Inspiration, Two Fold

Yesterday, two of my favorite local inspirations came together and I just had to post it. For the last year, I've been an avid follower of the online show: Peak Moment. In fact, when writing my contract for this quarter, I thought about Peak Moment and originally said: "how about I do some vlogging?" Something that I soon-after realized Janaia and Robin do much better than I.

Janaia Donaldson and her partner, Robin Mallgrin of Yuba Gals Independent Media host, direct and produce the show; which airs on Youtube bi-weekly. It's Peak Moment: Locally Reliant Living for Challenging Times. They speak with authors, nutritionists, psychologists, farmers, citizens of Earth, homeless people trying to build shelters, the list goes on...anyone who is facing obstacles due to the peak oil crises and creating solutions locally. The best part for me is that everyone is in the Pacific Northwest. The couple lives in northern California and travels throughout Washington, Oregon, California and Montana hosting shows and exposing pockets of oil-crises-resilience.

This week, Janaia and Robin went to Inspiration Farm in Bellingham, WA. Brian Kirkvliet, owner of the farm, has been a unique inspiration for Andy and I, and over the years we've followed his progress both as an artist and a farmer. My boyfriend Andy has been a glass artist for ten years now and as I became more interested in farming we formulated this ultimate goal of an art-farm. A farm where we produce delicious food and fine art, sounds a little strange, how do you keep the goats out of the studio? But for Brian and his wife it wasn't strange and sure enough after touring goat barns, compost-heated showers, and processing facilities he takes you into his gleaming white glass gallery filled with astonishing vases and chandeliers  Thank you to Janaia and Robin for bringing me news of other people doing similar things and thanks to the Kirkvliets, because inspiration farm has certainly been an inspiration to me.