Cari (Unruh) Locken – Scrapbooking Artist

It’s not every artistic father who has the privilege of writing about his daughter, an artist in her own medium and a good one. It’s not every day that a dad gets to brag a little about his adult daughter. Cari is a married woman with three children, ages 9, 7 and almost 5. She is an accomplished pianist, having graduated from the Royal Conservatory of Music with her ARCT in piano and from the University of Western Washington with a Master’s in Piano Performance. For some years she taught private lessons and has played worship music in her church. Presently her musical skills are for her own enjoyment only as she excels at preserving memories with the highly popular art form called Scrapbooking.


It’s an art form requiring proficiency with colours and textures and materials and design. Cari is recognized among the tens of thousands of scrapbookers in North America for her inventive, inspiring and attractive layouts and is frequently featured in Canadian magazines. As important as the design is the choice of words that often accompany the layout. One has to be a lyricist.

She began the creative outlet of scrapbooking in 1997 because it permitted her to tell the stories of her life and family using amazing visuals, textural products and extraordinary colors while also encouraging her photography skills. She has been widely published in BH&G (Scrapbooks etc.), Memory Makers, Creating Keepsakes, CARDS, Paper Crafts, Simple Scrapbooks, and Scrapbook Trends.

She is a member of the design team for several magazines including Canadian Scrapbooker Magazine, Scrapshotz, Black River Designs, The Inspired Scrapper and Cor'dinations ColorCore Cardstock. You can find her work in all these mags and usually with descriptions of the materials used and the application process. She is an instructor for assorted classes at her local scrapbook store and at various retreats and conventions.

In the Inspired Scrapper the June 12,2009 issue you will find June 12 2009 Challenge #24 - Teacher's Gift Card set by Cari Locken, a sample of her work for others to try. Here is a a gallery of some of her work for Cor'dinations ColorCore.


She has a personal blog called ‘Me and My Thoughts’ in which she displays and comments on her scrapbooking.

In the layout with Jayden, his daddy Tim and me, Cari has written, "While we were walking around the Blueberry Festival in downtown Cloverdale, Jayden asked me if I would take a picture of him with Daddy and Grandpa. I was thrilled to do that and excited with how the shot turned out. Love your smiles boys!”




In the last layout, Cari has written 10 Things she and Tim love about Ryan, her 7 year old son, the middle child. On can only hope these children will have opportunity later to reflect upon these memories and to know how well they have been understood and cared for.