A year ago I made the decision to join dA.

I'd long been an admirer of deviantART. I was always stumbling upon drawings and paintings I loved. I wanted to be able to participate in the community. I wanted to be able to comment and fave art I loved. At the time, there was also a Skyward Sword meme going around that I wanted to join in on, despite my extremely non-existent drawing skills.  My good friend, ~DarkHunter666 had been trying to convince me for years to join, so I finally made the jump.

I didn't really feel I had anything to upload, but I didn't want to leave my profile empty either. I didn't even know you were 'allowed' to upload anything that wasn't digital or traditional art. I uploaded a couple of things, filled in my profile, chucked up a ridiculous profile picture (which I still haven't gotten around to changing) and called it a day. I was surprised when some of my things got a few views and when a couple of groups requested to add my stuff to their group. ~thekookyartist prompted me to submit some of my work to groups and was the first person [who I didn't already know outside of dA] to encourage me to keep uploading things. The rest, as they say, is history.

I didn't expect anyone to look at my gallery. I didn't expect to become invested in this site. I didn't expect it to change me.

A year ago, if you had of told me I would have gained 1570 watchers, 22k page views, 2 Daily Deviations, have hit the front page a few times and been featured twice in a site-wide article written by one of dA's staff as well as been featured on dA's Facebook page, I would have told you you were insane. That is, some time after I finished laughing hysterically.

Looking back on it all, I have no idea how it happened.

Your encouragement means more to me than words can describe. You all, whether you're watching me or I'm watching you, have changed me completely.

I began viewing this hobby of mine as art. You made me strive to improve like nothing else before has. I began uploading and creating food art alongside digital art and not only believed myself that culinary art had a place beside all the others, I found everyone else did, too. When gaming sites wrote articles about the amazing Link's Blacklist art collab I found my cake was often one of, or sometimes the only, featured piece in the article. You encouraged me to want my photographs to not be just snapshots of food to illustrate my blog, but to become art in of itself. I bought a book on food photography and 2 weeks ago I bought a SLR so I can start putting into practise all I've been researching. None of any of that would have happened if not for you all.

When I was on holiday with my boyfriend, I was replying to comments here on dA when he suddenly asked, "And what are you smiling about?" I hadn't noticed, but every time I sit here and read your comments I end up unconsciously grinning. I am so full of self-doubt. Yours words help me get through that.

So I want to thank you for an incredible year. I want to thank you for affecting such a change in me. I want to thank ^maytel and ^Talty for the Daily Deviations that exposed my work to more people and helped made this possible. I want to thank every one of you who has ever looked at, faved or commented on my work. And I especially want to thank the one and a half thousand crazy kids who added me to their watch list and continually support and encourage me.

Thank you.