And Four Years Down the Road . . .

the journey continues on.

I'm a bit shocked that so much time has passed since I first started this blog and everything Inky Ivory. It took me awhile to even remember where this website was! Much has happened since I began experimenting with fluid art, being unsure of exactly what I was doing with it and where it all would take me. Turns out this year there's been a new, wide bend coming up, and it feels the turn could lead full circle.

My journey had not been a straight path from where I left off; it's been all over the place. I've made small paintings and big paintings with acrylic paint and alcohol ink. I've made bottle art, shell art, a wide variety of up-cycled items, all kinds of jewelry, and custom wood pieces. I've sold my items online, sold print on demand products, tried out a market, but currently I'm only selling at a retail space in a handmade store and taking on occasional commissions. I've also helped raise money for various good causes, too. And it's all been great. I love where Inky Ivory is at right now. It's a stress relief, an outlet, and a fun "jobby" that fuels and funds my endless thirst for creativity.

At the end of each year since I've been selling my art, I buy a "big ticket" item with my profits that allows me to try something new. After my first year I bought a professional wood burner so I could play around with pyrography. It was an awesome investment; I use it all the time for charcuterie boards, wall hangings, and ornaments. The next year I bought a Cricut Maker with all its accessories, which I would like to say I've used more than three or four times since I bought it, but . . . I haven't. So not such a great investment. I had so many ideas of how to incorporate it's use in my business, but it just hasn't happened yet. I don't feel too bad about it though; the whole point of selling my art is to have freedom to buy whatever I'd like to experiment with next, and some experiments fail! I think I'll still get around to it eventually.

Coming to the end of this past year I decided to take my first steps into the world of digital art, so my "big ticket" item was an iPad pro with all its accessories, an apple pencil, the Procreate app, an illustration bundle, and an illustration course. This is the mentioned bend that invokes a feeling of heading full circle since I've wanted to be a picture book author and illustrator since I was bitty! I just never could see a way to really push forward with illustration using traditional art methods; the tediousness would kill me. Digitally it's a lot easy (and cleaner) to fix mistakes, and I'm loving it.

I'll share the story later of how I came up with the idea for the first picture book in another post. In the meantime I'm sharing some of my digital art doodles on my Society 6 page and my illustration progress on Instagram @inky.ivory.illustration. I'll still be continuing to make all my other art pieces found on @inky.ivory too!

Keep going and finding joy in the journey.