El dia de los santos (Nov. 1) and dia de los muertos (Nov. 2), All Saints Day and Day of the Dead, are one of our favorite holidays in Guatemala. In contrast to Halloween, celebrated during the same time in the US, Day of the Dead is one of the most important family holidays of
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By Isabel Coxaj Boj We invited our colleague, Isabel Coxaj Boj, to contribute to the blog today to share more about the deep spiritual symbolism in traditional Mayan textiles and clothes. Isabel is a backstrap-loom weaving teacher, textile-lover, and Yabal’s Store Coordinator in the Yabal shop in Xela, Guatemala. The Maya are recognized for their
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What do mushrooms and weaving have in common? They’re both great income-generating projects for women in Guatemala! And projects that Yabal supports in our Guatemalan artisan communities. While we’ve had our Yabal weaving brand for over 10 years now, oyster mushroom cultivation is a newer project. The mission of Yabal is to support the economic
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above photo credit: Caroline Lindsell This year, Yabal began a new relationship with the artisan cooperative in Chichicastenango, called Utz Batz. They are a group of 10-15 women weavers that have worked together since 2008 as a fair trade artisan cooperative in order to create jobs for themselves. The town of Chichicastenango is famous with
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“When we moved to this area [in 2005 after Hurricane Stan] most of the trees in this forest had been cut by other communities living here. Those of us families from Chuicutama living here at the time decided to buy 300 acres of this mountain and re-plant trees so that our children would have a forest
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We had the pleasure recently to welcome doctor Kate Colwell to our women’s cooperative meeting in Pactuama, Santa Catarina Ixtahuacan. Kate specializes in helping artisans with healthy body dynamics, posture, self-care, and injury prevention. It was an important workshop to have with our group of 40 weavers and a great first introduction to the idea
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Inspired by the evening sky and the rolling colors of a moon on the rise. The Luna collection reflects a diverse landscape of rolling hills and deep valleys. The dark shadows and soft reflections of light that only Guatemala can inspire. The Luna collection is a collaboration between Minneapolis designer Araya Jensen and Yabal, some
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We had the opportunity this last week to check in on the progress of our community micro-credit and women’s savings circles in the communities of Pacutama and Chuicutama, and Cajola and it was inspiring to see the changes happening! Chuicutama Over 8 years ago, Yabal received a grant for Q15,000 for the community of Chuicutama
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Women’s Saving Circles in Pacutama, Chuicutuma, and Cajola This year began a new program with our women’s weaving cooperatives- financial literacy training and the formation of savings circles. We are extremely grateful to Catholic Relief Services for sharing their savings circles methodology to train our groups of women in this process. The two groups are formed of
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This past month Yabal had the opportunity to exhibit our new Eco Home accessories collection at the New World Craft Fair in Antigua, Guatemala. We’ve participated in the fair for the last three years but this year we were able to bring our weaving cooperative leaders as well! Thanks to the support from A Rum
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