Our Story
Our world is slowly losing its grip on the beautiful. The cure is to create instead of consume!
As the first generation immigrant daughter of a German father who spent part of his childhood growing up in Colorado and an Irish/American mother, I often felt like I was walking a tight rope between worlds: specifically the “old” and the “new.” I have distinct phases that I can remember in my young adult life where I was more proud to be either German (watching “Heidi” over and over on repeat and longing for the mountains), Irish (dedicating insane amounts of time to researching Irish myth, attempting to learn Gaelic, and mastering Irish dance), or American (wearing cowboy hats like my Dad and dreaming of making a career out of training horses).
In the midst of it all, I never stopped creating things. Whether it was drawing, painting, writing, sewing, knitting, embroidering, or teaching myself new hobbies (candle-making, spinning wool, or baking bread from scratch), I thrived on collecting skills. But it was never enough. Eventually, I always found myself back in the Community of St John chapel in Princeville, IL (pictured above) - on my knees with open hands.
“Lord, I want to create something to glorify You. Please, show me!”
Many people (myself included) associate traditional Catholicism with “The Old World” Europe for religious, cultural, and even ideological reasons - the world of kings, feudal loyalty, inquisitions, and crusades. But where does that leave folks like me: traditional Catholics in the “New World?” My desires, interests, and even identity on some level seemed paradoxically opposed the more I thought about it. How could I be culturally in love with the country that bore both my faith and also my parents while still living in and cherishing rural America?
Around the time I finally started developing a name for myself in our locale as a proficient horse trainer, I began to fall even more deeply in love with the traditional roots of my Catholic faith: wearing (and eventually making) chapel veils, teaching high school Latin, and attending adoration with the St. John brothers - a community of habited, incense-swinging religious out in the rural countryside of the midwest. (Pending Dec. 2025, I will become a third order lay member of their community.)
At one of the brother’s youth retreats, I met my husband, who hails from Cheyenne, Wyoming. Within a year and a half, we married and named our firstborn son after the Polish martyr priest of Auschwitz: St Maximillian Kolbe.
And finally, the paradoxes of “old” and “new” began to subside.
The “New World” where my parents’ families began a life became steeped in the history and love of the “Old World” - the heritage and Faith which they brought with them.
As a history teacher, I have grown to really cherish this beautiful country and especially after my marriage, the culture of the western states. To me, they are the last frontier - a place where Americans still raise cattle, work the land, and practice their faith on fields of their ancestor’s dreams.
Despite being in the Midwest, my hope is to bring a small taste of that rich culture and faith to you! Our “domestic churches” are the places where we continue that heritage - individual homes where we teach our children and knit ourselves into the universal song of the Catholic Church.
Regardless of why you are here - whether you are interested in chapel veils, liturgical candles, repurposed antiques, or Catholic literature and poetry (sometimes touched by the flavor of the West!) - my hope is that these products will help enrich your domestic church and help you feel connected to the rich heritage that is Catholicism in America!
As a Catholic, I believe we have been given this earth to be good stewards of it and that means our gifts and talents as well. That's what I have set out to do! Thank you for being here and supporting our growing family! God bless you and yours!
Ad Jesum per Mariam,
Anna Ketterling
Anna Ketterling has had a spirit of creativity since childhood. Her parents encouraged her in her love for drawing, reading/writing, sewing, and learning languages (she is fluent in English, German, and can read Latin). She holds both a bachelors and masters degree in English from Bradley University as well as a bachelors in History with a concentration in Creative Writing.
During 2020 lockdowns, her love for creating soared to new heights, as she branched out from simply sewing to drafting her own patterns (culminating in designing and sewing her own wedding dress) and mastering historic methods of hand sewing. She now makes chapel veils and western wild rags for Ketterling Creations but primarily targets her sewing skills toward making clothes for her husband, Chase, and firstborn son, Kolbe Ashley.
Her love for training horses - particularly working with those with a troubled past - also continues to grow (since age 12). Upon the death of her 94 year old horse trainer and adopted grandfather, Dewey Christopherson (2024), Anna threw her writing energy into documenting all the lessons he taught her over his many years as her mentor. She is currently focused on completing a book in his honor, entitled The Horse Listener: Horse Stories to Learn Your Horse’s Personality and What They Have to Say about You!
Outside of Ketterling Creations and her work with horses, Anna is a part-time Latin and History teacher at Chesterton Academy of the Sacred Heart, the lead writer for Rooted for Good (a Catholic skincare company), and most importantly, a full-time wife and mother. Chase and Kolbe are her entire world and the main inspiration behind the founding of Ketterling Creations.
