I grew up when green was just a color and sustainability meant outlasting my older brothers in a game of tag.
Being the oldest daughter, the fourth of nine siblings, I learned at an early age the value of using whatever material was available to create whatever was needed for the family. "Store bought" was not a common adjective used in our house. I honed my sewing skills by having to re-design clothes from my fuller figured cousins and watched carefully as my mother produced amazing designs with her crochet hook.
When the time came for me to leave home, time seemed to become my enemy to my creative ideas. Jobs, marriage, and starting my own family seemed to steal any free time. As the family grew, those basic sewing and crocheting skills assumed a more important role in my life. Using the quiet hours when the children were in bed to sew clothes for my nine daughters, or one son became a special time of personal rejuvination and satisfaction.

The free time became more plentiful, or maybe I just took the time, and my desire to expand my craftiness grew.
When we remodeled our house to add an extra room for the boy, I decided a braided rug was the answer to decorate the entry way. I had a pile of material, the need for a rug, and the fortitude to try it. So ready for the winter of 1997, my first braided rug graced our home; we still use that rug, but it has been "demoted" to the mud porch.

As my second daughter was studing textile design at the UW-Madison, she introduced me to one of her instructors who also was a designer/decorator specializing in floor coverings. The light was turned on! Not only could my braiding be my creative relief, it could also be profitable! As I explored the braiding design and technique books, it struck me that braided items did not have to be flat. Baskets, bowls, purses, a whole new world seemed to open up for me.

It is an exciting time in my life, but my most fulfilling projects are still being able to take discarded materials and create heirloom pieces that will last two or three lifetimes.