Craft in America

Doll making has been a tradition in my family for almost 30 years now. That's how long I've been doing it and the tradition of giving handmade gifts, that's what Kwanzaa all about. You know it's not, nothing's store-bought. It's all about giving something of yourself to that individual so what I do is, I take fabric and put it into reality to make something that's touchable that you could pass down through the generations and I will give an example. I was looking at a documentary the woman was looking for her history and in that she found out that her great-great-grandfather was a slave. At eight years old he was taken from his mother but I had a dream one night and Emily came to me and she told me she said I'm William's mother and so immediately I got up and started putting pieces together and as I was doing it, I found this old quilt, I cannot tell you how old this is, someone gave me. You see it still has a paper on it on the back of it so it's unfinished, like their life together was unfinished and she put all his clothes in a bag. That was the last time she'd seen her baby. He was eight years old and when I put him together, she wanted to be holding William. That's what I did and she came to me in spirit again and said I want to be crying, we want to be crying and I made them crying and when I saw that, I started to cry myself because they were now united in spirit and that's why I love these pieces so much because they're so historical to me. That's what Kwanzaa all about. We should always celebrate all year long because it's about the history. It's about knowing where you came from and where you're going.