Cilla (she/her) grew up in Boston, but the landscape of her childhood was always the last raw volcanic edge of Blue Hill bay in Northern Maine.  Cilla’s ancestry is Celtic and Scandinavian, from Scotland (Isle of Skye), Ireland and Sweden.  She grew into herself during seasons of wild wanderings, learning to navigate early losses by pushing her edges on muddy trails and in the sea, snorkelling for giant shellfish, kayaking with curious seals to Deer Isle to track the inexplicable buffalo, and writing and painting on the beach. 

Cilla’s early work life included stints in landscaping, archeology, editing and writing. Since 2009, Cilla has been a visual and narrative arts teacher and storyteller, a graphic artist and writer, a lover of ink, clay, and tragic Appalachian ballads, maker of tiny wool skeletons, driftwood looms, and fairy apothecaries.  Kids, including her own, are her favourite creative co-conspirators. In 2009 she moved from New England to Vancouver with her Canadian partner and spent a decade working and training in fine arts, creative arts education, literacy and counselling.  She raised two babies while working as a Reggio Emilia inspired arts instructor, and as a poetry mentor with the CEDAR camp for aboriginal youth, often teaching art in the urban wilds of Jericho Beach and the Pacific Spirit Forest.  She holds a BA in Literature from Brown University, a certificate in Fine Arts & Design from Emily Carr University, and completed her graduate work in creative writing and teaching at the Stonecoast MFA program in Maine. She began a Counselling Psychology study path in 2021, with a projected focus on nature and narrative therapy.

Since 2019 Cilla has welcomed deep recognition of her own core experiences and passions within the shared language of nature connection and mentoring.  She has deepened this understanding through her work in Victoria as a forest mentor at EPIC Learning Centre, and as an instructor with TRWS — first as a Tend the Fire apprentice, and now as a mentor with the Wolf Kids and Little Leaves programs.  She continues her nature connection learning through the Wild & Alive program, and through 8Shields coursework and reading.  Her newest inquiries include a deep dive into tanning and sewing fish leather, bird paintings on wood, and natural clay whistles.