Author: Karen GoatKeeper

Karen GoatKeeper loves to write. Her books include picture books, novels and nonfiction for science activity books and nature books. A recent inclusion are science teaching units.
The coming year has goals for two new novels, a picture book and some books of personal essays. This is ambitious and ignores time constraints.
She lives in the Missouri Ozarks with her small herd of Nubian dairy goats. The Ozarks provides the inspiration and setting for most of her books.

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GKP Writing News

Designing Picture Books

Designing picture books is challenging. I’m wrestling with this now as I do sketches for “The Little Spider”.

If you think all you need are a bunch of related illustrations and some simple text, you are not writing and have never written such a book.

The Framework

There are two themes to a picture book. One is the text story. The other is the picture story. They are separate, yet they merge the two into a whole.

Although these books are no longer limited to 32 pages, they do usually have a page total divisible by four. This has to do with how the books are printed.

The Text

The amount of text depends on the age range of the intended reader or listener. Very young children have books with very little text with a limited vocabulary. Very good examples were written by Dr. Seuss.

As the age of the reader increases, the amount of text increases. The books become more like illustrated stories.

“The Little Spider” is for the younger set so the text is limited and repetitive. The illustrations help by showing what the text is talking about.

photographs for designing picture books
One of the little spider’s adventures is meeting up with a bee in a flower. I took the camera out as the little spider was climbing a chicory stem and met a green native bee in a flower. The bees are camera shy, but I persevered. This picture became a model for some picture book sketches.

The Illustrations

Often the person doing the illustrations is not the person doing the text. Instead, that person is known for their art be it watercolor, pen and ink, decoupage, pencil or many other possibilities.

I and many other authors do both the text and illustrations. This gives the author more control over how the two work together in the book.

“The Little Spider”

This book is a simple story of a small spider that balloons to a new location. To do this, the little spider must find a high place and spin a line of silk for the wind to carry it off.

In designing picture books like this one, I first write out a series of text lines. The repetitive line is “The day is warm. I feel the wind. I must hurry.” This is found on the left page as the little spider ends each attempt and goes on to the next. The next action begins on the right page.

So far, my little spider has had seven attempts covering 14 pages. That leaves me devising seven more adventures.

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Latest From High Reaches

Finding Culver’s Root

Finding Culver’s Root was a challenge. This wasn’t because the plant was hidden away somewhere or growing in some special place.

The plant was growing right there along the road. It was even in the same general location where I had seen it several years ago.

Memory versus Reality

I remembered Culver’s Root as being tall and robust. The flower column was several inches tall lined with white flowers. It caught the eye.

The guide book “Missouri Wildflowers” reports the plant can be six feet tall. Maybe my memory wasn’t really at fault.

This year the Culver’s Root plants are much smaller and thinner. Perhaps the recent dry weather and late spring frosts affected them.

Waiting

Finding Culver’s Root was only the first step. The whorled leaves and flower stalk marked these few plants as the ones I sought.

However, the flowers were still buds. That means checking the plants every couple of days until the flowers open.

Culver's Root flowers
Sometimes the flower spike on Culver’s Root stands straight up. The plants I found had interesting curves in theirs.

Photographer’s Problem

The Culver’s Root plants were beside the road. They were also near the top of a hill and over the edge. This is a steep hill dropping down into the creek bed.

Although I know the drop is only 30 feet or so, it looks much farther to me. I don’t want to slip on the gravel and go over. Heights bother me.

The Solution

The flowers started opening. As is true of many such flower stalks, the lower flowers open first. As these fade, the ones above them open until the top flowers open.

I sat down on the edge of the road. The plants were just within reach. I pulled a couple over, steadied them and took some pictures.

Now that finding Culver’s Root is off my list, I think I’ll tackle the native cactus. A friend spotted a plant so the waiting for it to bloom begins.

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GKP Writing News

The Little Spider

In late spring long lines of spider silk waft across the yard. These are single strands, not webs. “The Little Spider” was written as I found out more about these gossamer strands.

Lots of spiders call my place home. They come in many sizes and colors. They are welcome as they help decimate the fly and mosquito populations. The orb web weavers are the main ones to make gossamer silk in the spring.

Spring Spiders

Wolf and jumping spiders survive the winter hidden in building crevices or leaf litter in the woods. They come out on warm winter days and in the spring. By summer these have laid eggs that hatch over the summer into fall. These rarely make gossamer silk.

The Little Spider was once an egg in a case
In late summer the large garden spiders – all females – mate and create egg cases like these. The spiders will die with frost. The egg cases will survive the winter protecting the eggs inside. These will become baby spiders once spring warms the area.

Orb weaving spiders die in the fall. They leave behind silken egg containers filled with eggs that hatch in the spring (Remember “Charlotte’s Web”?). These spiderlings scatter and build tiny webs in the grass. I see them decorated with dew shining in the morning sun.

These spiderlings are nearly blind as were their parents. However they do want to move away into their own territories so they can get more food.

Spiders On the Move

Tiny spiderlings may run fast, but it takes a long time for them to go any distance simply because they are so small. “The Little Spider” is about such a little spiderling that wants to move and has a way to go a great distance.

When the temperature is warm and the air has a slight updraft, spiderlings find a high place to stand. They spin a strand of gossamer silk. The air catches the silk and pulls it upward.

When the silk is long enough, the pull is great enough for the spiderling to be pulled aloft. This is called ballooning.

How Far?

Although most spiderlings don’t drift very far, others do. They have been found thousands of feet in the air on airplanes or miles out to sea on ships. Some cross the English Channel.

gossamer spider silk on pasture
Gossamer silk spreads across the pasture after spiders go ballooning and return to earth. A few build webs soon after landing.

After landing, the spiderlings cut loose their silk strand. These gossamer strands are left spread across pastures, buildings or blowing in the wind.

This journey is the story in my proposed picture book “The Little Spider”. Being a picture book, illustrations are important and take a long time to do. They begin with the sketches I am doing now just as a tiny spider’s journey begins with finding that high spot.

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GKP Writing News

Changing Novels Into Books

When I wrote my first novel, “Broken Promises”, I had the idea that completing the novel was all there was to it. How wrong I was. Changing novels into books takes lots more work and thought. Open any novel and you can see all the extra things added.

Front Matter

All the pages before the first line of the novel are referred to as front matter. This can include the title page, copyright page, dedication and table of contents. These are not always the same for a printed book and a digital one.

My title pages always have a reference to the place the book is published. I have my print copy, GoatKeepers Press; the Kindle copy, Kindle Edition; and the Smashwords copy, Smashwords Edition.

The Table of Contents lists the same chapters. It doesn’t have to be in the printed book, but must be in the digital ones.

Each chapter has a title. The print book has page numbers. The digital copies have hyperlinks from the Table to the chapters and back again.

The Novel

Well, this is what I wrote, isn’t it? Changing novels into books means making changes here too.

Look at a published novel. All the text has even edges on left and right. There are page numbers. Each chapter usually begins on a new page.

And the last page of each chapter is not only a line or two long. If this is the case, I go back in the chapter and either add text or condense so the last page has several lines or becomes part of the previous page.

Digital copies have no page numbers. Usually, they have few page designations as the text flows freely on the ereader. The text is not justified with those even edges, but left justified.

part of changing novels into books is writing the back cover
Potential readers often look first at the title, then the cover and last the back cover for a summary of the book. Each indicates something about the book letting the reader know if it is a book that sounds interesting to them. The novel is important, both the story and the editing. but the title and cover are just as important as the novel will never be read if the others don’t interest the reader enough to open the cover. This one needs work.

Back Matter

Lots of stuff can be at the end of a novel. Some series have the first chapter of the next book. Acknowledgements by the author to people who helped with the novel, comments about the novel and lists of other books by the author are common.

Print books list the author’s website or other social media platform. Digital copies may even include links to these places.

Changing novels into books takes time and thought. But a book is not complete without all of these additions.

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Latest From High Reaches

Thirsty Plants

Summer has arrived in the Ozarks. Along with summer have come tiny rains and hot temperatures. That adds up to thirsty plants.

Wild plants along the roads stand with drooping, wilting leaves. There isn’t much help for them. That is the terrible thing about even a small drought: watching day by day as everything dries up and turns brown.

In the Garden

Some gardeners let their gardens dry up. Their plants must survive just like the wild ones as the gardeners pray for rain that may, if the garden is under the right cloud, fall in time.

I prefer to water and mulch. My garden represents a lot of planning and work. The plants are finally starting to produce vegetables for the table.

Getting Water

The only water sources near my garden are a dug well with a hand pump, the rain barrels and the creek. There is no faucet and hose. Instead, there are two watering cans.

Thirsty plants need plenty of water. Each of 60 tomato plants requires a full can. The pepper plants are smaller and take a little less. The squash plants need full cans and more. It adds up to about 80 cans of water and hours of time.

A better solution is pumping water up from the creek. This is an adventure.

eggplant experiment
Eggplant is a plant I rarely grow as my garden seems to be flea beetle central. These two plants have been under mosquito netting until they began blooming. Maybe they are big and healthy enough to survive now.

Creek Water and Fire Hose

A few years ago, the old water hose wore out. The replacement hose is a discharge hose, better described as a small fire hose. It is designed to move as much water as possible in the least amount of time.

There is no way to water my thirsty plants this way without getting wet, very wet. That is not a problem in the hot weather

The biggest problem is reducing the water flow enough to not uproot the plants while trying to water them. Mulch helps.

butternut squash vines are thirsty plants
My garden never has enough room in it. This year the butternut squash are growing up over the shade house. It does save space and shades the interior, but the vines can’t put down extra roots. If any of the squash get too big, they need supporting. And the vines try their best to escape and spread all over. There are three plants on each side. All take a gallon of water a day once they are twice this size. At least the squash bug eggs are easy to spot on the leaves and vines up on the cattle panel.

Waiting For Rain

Twice a week now I argue with the hose. My thirsty plants look good. I’m picking squash and watching tomatoes hoping they will turn red sometime soon.

My garden survives because I can water it. My pastures were ready to cut for hay. The balers haven’t gotten here. In another week, there will be no hay, only straw.

The clouds drift by. Maybe my pastures will be under the right cloud soon.

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Latest From High Reaches

Raising African Violets

Houseplants, especially finicky ones like African violets are not a good match for me. They tend to die quickly of either neglect or overwatering.

The other problem for my houseplants is my ancient house with its dark rooms and damp drafts. It gets cold in the winter and hot in the summer.

Accumulation of Houseplants

Even though houseplants did so poorly for me, I kept trying. For a time, this was due to teaching as I wanted ferns for my classes. Two survived for years in my classroom. The native Christmas fern was returned to the hills when I left teaching. The other still tries to survive here.

A philodendron vine managed to survive a spring frost. I had just put the plants out for the summer and I covered the garden and forgot them.

My other houseplant is impressive. It is a Norfolk Island Pine now close to seven feet tall. Its pot is on wheels, but I can no longer manage to put it out for the summer.

African violets in bloom
African violets seem to have disappeared as being old fashioned. Perhaps they seem too tame as they are just piles of deep green, velvety leaves. Then the plants put up mounds of flowers over a couple of weeks. The orginal color is blue, but many others are available, if you look for them. They are easy to start using leaves.

Enter the African Violets

For a couple of years, I wrote columns for a local ad paper. I was just learning to write professionally. For subject matter, I interviewed local people and wrote about their hobbies and businesses.

One woman raised African violets. Her house was full of them, blue and pink. They were lovely.

These plants are easy to start from leaves. This woman would start several and sell them at her church bazaar.

When I left, two little plants went with me. I was positive they were doomed.

Surprise

At home I set these doomed plants on a shelf in a north facing window. They loved it. They grew big and bloomed. I started some new ones.

Now my north window sports lovely blue and pink flowers. They have moved into the kitchen west facing window as well and are putting on quite a show this summer.

African violets aren’t seen so much now. Succulents are the big houseplant item now. Perhaps the finicky reputation violets have is part of the reason. It’s a shame as, if you look for them, African violets come in many colors and do very well, if you have a window sill they like.

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Latest From High Reaches

A Country Year

Leonard Hall was a farmer. I am a homesteader. Yet his book “A Country Year” reminded me so many times why I chose and stayed in this life.

The difference between a farmer and a homesteader rests mostly on two things. One is the size of the operation. The other is profit. A farmer wants profit from his endeavors. A homesteader appreciates return on time and money, but it isn’t the main motivation.

Organizing Time

A year has twelve months. “A Country Year” goes month by month, but starts in March as that is when spring begins to creep into the Ozarks. The chores, tasks and more discussed are done from a time now passed and still present in some ways. Mostly the machinery and attitudes have changed.

The book is set in the late 1950s. So many things were different then. I was surprised the Ozarks had a five year drought as those I’m familiar with lasted only for the summer or, at most, a year.

Hall raised beef cattle, Hereford. Black Angus are all the rage now. His advice is good: putting out good pasture, good hay, not overgrazing and keeping track of the cattle apply for any livestock operation.

Oops.

A Country Year mentions planting multiflora roses
Multiflora roses are lovely in bloom. The flowers are white or pinkish white and have little scent. They normally have many thorns and the plants get large with canes growing ten feet up into trees or meshing with other rose plants. These flowers produce small hips and lots of them so the plants spread readily both by seed and from canes touching the ground and rooting.

Back then multiflora roses, the ‘living fence’ were being promoted. Sericea lespedeza was the pasture legume to grow. Both are considered alien invasives now. However, their widespread presence makes them permanent residents.

Multiflora roses spread quickly. They produce many small hips (seed pods) not as well liked as those of the native roses. These rose canes can grow up into trees and kill saplings.

Sericea lespedeza isn’t well liked by cattle. It seeds prolifically and can take over large areas. Roadsides, hillsides, good soil, poor soil make no difference to it. Goats and sheep relish it both fresh and as hay.

Why Homestead?

Along side the tales of history, people, hunting, fall butchering and monthly tasks, is a running commentary on the native plants and animals. Hall believed in conservation and practiced it. Over the years on his farm Possum Trot, the land healed from years of misuse. It became productive and brought back the native plants and animals as well as providing him a living.

Hall hints at then states in “A Country Year” why he loves living rural. For the author as for me, the biggest reason for living this life with all its work, problems, joys and disappointments is just that. There is time to look out at the hills or down a pasture and admire the beauty, the quiet (lack of city noise) and think my own thoughts.

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GKP Writing News

Hopes, Dreams and Reality Cover

I am not an artist or an illustrator really. I am an author who needs covers and illustrations for books and prefers or needs to do them myself. That is the case for the “Hopes, Dreams and Reality” cover.

The novel surrounds a storm, before, during and after. Mindy, the main character, goes through the storm even though it leaves her isolated with no phone, electricity or water and with the road washed out and blocked by fallen trees. Other complications arise both just before and during the storm.

Planning the Cover

Since the storm is the main trigger for all that happens, it made sense to me to use it on the cover. It is a major storm and Mindy must fight it, so the cover has her fighting the storm.

A sketch took shape around these. This was done on drawing paper with pencil. It was transferred to watercolor paper for painting.

My preferred medium is watercolor. The quality of the colors appeal to me although I am prone to make mistakes. Watercolor mistakes are permanent and must be incorporated into the painting or mitigated somehow.

A big storm keeps the day dark, muting colors. The mood will also be muted. These affect the colors I choose to use for the Hopes, Dreams and Reality cover.

Working In Watercolor

Once the sketch is on the watercolor paper and the chosen tube of paints are laid out, the actual painting can begin. Watercolor has several choices and problems to work with.

There is no white in watercolor. The paper is white and, wherever white is wanted, no paint is put. This takes careful planning. It is possible to mask these areas, but I don’t.

Watercolor paint is just that: water based. The painter must add water to the paint in order to use it. More water results in a thin layer of color called a wash. Less water gives sharper lines and thicker color. When to use wash or dry brush needs planning ahead too.

The final, and most difficult for me, problem is time. Each color must have time to dry before a neighboring spot is painted or the paint will bleed or spread into the other area altering color and shape. I hate to sit and wait.

Hopes, Dreams and Reality cover
My covers are a usually a blend of digital and watercolor. For the Hopes, Dreams and Reality cover, I painted the figure then scanned it into the computer. Then I added the background color and printing. Sometimes I do these with watercolor, but opted for the digital with this cover. And, yes, I corrected a few problems with the watercolor.

The Cover

After negotiating my way through all of the steps, I finally have the Hopes, Dreams and Reality cover. Now I need to finish the final edit.

If you have any comments or suggestions, let me know through the Contact Page.

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Latest From High Reaches

Nubian Goat Kids For Sale

Goat kids grow up so fast. One day they are so little and cute. Three months later they are big and I have Nubian goat kids for sale.

Much as I hate to part with these kids, they must find new homes. Keeping up with the work involved with the goats is getting too hard, so I made the difficult decision to not keep any kids and let my herd gradually die off.

All of my adult Nubians are registered as American Nubians with the American Dairy Goat Association. These kids can be registered as American Nubians.

My buck, the sire of all of these kids, is High Reaches Silk’s Augustus.

Nubian buck kid for sale
For a moment Nubian buck Lucky Boy stood showing off his good looks. He is usually playing chase with Favorite Girl.

Lucky Boy

When barely a month old this buck got lost out on the hills, was out through a six inch storm and found his way home again. In that he was very lucky.

Now this three month old (born March 3, 2023), frosted black, disbudded and friendly fellow needs his luck to hold and find him a good home. He does love the does which is a problem as he can soon disrupt my breeding plans.

Lucky Boy’s Mother is High Reaches Natasha. She is frosted gray, calm, friendly, an easy and good milker.

Nubian goat kids for sale includes Nubian buck born March 1
Little Nubian bucks become a problem in the herd by about four months old. This good looking buck is starting to think he should be in charge.

Brown Boy

Juliette’s buck kid has perfected the classic Nubian buck pose. His sleek brown fur glistens in the sunlight. His frosted ears and nose have a little white smile between them.

This buck is disbudded and was born March 1, 2023. His mother, High Reaches Juliette, is an old doe retiring after this year so he is her last kid. She was a spoiled little house goat when first born and was the model for the “Capri Capers” cover.

Lovely Nubian doe for sale
People notice the long ears. I see the smooth, glistening coat in golden fawn brown offset by the black dorsal stripe, those long legs, and wish I could keep what should become an excellent milking Nubian doe.

Fawn Brown Girl

High Reaches Spring’s beautiful doe has good milking background. She is disbudded.

At almost four months old, this doe would draw attention at a goat show with her looks and bearing. She was born February 28, 2023. Her mother is a very good milker.

Polled Nubian doe kid is for sale
Favorite Girl loves to play especially when it involves jumping and climbing. It’s hard to get a good picture of her as she never seems to stop and pose.

Favorite Doe

All right, I’m not supposed to pick favorites. However, this doe adopted me when she was born on March 13, 2023 and demands attention, being jealous of any other goat getting what should be her petting and scratches.

High Reaches Drucilla, Favorite Girl’s mother, has been one of my best milkers. This doe is her last kid as she will retire this year.

This doe is special for more than being friendly. She is polled, born without horns.

Reaching Me

I do check my emails through this site a couple of times a week. And the Contact Page is working as the various spams I get prove.

These Nubian goat kids for sale are also listed on Craig’s List for the lake of the Ozarks area with additional email and phone information.

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GKP Writing News

Creating Book Covers

My last week has been spent creating book covers for both my new novel “Hopes, Dreams and Reality” and the teaching units from “The City Water Project”. That means nine covers.

Finding Images

There are online places to seek and purchase novel covers. I’ve looked at a couple and found the covers look nice, but don’t suit what I’ve written.

That leaves me deciding on images and drawing my cover designs. For nature books I can use photographs with the title etc. put on them using the computer. All other book covers must be drawn.

The image must reflect the book or teaching unit. The first water unit has two activities concerned with bottled waters and comparing tastes. The cover image is a water bottle.

For “Hopes, Dreams and Reality” the choice was more difficult. The book spans almost a month. The major storm takes four days yet sets everything else in motion. So, the image needed to reflect the storm.

Readers like seeing people on the covers. I don’t like drawing people. Having the main character, Mindy, standing holding an umbrella seemed so trite. The cover image I’m working with has Mindy fighting the wind and rain with her umbrella on her way to the barn.

Complications in Creating Book Covers

There is more on a book cover than the image. The title and author is on it too. The image may take center stage, but there must be room for the writing.

Another decision is whether or not I will write the title on the image or use the computer to add it to the image as I finish the cover later. With the teaching units I printed the titles on the covers. For my novel, I will use the computer.

creating book covers requires fitting the cover to the project
If this were a book cover, I would add a dark blue border to define the cover as I did with “The Pumpkin Project”. This is for a digital download teaching unit from “The cith Water Project” so the border is not needed.

Creating the Cover

Sketches are fine. I sketch all my covers and illustrations with pencil first. Then I clear table space and take out my watercolors.

Watercolor pictures look good to me. I like the quality of the colors.

Watercolor is unforgiving. Any mistake is permanent. That is a major reason most artists prefer painting with oils and acrylics.

Digital Art

I know a digital artist and love her work. I still prefer creating book covers and illustrations with watercolor. Then I scan them into my computer.

This lets me add writing, if I want to, crop the image to the size of the book and, most importantly, fix mistakes where lines got too thick and other flaws in my image. I can also add an all over background color instead of using a wash.

Does my method of creating book covers work for everyone? Definitely not. It does work for me.