This year I attended the Columbia Basin Basketry Guild‘s fall retreat at Camp Magruder, OR. I’ve been a member of the guild for 3 years now, but hadn’t yet made it out to the yearly retreat. A few months back the weavers in Eugene had me come down and show them how to prepare Himalayan Blackberry for weaving, and they convinced me (it didn’t take much convincing) to make the retreat a priority. Since I have to listen to my elders, I made sure to follow through!

I took two classes while I was there, a small Adirondack pack basket taught by Jill Choate and a woven Goose class taught by Donna Sakamoto Crispin. I’ve splint basketry for a long time now, as I work mostly with English Ivy which is more conducive to wickerwork, but I really wanted to play around with it. Now I’m super hooked! I wasn’t able to stay for the Sunday demonstration of how to get splints from White Oak, and was super bummed about it. The Goose class was also really great. For a long time now I’ve wanted to learn to weave shapes so that I can weave little animals and figurines. I have a really good idea now for how to do that.

It was great to meet a lot of new people, see old friends, and spend time with experienced weavers. As I delve deeper into the rabbit hole of basketry, this was definitely an inspiring trip. I can’t wait for the next one!