Hometown: Davis, CA
Current Location: Natomas, (Sacramento) CA
Occupation: Customer fulfillment coordinator for a network storage manufacturer

You’re a Cali girl. How is it out on the West Coast? Haha, well its all I really know! I love it, I’m a sunny being, so I need sun to make me happy! I’m settled 45 min from SF, 2 hrs from Tahoe and Reno. I get the best of all worlds, snow without living in it, breeze if I need it!

Have you ever been to N. Y. C? Never had a chance to go to the East Coast, but its totally on my “To Do” list. Would you ever make a trip? Just need a reason! I’m hoping sometime in the next couple years when I finish my bachelors and start gettin some serious career cash

Many people have been moving out of NY looking for creativity? Do you think the west coast is a the place to be now? I never considered creativity to be location based, but I tend to harbor the idea that the bay area and NYC are both breeding ground for creativity, art comes to mind.

What attracted you to designing BB themes? I’m a matching fiend and super girly girl. I just got my bb in Feb and started theming that month! I only had a few themes and I realized my ass is way too picky to rely on someone else. And it would just be faster for me to do it myself. I had a great teacher, Stephanie K, who patiently helped me learn my way around everything I needed to know.

Do you have a background in graphic design? No, I just started using graphics programs when I began making themes, never used photoshop before but now I’m starting to consider taking some courses at the community college to help me since it feels like I’ll stick with this for a while.

What’s the largest project you’ve ever taken on? I cant say largest but I think the most difficult theme I created was for EY Interiors, for Tiaa, she had a company logo and a concept and I had to kind of run with it. The dogs, sports teams, and Hello Kitty themes are the easiest because you have images to work with, but I had to get creative with hers. It was fun but a lot of work.

What type of clients do you attract? I try to feel it out but its hard to tell based on emails. Naturally mostly females, since pretty much all of my themes are pink. I know there are women who use my themes that are 45+ and some that are 20 ish. I’d like to hope my themes are diverse enough for all ages.

Do they typically reach out to you or vice versa? They reach out to me. I use twitter (@ChynaGyrL1980) as a tool to allow my followers to see my themes as I create them and link them to my site to download. I have great followers that usually retweet my themes so it ends up hitting a broader audience. I also post my themes across various forums.

What’s the process for a customized theme? I’m usually contacted via email and the person gives me their device and the theme they’d like. If they have pics they want me to use they can supply those as well. I will add them to my theme request queue and go down the list, contacting each person as I am ready to do their theme. It really depends on how much is happening with school, work, and home and how I can balance it all.

How long does it all take you? I am a bit of a perfectionist so I like to do a few revisions, I’m also a major multi-tasker so I’ll do other things in between. Lately I’m finding that I will make new dialog boxes and color things to be the perfect shade and that is what takes up a lot of my time since I’m such a newbie with the photo programs. I’d say it takes about a day or two,. maybe 3.

Would you say you’re “addicted” to your BB? Yes, its like my 3rd arm.

Which model do you have? Lol curve. thats why all my themes are for my device. Hard to get motivation to create a theme that you cant enjoy!

Many of your themes are for BB Curves, although they also work on the World Edition. Will you also make themes for the Storm, Pearl, etc? Converting is a very big task and not very rewarding to spend hours to redo all the aspects of a theme for $5. I just dont have the desire to do all that work when I could be making a custom theme in the same amount of time for 5-10 times that amount. So unless I have 4-5 people requesting the same converted theme, the motivation is low. My other idea was to post the converted themes for donation, so that may be coming for a few of my themes. We’ll have to see, school starts this month. Ugh.

Was your BB your first smart phone? Why or why not? Yes, its my first. I was actually holding out because my contract was almost up and I wanted the HTC fuze but it was too expensive. I had a friend selling this curve on craigslist and he told me I could have it for $80. Best $80 I’ve spent, because its introduced me to a whole new world.

Do you have a favorite them? My themes change with my mood, but a few of my fave themes are bold rainbow flowers, blk white pink flowers, rainbow star shower. Its weird, I dont know why I love my flower themes, I dont even like flowers that much. I have a few HK faves like Hello Kitty Loves Pink and Hello Kitty Bumble Bee. And Pink Twitter. Oh and Pink Skyline n Moonlight Sunset Fairy. Lol yeah no favorite favorite.

How long have you been created themes? I started doing this in Feb. I think I started getting good around May I think.

Do you think you’ll ever create apps for BB as well? I have no idea where to begin with that one but after all the coding I’ve had to do to set up my website, I feel like its not out of the question, I just wouldnt even know where to begin!

Mac or PC? PC is all I’ve ever had!

Ubertwitter or SocialScope? I’m really a hard core Ubertwitter lover, but I’m starting to get used to SS. I like that I can post to facebook too. If Ubertwitter could swing that I’d go back. I hate not being able to delete direct msgs in SocialScope, its annoying.

Blogger or WordPress? I use blogger now but I’m setting up another website, mellysbbthemes using wordpress. I’ll see which is more functional, cant answer this question yet!

Facebook or Myspace? Facebook for my real friends, myspace was fun for a minute but I’m finding facebook more “real”.