"Guided"

Ever since I re-priced a vintage Faribault Woolen Mill blanket at the store, up from my coworker's price of $8 to $20--and then went home, looked the blanket up, and saw I should have added another zero, ever since then I've kept my eyes on wool items going out on the floor at work, to make sure they're priced correctly. (A few months ago, we priced a Pendleton at the high but fair $150.)

It's funny--good quality things often stand out. They... I don't know, they attract the eye, they look... good. Pleasing. I can often catch them with a quick glance. Usually my coworkers catch expensive labels now we all know they're worth so much, but last week I pulled a vintage Pendleton shirt out of textile recycling, priced it $10 (it was worn at the neck), and hung it on display in my book section.
It sold in minutes.

Yesterday I spied an attractive blanket hanging on a rack to go out on the floor, and, sure enough--Faribault Mill. This is old mill in Faribault, Minnesota, that--along with Pendleton in Oregon--"are the only vertical mills in the US, which means their work starts with raw wool from the sheep and ends with the final woven product." (via)

The blanket was priced $10. Sigh.
I was going to point it out to the linens person, and then I thought--wait! I want this. Without looking it up online, I bought it at the store price.

I do not need any more blankets, and it's not my usual style---red, white, and blue? but it really attracted me.
I found an interview with the designer, a Minneapolis-based artist, Dyani Red Hawk (Sičáŋǧu Lakota). The interview is recent--from January 2021.
She titled the blanket "Guided", though the name is not on the blanket itself. What she said about designing it––in winter––explains why I was drawn to the blanket, though I couldn't have said so myself:

"I went for a run,... for uninterrupted thought and prayer, ... the evening of the full moon. I headed out at the end of the day and was surprised how quickly the sun set.... I thought I would be back before dark, but I miscalculated. I ended up being so grateful though because on my route home, I was running toward the full moon. It was really bright and low in the sky—a big, beautiful, golden full moon.

"I was thinking about the blanket and what it meant to me as I was trying to decide on the title. I thought about winter, the North Star, stars in the winter sky, that celestial presence and the guidance embedded in our [Lakota] symbolism.
I also thought about how life and the necessity of guidance can be different in winter. I thought... also about the importance of finding a title that provides an open invitation, ... allowing folks to apply meaning that speaks to what guides them."

The little white patterns are tipis.
She says:

"The stars were placed first. The four direction crosses came in next. I tried several variations in the striping [background], ... experimented with some zigzags, and nothing was working.
Then I thought, "Oh, tipis!" and as I put them in, it spoke to the feeling of winter for me. I envisioned all these quiet lodges, a camp in the snow against a quiet deep blue sky."

I've had bad, anxious dreams a couple nights this week, though I've felt fine in the days.
I slept under the blanket last night, and my dreams were good.  I love it so much.


Oh! And I should give a cake report:
the cake I baked for the work potluck yesterday, the day I bought the blanket, turned out great!
It tasted as good as I'd figured it would (can't go wrong with eggs and butter), and it looked beautiful when it was cut into