Born on an Iowa farm, Verna earned her BA in Art from Clarke College in Iowa, then pursued two years of graduate study in Painting at Catholic University of America in Washington, DC and Mills College in Oakland, CA. She spent the next ten years teaching studio art to prep school students in Maine, New York, and Alabama. After teaching, Verna moved to Cardiff, Wales. This later evolved into owning an import retail/wholesale business based in New York and Vermont.

Verna re-immersed herself in painting upon her move to Massachusetts in 1996 and became an artist member of the Marblehead Arts Association and exhibited in shows in Marblehead and Newburyport.

After her retirement in 2006 from the Department of Housing and Community Development in Boston, Verna moved to Marlborough, MA and sought another outlet for her painting. In 2007 she became a docent at the Danforth Museum of Art in Framingham, MA and joined BlueSkies when it was formed in August 2007.

Verna paints primarily in acrylics on canvas and paper—her expressionistic style is a personal quest of discovery and rediscovery.