- I probably had five or six pieces.

When I sold them, I got really emotional and started crying to the point that people have said, "Do you want me to buy something else?"

And my husband would be like, "No, she'll be fine.

"Go ahead and take it."

(chuckles) (cheerful music) Hello, my name is April Couch, and I am the artist-owner of Totally Tangled Creations.

I got my degree in business administration, and I worked in banking for 17 years.

Then I quit to be a stay-at-home mom, and I did that until my kids all went to school, and I had to decide what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.

And I didn't want to go back to my career because it was not something I was passionate about, so I decided to go back to my first love, which was art.

I just happened upon this type of art which looked like what I was doing.

Most people call this Zentangle, I call it doodling.

Zentangle is an art form, but it is a meditative way of creating patterns repetitively.

It's mostly done on, like, little squares of paper, that's how it starts.

Immediately, that seemed like boundaries to me.

I wanted to explore different things.

So I took Zentangle and my doodling, and I married the two, and I came up with my own style of doing this.

And everything just kind of happened from there.

Usually, it starts with a piece first.

Probably four days a week, I'm out shopping, looking around, thrift stores, on the curb, wherever.

And then, once I have the piece in my hand, I decide what I'm going to do with it.

And if you look at them, most of the designs look pretty much the same, even though not any two pieces are the same.

They all look totally different.

As I work on a piece, the designs are pretty much random, and I just let my pen flow, and whatever comes out, comes out.

From start to finish, a small piece can take me three hours.

A large piece can take me 75 hours.

I'm absolutely in love with this piece.

You spend time with the things that you create, and they become a part of you.

This was the first gourd that I did, and I have a picture of my daughter holding it, and she has this big smile on her face.

And so, that memory goes with this gourd, and it makes it even harder for me to release this piece.

So, the success is about helping others, not just yourself.

It's about uplifting a community.

Akron is on the cusp of something I think is really great, and to see that dynamic of artists really growing and developing businesses, seeing that happen, and being a part of it, it's been really exciting.

When I'm creating, I truly leave the world.

I'm in my happy place.

No one sits and does this for hours and hours and hours without loving it.

And I absolutely love what I do.

And I think everyone has the right to love what they do, especially if they're gonna do it for the rest of their life.