She turned a calming hobby into a business during quarantine

“My Economy” tells the story of the new economic normal through the eyes of people trying to make it, because we know the only numbers that really matter are the ones in your economy.

Tally Dilbert, 23, was finishing up her last semester at the University of Texas at San Antonio when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the country and everything shut down.

“There was a point that I was so bored, Dilbert said. “I was like, ‘I have to do something else.’”

Dilbert began feeling anxious, too; the shift from having a busy life and being on campus to being home all day was getting difficult.

“I had to do something that calms me down. And I remembered I like to paint, but I’m always giving myself excuses because of school and time,” Dilbert said. “And right now, I have a lot of time.”

Dilbert has always been interested in art — she remembers painting in school while growing up in Honduras. She would also sketch fashion pieces during college for fun.

During quarantine, she found herself painting again and sharing her work on her Instagram.

“People started asking me, ‘Are you going to sell them?’ Or, like, what I’m going to do with them?” Dilbert remembers.

So Dilbert decided to post her paintings with a price on each.

“Eventually I had more clients, more people asking me if I could do, like, custom artwork for them.”

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