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Growing up both of my parents were makers. My mom really liked to sew and to do crafty things. So we always had craft projects to use as Christmas gifts and whenever Halloween came around or there were school plays to do she volunteered to do the costumes or the backdrops or whatever and we had a fun time brainstorming how to do those things and problem-solving. And then my dad, he did stuff like woodworking, cabinet making, eventually we both got into blacksmithing and metalwork. And we did that together until I went off to college. And so for both of my parents --They were divorced when I was young--with both of my parents, the thing that I had in common with both of them was creativity and no matter what was happening in our lives no matter you know, what stuff was going on, making something was the way that we could connect to each other, the way that we could feel like... like have quality time with the other person. And so art and creating became really important to me. I had an affinity for it at a really young age and then they reinforced it and it continued to be really important to me.

I actually really disliked painting all the way up until college and in college I was trying to choose between being a physics major or an art major. And I chose art and I ended up having to take a lot of painting classes. Because they were the only things that fit my schedule.

And I took all these painting classes. I still wasn't a super big fan of it, but I grew a lot that way. But five years of school is kind of a lot and it's a lot of creativity to squeeze out of yourself and my mental health wasn't great during all of that so by the time I was done with art school,

I was completely burned out and I wasn't very good at being social and I didn't have really any art friends and so I wasn't connecting with anyone creative creatively anymore. So I was very burnt out and I kind of stopped making art for myself after college. I taught art at an after-school program for a couple years and later on I taught art at a paint and sip place. I taught painting. And somewhere in between those two things someone from art school invited me to an inktober Facebook group and I participated and I surprised myself by participating every day for the whole month of October. This was in 2017 and I hadn't had an art routine at all. I hadn't even thought about getting back into, like, art for myself, but I did it. I participated. And the next year, I did a little art here and there and then inktober came around again and I participated again and it kind of just built from there every year. I got a little more invested in art and a little more interested and now I have a daily art practice and it's something that is really important to me that I really enjoy. And something that I hope I can inspire others with I can share with others. Artwork for me has always run parallel to therapy and my mental health and what I'm learning. It's kind of how I express what's happening inside of myself and also how I explore and practice ideas that I'm learning about myself in therapy. So it's all really important and one of the things that I hope to do with my artwork is to encourage other people to explore their creativity if creativity is a way they are willing to learn about themselves. 

Yeah. That's kind of a surface level run down of. How I got to where I am today artistically.

And I looked at the ways in which I got out of burnout during those situations-- the ways in which I got back into art because art is important to me--and it was always realigning with why I started art in the first place. Why do I like to make things? how did I make things when I was a child? What do I feel like making? Giving myself the periods of time where I'm not working on commissions or on artwork to make other people happy on social media or elsewhere.

And really giving some thought to the type of art that I want to make the type of things that I want to say abd the concepts that I want to explore. And I kind of re-center myself there. And every time that has happened and I've realigned myself burnout has happened less and less. Or the stretches between burnout have gotten longer and longer because I've learned to pay attention better to when I start drifting, when I start making a lot of art that's not for me, or not taking care of myself and pursuing my mental health. So consider what you value. And consider if what you're doing aligns with those values. And if it doesn't, then I guess you have a decision to make.

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