About Us
Patriot Picnic Basket
I have loved baskets ever since I received my first wooden-lidded picnic basket as a wedding shower gift 31 years ago. Our home has since been decorated with baskets; we carried our babies' necessities in “diaper baskets”; I have hidden the Scotch, masking, and duct tapes in market baskets, (so it's there when needed); our kitchen is filled with bread baskets, muffin baskets, napkin and paper plate baskets, utensil baskets, and casserole baskets; the laundry is hauled in wash-day baskets; our books are held in magazine or carry-all baskets; library books are transported to and fro in leather handled tote baskets; etc., etc., etc., :-) In other words, I am never found without a basket in hand!
Holly Berry Basket
Although my love for baskets has covered the last three decades, I was not actually "hands on" involved until the summer of 1991 when I was introduced to basket weaving. At the time, our family lived and worked at a Christian camp in northern Wisconsin, and a lady from Milwaukee was attending a week-long family camp. She was an avid basket maker, and so she offered a class out on the deck of the dining hall. Being on a tight budget with a family of seven, I did not even have the $10 material fee needed to take the class. But a good friend paid my fee, and we spent a beautiful afternoon weaving our first baskets. I was immediately hooked! Up to that point in life, I had enjoyed many other types of crafts, but now, basket weaving quickly moved into first place.
Victorian Gift Basket
Since that memorable summer afternoon 13+ years ago, I have woven over 3000 baskets, taught hundreds of classes, and designed a countless number of patterns.
I am currently teaching basketry for adult community education in four different public school districts. It is always such a joy to share in a new student's delight with the completion of their first basket weaving project.
Craft Caddy Tote Basket
My daughter, Katelyn, and I create and weave all of our baskets in our own home shop. We have been blessed with a restored 1916 country farmhouse on a 20-acre hobby farm located in eastern Minnesota, and have had nine children, six of which are still at home. (The others keep coming back home with more!) We have a large vegetable garden, a dozen apple trees, a long row of raspberries, and lots of flowers in the summer. We raise chickens and turkeys, keep honeybees, and have two horses and one calf, (when he chooses to stay in the fence), two dogs and a varying number of farm cats. There are bikes in the dirt driveway, a swing set and swimming pool in the back yard, and two small ponds out in the pasture. All in all, it is a great place to raise a family and — WEAVE BASKETS!
Joanna's Collections, 57727 Cloverdale Road, Sandstone, Minnesota, 55072, (320)245-2883
All content ©1993-2007 Joanna Schutt