Also known as Orange Shirt Day, September 30, 2021, honours the Survivors of the residential school system, and the children who never came home.
At CQA/ACC, we recognize the need to learn about how we can all help to reconcile the damage that was done, and is being done, to Aboriginal people, so we started a list of things that quilters might do to continue their learning and take action.
1. Read Phyllis Webstad’s story about the original orange shirt.
2. Make a block or quilt and donate it to a residential school survivor through Quilts for Survivors started by Vanessa Genier (deadline for blocks is October 11; after that Vanessa requests finished tops or quilts).
3. Read the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s Calls to Action.
4. Read Spirit Bear’s version of the Calls to Action with your children and grandchildren.
5. Make a Star Quilt and gift it to a survivor or to a loved one at a significant time in their life. Learn more about Star Quilts here.
6. Make a donation to an Indigenous organization, such as I Love First Peoples, the organization that sets up Sew & Sew Skills Labs in remote community schools.
7. Read a book by an Indigenous author.
8. Search this map to find out which traditional territories you live on.
9. Listen to the stories recorded for A Day to Listen: Amplifying Indigenous Voices on June 30 when radio stations across the country broadcast Indigenous stories.
10. Wear an orange shirt.
Please feel free to share your own suggestions in the comments on our Facebook page, where you’ll find this post.
