piwo
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Post by piwo on Nov 17, 2005 12:42:34 GMT -7
Well, Nancy asked me to post some pictures of my Tipi, but they are so large and I cannot figure out how to make them fit better and still look clear. So, I’ll put one (it is distorted after shrinking) as a teaser, and provide my webshots album link to view the others: community.webshots.com/user/dobrepiwo Why is this in the Genealogy Forum? Well, the yellow band that runs around the upper part of the Tipi is actually my Babcia’s family tree (all her children and their descendants). It is a series of rectangles, each of which represents a family member. The same general code exists in each. The diamond on top is my grandmother. The five diamonds below that are her five children. The two rows of 7 diamonds below that are her grandchildren. A simple pattern to identify who is being represented is the blue “hourglass” inside any given diamond. If here are two diamonds with the blue paint inside, this means that we are discussing a given grandchild, with their birth order position noted by the blue paint, and their parent is also ""highlighted". Some rectangles have diamonds under the 14: these are children of the grandchild being represented, and the banners that hang from some of those diamonds are their children. Sounds complex, but isn’t really. All the artwork in total tells a story as well. Blue circles are hail, the family, then the sun on the back: a message in pictures...... I’ll discuss the actually genealogy and family history on another thread here sometime. Here’s a peak:
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nancy
European
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Post by nancy on Nov 17, 2005 12:56:45 GMT -7
Piwo,
This is a truly terrific piece of family art! Thanks so much for the photos. Was the design and creation also a family project? I have thought of making a large cloak or cape with a family tree, but have not gotten far with the design.
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piwo
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Post by piwo on Nov 17, 2005 13:13:23 GMT -7
Well, the project to build the Tipi started when my girls were quite young, and they adopted my love for western/plains history. We decided to build it together, but you know how those things go. It took several years to build. The design came from a book published by the "Laubins", a couple who were considered the foremost expert on Native American Tipi's. They lived on and off with different tribes of Indians their entire adult life, and have their collection at the University of Oklahoma I believe. I modified their example of a Lakota tipi to a size I wanted, and simply followed their instructions. These dwellings are not true circles, but ovals, and mine is about 15 foot wide, and about 17.5 foot long, with the top of the flaps about 15 foot high. The poles are 24 foot poles. My daughters helped make some small trinkets to hang both inside and outside, and it is a hit every year when the family comes over with their kids on Thanksgiving. The artwork design was mine, and wanted to tie the family and our unity together. I didn't have it up the past 2 years for weather reasons (strong snows one year and rain and didn’t want to put it away wet), and had to scramble to record a number of "new arrivals" since my last update in 2001!
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Post by rdywenur on Nov 20, 2005 8:56:34 GMT -7
there is a photo editor that I found. I have a free version. Works great. www.showyourphotos.com/PS I was wondering what a TIPI was. You have clarified my guess..(teepee)
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forza
Cosmopolitan
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Post by forza on Nov 20, 2005 17:48:48 GMT -7
Piwo, Great tipi! If I were rich I'd buy back some formerly property of my grandmother and give it "back" to my quite large family for recreational use (I have lots and lots of cousins since my mom had 5 sisters and 2 brothers!) but having a tipi with relatives symbols on it is the idea i like a lot, too. BTW there's a company that supposedly does make tipis the way they were made in the past.
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piwo
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Post by piwo on Nov 28, 2005 13:09:15 GMT -7
Thanks! I’ll give it a try. I spent so much time trying to reduce the photos to a manageable size, and never really succeeded. Thanks! It took a few years starting and stopping. I read and reread the construction instructions from the "Laubins" book so many times; I could almost recite them from memory. The Laubins devoted most of their adult life to studying plains Indians, their dwellings and art. Much of their work is available through the University of Oklahoma (at least it was). I wanted it to be as historically accurate as I could, and their works are still the benchmark today. As for the "family tree", while the combination of characters is mine, they are all symbols used in Lakota artwork, and like many (or most) lodges, it tells a story. In my case, the blue circles represent hail, then the family tree, then the rising sun. Lots of poetic license in Native American art and names, so you can probably come up with a few possible meanings. As for the spelling, the word Tipi (teepee) comes from the Lakota (Sioux) language, and means "they dwell" (Mieszkaja in Polish Language). When the Lakota language was put to paper using the English alphabet, the "I" was pronounced just like "I" in Polish language: like ee sound in English. It is the same for the other vowels as well. The Tipi was damaged slightly this year, as some rough housing caused a youngster to be pushed through the door opening, and ripping off the section of the bottom two lacing pins on the left side. So after I figure out how to fix it, it will look more “used”, and thus more authentic yet!
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nancy
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Post by nancy on Nov 28, 2005 13:55:51 GMT -7
Piwo,
How did you come to choose a tipi? Are there native americans in your line?
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piwo
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Post by piwo on Nov 28, 2005 16:12:14 GMT -7
Piwo, How did you come to choose a tipi? Are there native americans in your line? No, not really. My cousin (and Godfather) was a bit of a mentor for me when my dad died (I was 14). He loved the west and we would travel there by car several times a year and just talk American Western history: the plains, the mountains, and I began reading just about everything I could. It was a good distraction. Much of history is romanticized of course: cowboys being all good guys, Indians being bad guys, Noble red men or butchering thieves.... But I read many different books from many different points of view. I once read that you needed to read a book in the language it was written in to truly understand it, and there was a book I wanted to read by an old survivor of wounded knee, but it was in Lakota language. I tried to teach myself Lakota language (there are numerous Lakota colleges where you can order courses), but school, work, then career just made it impossible. When the movie Dances with Wolves came out, I could actually understand a bunch of what was said.. That was really cool! Nonetheless, the love of the history and the original inhabitants of the plains has always been a hobby, and somewhat of a passion. It was nice to incorporate both my own heritage, and that of my hobby as well. Long winded answer, sorry..
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nancy
European
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Post by nancy on Nov 28, 2005 17:49:15 GMT -7
Not long winded at all, but a most interesting explanation. many thanks.
I once had a simiilar involvement with Ireland.
(Dance with Wolves is a wonderful movie, one of my favorites.)
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