Yvonne Young Merrill grew up in Salt Lake City, Utah. Marriage took her to Seattle, Madison, Wisconsin and ultimately Anchorage, Alaska where she moved three times for a total of 35 years. Yvonne lived intermittently in Alaska from 1963 until 1996. Today she returns every summer. She raised three daughters there and helped hand—build two homes - one in a mountain wilderness and one on a scenic lake.

Her professional work included ten years teaching in the Anchorage School District and Madison, Wisconsin School District, and 15 years designing hands-on exhibits for children with the Anchorage History and Art Museum. Much of this curriculum became the focus for the Anchorage School District Art Department. In this capacity Yvonne developed interactive kits on Color, Shape, Pattern, Texture and The Impressionists. Replicas of these kits were sent to 25 rural school districts where art teachers and instruction were scarce. Yvonne visited these remote Native villages and inserviced the kits. In addition she researched and produced 50 kits developed for "bush" programs on Eskimos, Aleuts, Northwest Coast Indians and Athabaskans. This work influenced the first hands-on book, Hands-On Alaska, which has sold over 10,000 books.

In 1987 Yvonne founded The Imaginarium: A Family Science Center with three other women. Today The Imaginarium is doubling its space in a multi-million-dollar facility in downtown Anchorage.

After several years as the director of The Imaginarium, Yvonne started Kits Publishing in 1994. When Yvonne relocated to Salt Lake City (11 grandchildren in Utah were a draw with which Alaska’s grandeur could not compete), the Hands-On books became a business involving travel, research, museum and private collections, ethnic stories and the diligent work of producing a book a year. Today Yvonne has produced 12 books (Hands-On Pioneers is out of print) and is still excited about ideas for future publications.

Mary Simpson, artist and project assistant for the books, worked with Yvonne in Anchorage and their association continued for another 20 years after Mary moved to Lyndonville, Vermont.