Introducing the Team
Fran Allen Smitherman
Fran Allen Smitherman has ALWAYS loved photo albums, and as a founding member of Creative Life Scrapbooking she is blessed to have this opportunity to stretch herself to create pages that do more than “get it done.” She is passionate about saving memories and having fun while doing it, and she works hard to fit in-person and virtual traditional and digital scrapbooking events in with her family, her career and her many other hobbies. She has been a Creative Memories Advisor since 2002 and she is a Senior Executive Ambassador with Forever. To Fran, life is beautiful and it is worth celebrating, and having a safe way to preserve your photos and to tell your stories is one of Fran’s biggest focuses in life. She loves to help others all over the country do the same and is honored to be a part of the CLS creative team. You can follow Fran on Facebook, on Instagram and on her blog.
Karyn McDermaid-Rolfe
Karyn McDermaid-Rolfe has been a Creative Memories advisor in central Illinois since 2001 and is a founding member of Creative Life Scrapbooking. She hosts both in-person and virtual scrapbooking events. Karyn has been a content contributor for Creative Memories since 2016 and creates layouts that are shared on the CM Blog and in promotional materials. She has also been published in Creative Scrapbooker Magazine and Creative Keepsakes magazine. Karyn was also a member of the Creative Memories Consultant Design Team in 2005. She has enjoyed crafts and many different art forms since she was young girl, but scrapbooking is her favorite hobby. She loves to create pretty pages and find unique uses for Creative Memories tools and materials. In addition to scrapbooking, Karyn loves playing with her grandchildren, pottery, and gardening. Along with her husband, she also enjoys hiking in the mountains, boating on the lake and searching for interesting antiques to collect and sell. You can follow Karyn on her blog, on YouTube and/or on Facebook.
Martha Murray
Martha started scrapbooking in 2003 after being invited to a Creative Memories party and fell in love with scrapbooking and Creative Memories products. In 2016 she became an advisor and hasn't looked back! She loves to create pages to document her family's story for future generations and to be able to share layouts and ideas with other scrapbookers (they are the best people)!
In the past, she has created layouts for Creative Memories’ Virtual Crops , has had a few designs published in Creative Scrapbooker Magazine, and has been a guest designer for CLS. Her latest venture is Master{pieces} by Martha. Her goal is to use the essential CM tools available and show you how to make any paper-pieced embellishment you may need. You can find the instructions to create her embellishments and layouts on her website.
She has a wonderful husband, James, of almost 24 years and is a mom to a 19-year-old daughter and a 17-year-old son. She loves scrapbooking her family story; it's her therapy, passion, friend time, and her me time!
Diana Brinsley
Diana is a busy mom to 3 grown daughters, a grandmother to 13, and a great-grandmother to a set of adorable twin girls and 5 super cute little boys, with two more girls due in 2023. She is an avid photographer with plenty of subjects to photograph and 43 years of travel photos to scrapbook. She has been preserving her photos in traditional and digital scrapbook albums since she joined Creative Memories as a consultant in 1994. Diana is a former blog author and content contributor for Creative Memories and has also been published in Creative Scrapbooker Magazine.
Melissa Ullmann
Melissa has been a scrapbooker for 29 years—the hobby started when she got married in 1992, as she received a Creative Memories album and supplies as a wedding gift from her grandparents. Melissa has worked for both old-co and new-co Creative Memories Home Office but leaving her dream job there in 2018 but continuing to freelance for the company. In February of 2019 she started The Creative Chatterbox, where she teaches online/virtual scrapbooking design and technique classes. She offers a membership group with weekly classes. Melissa is married to Dennis, with two adult sons- Josh and Taylor. Now that her nest is empty she enjoys chasing her English Springer Spaniel, named Porter and visiting breweries.
Lisa Graham
Lisa Graham lives in Northville, Michigan with her husband Rich and 2 sons, Richie and James. In 2001, Lisa became a CM Consultant after falling in love with their product line at her first Home Class. She was especially drawn to the time saving products & tools as well as CM’s simple approach to scrapbooking. She also loved the idea of helping others preserve their memories. 20+ years later, Lisa is still passionate about memory keeping and proud to be a founding member of Creative Life Scrapbooking. Lisa has expanded her offerings to include Forever and Sunflower Studio - a place where people come together to create works of heart. You can find more about Lisa’s offerings at LisasWorkshop.net
Krista French
Krista French has loved to craft and create since she was little and has been scrapbooking her cherished memories for about 18 years.
She joined as a CM Advisor in 2015 when Creative Memories came back to Canada.. she jumped on the chance to join in the fun ... and loving every minute of it.
She has made so many friendships and has enjoyed helping others get their memories into albums.
Her other love is gardening and enjoy the outdoor spaces.. and oh yes! She scrapbooks that too.
She is enjoying the fun of CLS team, creating fun ideas to share. Such fabulous group of ladies .
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