Hiya! I am a very busy graphic designer, educator, wife and mother of two gorgeous children—Seriously, I am not just saying that as their mom. My kids are really good looking, like model material. Not sure how that happened.

Originally from Wayne, Pennsylvania, I have a BA in English from Villanova University. Not knowing what to do after graduation, but always needing to be useful and productive, I joined the U.S. Peace Corps serving in Cape Verde, West Africa for over two years where I taught English as a second language. Yes, things were tough on that small desert island of Sal where I lived, dealing with friendly, gorgeous Cape Verdeans and Italian ex-pats inviting me on to their catamarans. I saw why it is called “the toughest job you’ll ever love.”

I then returned to the Philadelphia area and attended Temple University’s Tyler School of Art, receiving my MFA in Graphic and Interactive Design. Immediately after graduating, in the summer of 2004, I taught a summer design workshop for Tyler’s Tokyo, Japan campus.

Since moving to the west Texas town of El Paso in the late summer of 2004, I have been the recipient of Gold and Silver ADDY awards from the Advertising Federation of El Paso and received honorable mention in the 9th International Biennial of the Poster held in Mexico City in 2006 and was a finalist in 2008, and 2010. In 2009 I was invited as one of only 100 designers worldwide to participate in the poster exhibit Voices in Freedom sponsored by the International Biennial of the poster in Mexico City.

In 2011 my work was included in LogoLounge Master Library Volume 3: 3000 Shape & Symbol Logos and in 2012 in Logolounge Master Library, Volume 4: 3000 Type & Calligraphy Logos, both by Catherine Fishel and Bill Gardner. In 2014 I was a finalist for the The Texas Institute of Letters’ Fred Whitehead Award for Design of a Trade Book for my design of Remember Dippy by Shirley Reva Vernick, published by Cinco Puntos Press.

I enjoy most designing for the community, the environment, the arts, multi-culturally, and anything having to do with wonderful, wonky vernacular and historic typography. I am also a well-recognized grammar nazi and self-proclaimed enforcer of correct hyphen, en-dash and em-dash usage in the El Paso–Juárez region, as you may have guessed already from this text.

In addition to designing lots and lots of stuff for over ten years, I LOVE traveling, especially off the beaten path—favorite trips include Lhasa, Kathmandu, Victoria Falls, The Dogon Country, Chengdu, Barcelona and all over Italy. Travel informs my design and I see it as an investment in myself. My best case scenario: disembarking after a long train ride into a place I have never been where people are wearing strange clothing and speaking a language I do not understand, cell phones do not work and credit cards are not accepted, all I have is the summer off, a Lonely Planet guidebook, and a voice inside my head that says SHOW TIME!

Currently, I work out of my home studio in the EP and teach all levels of graphic design, including web design, as a tenured Associate Professor at The University of Texas at El Paso.