Ida Sahmie was born into a traditional Dineh family near Pine Springs, AZ in 1960. Her mother and grandmother began instructing her in how to weave at an early age but by her late teens, Ida had decided she didn't have the patience it took to be a serious weaver.

In her mid 20s, she met and married Andrew "Louie" Sahmie, a Hopi. She went against tradition and moved to his home after the wedding. Her mother-in-law was Priscilla Namingha, a great-granddaughter of Nampeyo of Hano and a well-known potter. Ida said she was spellbound watching Priscilla make pottery. Then Priscilla encouraged her to put her hands in the clay herself. They worked together for several years before Ida realized she needed to develop her own designs. Most of the designs she uses now are based on ancient Dineh sand-paintings. As sacred images, they must be rendered exactly. Some even require that Ida have a Night Chant ceremony performed before she starts painting. Otherwise, it's not safe.

Ida was driving Priscilla to the Keams Canyon Trading Post to sell her pottery one day when Priscilla suggested she bring along some of her own. Bruce McGee, of the Indian Art Gallery, bought most of Ida's pieces and asked for more.

Ida uses a mix of natural white and yellow clays to achieve the blended peach-colored body seen on most of her pieces. She also mixes a bit of the white clay with a boiled-down soup of wild spinach to create the softer black slip she uses to paint many of her designs. She fires her pots outdoors, the traditional way, with ash and sand that is mounded over with sheep manure to produce an intense heat. Firing a few pieces can take all day and the weather has to be perfect, the whole time. At the 2010 Navajo Nation Fair, Ida entered some of her pieces in the Arts and Crafts competition and won the Best of Class and a Second Place Ribbon for her efforts.