I was born in Berea, Ohio and moved to Santa Cruz, CA with my family when I was 6 years old. I have early memories there of the beaches and lagoon that we lived on . . . walking along the beautiful Eucalyptus Palisades, the brilliant monarch butterflies. We moved to Oregon in the early '80's . . . I will provide this next glossing over of the parts about my mother who was a drop-out hippie lawyer which thus explains how I lived on an Oregon commune while I was a teenager and my Eastern-influenced background. I married when I was 20, while in college and I have raised my four children here, in somewhat rural western Oregon, except for our recent (and not regretted!) 10 month move to North Carolina (and back) in 2008-09. Divorced and now very happily remarried for just 3 years, I have now gained a wonderful husband and step-son, our family now numbers seven!

Even as a young child, I have always been artistic and previously been described as 'unorthodox' or told that I seemed to march to my own drum. As an adult, my strong mothering instincts prompted me to stay home raising four children and homeschooling on our Oregon property for many years and eventually my creativity grew into the business of Fairy Cove Silks. I had many diversions along the way: college, and childrearing, extensive gardening and plant collecting/propagating, reading reading… studying homeopathy and naturopathy.

My children taught me much about being an artist! In teaching them valuable daily lessons, encouraging their arts and interests encouraged me to explore alongside theirs with their Waldorf-style education with many handwork and natural material crafts in their environment. I taught myself to sew and work with the children to make sewing projects, along with knitting, dollmaking, felting, leathermaking, and much much more crafts and such. I learned to make peace with myself as a proficient grown woman and artist, and also I learned how to correct mistakes . . . which still comes in extremely useful on a daily basis at the Studio!

In an effort to supplement family income I had dabbled with selling different items previously in secondary markets and was ripe for something individual and specialized that I could actually produce. I began sewing silk blankets and shortly dyeing fabrics and within two years Fairy Cove Silks was truly blossomed into a business with website, pricelists, and orderable product line. This was back in 2005. Since then, we continue to expand our products, always ready to take on new projects, filling the needs of the market.

I have always seen the possibilities of color and uses of silk products. I have thrived on working to bring these to many diverse people worldwide. It has been an amazing wonderful blessing to have made so many loyal and passionate friends worldwide. I am the owner and artist of Fairy Cove Silks that made it grow into a company, but it has been carried all along the way with the support of family, friends, and employees that makes Fairy Cove what it is today.

There are many hands involved in our silk-making every day and it is impressive to recount it. My goals and plans include continuing to grow the business into a strong economically viable company - it's been a long road for this cottage industry business - and knowing that the beautiful, hand-dyed silk products that are truly Made In Usa are because we are making them here in our community to the standards of beauty and form we've created.

What you may not know about me: In my off time, I daydream of spending lots of time laying on the beaches of Fiji with my husband relaxing, relaxing . . .