Wow! The stars really aligned on June 21st this year, giving us Indigenous Peoples’ Day, Father’s Day and the Solstice all in one! There’s so much to celebrate today, so let’s get right into it.

At Baaad Anna’s we carry Sea Wolf and Sage Earrings. Cecelia, the maker behind Sea Wolf and Sage is an exceptional artist, and we are proud to have her work in our store. Cecelia’s earrings are a perpetual staff favourite, and most of us have a pair or two (or five!).

All of us fibre artists and yarn crafters living in unceded and unsurrendered xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) territories (what we now call Vancouver) are lucky to live somewhere with a beautiful and rich textile history. There is so much to explore about the history and alive tradition of Coast Salish Weaving, Spinning and Knitting. I’d recommend looking at some information from the Billy Reid Centre out of SFU around the current state of Coast Salish Weaving, it’s having a revival that has been hard fought for.  I know it was quite popular for the last three years, but if you haven’t seen the National Film Board documentary on the Story of the Coast Salish Knitters, now would definitely be the time to add it to your list!

In the process of writing this blog post, I came across the Indigenous Artists Collective. They are an organization that uplifts and connects over 500 Indigenous artists within Canada, and have a robust directory of living, active Indigenous artists, and are a great resource if you’re looking for a specific art or artist.

Next up: Father’s Day! Here’s a shout out to all the sweet dads that come by the store, stroller in tow, who knit things for their kiddos and their partners (and hopefully themselves as well, but we haven’t seen any evidence of that yet!). We tried to find some knitwear designers to feature who are also fathers, asked around, searched Google, but couldn’t! If you’ve got a dad designer you want to show some love to, please drop them in the comments.

Finally, we’re at the solstice, we made it. It’s the longest day of the year, and the time where we now welcome back the darkness. While that might sound a little scary, it also means we are (eventually) welcoming back cooler weather,  cozier mornings, more time to knit, crochet, embroider and weave. It’s hard to believe that a time is coming where it will once again get dark at 4:30, but it is! So let’s savour the light while we have it friends.