Hello my name is Sarah Neely-Smith. If your wondering were the name Ella came from, it came from my middle name. Ella Smith has been my pen name since middle school for all my writing.

It all truly started when I was a kid with a rare blood disease called Kostmann Severe Congenital Neutropenia. This is when my body didn’t make enough white blood cells to fight off bacteria. Because I got sick all the time, art was my escape, I even started to imagine starting or working for someone as a graphic designer so if I was sick I could still do my work from home. Once I. got diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia, also known as AML. I had to put my life on hold to fight my cancer battle but I kept my art with me.

Once I won my battle, I went to school for my associates in liberal arts, then I went to get my Associate in culinary. I found out I was great at cooking when I was in my hospital room, especially in the middle of the night and all I have is the extremely hot water from my bathroom. After working a few culinary jobs, I loved cooking but i still felt like something is missing. at that point I took a special test and it told me that my top one for a compatibility career was graphic design.

This started my journey with animation first, were I quickly learned I am better at 2d animation than 3d animation. So I switch to bachelor’s in graphic design were I am scheduled to graduate with a GPA of 3.75 in July 2023.

My work ethic

My goal is to become a freelancer to help other. To be kind, respectful and to fulfill your design dreams.

Because I know first hand have hard it is to get hired because of a disability, this is why I want to be a freelancer. I want to be hired because of my work and not be dismissed because of my disability. I want to sell my photography, my paintings, be hired for face painting and to be hired to create different graphic designs. Go check out both my portfolios if you haven’t yet. If I ever get to poplar, my goal is to hire people for their skills not their race, gender, or even disability. I would even hire veterans.

My goals

My goals over all is to take a portion of my proceeds and donate to a local oncology family.

Because knowing first hand how hard it is financially to go through a battle like that, I wanted to help relieve some of that stress on them. This money could be use to pay bills, medical, gas, food, lodging, travel expenses, or if the cancer is terminal they can use the money to go or do something together one last time.