Updated: February 2026
I’m just a quiet person who prefers to be in the back of wherever I am. I really don’t like attention. So you won’t find me on Instagram, Pinterest or Facebook. I did try them but decided they are really not for me. Although, I have been a blogger since 2002 (anyone remember Greymatter??) and that’s why you will still find me with a blog. Once a blogger always a blogger I guess.
I started out with graphic design in the late 1990s for my personal webpages, then moved onto being a “webmaster” in the early internet days. Then the CSS movement came along and I loved then concept and participated in Dave Shea’s CSS Zen Garden project. My submission, Port of Call, is still found here. I was honored to be mentioned in Dave’s CSS Zen Garden book for participating in the project.
Then I started dabbling in scrapbooking thanks to an Australian friend named Loretta (Retta) (Paisley Blues). She introduced me to Pickleberrypop back in the early 2000s. I started dabbling with making my own pages and quickly realized I could make kits too (always the graphics designer). It took a few years being on the back burner, but by 2009 I had my very first pack of papers for a freebie. It was a slow start. I made a a few things here and there. But it wasn’t until I discovered Digital Scrapbook [Pixel Scrapper] that I really started being active in the scrapbooking world. My first blog train was the PS October 2014 Blog Train Autumn Art. I was hooked.
In January 2017 I was honored to be considered by Digital Scrapbook.com [Pixel Scrapper] as a designer. I have been there for over seven years now. I’ve since worked with the wonderful ladies at the Scrappy Sisters store before they closed. Later I joined Toiny and her fantastic Team over at the Digital Scrapbooking Studio. I only left the Studio since I started homeschooling my kindergartner in addition to my 4th grader & I didn’t want to juggle too much. Although, I have been homeschooling my kids since 2004, I still know my limits lol!
I have a special fondness for cupboards and food pantries – maybe because my grandmother always had a well stocked pantry. Curios are those novel, rare or eccentric bits of odds & ends which I have always loved. So I hope you enjoy The Curio Pantry where I hope to fill it with all kinds of delicious odds & scraps to help you with all your digital scrapbooking, memory keeping, or other projects!
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On the personal side, I’ve been married to one of my best friends for over 26 years and have had 6 children, the oldest has left the nest, 2 were born sleeping in 2009 & 2014 and the other 3 are currently at home. I grew up in Florida but have lived in Louisiana, Kentucky, and now Virginia is where we call home.
Hubby and I have always been homesteaders and love to live life the old fashioned way. Though my hubby is a tech geek too. Throughout the years we have raised chickens, goats & turkeys. But now that we are settled into an old farmhouse, which I have fondly named Hearthside, with our few acres, we were able to make having a dairy cow happen! It happened December 2025 and so we now have our own family dairy cow, Buttermilk, who is hopefully expecting a calf Summer of 2026! On the farm there are always losses. We have lost chickens before, sometimes a turkey, but this year we lost our newest pig, Dillsworth, an unforeseeable event that sadly happened in November 2025. We also still do want to add sheep in the future. So despite everything our farm is still growing.
And as of January 2026 I no longer create using any AI in my creations, bundles, kits, or freebies. It certainly can be tougher to do this since so many resources now are AI generated. But I am determined to be 100% me – 100% human. 🙂 I also do not use any AI chat programs to create any of my content, or at all for that matter. I compose directly from my own head and heart and try to breathe life into the words I write so there is meaning and understanding within them. If I fail at any point with that then I guess that’s just part of being human lol. I am okay with that.
There may be a day you won’t find me hanging out on the internet. Quite frankly, I prefer the company of cows, chickens, pigs, and the beautiful nature that is all around me, anyway.