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THE BEST OF KANTHA FOR ALL!
Dignify’s origin story has long been included, in brief, on our about page, and I refer to it whenever I’ve done interviews or podcasts or if I meet someone in person who inevitably asks, how did you get into this?
I'd like to share a bit of a wider panorama of the story, and an update. I have heard some tremendous stories from customers about the meaning that their blanket has had in some aspect of their life or a relationship. I'm so inspired, I would like to share more of mine, too.
The story of dignify is very intertwined with my friend, Kathy.
In June 2008, I was early in my first pregnancy, due in January 2009. My husband, Wayne, & I had just left for a vacation to Spain — flying in & out of London, UK, where we have relatives we planned to visit for a few days. The first night after arriving, we woke up in the middle of the night (of course, jetlag) to an email from a friend that said, “Please phone us when you get this.”
After steeling ourselves, we called & found out that our good friend, Julian, had died in a car accident; leaving his wife, Kathy (who was also pregnant) and their two children to mourn his way-too-young passing (age 33).
We flew home a few days later and grieved with our friends & community. During the funeral, Julian’s father-in-law, a retired Christian pastor, spoke. Something he said had a lasting impact on us; amidst, of course, crying out the sadness & injustice of it all, he said, “God, you have our attention. What do you want us to hear?”
What did we hear? Unsurprisingly, a premature death certainly leads you to take stock of your life. Wayne did not like his job & felt like he was wasting his years in a poor fit position. Two years after our loss of Julian, we took a leap & moved to a different city (me 8 months pregnant with #2) for Wayne to finish a graduate degree that he had begun by distance many years before.
It was in one of those classrooms that we first heard about kantha blankets. Wayne took a class on "social enterprise" (business with goals additional to profit-making) and met Robin. Robin was from Oregon, but she had been living for 5 years in Bangladesh with MCC, working with women who were in the sex trade but wanted to get out. Her term with the NGO was over, but she had decided to return to the country & start a business to employ women who were ready to graduate MCC's program.
Wayne kept referring to them as sweaters (i.e. “It’s so great what Robin is doing with these sweaters”) — he had no idea, and Robin just laughed it off. We loved the concept, though, and when we figured out that it was blankets, we definitely wanted to support her. It just wasn’t an item we really had an occasion to buy, especially on a student budget.
A year later, Kathy came with her kids to visit us, along with a new man in her life. That weekend, they got engaged to be married; I knew right away what I wanted to give them as a wedding gift!
I bought a kantha throw made by Robin's business, Basha, and brought it to Kathy’s wedding shower. The other women LOVED the blanket itself (so soft!) and also the story of redemption that it symbolized.
I always get a little sappy around our dignify anniversary, thinking back on these origins... where dignify has come from, and to. I am very humbled and indebted that from such great pain could result so much beauty & life.
We’re celebrating 7 years of dignify next week with our once-a-year anniversary sale! Everything in the store (except gift cards) will be 20% off on Saturday, Nov 16th. Join me in celebrating!
Wow. Thank you for sharing this. Sometimes it seems God does his most beautiful redemptive work out of pain. He does far more than we could ask or imagine.
I've taken a Halloween approach (thus far) that is almost entirely of a free-for-all. As in: Go trick-or-treating, have fun, eat candy, keep it in your room, go wild... and usually by two weeks in, it's all gone, forgotten, or lost its lustre. This week, though, our three kids brought over 1200 candies & chips back into our house (!!!). It was, to understate things... a bit much.
When you find yourself with an abundance of junk food, the idea of throwing it away feels inconceivable (at least for me). Maybe it is that candy is non-perishable, and there is a sense that throwing something edible in the garbage is abhorrently wasteful?
A little behind-the-scenes insight here...
As a store owner, there are loads of resources out in the wilds of the internet, ostensibly to help me succeed in my business. Did you know that I start hearing about Black Friday (as in "are you prepared to break through on Black Friday?") in the summer?
It is SO EASY to find ourselves as consumers in the maelstrom of other people's (and corporations') marketing efforts, and not even remember how we got there, or even notice these (very intentional) forces working away on us.
Here are some actions we can take now to simplify the noise before the noisiest time of the shopping year: —
I shared on Instagram recently a post that Gretchen Rubin had written (taking concepts from her book, The Happiness Project), entitled,
I've written a lot over the years about spending wisely, thoughtfully, holding back, slowing down, and really considering, "Do I want to spend money on this [insert item, service, etc. here]?" I still think that this line of thinking is crucial — a necessary counter to the bombardment of our culture towards buy-buy-buy.
But, Gretchen was tackling the question from a different angle: yes, being thoughtful; but, actually with a focus on the positives of actually spending the money.
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Reji
November 09, 2019
I am new to your dignify world but so grateful to know about you. A friend had a throw that I admired and now I have my own. Your story is full of despair and glory. So are the lives of these beautiful people you touch. Thank you for your passion and commitment.