The Blog

Cynthia, also known as MrsPeel, is a cherished community member and a wonderfully prolific scrapblogger. She’s created more than 70 scrapblogs and over hundred a scrapblog pages! Cynthia is multilingual and speaks fluent English, Spanish and Portuguese. It is touching to read of the many hardships she has overcome; the rest of her interesting story follows below:

1. Give us a little bit more info about yourself (where are you from, work, school, family, hobbies etc…)

Hi, well, my story is a bit long, as I’m approaching my 50th :)) but will try to be brief:

I was born in Argentina, grew up between Buenos Aires, Cordoba and many cities in Brasil, mainly Rio and the region South of Bahia (Trancoso, Porto Seguro, these Brazilian paradises the Portuguese discovered in the 1500’s!!!)

I was born with a double hip dislocation, didn’t walk until aged 5, had operations (9 of them!) by the time I turned 8. Then, I went against all medical predictions and had a brilliant life as performer and traveled the world singing. I have done many other jobs to be able to keep doing music and lived in many countries until settling down here in the UK, where I now live with my daughter Sarita (ladypink) who is 12. In this country I did a lot of interpreting work, but in 2001 my mobility started to decrease and I was offered a hip replacement in 2003. This went horribly wrong, 4 operations in the same leg to try to fix me also failed, leaving me in constant pain …

2. How did you find out about Scrapblog?

I blog in Vox.com, and one of my friends there showed us the link: she did a post with a scrapblog, I came to have a look and … now I’m hooked!!!!!

3. Are you involved in any other creative activities (online & off)?

Yes, well, apart from blogging in Vox, I love photography, have a Flickr page. I’m also taking a course in journalism.

4. Which one of your Scrapblogs describes you best?

Probably 2004 (seen above) and the Wedding edited (below), as they show both of us, Sarita and I, but talking about me especifically…I’m not sure…I like each and everyone of them!!!

5. Who is your favorite Scrapblogger & why?

Mmmmm….difficult to choose. I dont have a huge list of friends, but the ones who are listed are all equally brilliant….I’m not one to go clicking on friends easily, so if I have them listed it means they touched my heart , I love their work…when you live 24 hs in pain and your time at the computer is limited, the time you give to people is precious, so I couldn’t really choose…

6. What’s the one Scrapblog feature that makes you happy?

The opacity setting, which I recently discovered….

7. What is the most creative technique you’ve used in Scrapblog?

I rarely use the themes, so every new page is a creative challenge….the whole thing is brilliant and a huge incentive to creativity….

8. What keeps you coming back to Scrapblog?

Well, I just finished wallpapering a piece of my living room mostly with Scrapblogs….I find it not only relaxing and extremely therapeutic, but also the general vibe is fabulous…..the people here are (unlike many places I have found online) great, everyone will help, the encouragement I have received is priceless….. and here I have to mention Alex who patiently guided me in the beginning (and left me speechless with his photographs!!!) and Rebbeca, who was one of my very first *friends* here!!!

9. What would you like to see next for Scrapblog?

Ohhhh I’m greedy ;)) I would like more backgrounds, more stickers, LOL more everything, but I reckon having to choose one, I would say more options in music (or tell me how to put my own music, I can never find the way! lol)

Also, a REPLY button. That way we wouldn’t need to go back every time someone just commented somewhere we did….we could reply to the person….I m sure it wouldn’t stop the conversation or other people entering it, but sure would make our lives easier!!!

10. Can you share one tip for new Scrapbloggers?

I personally like the text combining the pictures….I have found that in doing so, I don’t need to keep so much of a written blog, and it will be a treasure for my daughter in the future to have a *diary* of Scrapblogs….. my next task is to start printing and bind them in a book!

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Thank you, Cynthia, for sharing your story and scrapblogs with us, you have been inspirational. We’ll keep on adding more backgrounds and stickers regularly and are working on providing more options for music and making printing available. We look forward to your next scrapblog!