The big day
After a couple of weeks preparing everything, I went to the Picnic in the Park event being held in Weston Turville, Aylesbury. The weather was kind although a little breezy. However, the gazebo managed to stay rooted to the spot despite a couple of heavy gusts!
This was my first time of selling face-to-face to the public. I had bought the gazebo, a supply of my books and a card reader. It worked perfectly taking payments from various credit and debit cards including Google Pay on people’s phones.
Fortunately after a dull start, the clouds lifted and we had sunshine, no rain, which helped proceedings. I was lucky enough to meet our local MP Mr Rob Butler. He kindly agreed to have his photo taken alongside myself and my sister Yvonne. It was a pleasure meeting and having a little chat with him.
This event was supported by many other stall holders and organisations. It was my first experience of being on the other side of the table. Definitely a new experience for me. I really enjoyed having people coming up to my stall and buying my books. It was also nice that they gave me their email addresses. I can now keep them informed of what was in the pipeline and when new books are published.
My table
I was able to display a variety of my books. These included colouring books for toddlers and kids, as well as dot to dot books. Also colouring books for adults for stress relief and mental wellbeing. There were various notebooks and exercise books for school and college work as well.
I am always working on new titles to expand the range of books to all ages. At the moment, I am putting together a 50 image ninja colouring book. This will be followed by a book for the older kids in us featuring ‘things that fly’. Hopefully these books will be published and available in the very near future.
I couldn’t have attended this event without help. Therefore, I would like to thank my sister Yvonne and brother-in-law Ken for their amazing help in putting together this enjoyable day for me.
The icing on the cake for me was a display by a WWII Hurricane at RAF Halton. Coming from an RAF family, it was fantastic hearing and seeing this amazing plane against the blue skies.
If you would like to ‘follow me’, I have an Author Page on Amazon where you can subscribe and be kept updated when I publish a new book. You can find my Author Page here: Gordon Chesterman