My Blog: http://queen-of-nostalgia.blogspot.com/

Find me on Etsy: http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5583375

You can also bid on my pretties on eBay: merchant/queennostalgia_W0QQ_nkwZQQ_armrsZ1QQ_fromZQQ_mdoZ

I would love to say that I have been scrapbooking my entire life, that as a toddler I saved my first doodles or that I saved the curls my eight-year-old sister snipped from my head during an impromptu game of beauty shop. I would love to say that they are safely tucked in an archival safe book. But alas, I didn't know what scrapbooking was back then.

I always had the desire to be crafty, however. I took a turn at making purses from Kleenex embellished with Magic Markers; they didn't hold up well. I attempted cross stitch; it simply made me cross. I tried my hand at quilting; my mom had to finish the blanket for me. As I grew older, I put my Magic Markers in a box of ever-increasing craft supplies, earned a degree in Education, and became a teacher.

But I never lost my love of "making things pretty." My students would smile and tell me they could always spot my handouts; they were so "pretty" with a well placed title in a fancy font, a subtle graphic in the bottom border, shaded text for the instructions.... Even with the hectic schedule of grading research papers and teaching journalism and composition, I enjoyed taking the little bit of extra time to make worksheets and syllabi pleasing to the eye. I loved old pictures and would explore antique shops looking for antique portraits to use in creative writing activities, I would collect bits and pieces of ephemera and fabric and.... I was sure I could find a use for them in a project somehow. My box with Magic Markers had long since morphed into an entire spare bedroom filled with crafts and pretties...

And then, one day, as I was preparing a bulletin board for Romeo and Juliet, one of my best teacher friends came running into my room, clutching a large album.

Her scrapbook.

Within minutes I was absorbed in her pages, and she talked me into going to a "crop" with her that weekend. I wasn't sure what a "crop" was, but I was intrigued.

That was almost five years ago. Since then I have hosted crops, taught scrapbooking classes, completed over a dozen personal scrapbooks for my family, and joined a design team, "Better Than Doing Laundry", and sell scrapbook pages and other pieces of paper and altered art. My work has become recognizable for balance of design, harmony in colors, and my unique use of vintage notions to create texture and interest - truly one of a kind pieces. While I have traded in my Magic Markers for distressing inks, and my Kleenex purses have been replaced with my signature Teapot and Watering Can albums, my enthusiasm and passion remain as strong as when I was a child. My love of vintage is balanced with my sense of play with whimsical touches, and my artwork will find its way into your heart. Even without using Magic Markers