My name is Erin, and I have lived in Guatemala for a little over a year. My husband and I are here taking care of our little girl, whom we are in the process of adopting. There is a local store here in the town of Antigua that sells used
huipiles, and since I love to "reduce, reuse, and recycle", last year I made Christmas ornaments from the beautiful fabric as gifts for some family members. I posted some photos of the ornaments on my personal blog, and soon thereafter I began to get requests to make some for my readers. Struggling to maintain two households - one in Guatemala and one back in the US - on a fraction of our previous income, I was thrilled to have the chance to earn some extra money. I sewed as quickly as I could and sold 400-500 ornaments in late 2007. I then moved on to making other products that used
huipil fabric, such as simple baby dolls,
Semana Santa carpets, turtles, collages, and names.
It's a lot of fun to look through the piles of used
huipiles at stores and markets to find the most beautiful patterns and colors. The hardest work has already been done by the women who wove the fabric, and once it is of no more use to them as clothing, I am happy to use it for another purpose.
Me with our little girl in Guatemala on Thanksgiving 2007:
La Chapina, the NameThere are affectionate nicknames for people from different Central American countries. For example, the nickname for a person from Nicaragua is
nico (masculine) or
nica (feminine), and in Honduras it's
catracho (masculine) or
catracha (feminine). In Guatemala, it is
chapin (masculine) or
chapina (feminine).
Because it is almost always women and girls who weave the beautiful Guatemalan
huipiles, I have named this site
La Chapina to honor them and their beautiful work.
La Chapina is pronounced "la cha-PEE-na".
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2 comments:
Hi, my name is Shelby. I am a Junior at a high school in the United States. For my Spanish class, I am doing a project on Guatemalan clothing. A required portion of my project is an interview with someone who has knowledge in that subject area. Unfortunately, I have been having a difficult time with this aspect of the project, because there are not a lot of people in my area with knowledge of Guatemalan clothing. I was hoping you might be able to help me. I have prepared a list of interview questions that I would love to ask you, either via email or phone. If you could please email me at chocolatehorses18@verizon.net, we can further plan from there. Thank you so much!
Shelby
Hi! I am making stops at all blogs I find with people with adopted children from Guatemala to extend an invitation to visit my blog. I was born and raised in Guatemala, later moved to the US and became a naturalized US citizen. We have one son adopted from Guatemala and two biological born in Guatemala. Having met various people with adopted children from Guatemala I felt I had a gift to give and that was share my heritage. In the blog I am posting all things Guatemalan: recipes, nursery rhymes, places to visit, etc.... If you do stop by and like it, please share, comment and ask for topics.
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