Today is Theland Kicknosway’s 18th birthday! In honour of his birthday, we are going to make a donation to his upcoming journey across Canada to raise awareness about the epidemic of MMIWG2S (Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, girls & 2-spirit). If you feel so inspired, you can join me in showing support and solidarity by making a donation here.
For more info on his upcoming journey, check out his Facebook event page here.
These photos in this post are from Theland’s 4th Annual Run for MMIWG2S in March 2018, when he was 14 years old! My children and I had the honour of joining him for the last 2 kms to show our support and help him raise awareness of this important issue. This is one of my most favourite things I have ever done with World-Changing Kids!
There was so much beauty, love and truth in this day. Theland kindly let my kids set the pace of the last two kms of the run. We ended in Gatineau Park, at a site that is meaningful to Theland and his family – at a tree that they have designated as a memorial to someone they loved. When we all arrived at the tree, Theland led us in a prayer and a smudging ceremony. Both of my kids politely declined the smudging ceremony and Theland said that was OK. Then Theland provided each of us with a handful of tobacco to place at the base of the tree. I asked him if my kids were too young to participate in this and he replied that there is no such thing as too young, they are able to participate if they choose to. What a lovely philosophy that is for everything in life – what a beautiful way to raise our children.
I am so grateful to know Theland and to continue to learn from him.
Happy Birthday Theland!
#teamtheland #mmiwg2s #thelandsjourney #fsis