About Jane Milner in her own words:

Somewhere in the mid ’90’s, I took my first basket class, called Cherokee Baskets, a fun class through Sierra College. Cat Mena had dyed some #2 round reed with natural dyes for weavers, and we used #4 dyed round reed for the spokes. We learned reverse twining (the twist between the spokes goes towards you rather than away from you). My second class was also through Sierra college and the instructor had a copy of Flo Hoppe’s book, Contemporary Basket weaving. I ordered the book from The Book Seller in Grass Valley, and proceeded to teach myself to weave baskets from Flo’s book. In the back of her book was a section called sources, which listed a shop in Sacramento that carried basketweaving supplies called Rumplestiltskin on R Street. I was able to purchase several different sizes of round reed, plus got my copies of Lyn Siler’s books, The Basket Book and Handmade Baskets, 2 of the books I still recommend to all of my students (plus Flo’s books).

Not having a basket weaving instructor, I taught myself to weave baskets from these 3 books. In 1998, CNCH had their conference at the Nevada County Fairgrounds and my sister in law, Laura Rider came up to attend the conference and said that on Saturday, the market place was open to visitors. I thought, OK, I’ll come for an hour or so…I was there all day. I met Mary Lee Fulkerson from Great Basin Basket Weavers and the rest is history. I joined the guild (in Reno). They had first Thursday meeting programs with a small project, and third Thursday all day workshops. There I learned not just round reed, but rib style baskets and plaited baskets, and learned how to weave with willow harvested along the Truckee River in Reno. At the time I was working in the Operating Room part time and made sure I had Thursdays off!

After about a year and a half of taking their classes, I heard about the Stowe Basketry Festival in Stowe, Vermont and signed up for a week long set of classes.Since I was a relatively new basket weaver, I had performance angst! I met Flo Hoppe, Dianne Stanton, Cass Schorsch, JoAnn Kelly Catsos (black ash baskets), and Sandy Whalen (my second willow teacher). I became a frequent flyer at the Stowe Basketry Festival, then learned about Northwest Basket Weavers in Washington state and Columbia Basin Basketry Guild in Oregon and attended both of their retreats over the years. There, I learned weaving with cultivated willow from Katherine Lewis, cedar bark from multiple instructors, rush, Northwest Sweetgrass (a smaller cousin of rush), full turn twining sally bags, an occasional reed basket, and waxed linen.

Other retreats that I have attended were the Baskets and Gourds: Containers of our Culture in Visalia, and the Mistie Washington Gourd and Basket Guild in Southern California, and just got home from the Western Pleasure Basketry Retreat in Sandpoint, Idaho with Jill Choate weaving antler baskets.

After about 2 years of being a student I started teaching twill baskets at Great Basin Basket Makers. All third Thursday classes were taught by guild members.

I had wanted to demonstrate basket weaving at the Nevada County Fair and in order to do that, I was required to join Foothill Fibers Guild, which I did. At the fair, the president of the guild came up to introduce herself, and it was a friend of mine who had been in the same Lamaze Childbirth Class in the summer of 1975! I finally remembered to attend a guild meeting several months later and the gal who sat next to me asked if I could teach her how to make an Adirondack Backpack (she had spent her high school years at Lake Placid and loved the Adirondack pack baskets). I said sure, but first you need to learn how to make a simpler basket. My teaching career at Foothill Fibers Guild was started and continues to this day, although it was sidelined during the pandemic.

We live above Nevada City at 3,100 feet in a converted wood storage barn that used to belong to a friend of ours. Denis and I (with the help of several other folks) turned the barn into living space. There are many places for baskets…tops of bookcases, top of the buffet, hooks on the upstairs floor joists…