Ok.. Where to begin..?


To say I've been having a bad time recently would be putting it mildly..
The past couple of months, and especially the last.. 10 days or so? I would easily consider to be something along the lines of being the most severe nervous breakdown I've had in recent memory, possibly ever..
Not sleeping, crippling anxiety, panic attacks... It's become severe enough that I'm starting to consider seeking professional help to deal with it.. (I never do that..)


This brings me to the next thing, which is directly related.
I am considering retiring my horror themed secondary account..
Suffice it to say I've suffered what you could consider something of a very specific psychological trauma recently which has made even thinking about that type of content.. difficult.. (Even certain halloween stuff bothers me.. I love halloween..)
Creating such content has become.. Impossible at worst, mentally hazardous at best..
I'm making note of this in particular because, there are 4 or 5(?) commissioners.. some backlog, some recent.. which have commissioned content along those lines.. I will be getting in touch with them regarding either refund or substitution, as I am.. not capable of producing that type of content at this time, or possibly ever again.. I have no idea if this will ever stop being a problem..



Next thing.. You're going to be seeing me posting more personal art between commissions..
Why? If I don't I am literally going to lose my mind..
I thought I could just put my nose to the grindstone and power through things as I stated in my previous journal... That was stupidly idealistic of me to think I could do that, and that plan got crushed pretty quickly..
So.. I'm revising my plan bit.. Non-commission art will be making it's way into my gallery at more regular intervals.. This does NOT mean work on commissions has halted.. It just means I needed a mental health break, something that has become alarmingly important recently.. Everyone's continued patience with that would be very much appreciated.
I am also seeking alternative methods of funding more quickly for refunds to try and at least cut back on much of the backlog volume..




And that brings me to the last thing..
I won't be naming names, but I have recently come under verbal attack by either one of my backlog commissioners or one of their friends.. Evidence is unclear as to which, though I have an idea who is who.. I am in process of tracking down related documents and dealing with the likely culprit via e-mail..
In recognition of my own faults where the backlog is concerned and generally not feeling well lately I decided not to directly pursue the matter with FA staff myself.. Though it should be noted my fiance does not feel the same way and been pursuing it autonomously..
I will however state that this incident happening while I've not exactly been in the best place emotionally just about got everyone tossed in the "future refund" pile and nearly pushed me toward just tossing my wacom tablet in the trash.. As you can guess from above, I did not go in that direction..
But, this commissioner did just talk them self out of some rather significant compensation for the delays involved, and instead will now only receive a refund for the exact dollar amount owed them when I am able to do so as confirmed by my own payment records if I can find that particular record..

I guess what I'm saying is..
I know I screwed up.. I know how badly I screwed up.. And I'm trying to do something about it.
Chewing me out for it (especially publicly) isn't going to accomplish anything, and in fact is probably just going to make matters worse.
Again.. Everyone's continued patience would be very much appreciated..

(Negative comments will be deleted and commenting on this journal may be suspended as a result..)

Right, so.. I intended to make an announcement a few weeks (?) ago..
But then things happened and that announcement suddenly became kind of irrelevant..

So here's a more up to date announcement/statement... thing..


Due to extenuating circumstances that are far too complicated and frankly embarrassing to go into publicly..
Other than a certain someone in my life owes me a lot of fricking money because I decided to be helpful... I've gone from semi-financially stable, to effectively broke in the space of about a month.. And it's likely to be some time before this situation is corrected..

This means several things..


First and foremost.. As much as I'd rather not for probably another 6 months to even a year.. I need to reopen for new commissions, effective semi-immediately.. (Need to iron out a few things first..)


..Now before anyone gets the urge to strangle me, I've not forgotten about everything else I currently owe..
More recent things are in the pipe to get finished as soon as possible.. (hoping a month or less, but don't quote me on that..)

But then there is the really old stuff from when I had my little.. collapse.. some time back.. y'know, the thing that a lot of people are probably kind of mad at me for at this point..
That entire production queue effectively imploded on itself because.. well.. Let's be honest, I was an idiot and bit off more than I could chew during a not good portion of my life..

What am I doing about that? Well, my original plan was just to refund everyone involved and reset back to zero as it were..
That.. isn't even a remote possibility now any time soon because of recent events..

So after a lot of thought, I've realized I need to start putting out new content anyway.. I'll just slog through it and hope I don't drown/burn out..
The catch is, at this point I've lost a lot of the original files, particularly for the YCH's.. And I've definitely misplaced pretty much all of the original notes containing instructions... (These are pretty old..)
And even if that wasn't the case, the numerous multiple-slot YCH's would've been the death of me.. A mistake I'm never repeating..

As such, I'll be getting in touch with people on the list in batches.. They'll have two options.
A new or modified commission with updated details, all of which upgraded to full color process commissions free of charge.
Particularly old commissioners on the list will likely be offered additional bonuses on a case by case basis.

Either that or they can opt for a refund, which unfortunately will result in a rather long wait..

I plan on just.. biting the bullet and cranking out as much art as possible over the next while because frankly I've been a little creatively starved thanks to my life as of late.. So, barring anything utterly ridiculous happening, this should get things moving along relatively quickly.. Particularly if I can resolve the decidedly rather ridiculous YCH situation which has been the worst bottleneck..


So.. yeah.. that's the plan, so to speak..
I'm sure some people are going to be irritated about it, frankly.. I can't afford to worry about that at this point..
I want this resolved probably more than anyone else, and this is the best I can do.


Also, as tempting as it might be to contact me via note first regarding this, that will only slow things down..
I WILL get in touch with you on my own.. I just need to get things in order first.

(I'm also leaving comments enabled on this in good faith.. Please don't make me change my mind.. )

Yeah.. I won't be enabling that until I see solid confirmation that it's safe for accounts that contain NSFW content.. (Like mine..)
I've heard of a couple of instances already of PayPal accounts getting closed because of it..

Suffice it to say I'm not taking that risk without some guarantee's..

So.. I'll be sticking with Ko-Fi and Patreon for now.

So.... More chubby bunnies in lingerie?

Y/N?

Ok, yeah... HI, I'm not dead!
Though I did take a semi-unexpected hiatus..

I took a long break from.. well.. everything for a bit.. I needed to reset myself after everything that's happened in my life over past couple of years, and especially the last few months..

I needed to figure out where I was, what I was doing and where I was ultimately going..
Honestly there was a period for a couple of months where I considered giving up on art entirely.. That's how much things have changed in my life.. Obviously I decided against that..


After that break was over, I started spending some time getting reacquainted with myself and what I want to do with my art instead of worrying about the previous pile of backlog that had honestly been causing a kind of crippling anxiety which was really preventing me from getting much of anything accomplished..


So, in short.. New content is coming.. More than you might think..
No longer being completely artistically burned out and restained by a to-do list helps quite a bit.



Lastly, refunds.. Admittedly this is.. taking longer than expected, I had a few snags where records were concerned as well as commissioners that have seemingly just up and vanished..

If you haven't heard from me or are waiting on a note reply, you'll hear from me soon.

OKAY... So, apparently the bank had what I needed sitting at their front desk for like a week and nobody freaking told me.. But I have it now, and.. Now is the time for the previously announced.. er.. annoucement..

Some of you are aware that I've... Not exactly had the best past year and a half..
(maybe 2 years?.. I've kinda lost count..)

The earliest problem was a previous job (some may remember what that was) that held up a couple of commissions, kicking off a backlog that has yet to be resolved and had just kept on growing until I eventually put a stop to it a few months back..

Sadly that hasn't really helped all that much, as in that time I (along with my family) ended up caring for my failing grandmother for over a year..
I ended up caring for my mother for over a month after she had another knee surgery..
Shortly after that my grandmother finally died, very slowly... This resulted in a greiving period that.. let's be honest still hasn't quite run it's course..
Then over the last month or so, both of my aunt's dogs die, and my mother has her second stroke.. (She's ok.. thankfully..)
And in between all of that my own health has been a rollercoaster, most likely due to stress.. I've actually been rather violently ill the last couple days..

LONG STORY SHORT..

Every plan I've had to get caught up, has failed miserably, for one reason or another..
And you know what? If I've learned anything recently, it's that life is too short..
So, I give.. I'm throwing in the towel, I know when I'm beat.. I'm adult enough to admit when I've made mistakes and can't correct them..

I over-estimated my own abilities when scheduling commissions, and I've now buried myself in them..
But no longer.. I'm fixing this the only way I can at this point..

As I said above and in a previous journal.. My grandmother passed a few months back..
This has resulted in my gaining some monetary inheritance (after the bank dragged it's heels).. It's not huge, but it's enough for me to use a portion of it go through my backlog and refund old commissions that have been sitting there far too long..
After that I'll have enough left to live off of for a little bit while I contemplate my next move, as well as sock some away in my savings so my future ends up looking a little better..

Over the next few days I'll be contacting people about amounts paid and start working out the details.

If I haven't completely torpedoed my reputation afterward I'll probably be opening for commissions again in a few months..
And be far more careful about it this time around..
We'll see.. This is the closest thing I have to a reset button, and I'm using it.

HOKAY.. So.. It's probably obvious by now that my previous plan to get... Almost everything caught up by now..
HASN'T EXACTLY WORKED OUT...

The funny part is, everything 'was' going according to plan... And then something rather complicated happened with my mothers knee surgery..
Short version? It got bumped ahead 3 months, and right into my path like a giant brick wall..

Why does this effect me? I'm basically her 24/7 home care "nurse" until she's back on her feet.. And that's probably a week or two away at this point..
Add that on top of everything else that's gone wrong, including my grandmother taking an even more significant turn for the worse..
This has basically resulted in whatever little free time I have being devoted to resting and keeping myself relaxed so I don't either go insane or die of exhaustion.. I don't remember the last time my feet were this sore..

So, at this point I may as well just declare myself on a sort of half-haitus until at the very least my mother is able to walk again..
I'll be working on what I can when I'm not completely exhausted and have a couple hours to myself, but I've had precious few moments like that over the last like.. three weeks.. ;~;

Additionally.. I'm going to be taking some time when available to send out some notes to existing commissioners, there's a few of you I need to discuss things with now that things have basically blown up in my face.. And for once it wasn't my dumb choices that did it..

Hokay... After about a week of planning and deliberating...
I think I've come up with a way that I can actually properly move forward out of this backlog pit I've been stuck in for.... Honestly I have no idea how long at this point..

Based on recommendations from friends, and what I've observed a few other artists do in similar situations...

I'm going to have two separate production queues from now on until the backlog is finally cleared out..

What does this mean?

There will be the current queue, which is where all new commissions, YCH's and anything else will end up from this point forward.
This queue strictly under no circumstances will ever exceed more than TWO items at any given time.. This is for immediate things that will be finished as soon as possible to make room and keep things moving along at a steady pace..

And there will be the backlog queue, which as of this moment is locked down.. Nothing new is going to be added to it, because that has been the problem... I have had difficulty making progress because I'd have to line up new work to make ends meet, which would require shuffling things around without putting clients at too much of a disadvantage time wise... And.. Well, look where that's gotten me..
Putting a lid on it places the queue in a fixed state, which allows me to systematically deal with what needs to be dealt with in an orderly fashion without having to juggle anything new.

What this means, is you'll be seeing new commissions showing up along side commissions that have been in the pipe for a while for reasons beyond my control..
I will be dividing my efforts evenly to keep things moving along, because as much as I hate to admit it.. I NEED to keep bringing in new work, but I still have old work that needs finishing..

I got myself into this situation because of very poor planning on my part...
I'll only be able to pull myself out of it by coming up with a solid plan and sticking with it.

I'm going to be posting a rather strict TOS pretty soon in light of one commissioner who... quite frankly.. was kind of a jerk, and has since been begrudgingly refunded.
I don't take kindly to being called "sketchy/untrustworthy" just because I didn't get back to their notes right away... I'll admit, I'M NOT FAST...
My inbox is a cluttered mess and between everything else it can take days or even weeks to slog through it.

I'm busy as hell and frankly have no bloody clue how to organize my time better... So yes, I can be slow... I freely admit that.

What I don't do is "stiff" people on work they've paid for... Will it take a while? Yeah probably... But it WILL get done..
Dispute that statement and all you're going to do is piss me off...

I appreciate that most of my commissioners have been very understanding and patient about delays..

But this one bad apple who went as far as messing with paypal, has prompted me to take a... harsher... stance to people frankly getting in my face after less than a few weeks and flinging accusations...

The TOS will include very specific conditions regarding delays.. And spots in production queues are going to be more strictly enforced..


On an upside.. I'm pretty motivated to get this damned production queue of mine cleared now...
One good way to motivate me is to get me angry... >x>

Once my schedule clears up, I'm considering doing dakimakura's through a couple of manufacturers I've found..

What are some character's and body types, I've done before or otherwise, you might be interested in on something like that?