Owner of Classic Art & Frame Companies in Valdosta and Tifton for 20 years, her own work as a fiber artist has been a well-kept secret. Carla grew up in Miami, Florida and Huntington, New York. She attended Georgia State University and University of Georgia, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1978. A former member of the Lowndes/Valdosta Arts Commission Board and member of the Board of Directors of the Chamber of Commerce, and also was on the Mainstreet Downtown Design Committee. Carla is a graduate of the Leadership Lowndes Class of '93, is a past president of Quota International of Valdosta and the Valdosta Downtown Business Association.

Carla said of her work, "My fiber designs are meant to enlarge and intensify fleeting moments in time. Residual dream images, photographic images, or other instantaneous mental pictures transformed into a drawing that will take many thousands of moments to complete in fiber present and shape an interesting juxtaposition of time. I enjoy the interplay of color in cartoonlike images, the color producing the necessary depth of field."

Carla resides in Hahira with her husband, Don Penny.