Motivation Monday (heavy photo post)

I know it's been a while but Motivation Monday is back! Keep in mine these posts are heavy picture posts so may take a moment to download. These are all picture complement of Pinterest. They can all be credited and found here: http://pinterest.com/craftdonkey/motivational/ These are made to help you get motivated by colors and lines and just in the artist general expression of their photography or art. I love this collection. I included many color combos in this one as well as some striking pictures. I just adore them all. They really do inspire and motivate me. If you're new to CD, then I'll explain a little I post these to draw out something in you. Maybe you see a picture and love the colors or the lines it creates anything you can use to draw out inspiration. And if nothing else, their super pretty to look at. Happy Monday!

Don't forget the February blow out giveaway! Here you can find all of the pictures and details. http://craftdonkey.blogspot.com/2012/02/february-giveaways-good-bad-ugly.html

I have a linky tool set up for you to load pictures of your craft spaces. No matter if its the livivngroom table or a full room, share with us the clean and the messy! Then send your friends over and leave a comment each time you've spread the word for additional entries to win a large lots of goodies as well as a Clip it up!!!

Motivation Monday & A little Story

So, this last weekend, (as you can probably tell from my posts), motivation hit me big time. I got some great masculine cards completed for people this week. I still have about 4 more to do. I think I shall complete them tonight. Including one or two very fun girl cards. I get very excited when I get to do girl cards now, as well, there's only about 8 girls in the business and over 60 men! So, I'm rather excited for lace and charms and crystals!!!

I'm not sure what cause my burst of motivation. I have been making an honest effort to keep my area very clean. Ok, that's a lie, it's never been "very" clean. I'm making an effort to keep it in good enough shape for me to be able to work in it. Yes, that's a more factual statement! I really think this has contributed to my recent motivation to "do" some... anything. I don't dread looking into the room, keeping the door kept shut because I didn't want to have to go and clean up all the many messes that cluttered the room.

While I still create best with a bit of chaos, and maybe some wine. I'm beginning to like to put things up when I complete something.

Do you work better in chaos or with everything in its place???

Side note: funny/not so funny story to share. Saturday, I was making some cards and did some embossed gears on one of them (see previous posts). I knew I also wanted to add some metal gears. I went to look for them and couldn't find them. I looked and looked. I probably looked for a little over 45 minutes. Dumb founded confused as to why they were not where I always put them. My daughter then walks in, I'm beyond frustrated. I have tons of gears, store bought, vintage, clock parts etc. And to not be able to find a single one.. irritating!! So, she comes in and asks why I'm upset. I tell her I can't find the gears. She then informs me that a week or so before Taylor (my 11 yr old son) was in the room going through my metal drawers and "taking stuff." GRRRRRRRRRRR. I then talk to my son and he indeed took, hmm I'd say well over 45 gears from my drawers and used them to build little things for his army men and what not!!! Needless to say we had a big ole conversation, about taking things esp. vintage things without asking. It irritated me soo much! However, I do have a feeling in the near future I'll laugh about it, just not there yet!

Now see I've never had an issue with my kids kidnapping things from my area, as in my area they both have big ole drawer units filled with crafting supplies ranging from play dough to cardstocks, papers, embellishments, glues etc. Anything kid stuff or that I no longer have a use for! Do you kids kidnap things from your stash? This is my first encounter with it but I'm pretty sure it was last.

MIA and Motivation Monday

Okay, so I feel as though I owe everyone a bit of an apology. I have been getting used to this whole working outside of the home and still functioning and getting everything done. PS I'm loving my job sooo much! However, this past weekend I created a plan! I am the queen of plans! Follow through is the tricky part right? Yes, indeed. So, here's the deal. I plan on from now on changing things a bit to make things work with more ease for me. Wednesdays will now be the night for tutorials. Thursdays were my day of choice for this, however with football season going on.. ya.. um.. it's being changed! LOL I do regret to say that I have been crafting!! Well ok I dont regret to say it however, I made about 10 cards last week.. which was a task in and of itself as I haven't made cards in... hmm.. well in longer than I can recall. I mean I'm the person who will buy her friends cards.. lol. However, with the new job after the ladies in the front office saw my crafty skill I got nominated to make cards.. and I sorta voluntered! None the less, I made them and completely brain farted takign a picture to share. Good news is each week of the month I'll have cards to make. Sooooo, those of you who love cards... you shall begint o see some showcases once a week.

So, lets move on to some motivation shall we... All images are thanks to Pinterest.com and you can follow any and all of my boards by clicking here http://pinterest.com/craftdonkey/  Everyone knows my love for pictures and colors in general. So, today I'm bringing some amazing pictures. For the original origin of these images, check out my pinterest board titled "Motivation". These are mostly places and scenes, however there's also some color combos and flowers!

When in a crafting slump..

Have you ever had a feeling like you wanted to be being creative.... yet you had no motivation to actually do it. Or maybe you felt guilty. I'm often overwhelmed with the fact that I know I should be doing something else.. like laundry or cleaning or something of higher priority. So, then I sit guilty I don't want to do those "important" things and shouldn't be scraping. Then what happens is.... I do absolutely nothing at all trying to convience myself I am fine to scrap.

Does this happen to you? What do you do?

Lately I've been going on ahead and scrapping. Knowing that all the other things can wait an hour or two or even until the following morning. Crafting is my release. So, I have been tryin to make more of an effort to make sure I do it. I still feel a bit of guilt. But, I've learned instead of making a page I may do some work on a project or work on some little things. Like maybe create a new type of flowers or a new distress technique. Just something. Anything. I have found that keeping a folder on my computer of things I find that inspire me. They could be layouts I loved the colors of, or see somethign ont hem I want to try myself, or a project that inspired me or a tutorial. Then onthose nights when I want to do something but not really sure I have one of two options... just start playing with things until I make somethign I like or.. look through that folder. I find that to work super well to spark my creativity. What do you like to do when you need motivation?

I find I am not scrapbooking as many layouts, but when I do scrap the layouts cause I am really "feeling" it i love them so much more than making them because I feel like I should be doing and want to be doing something crafty but not sure what.

I mostly scrapbook in the evenings. I find it relaxing and well I have no other time. I scrap after the kids have gone to bed and a silence and peace falls over the house. When do you scrap? Why does that time work for you?

How do you balance the things that need to be done and the things you want to do?