Down to the wire and the flock reduction

As per my usual, everything seems to be coming down to the wire. Truth is I get nervous but I also enjoy this kind of pressure regardless of how frustrating it is.

Good news is I now have a trailer which I can use for the show and I've gotten all my fowl I intend on showing into conditioning pens. The entry forms must be in by Sept. 27th, so whoever is in best feather by the 20th will be entered and the others merely sold.

As of the headcount I made the other night there are:

7 geese
6 ducks
47 adult chickens
6 young guineas
95 young chickens

that will be staying on the farm after I sell the rest.

Conditioning for the show I have:
6 LF Polish roosters
6 Bantam Polish roosters
1 Largefowl Houdan hen
18 Largefowl Polish hens
8 Bantam Polish hens
3 Bantam Cubalaya roosters
2 Bantam Cubalaya hens
1 Bantam Cochin rooster
8 American Game roosters
10 American Game hens

Pretty much all of those will be sold. Seriously, there is maybe 3 of those birds that will come home from the show. And on top of that there's a ton more birds I'm selling.


I'm also working on a bit of cd art for a musician, but will wait until I get the greenlight to reveal who it is and to link to their site on here.

Showing, Moving, Painting

As you can guess there's a lot going on lately. This entry will in some ways be my way of itemizing what is going on, what needs to be done, etc, etc.

First, Art:

- I have some election signs I agreed to paint for one of the locals that are due Sept. 1st - still doing the layout of the design
- I have a cd cover to produce - still sketching, but I haven't been given a deadline as of yet.

Second, Moving:

I'm moving in October to go back to Minneapolis, MN. This means:

- I need to price the cost of having internet installed in my new dwelling
- I need to pack
- I need to have my vehicle fixed up and road-worthy
- I need to have enough money to make this work
- I need to buy a new computer once I get there so I can work
- I need to sell a ton of my birds to generate money and to lighten the burden on my family who will take care of the ones I keep (til I can find a place for them up in Minnesota)

Which brings me to the Third act, Showing:

- I need to get my birds conditioned
- To do this I need to finish my conditioning shed
- I also need to reorganize the yard to make use of the stag pens for part of this conditioning
- I need straw for part of the pens
- I need to fix the windows and remove the interior of a trailer I bought to haul the birds to the show and sales in (its a camper trailer)
- I need to get the trailer licensed
- I need to make sure I have the money to cover traveling and entry fees
- I need to verify if anyone else is going with me.


Somewhere along the line I also need to make crates for hauling to the show, crates for the sales, fix the main chicken house roof, sell the free range chicks....all this needs done before the 8th of October. And I'm moving to Minnesota shortly after the 15th of October.


Can we say stressful?

Clear out the cobwebs...Artist

First off, its been way to long since I've made the effort to blog. Simply horrendous of me I must admit.

So what's going on? Well, first off I'd like to make the mention that there is the possibility I will be moving my blog to a new address. Once/if I get the new one set up and to my liking I will post a link to it on this one.

Don't forget, the holidays are soon approaching and I am taking on commissions once again. New work will be posted very soon.

Painting and an Artist Feature

Once Again I've taken forever to getting around to updating the blog. The good news is however that I've finally finished the farm logo. I've emailed the client but have not yet heard back from them (if you're reading this please email me back!). It took a lot longer than anticipated, mostly due to life getting in the way but also the occassional lack of supplies.

So here it is:




Now to the Featured Artist. A couple of months ago I met up with MareLee Thorneberry, a fiber artist who has recently moved to my hometown. What's a fiber artist? She is a spinner, weaver, knitter, fabric dye-er, wool processer, etc. MareLee originates from the Rocky Mountains and Canada and has been plying her trade for the last 37 years. Aside from conventional weaving, she experiments with materials others may not consider usable - such as feathers and spiderweb. She is starting up a shop in town called "Prairie Woman's Threads" which uses exclusively materials grown and bought here in Nebraska. Below are pics of her shop. Materials can be purchased there, as long as lessons on how to do anything you want with the fabric. Looking for equipment, tips, lessons, fabric, or just to chat about your work? You can contact her via email at prairiethreads [at] homtail [dot] com. Here are some pics of her shop:

Its coming together....

Time for an update on the painting I posted last time. Its coming along quite nicely and most of the animals are now in the painting. I still have to put 1 chicken in but have to wait until the animals behind it are complete. I'm quite happy with how the donkey is coming along especially. Sunday I will be making a trip to an auction and will be picking up more Titanium white paint so that I can complete the horse and donkey and move forward. I had a "backup" tube of paint but it turns out it was too old and was more like clay, so rather than compromise the painting I am waiting to buy paint on my way through to the auction.



That's all for this post, have to keep it short today cause I have errands to run and have to finish making crates for the auction.....

Where'd it go?

You may have noticed a bit of a disappearing act concerning my website. Fear not, it will return! What happened is that I missed the deadline to renew my server subscription and opted to wait to renew until their next billing period. After that I had to reboot my website....well their site wasn't functioning that day so I let it be and decided to try again another day. By the time I remembered they had deleted all of my backup files off their servers even though I had renewed my subscription. So what does this all mean? Simply that I will be getting the website uploaded as soon as I find the disks I kept all my files on.


What else is new? Aside from being very busy at my night job I've been working (when time permits) on a commission for a farm down in Kentucky. It will be used as a farm logo for them when completed. Here's a photo of it in progress, albeit not an up-to-date one:




Time to get back to painting, so I will leave you with some new pics of a few of the birds here on the farm.







Oh! one last thing. Be sure to check back for updates as soon (very soon) I will be posting an article about a new shop here in town. Its something I think artists, crafters, diy-ers, and farmers will all enjoy.

Update Time!

I've been waiting until I had the proper shipping info to unveil these, they are the awards that were given out to the members of the Polish Breeders Club at our National show this year. It was a lot of work (especially finding a way to make the lettering work!) but overall I'm satisfied with them.

Congrats to the winners!










And don't forget the holidays are fast approaching. If ya have a chicken fanatic on your list and don't know what to get them, have a look at my online store, you may find just what you're looking for.

www.cafepress.com/hoffmanart