u/harlequinhawk

Michael Tyrrell behind the camera doing an impromptu book cover reveal for My Daily Piney: Heartfelt Stories Rooted in the Pines Fall & Winter Editions. This book completes the 2-book series and is one of our best yet! Michael created the whimsical Sage on the cover and has two pieces of art (Sandhills cranes & Turkey vulture) contained with in the flip book. It’s a daily reader series that requires you to flip the book upside down to read the second portion of the book or the next season of stories. All inspired by time spent in the NJ Pine Barrens. Thank you Michael Tyrrell for helping this project become more than just a stack of paper pages. It comes out officially September 1st.

My talented friend Michael and illustrator for our forth coming book series titled My Daily Piney (rel.9/01). It’s my second series (Quintessential NJ Pine Barrens Collection the 1st). I caught up with him today to give him a T-shirt that I had made up special as promotion but also as a thank you for helping this project come to fruition. He had not seen the second book cover as my book cover designer took all the pieces given and created the work for book one and now book two. A talented friend and fellow local history author Dennis McDonald’s photography is also seen on the cover of book one and two. We shot a short video that I’ll post up later this afternoon. Thanks for reading and being an aficionado of knowledge!

Just got done with processing our last batch of fresh picked Jersey blues. And on to some light reading to keep up with My Daily Piney. By the way, like the hat says, so I’m not the only one who has a Ma like that, right?

Roast me if you want but I know these musical devices have been used historically in our area. In a local Pemberton Township history book it featured several bodies of Jew or Jaw harps found out at Hanover Furnace. I’m a Piney who likes to keep it simple. Toss one of these little twanging things in your pocket and you’re on your way to a good time. Any one else play one? Or dug one up while metal detecting?

hEY hey Hey what's happening?

We have a list of events that had one date change due to the unforsaken weather forecast for this Friday. That event at Whitesbog Village in Browns Mills, NJ, is thankfully moved to earlier in the day and on Sunday. Please be advised and plan accordingly!

How will you be celebrating tomorrow, June 28th, 2026? It will be 113 years since the governor of New Jersey gave a campaign speech that has forever shaped how the nation and the state see the Piney. That's if you know what a Piney is in the first place.

Yesterday, after blueberry picking, we did more garage cleanout and organizing, and I put about 20 bales of grapevine wreaths out to the curb. One stack went to a lady in a jacked-up truck who said she was an interior designer, and she asked where I got them. I told her I was a Piney and that I made them. She didn't know what a Piney was. Here I'm celebrating the history of the people of the Pines 113 years later, as the history hasn't been lost to me or to those who choose to read. And the negative stereotype exists still, but some have forgotten all about the people of the Pines. Yet, some of us are still proud to be Piney, especially knowing the history of the word.

My brother-in-law and my sister handcrafted a museum-case-style box for me to hold the deteriorating Boston Evening Transcript I found online from June 28th, 1913 (even the lock was made in 1913). No Piney Museum to donate it to, I hope one day there will be one before I die.

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