storytelling sentences that were part of this 24th annual community art and street theater project…in celebration of Earth Day…”Seeds! Awesome Vessels of Power!”

Parade workshop photographs

Earth Day Parade Photographs

“Seeds! Awesome Vessels of Power”  is a simple story about the life-cycle of the seed, and how our actions affect our beautiful, seeded world and planet home. If we do not understand what awesome vessels of power seeds are, and that we must tend to our precious seeds nothing on this planet will survive. Our parade is a simple story about life unfolding, and it is a call to wake up and take action. We are pleased to be presenting a fresh version of a story in honor of Earth Day, by recognizing how truly amazing a seed is.

Many thanks to Gaylord Nelson’s idea of a “teach-in”–which was more than just a “sixties jargon”, and to which we agree is defined as educational, school-based, widely distributed, locally controlled and with invitation for mass-participation.

Many thanks to our community for welcoming and participating in the creation of this parade.  Many, grateful thanks to those who have contributed the necessary funds to support this community tradition and project, so far….

Did you support this year’s Earth Day Parade in Traverse City, with a monetary contribution?  If not, can you now give a donation of $20 or more?  Any amount will be gratefully accepted.  Beyond the dozens of hours our staff and parade crew and volunteers donated their time to this event, we are still working to cover the very basic costs of this year’s parade, and will continue to do so until it is reached.

Earth Day IS Every Day: Help us by giving us the help we need to cover this year’s costs (2013), so that we can begin again, and keep this parade going in 2014.

Please know you can easily and immediately donate towards the Earth Day Parade in these ways:

1. On this site www.littleartshram.org click on “Donate: causes” in the top right hand corner, under the sunflower and crow.

2.  Or, mail tax-deductable donations to:

Little Artshram/Earth Day Parade

P.O. Box 844

Traverse City, Michigan 49685

THANK YOU

`penny Krebiehl

for Little Artshram

www.littleartshram.org

`penny’s parade journal, Wednesday, April 17th

This morning my heart-mind and body is swimming between the worlds of work and need.  Wednesday is a bit of water-section and center-section day with an evening of air-section, as my energy permits.

But, starting it off is a combo-reality check-in about this week being in part a very BIG left-brain sort of week –being tax-week–looking at the actual earned income of an artist/educator/garden-farmer; while continuing to plot out my personal income streams (paying my living expenses).  Arks to the balancing of the left and right brain-work—but gratitude as I sit in both places—right/left; student/teacher–all the  while continuing to stay true the best I’m able to my impassioned work, a little outside of the box—and defending/persevering in those roles.

SO—I go to a morning read and source of both inspiration and mentoring from another who is doing similar work as I, although on a MUCH grander scale, and I reflect on the role of both self and community educating with the utmost respect, what the heck I’m doing, and, why I continue this kind of creative work that enchants, exhausts, and enriches me.

In other words, I’m being asked to explain myself.

So here goes:

Earth Day Parade Q&A

The Economics of the Earth Day Parade:

The Earth Day Parade has miraculously thrived in somewhat of a “gift economy”—a mixture of monetary donations from individuals, combined with labor and vision donations from many, many volunteers, along with a devoted pod of artists and organizers hired for the Earth Day Parade who blend countless hours of volunteer labor within their honorariums fees.

Some questions you might have:

Who Produces the Earth Day Parade?

Little Artshram is responsible for the production of the Earth Day Parade. It is at the minimum a 6-month process for our staff—fundraising, organizing, training artists, securing permits, with addressing logistical and creative questions that take all of our skills to support the community in producing the final event.

Does the City of Traverse City sponsor the Earth Day Parade?

No. The city supports us by assisting/guiding us through the paperwork/permit process and give kudos to the Earth Day Parade as a example of a community art event. However, we get no financial support from the City. We pay for all the  services ($1,500), liability insurances, street permits, and expenses.

Does the Traverse City Parks Department support the Earth Day Parade?

Through the years at our Earth Day Parade and community picnic and celebration at Hannah Lay Park, the Parks Department has been very helpful.  HOWEVER, this year, because of our budget constraints and need for additional volunteer support, AND because collaboration is a good thing, for our after-party, we are joining the Dirt Fest at NMC.  INFO on the Dirt Fest is here:  https://www.facebook.com/events/236036129870976/?fref=ts

How is the Earth Day Parade budget structured and why do we need financial support?

EXPENSES:

People and people services: (fulltime and part-time artists, organizers,  including training/set-up of parade parking/traffic patrol, information/recycling, etc.): $2500.00*,

(For nine (9) weeks, of the six (6) months of parade organization, the full and part-time artists alone have clocked in over 600 hours, of heart-mind-hands-on work.  AND, please note: this represents 6 people with stipends, not a full-hourly wage.)

Insurance and permits: $1500.00

Printing, promotion, and fundraising mailings: $500

Supplies for puppets and parade-building materials and expenses: $1500.00* (give or take–depending on how much “stuff” we glean and search out)

Space rental, at Blackbird Arts for the parade build and housing our guest artist and puppeteer: $700

TOTAL EXPENSES: $7,700.00

Solicited contributions before the Earth Day Parade: $1,250.00

Contributions we would like to collect on Earth Day Parade day: $1750.00 (*note: not certain of this yet)

Sponsorships: $4200.00 (*note: not certain of this yet)

Little Artshram operating support in 2013: $500.00, in on-hand materials/supplies/services (PLUS, volunteer-time/task-oriented gifting)

TOTAL INCOME: $7,700.00

*With expenses, supplies for puppets are only $1,500, with a priority on people costs: $2,500.  You can see that the folks working to bring this community project to life are donating much of their time, as well as, the Little Artshram organization. We are both proud of this, and concerned that this model of gifting our community is WAY out of balance and will be adjusted to reflect a living wage for the people power/workers in 2014.

*All our income is uncertain and mostly raised from many donations of small amounts.

It takes both money and volunteers!

Over the past 24 years, as the Earth Day Parade and community celebration has grown, there have many added organizational expenses for permits, fees, staff, and more. Many people do not realize that the Earth Day Parade does cost money—that it is at the very least a 6-month-long project to assure its wonderfulness each year.  Little Artshram subsidizes the expenses from its general operating support, and has always worked to increase the focus both on donations for the day of the Earth Day Parade itself and on opportunities for businesses along the parade route and community group sponsorships. The recent years have been difficult for two main reasons:

1) With the general economic downturn, Little Artshram has had less to offer from its general operating support.

2) Low turn-out of pre-parade participants/volunteers in the parade-building workshops and a couple of  years of unfortunate weather the day of the Earth Day Parade celebration.

We truly do NOT have a budget to cut-back on, and we never have.  The devoted dozen or so folks holding the energy and framework of this parade have always and are still gifting the Traverse City community with this 24 year tradition of a community art project.  But this needs to change this year, in order to ensure this community event continue in 2014.

Our expense budget outlined above is realistic.  Just like investing in a CSA-community supported agriculture membership, we ask folks to understand that we cannot predict the weather, yet ask for your investment in our work regardless.

We are so incredibly frugal when it comes to any sort of purchase or expense added on to the bare minimum of projected costs, and we do so with a true garbage-artist sense of glee and pride!  Making stuff out of stuff ROCKS!

AND, this year, as an incredible act of our belief in ABUNDANCE rather than scarcity, we are gifting this community with even more, through the generosity of a professional parade artist and puppeteer from In the Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theater joining the parade staff—-as he is gifting us with his presence, energy and commitment to our shared work of community art and street theater!

In order to make this parade a smooth, safe running public event, we actually need to INCREASE our staff in 2014, and know that we can not continue to rely on volunteers putting forth what amounts to a full-time, 40 hour a week job, on top of another 40 hour a week job.

At the same time, we also need additional volunteers. The more years someone volunteers, the more skilled they are. That helps us greatly. Volunteering can be as little as a one-time deal on day of the Earth Day Parade, or as long as the 4 weeks of consistent support we need for the public workshops beforehand. This has been especially crucial in 2013 as we are working with a minimal number of parade artists who are leading workshops, designing, organizing and building the parade.

Could you still join us—even these last few days of parade week—as a workshop volunteer?

We will need help finding Happy Can Hosts, people who will follow our parade route these next few days with donation cans and parade info, encouraging additional sponsorships—-AND, show up on parade day, decked out in a mask and costume asking for donations along our parade route. Would you be one?

Could you be a volunteer on the day of the Earth Day Parade to help set up, pack-up the puppets and parade gear?

Could you help with the parade studio clean-up on Sunday at Blackbird Arts?

Can the Earth Day Parade be sustained by many people, or by several big corporations (as some recommended)?

We believe that the Earth Day Parade can be sustained by the strength of the community, built by donations from people who want it to continue as a community art-making, vision-stretching, life-affirming event. If everyone who comes to the Earth Day Parade contributed  $5-20, (less than the cost of a movie), then Earth Day Parade would flourish, end of story. On parade day, with just 250 people each giving $20: that is $5,000!

We need your help to keep the Earth Day Parade with its freedom of expression rising honestly from the community. Would you really wish to see a corporation brand the Earth Day Parade with their logo? Nestle’s Ice Mountain company for instance—do you remember several of our parades focus on the issue of water privatization along with the most recent being 2012 titled “The Great Lakes: Our Living Water”.  Each time we theme a parade with our love and concern for our fresh water lakes, we send out among other concerns a continued plea to end the proliferation of plastic bottled water and the selling of water for a profit.  Would they have allowed the community to raise awareness about the negative issues of privatized water?

PLEASE join us and let’s build a broad base of financial and volunteer support to assure the future sustainability of the Earth Day Parade! Little Artshram and a our small pod of faithful community members,  cannot do it alone.

How do we build a broad base of financial and volunteer support?

Are there those among you who would step forward to inspire a group of your friends to support the Earth Day Parade financially? Say, 10 or 20 friends? An  idea is to host a parade-route block-party, or fundraising breakfasts and brunches on the day of the event. Teams can be made up of children, teens, beautiful young adults, families, old timers, you name it. You probably have better ideas than we do–who is it that loves the Earth Day Parade and celebration?

Are there organizations or clubs that could be a sponsor the Earth Day Parade such as your co-op, or church?

What other ideas do you have?

We now ask for donations on the day of the Earth Day Parade (such as when people purchase tickets to events). How could we do this in a fun, successful way?

If the Earth Day Parade is to continue another quarter century, and have a long life, inspiring and delighting generations yet to come, it must have the community’s financial and volunteer support. That is the simple fact of it. Now is the time to help continue this tradition.

Climb aboard this Earth Day Parade Train! We want to honor you by adding your name to this list:

Here is our growing list of folks and businesses that are coming aboard our parade-train as sponsors and partners along with Blackbird Arts:  Chelsea Taylor, Anne Drake, Kristin Anton—devoted artists, teachers and a fantastic part of our parade crew, Sharon and Kerry hands-on volunteers, TC Sings! The Good Work Collective, The Great Lakes Children’s Museum, Scrap TC, NMC Student Life Organization, Oryana Natural Foods Market, O’k Puppet Theater and The Pretty Good Players, Mayor and Mrs. Michael Estes, Jack and Susan Seaman, Sandi McArthur and Jeff Anderson, several anonymous donors….

What will you get in return?  LOVE! APPRECIATION! and a PARADE!

Although it may not be obvious, there is an online donation option on the Little Artshram web site. Click on the words “Donate; Causes” on the top right side of the home page, just beneath the crow and sunflowers. This will get you to our standard “year round” donation page under our “mother” non-profit Greater Lansing ARTSPACE/dba Little Artshram, allowing you to donate.

Please know everyone can easily and immediately donate towards the Earth Day Parade in these ways:

1. On our site www.littleartshram.org click on “Donate: causes” for donation page.

2. On Earth Day Parade day, when you see a person with a “Happy Can” coming your way

3. Mailing a check: Little Artshram, P. O. Box 844, Traverse City, Michigan, 49685

4. Show up at our puppet and parade building studio in the next two days and take on a volunteer shift, or sign-up to wear one of our BIG puppets and join in one of the parade sections.

Little Artshram is a registered 501.c3 non-profit organization and all gifts are tax-deductable.

peace, love, art.