(Most Likely) Final Update for Camp Elementa!
3 months ago
– Thu, Nov 28, 2024 at 06:16:52 PM
Hello there, backers! Hope you've had a lovely day of it, especially if you're in the USA. It's been a very long ride, but I'm so glad we've seen it through.
I can proudly say that I've shipped out all the books that have been paid for and will stop checking my BackerKit daily for orders come January 2025. Please do let me know on social media if you've been playing and enjoying Camp Elementa or any of my other games. I'm @dvaleris almost everywhere, except on Instagram where I'm @dvalerisActual. My weekly newsletter is also free to subscribe to!
Have a lovely holiday season, friends, and thanks again for all your support!
xoxo, Doreen.
Happy October! Shipping Is Almost Complete!
5 months ago
– Thu, Oct 03, 2024 at 03:46:14 PM
Happy October, backers! As of today, I've shipped out the majority of Kickstarter orders. Am planning to finish the rest early next week, if not sooner, once I've hopefully recovered fully from this debilitating bout of hay fever. There's nothing quite like being so out of breath that I can't carry a crate of packages from my van to the post office door by myself. Once my immune system calms down, I'm looking forward to getting the rest of the packages out to you.
It feels like it's been one thing after another with this project, but the finish line is finally in sight! Thanks so much for your patience, backers. I'll write a closing update in November, after everything paid for has shipped. In the meantime, you can keep up with me at my Books And Games newsletter! Happy camping, friends!
xo, Doreen.
Shipping starts...now!
6 months ago
– Wed, Sep 04, 2024 at 07:32:03 PM
Hello, backers! Over 80% of you have responded to the BackerKit survey, so I'm going to start locking addresses shortly and shipping out books. One thing I want to note: I will only lock your address after you've completed your survey. I plan to leave the store open till at least the end of the year, so there's genuinely no rush if money is a little tight for you till then.
For those of you who have already paid and are not getting Local Pickup, I'm going to start packing envelopes and printing labels this weekend. For those of you getting Local Pickup, I'm aiming to distribute packages on Friday. I'll also be adding a physical copy of my first minizine to everyone's shipment, as a thank you for all your patience with me through this very long process!
Hopefully, my next update in October will be to let you know that all paid purchases have been shipped. Thanks again for all your support through what has been an unexpectedly difficult year: it has meant so much more to me than I can ever express.
xo, Doreen.
BackerKit surveys are out!
7 months ago
– Thu, Aug 08, 2024 at 05:10:49 PM
Phew, that took forever! The nice people I was finally able to get in touch with at BackerKit tell me that the survey I built looks fine, and since it's passed the smoke test, it should now be in all your inboxes. My current plan is to give everyone till the end of the month to get your addresses and payments in, then I'll lock orders and start shipping in waves.
Thank you so much for your patience and support! It has taken us so long to get here, but I'm so happy to finally be able to get these books in your hands soon.
xo, Doreen.
Progress, finally!
7 months ago
– Mon, Jul 29, 2024 at 01:07:24 AM
This is a long-ish story, so bear with me. Tl;dr: I'm waiting on a human at BackerKit to approve the shipping survey and then it'll be heading out to you!
So I was feeling pretty ill towards the end of last week, to the point where I had to cancel all my plans over the weekend that involved leaving the house (including an invitation to the French Embassy last Friday to watch the Olympics Opening Ceremonies. I'm still sad about missing that.) I did start feeling significantly better on Saturday but, out of an abundance of caution, decided to stay home alone on Sunday instead of going with the rest of the family to visit my kids' grandparents, some 90 minutes' drive away. This turned out to be an absolute boon to my productivity, because it gave me an entire day, uninterrupted by my beloved but demanding children, to catch up on work AND to fight it out with BackerKit. I did enough troubleshooting that the automated system finally, grudgingly, allowed me to send in my survey for human review. Mostly, I just gave up trying to solve a circular issue involving shipping by pledge level that, honestly, still makes me mad thinking about it.
This process also took a little longer than I ultimately wanted it to because the United States Postal Service had two different price increases in July, for different types of mail, and I didn't have the brainpower to deal with that until after both changes had gone through. But I believe I've properly sorted out all the shipping rates for this campaign finally! Once BackerKit approves the survey, you'll be receiving yours at the email address you used to pledge to Kickstarter for this project. If you used an Apple ID to pledge, please message me through here with your best email address so I can route your survey to that instead.
The end is in sight! I am very tired, but I'm hoping to be able to mail these beautiful books out to you soon. 2023 was a pretty awful year for me and it has taken a surprisingly long time to recover. Thank you so, so much for all your patience and support throughout. I'll update here again once the survey has been approved and passed the smoke test to let you know to look for it in your inboxes.
xo, Doreen.
