My family moved into our new house on the first day of quarantine. I remember my mom telling my brother and me that school would be fully virtual and all the stores and restaurants would be closed. Movers wore bright blue masks wrapped around their faces as they carried furniture and boxes of our belongings into our home. My mom was one step behind them with a bottle of Lysol and wipes. The entire process felt isolating and wrong. I was confused about what was going to happen next. Were we ever going to leave this house?
A week passed. We were still stuck. My routine was monotonous: virtual school at 8:15 a.m., an elaborate homemade breakfast in the kitchen, back in my room for more school, and repeat. While some students truly enjoyed not having to leave their rooms, I was the opposite. I felt unmotivated to do anything. After school, I would immediately yell, “I’M BORED, MOM!”
My mom always responded with ideas. “Why don’t you go for a walk or play outside with the dogs?”
I ended up sitting in my bed and scrolling through TikTok. My For You page became flooded with millions of digital art pages and sticker businesses, which caught my attention. Shortly after seeing these, I jumped out of bed and ran quickly down the stairs to my mom.
My mom fell in love with the idea of me starting to draw digitally and finding something that gave me purpose during a quiet time in my life. I pulled the barstool out and sat next to her at the kitchen counter, downloading the app “Procreate” on my iPad.
“Honey, let’s see if this is something you truly like and know how to use for a few weeks.”
I was optimistic about this app. Every day, I would create a new drawing. I’d go on YouTube and search for tutorials that I could easily follow along with on my iPad. As the days went by, my Procreate album started to fill up with more and more of my artistic creations. Soon, I realized I wanted to take this passion and turn it into a business.
As I started brainstorming what this new business could be, many ideas came to mind. Then it clicked: Amanda’s Sticker Studio. I realized that my path was to create something unique and personal that would bring a smile to people’s faces. Custom sticker packs featuring the iconic TV shows and movies that people were binge-watching in their homes, personalized name stickers, and even custom designs.
The process of designing stickers was self-taught. I purchased a Cricut machine to transform my designs into stickers. First, I designed a pack of stickers and added a clean white border around it. Then, I would export the design to the Cricut app on my computer. Once I inserted a new design and uploaded the sticker artwork onto the app, I carefully designed and printed it. With just a press of a button, the Cricut precisely did all of the careful cutting work. I gently removed the stickers from the sheet, revealing my new product. As more ideas began to flow, I found myself sketching out sticker packs that ranged from beloved TV series like Friends to All American. Each pack was crafted with care. With every new design, my excitement grew. I was building not just a business but a way for people to express themselves.
Pretty soon, I began to get busy. One of my most consistent clients was a group called “The Tenafly Lunch Club” or the TLC. The TLC was a group of dads who came together, and each week, one of them would create a special lunch to distribute to the others in the group. Josh Capon, a famous chef in our town, came up with the idea of bringing people together through food while all the restaurants were closed. I spent countless hours designing, discussing with the club members, and finding humor in each design, sometimes until one in the morning.
When it was my dad’s turn to make a dish, he chose a brisket sandwich. As I started thinking of what I could make that would be humorous, “Body by Brisket” came to mind. I took a photo of my dad holding the pieces of brisket and imported it into my app. The dads found it hysterical, and it brought humor to everyone’s day to see the stickers (and the brisket was delicious). As my reputation for designing humorous stickers for the TLC grew, not only did the members look forward to a delicious meal, but they also looked forward to seeing my twist on the stickers I would create for their meals.
The pandemic initially brought many dull moments, but I turned this time into a purposeful period of my life that I will never forget. There are not many people I know who ran a small business at ten years old, but I will always cherish the memories I made from this. I was proud of myself for adapting to the pandemic and not allowing my days to pass without meaning. Amanda’s Sticker Studio is something I will always cherish as an outlook for creativity and purpose.
