There are 2 things in life that really assist in my creativity – nature and ambiance. My new home has both! Wonderful ambiance of soft colors and open spaces. I often have soft music playing in the background, and now that it is cooler, a fire going.

The walkout basement is unfinished yet climate controlled and absolutely perfect for an art studio – the studio is in process. Hopefully I will have it fully organized and functioning by Spring.

But the bonus is the big windows looking out into a wild wood area, often giving us close to 50 birds at a time at our winter feeders.

In the summer we fed several hummingbirds and next year plan to keep the finch feeders going in the summer. The cats are in heaven and we have a lot of vantage points set up just for them (this house is very cat-centric.)

The dogs love the fenced in back yard and all the possums, turtles and other strange wild creatures they find that have wandered through or are occasionally still there in the morning. It keeps them on their toes.

We have swarms of the yellow goldfinches and a large amount of the red and brown house finches. We also have red winged blackbirds, chickadees, 4 pairs of cardinals, blue jays, nuthatches, mourning doves, downy woodpeckers, at least one red bellied woodpecker, snow birds (juncos), and loads of house sparrows (which are really English finches imported from England). Periodically we see a hawk or a Green Heron sitting in our trees.

And do not forget the feisty squirrels – we have 2 that I suspect are male and female.