Hi, I'm Lara Laughlin Tolchin. As a child growing up on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, the beach was my playground. My sister and I spent hours mucking through the low tide mud, looking for sea creatures; we combed the beach after storms looking for treasures; and spent many weekends on the water. In college, I kept the ocean close to my heart, earning a bachelor's degree in biology, with a marine science minor.  I put my education to work after college: as a volunteer at the Long Island Sound Taskforce, as an assistant in an environmental consulting group, and as a curator's assistant in the Department of Invertebrates, at the Museum of Natural History in New York City. When my husband and I started a family, I stepped away from marine biology to raise our children.

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Twenty-two years later, with two grown kids and thousands of volunteer hours logged at my kids' schools and within our community, I decided I wanted to return to work. However, this time I wanted to try a more creative path in the field of graphic design.  So in August 2019, I received a Fundamentals Certificate of Graphic Design, from Emory Continuing Education (ECE), a division of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.  This certificate provided a solid foundation in the basics of graphic design, as well as competency in Adobe Illustrator, InDesign, and Photoshop.

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Today, I am following a different, more "artistic current" in the waters of life and I am eager to see where it takes me!