ippuku abisensei🍵🐔👘

**Longer than usual post warning! About a magazine article’s length. Buckle up, kids!**

Last Wednesday, I thought I had my weekend plans on lock – going to visit Oma and record more of her stories for her YouTube page with Scott, maybe hit up the Asian market near her place for some staples.

But then she got sick. Ended up in the ER sick. (side note: She is not out of the woods yet but is doing better now thank you) So our Saturday suddenly opened up.

And that was when the Social Media Manager from Omlet slid into my inbox.

Was I free this weekend? Did I want to travel out to upstate New York for the Country Living Fair and hang with the Omlet crew?

The answer was an absolute HELL YEAH I DID!

It’s no secret that I’ve been an Omlet fan girl for the past few years now. We use 90% of their chicken products on the daily. I recommend them to everyone who keeps chickens and wants their feather babies to be safe and cozy. Without sounding too much like a saleslady, we go hard for Omlet stuff out here in our woods.

So of course I jumped at the opportunity to go out and meet the team that makes this stuff.

I spent the next few days arranging travel plans – checking ALL the chademo EV chargers along the route, snagging a hotel room, etc. By Saturday at 5AM I was PUMPED and ready to roll.

The drive out west was stunning. Beautiful flaming red, orange, and yellow foliage. Cool, crisp air. Wide open sky that transformed from a starry inky black to clear blue as I made my way to the fairgrounds.

I arrived around 9:30AM and snagged a great parking spot that indicated someone must have come and gone well before the Fair was open to to the public. I thanked the parking gods. Today was going to be a great day.

I was greeted upon arrival by Rosie (Omlet’s Social Media Manager) and she hooked me up with my entry band and introduced me to the whole crew we’d be working with that day. It was a pleasure to meet everyone, and I learned that I had little bit of a reputation at the Omlet HQ from some previous projects that I’d worked on with them. I’m not gonna lie, it made me super happy to hear that.

After introductions, I was gifted an AMAZING swag bag full of Omlet goodies and a schedule of the day’s events. Christmas came early for me, and the Omlet crew was my Santa. There was a beanie, a cap, stickers, a lovely Yeti tumbler, an egg carton, and an item that is not yet released that I am VERY excited about. This item had been on my wishlist for a while, and I did a super happy dance when I saw it. Whoever put these goodie bags together freaking NAILED IT. THANK YOU SO MUCH!

And then the big dog himself arrived: Hanns Paul, co-founder of Omlet.

It was a surprise and an absolute pleasure meeting him in person, and I was really flattered that he had read – and actually ENJOYED reading – this humble little blog. We then chatted at length about all things chicken keeping and what the chicken means to us and their influence on our lives. We covered a lot of ground on topics like what could be improved with modern chicken setups, how do chickens impact humans and human emotional needs beyond being food, along a plethora of other topics. I’m still processing the large amount of ground we covered during our chat.

Honestly, this curiously inquisitive line of thinking is what I love so much about the Omlet brand itself – always questioning, always learning, constantly tinkering. Always looking forward to making new discoveries. Exploring what chickens mean to us and how their presence can be therapeutic and healing. Diving into the deep history of the human-chicken connection to see what insights can be found.

It is right there in their branding, which I shamelessly lifted for my last blog post title: Because of the Chicken.

All of these ideas resonate with me on a personal level as explained in my last post, and it is also worth noting that I raised our first batch of chickens partially with the intent of giving them jobs as actual breed ambassadors and taking them out to places like nursing homes and schools to show people their healing nature. That idea sort of fell to the wayside, but our chickens have attended many a telehealth appointment with me as emotional support and vibe with me on the daily, so I guess that counts.

The first event after greetings was Chicken Meditation. I was joined by a few fellow Omlet invitees to hold a chicken and just vibe out with them. The objective here was to measure how hanging with a chicken could be therapeutic and relaxing, and for science we measured our blood pressure with fingertip pulse oximeters before, during, and after meditating with our new chicken buds.

And honestly? It was fun! The chickens were a little spicy at first and rightfully so – they didn’t know me and I didn’t know them, but soon after they realized there was no danger they calmed down and one even fell asleep in someone else’s lap. It was a great experience, and was very similar to how we do chicken recess and sitting time with our birds during lunch breaks at home.

I am happy to report that my blood pressure started at 89, dropped to 49 while in vibe, and then stabilized around 75-79ish. So the science doesn’t lie – chickens really do have a magic calming effect! Either that or I have a health issue that I don’t know about!

We also were joined by Hilary Hawke, a professional banjo player, to see how the chickens would interact with music. Would they freak out? Would they enjoy it? Would it also have a calming effect?

The answer is yes. At first they were a little worried, but their attention quickly turned to interest as their mental alarm bells began to fade. After about 15-20 minutes, they were calmly laying in the grass together enjoying Hilary’s music. It was honestly a whole vibe – just some chill people and chill chickens hanging out and enjoying each other’s company. The kind of group companionship that transcends across all living things. We are all occupying this space together and having a great time.

The day flew by shortly after Hilary packed up playing for the birds – lunch was fried pickles and apple crisp. I visited a few of the vendor halls with THOUSANDS of goodies like clothes, antiques, candles, blankets, and crafts. It honestly had a great energy to it and I enjoyed looking around. I will admit that I didn’t buy anything though out of an abundance of caution: living in a tiny home means that we don’t have much space for a lot of stuff, so it was window shopping for me that day.

I did encounter a vender named Lisa who had a beautiful wool kimono ensemble and dressing set, so the temptation there to purchase was very real. I LOVE me some wool kimono but don’t own any at the moment. I actually did try it on, but as with most vintage pieces it was both too short AND too narrow for my big American booty. Boo for me, but hopefully someone else dropped by and picked up that great set.

Yes, I know I could’ve finagled the dressing to MAKE it fit me, but that isn’t the point.

Last on our agenda for the day was a live chat with Hanns, Rachel Hardage Barrett (editor in chief of Country Living Magazine) and – to my complete surprise and delight – Melissa Caughey, author of How to Speak Chicken and webmaster of Tilly’s Nest.

EXCUSE ME WAT.

All these heavy hitters on one stage? GET OUT.

Honestly it was awesome to listen to three seasoned chicken pros talk about the recent surge in chicken keepers, and why chicken keeping appeals to people who don’t consider themselves farmers. Turns out, with a rise of what Melissa calls “Henfluencers” on social media combined with Hanns’s answer of chickens nourishing the human soul for the past few thousand years, it is easy to see why more and more people are picking up the hobby.

I really enjoyed the chicken chat, and Hann’s take on chickens as a great modern pet (paraphrasing from my notes here): “Chickens are the perfect modern animal to keep, and they give you an instant, tangible result after taking good care of them – eggs! I’ve never seen AI lay an egg!”

Right. On. Brother. We feel pretty much the same way in our house.

At the end of the chat, I got to talk briefly with Rachel and Melissa too. Rachel IMMEDIATELY noticed my Molly Yeh chicken sweater from last year’s collection with Tractor Supply, and that made me very happy.

It was also really nice to let Melissa know that I really enjoyed her books, and am looking forward to her new one coming out. We had to wrap up quickly since we were late for our dinner reservation, so I didn’t get to talk to her as much as I would’ve liked and I feel like I kind of ghosted her.

So Melissa if you see this, I’m sorry and hope we can chat again soon!

After the chicken chat, the fair came to a close for the day, and I was able to enjoy a wonderful meal with the Omlet team and the other invitees. It was a great time with wonderful food and conversation, and I am super grateful for the whole experience. It was awesome to connect with so many cool and like-minded people and I hope to have more opportunities to do so.

Thank you so much to everyone at Omlet for a wonderful time, and I hope to meet up with you all again sometime.