Motivation Monday!

I know I missed a Finished Friday and Sneak Peek Sunday, but between school and work my life is a little hectic right now, and art hasn't been in the forefront of my mind. But I'm back with a day off from school and work so today is an art kinda day!

So here's what is motivating me today: Everything!

From my pets being adorable and cuddling up with each other:

To finding a whole mess of eggs inside the nest box:

To getting this look when feeding my chickens:

To the wonderful fog we had the other night:

So today, in response to the beauty I see everyday that is constantly motivating me, I will be buying a new camera. Then I can capture the beauty I see and share it.

I hope to have many more pictures of my world to show you in the future!

Motivation Monday

It's time for another Motivation Monday post. I try to pick one thing that motivates me each week to paint, draw and in general be crafty. But lets switch it up. This week I'll show you what motivates my whole life.

Everything I do is simply a step towards my dream of owning a small piece of land and homesteading.

But what is homesteading? Well everyone seems to have their own definition. My explanation of my dream is simple; a small piece of land, a cob house I built with loved ones, some farm animals and a huge garden. If I still have to work in town to pay the bills, that's fine. I just want some space between me and the guy down the road so I don't feel so crowded. And if I can manage to go off grid someday, that'd be great too, but for now I'm trying to go one step at a time. And my step right now is Save Money. Then it'll be onto Buy Land, Build House and Live The Dream.

Here are a few pictures of other people who are living their dreams:

Cob Couch

Cob Kitchen

Interior Of A Cob House

Chickens On A Farm

Path To Freedom: Urban Homestead

Want to see more pictures of ideas and inspirations for my future homestead? Follow my Dream Home board on pinterest!

This is what motivates me, what motivates you?

Motivation Monday And The End Of Holiday Vacations

Well vacation time is over for some of us, or for me, filling in for everyone at work is done and I'm back on a regular schedule! So it's time for more art! But for now this is what is motivating me this week: EGGS!

I'm always so amazed at the variety of colors I get out of my 5 backyard hens. Everyone is supposed to lay brown eggs, but what is brown? I've gotten eggs that where such a light brown they were almost pink, eggs that are so dark they could be called chocolate colored and eggs that are a pinky brown with white specks. And then there are the occasional white eggs from my brown laying girls. I think the shell color depends on what they eat, and my hens get whatever food is left over from meals as well as an egg layer feed supplemented with cracked corn in the winter and rolled oats in the summer. They make great composters, and oddly enough, my chickens will eat everything but onions!

Here are a few pictures of my girls and their beautiful eggs!

A few of my chickens when they were little. Some of these guys are meat birds, I only have laying hens left.

One of my Barred Rocks. 

Beautiful eggs.

Light Brown

Dark Brown

Almost Pink

Brown with white spots

And I do get the occasional tiny egg!

In case you missed what I do with my eggs, here is a laser etched egg ornament! It can be found in my online Etsy shop!

Tree of Life laser etched egg

Falling Behind and Catching Up!

I've been a little busy here lately and so guess what I did? I missed a Sneak Peak Sunday, Motivation Monday, and a Wacky Wednesday! Well it's time to get caught up here, so here is the sneak peak:

Can you guess what I'm going to do with this? =)

And as for a Motivation Monday - 

Spray paint always motivates me. I plan on bringing out my spray paints again soon and painting a bunch of pictures with them. I will definitely be taking a heater to the garage with me! But what do I paint? Well here is one of my previous paintings:

And my Wacky Wednesday? Well the only thing I made a total mess of this week was my car. So I don't have any projects to show you that have gone wrong, guess we'll skip the Wacky Wednesday post then.

On to my Finished Friday! I finished a few more egg ornaments which I added to my Etsy shop, along with the finished painting from last week. Here are some of the eggs:

This egg is just a tad drunk =P

This one is perfect for a unique wedding gift!

You can find the eggs for sale here: Wedding Egg, Cheers Egg

So looks like I'm all caught up on posts now, but I will be working overtime for the holidays  so there will be no more posts until I'm back on a regular schedual. Until then:

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Motivation Monday

Today I'm following Veda's Beads with a Motivation Monday! It's been extremely cold and dry lately so I thought I'd like to remember how my yard will look in the spring. Today I'm also feeling very bright, full of reds, yellows and oranges. Here are a few pictures of warm sunny days and bright colors!

These Tulips look like they're on fire.

Ruffled edges in orange.

Light red and yellow.

Pink and white.

Orange and burgundy sunflower.

Velvety petals.

Green and white flowers.

Now I just need to do something with all these great colors!

Blog Organization And A Sneak Peek Sunday

I'm taking a cue here from Veda's Beads and trying to organize a way to blog without feeling like I have to post all the time. I really just don't have something interesting to talk about every day!

So here's my organization plan for posting:

Motivation Monday - Something that inspired a piece of artwork.

Wacky Wednesday - Art projects that go horribly wrong or create huge messes.

Finished Friday - What projects I've completed for the week.

Sneak Peek Sunday - What I'm currently working on.

Hopefully this will help with the blogging organization, now I need to organize time to paint, cut glass, and post new items on Etsy!

I know I did a sneak peek yesterday, but here's another one:

I'll be back tomorrow to share some Motivation with you!