Believe it or not, Eonlight Valley's history goes back a long time, before it was even called Eonlight Valley. It used to be called Mew's Hideout, then Mewforina, and after that Mew's Paradise. This page shall describe with detail how Eonlight Valley came to be, from the very beginning. :3
I first got into webmaking when I saw an advertisement button to FreeWebs.com. I was 10 or 11 at that time and thought of FreeWebs as one of the best things that's ever happened because well, I never knew that almost anyone could make a site, and was eager to make my own. My first site was intended to be the homepage for a club my friend and I started at school, although we never really had any members except for a few teachers. *laughs* It lasted maybe a couple of weeks and my dad was impressed. Soon I got bored because we had no ideas for content, and our creativity was limited due to the fact FreeWebs only allowed 7 pages at that time. I soon quit FreeWebs until...
One day, I can't remember how, I stumbled across a prodigious site responsible for the inspiration of many of the older Pokemon sites in this fanbase. Mew's Hangout. The site is unfortunately closed now. Mew's Hangout inspired me to create my own Pokemon website -- I was so impressed by Mewkitty's art and since I was a Pokemon fan, why not create a Pokemon site? I bounced around quite a few different hosts in the next half year or so, hoping that someday my website would be among the elite. (This dream has now been realized. :3) I started by making pages just about every site had -- the sitely pages, as well as free graphics and web help guides and so forth. Back then I based nearly all my works on the works of more popular Pokemon sites. I didn't steal, but quite a few of my ideas were copied or altered. I even copied layouts now and then, but I never got flamed for it. Although I'd have learned sooner if I had been flamed, I'm actually glad I wasn't. Why? Because back then I was a shy little girl who wanted to be liked by the Internet fanbase, and if I'd been bashed/flamed in any way, I'd probably had quit sitemaking or moved on to a different fandom. Now, however, I'm much more knowledgeable in the Internet fandom area and have fortunately developed a hard center.
I remember when my site first was "established" for sure, I had a pretty pink layout and very few useful pages. That was when I started to affiliate with other sites, and they helped me well along the way. After that, while I made new pages, I also sought out better and more original layouts. This proved to be very useful, as my layouts tended to attract more visitors. I also renamed my site quite a few times - I think the oldest one was "Pokemon Mansion".
As I slowly climbed up in topsites, I also became a bit more professional. I knew more about the Internet community and how much originality was valued in fansites. So... I discarded a few pages and made new ones, as well as creating my OWN layouts with my OWN coding. Although Mew's Hangout was going down by this time, many other popular sites inspired me and urged me on.
After a period of time, when my site was perhaps around #16-#20 in the topsites, disaster struck. My site had been developing so well and getting more and more popular, but my host at that time, Orgfree, went down and my site was completely deleted. I lost quite a few pages and had to rely on an old backup. That was when I lost about all my motivation, and sat back and did nothing for a period of time, until finally, I decided to rebuild the site and give it a new name: Eonlight Valley. (I was never quite sure how I thought of the name - one day it just laid itself in my head.) However, I lacked one thing: a good layout, and I wasn't inspired to make my own, until a good person named Myuureon made one for me. It was dark purple with an Espeon on it, and it was very professional-looking and cool. I began contacting old affiliates and remaking my pages.
That time of rebuilding was rather rocky. At some points in time I felt depressed and let the site sit and die. Then I would suddenly revive it with some major update or another, and then gradually update regularly and then suddenly die again. I also began to get bored of my layouts, and sought to make better ones. Some while before I found out about Valley of Nightmares, perhaps in the first few months they opened, I believe. Eevereon was such a great artist and her layouts usually inspired my own (especially the purple Tranquility of Night layout, which is now somewhat of an important "history mark" in Eonlight Valley). I began to base my layout structures and art on hers, and it went well for a while, until people began accusing me of stealing. This made me upset and angry, especially since I began to become very good friends with Ev and flufy, so I became determined to develop my own unique, individual style and such.
Over the course of the next few months I got a tablet and had a much easier time drawing, and EHQ also became my sister site. Its owner, Eevee-chan, was a great source of inspiration for me whenever I felt like I couldn't draw or accomplish much. Getting a domain had also been one of my goals, but I never actually thought I'd be able to persuade my dad into getting one until the owner of RivaCo.com sent me an IM asking me if I wanted a domain for free. At first I was like "psh no way that's true", but in the next minute I was looking at an Internet site, mine, with the address of www.eonlightvalley.com. I was astonished and going O__O the entire time, and my heart was beating rather fast. I remain grateful beyond words forever for the generous donation. ^_^
Eonlight Valley was also heading up the topsites list, but while its growth was the greatest I happened to be oblivious to its success. o_O; The last day I remember paying great attention to EV's stats was when it was around #11 or so in the topsites... and then suddenly, the next time I really noticed it, it was in the top 5. If it were me a few years ago I'd have been dancing with joy, but the me now was quiet yet very pleased inside. I'd realized that the stats was not what really mattered to me, it was how I thought of my own art and content. I'm still not 100% satisfied with everything, but I intend to make Eonlight Valley the best it can be and preserve it for as long as I can. ^_~
Eonlight Valley's birthday is November 7th, 2005. This is not exactly correct, but it's my estimate. >>; I'm also pretty sure I first started making a Pokemon site in 2003-2004.
Eonlight Valley, all its content and graphics are unless stated otherwise (c) Kronakitty (kronakitty@gmail.com) 2005-2008. Official Pokemon contents and images are (c) Nintendo 1995-2008. This is only a fan site, and I do not claim ownership of Pokemon.
