Hi all,

I've been postponing my journal posts and visits on dA. Until today. This will be my last (and also very long) journal for a while. Some people may wonder what happened. For those of you I will explain why I won't be active for a while:


My boyfriend has 2 jobs to take care of and his Master at the University of Technology in Eindhoven, Netherlands. I myself try to get by by freelancing and setting up some new projects that may help us financially. It's hard. I'm sure there are plenty of you out there who know what it's like not having a lot of money, or even worse, not having any at all. We can eat and pay our bills. But we have a (study) loan as well so we can pay these bills. We're really trying but it's hard. We're happy people, just not so blessed when it comes to money.


Next to my regular webdesign activities, I'm also working on a few non paid projects. Some people may not understand this. But I need to do this in order to get my name out there. I can't tell anything about these projects yet. Except that they will probably be online in the Summer of 2009.


Being on the PC all day doesn't help when it comes to my health. I've been struggling with health issues for over a year now and my doctor (GP) does not take me serious at all. I'm trying really hard to find a new GP that will accept me. Please don't start with me here. I've had discussions with people in other countries who just don't get the situation. They try, but it's so complicated. My GP doesn't take me serious at all, and I can't visit the hospital or specialists without his approval. You *need* approval from your GP before you can go elsewhere. Since my GP isn't helping me, I tried finding another GP. Point is, anyone I tried so far refused me as a patient. Not because of insurance or anything. I have a great insurance, covers most of the meds and consults I have. No, the GP's I approach are either fully booked already or think it's not that big a deal and say, "since you already have a GP, we're not accepting you". So we're back at square one. Still trying hard but no luck so far.
I don't like talking about it publicly, but there is no other way on dA, since I can't hide my journal for strangers. So I have to share some issues with you here so you know what kind of issues I'm talking about. Do not challenge me on what I haven't tried so far, because I'm well aware of what I need to do to get healthy. It's the GP that isn't cooperating. I feel a lump in my right breast, I can't get a mammogram. I'm not old enough yet to get a direct invitation and like I said, GP is not examining me or sending me to the hospital. Also, my right breast is infected and the cream I got isn't helping. They won't give me anything else and won't help me either. They won't even have me over for a consult! I have been having *huge* cluster headaches for over a year now. When these headaches get to the worst point, I can't function (really). There are no meds to cure this. My current GP keeps saying it's migraine. But the migraine meds don't work and GP won't do anything. Ever since I got in the third trimester of my pregnancy, I've been having serious issues regaring my defacation. I have meds, got those after almost a year. I was really clogged on the inside and needed all sorts of treatments like clysmas and such. No details, but you get the idea here. I'm still on those meds. I eat healthy, I bought a Wii Fit and Wii DDR so I can exercise more with my son here. I really notice me exercising but my defacation remains the same. As you can see, I really need help from specialists and I need my GP to be there for me when I need help. In this country, you can't go to the hospital without the approval of your GP. Unless there is a life threatening situation of course. But none of my conditions are life threatening enough.


Foremost, I am a mom and take this very serious. My son goes to his grandparents once a week, for a day. His grandpa picks him up in the morning and grandma/aunt bring him back in the evening. This gives me some time to breathe a little. Work out, work, relax etc. I love my son but many parents will confirm that being a full time parent is exhausting.


I'm being very serious. I usually don't see em coming. But my family does. At this point, my boyfriend told me I can't work anymore for a while until I'm feeling better again. I'm tense and have a high standards when it comes to my work. I literally work until I can't go anymore because I don't have any energy left. I'm not just doing nothing right now. I am playing games I haven't played in over 6 months (please understand that games are in some way my job as well and it's weird having to write about stuff but never really relax and play). I also enjoy my son growing up. I'm already planning things for new projects I've started. These will take up many months of work.


Well, my own macro camera is old, unreliable, drains batteries within minutes and needs replacement. We are planning to save for a DSLR for me. By the looks of it, I won't have one this year, not next year, maybe the year after that. Very unsure. The other camera, also old, broke down on us and has been returned to the manufacturer. Hopefully it can be fixed so I can use that one until I get that DSLR. I can't really keep up with my hobby as a photographer without decent equipment. I'm really sad about this, but this is the way it is. I'm currently trying to maintain a 365 project blog. I upload a pic once a day. Lately I haven't been able to use the Canon, only the Olympus for macro pics. The quality isn't all that good, but if you want to keep following my work, check out [link]
I will hopefully have the Canon back in a few months. When I do, I will start shooting again outside


Not as much as I'd like anyway. I'm not going to throw with names here. If the people read this they will know if I mean them or someone else. But lately, people have been disrespecting my wishes again when it comes to my work here on dA. I offer some pattern packs. These are for personal use. However, someone asked if it was ok to use them in *their own* game. I thought that was okay, but also said I didn't want them to upload them to a website. And guess what, someone still did after I had said no. This person apparently feels that I replied too late the second time and therefore it's no longer my own, it's theirs and they can do with it whatever the *&^$#* they want. I disagree. I have Sims sites myself and didn't even upload these patterns there. If I'd do that now, people will think I stole these textures from another Sims site, while they were mine to begin with! It's ridiculous. I spoke my mind about this on that particular website and my post got removed a few hours later. I don't know what to think about this, except that I hate people who disrespect my work.
I had to find out about this through a friend who downloaded the textures on that site and then showed some screens to me, not knowing that those were mine! Such a coincidence! But a good thing I found out. I'm pretty sure I won't upload any more sets anytime soon on dA or any other site.
I know it happens to everyone who makes something, that people steal or take work and turn it into something they made or worse. But I can't use stuff like this right now. I will never accept it.


I entered a contest last month and lost. Even though it was not a fair contest (I showed it to many people and the contestants who got into the top 10 didn't all deserve to. I had hand drawn some entries and everyone *loved* them. But the corrupt judges apparently overlooked my quality entries which contained no copyrighted materials and entries from the ppl who were chosen did. Strange but sometimes that's how it goes. I want to enter contests more often. It may give me a chance to either money, prizes or just more people finding out about me, my name and my work. Which is what I need for my freelancing job to succeed as well. Entries in contests take time as well.

With everything I have on my mind regarding my health, I can't concentrate on work. And I certainly can't use dA often. I admit I miss it a lot but right now there is no choice for me. I have also accounts on other (social) networks like Twitter, Plurk, Facebook, Last.fm etc. I haven't really used any of those actively, except for Plurk, where I chat with some internet buddies about stuff that makes me happy or bothers me. dA is not the right place to do this. If you want to talk to me, send me a mail on [link] (I've got a beautiful contact form there and it works like a charm. There is no reason to say you can't contact me)
I want to add that I'm not leaving permanently. I just won't be that active I used to be for a while. I have to fix some things in my life and dA is just not my #1 priority. I still want to thank =rebelx for giving me a 3 month sub. I really enjoyed it for a while until too many problems started kicking in. I will renew it, just not now. I feel horrible for not being active while I had a sub. There just wasn't any way for me to be active everywhere at once with so much going on in my personal life. I hope you all understand.

Oh and once again, I won't be gone forever. I will come back

I figured it was time to update my journal again! It's something I'd like to do more often. But I'd like to do this well, so people will enjoy it more. And of course, there's the fact that I'm always busy, so it usually just is like *I'll do that tomorrow* or something. Not this time though.
Even though I'm sick, I still try to work. I should rest more. I think. I need my rest in order to be able to work and to take care of my little son. He's cute, but also very active and I often have a hard time keeping up with him when he's running around crazily
We talked about our finances and the things we need to buy this year. BF will get new PC parts after his exams. We also have to pre-order the (Limited) Collector's Edition of The Sims 3 in early February twice. I planned buying a Wacom Bamboo Fun (A5) for my birthday. My birthday is on Feb 10th and my BF has his on the 18th. Last year we bought the Wii from the money from both our birthdays. But this tablet is not something we'll share, so I won't be able to buy it for the both of us. Maybe during the summer. Our cameras need replacement. We've had lots of chats about this. Mine is old and not quite reliable. His is old and starting to act up (weird horizontal lines, purple borders etc). We won't be able to afford two normal digital cameras. Let alone a DSLR for me! Since I'm the one constantly taking pics, BF decided we'll be saving for a DSLR for me. We might be able to buy this at the end of 2009, but not a day earlier. The fridge needs replacement, some of our furniture is very child unfriendly (and it's also not very organized). We've got lots of expenses. And not a lot of money coming in. So I'm really sorry if I lack updates here. Let's just say I often have my priorities, even though I love dA and my friends here!
That's all the more reason I'm very thankful for =rebelx for buying me a sub. I'm really enjoying it!

Woah! I logged in yesterday and at first didn't see anything different. Until I saw the icon before my name. At first I didn't quite understand it. I had looked at the prices of subscriptions yesterday! I wanted a subscription, but I decided to wait a little, since we're having some financial problems due to unexpected (high) bills and of course Christmas. I checked my PayPal, making sure I didn't actually already buy a sub, but everything on my account was still there.
Then I checked my mail to see if there was a notice about the sub, and there was indeed!

Thank you!! =rebelx for buying me a sub

It's awesome. However I don't know what gift I should return lol. I will think of something

At the moment I am installing Windows Vista, XP and later on also OpenSuse on my PC. I got new PC parts for Christmas. The old ones were from 2004 (and older). In order to do my work properly, I needed some new hardware. I will tell more about this later.

Again, thank you =rebelx for the sub! I'm very happy and grateful

I'm trying to get my name out there, while developing and designing tons of new and existing projects. The best way to do so is to get involved in the whole social networking scene. It's also quite useful for me to figure all of them out since I occupy myself with web 2.0 apps. Anyway, I can be found at many social networking sites. I've added most of them on my website. But I've also added some of them below, in this journal.

I found this a while ago on x-missworld-x's journal. I was featured there and wanted to do the same for others. But I got so caught up in designing a CSS for my dA (gave up temporarily) and other projects (which I'm still working on btw), that I forgot about paying it forward. So I'm doing that now. It's very simple.

The first ten people to post a comment in this journal, will have three deviations chosen by me and those will be featured here. If you choose to part take in this, then please pay it forward!

Let the fun begin!