It was about 12 years ago that I designed my first invitation. Here I was, still a graphic design student at OCAD (Ontario College of Art & Design) and working part-time at a communications agency when someone came along and asked me to design invitations for her husband's 75th birthday bash. Well, to be perfectly honest, I had no idea what I was doing. I mean, I had learned much about graphic design in school...the principles of design, working with typography, print production, etc. But having never designed an invitation before, I had to learn to apply my skills to this new medium. It was certainly a learning process! I learned through trial-and-error what papers could and couldn't mix with the inks of certain printers and learned the hard way what sort of adhesives work best. I even learned the do's and don'ts of invitation etiquette...a world I was completely lost in! Though probably my most frustrating project to date, the invitations turned out lovely and despite the rough process, I realized how much I enjoyed this medium and the creativity that I could incorporate into it.

I've certainly learned a lot in the past years as I had the opportunity through my freelance work to create more invitations for various events including my own wedding. The more I got into it, the more I enjoyed pushing my own creativity playing with various paper textures and embellishments. However, all this time, invitations was only a very small part of what I did. The opportunity for invitations only came around once every few months and in the meantime I continued working for that communications agency as well as doing freelance corporate design for small businesses while what I really wanted to design was invitations.

In the fall of 2011, I started Impressions. It began as a part-time business on the side while I was working my regular full-time graphic design job. I began to expand my products to include personalized children's art and growth charts as my life began to revolve around babies and children.

In the summer of 2014, after having completed maternity leave with my second child, I took the plunge and pursued my business full-time. It has really grown in the last year and I love what I do every day and so grateful to have the flexibility I need to be a mom. I'm extremely excited about this new chapter in my life and look forward to the opportunities that await me.