Recently, several people asked me why I’m making digital collages. I told them making collages that celebrate my ancestors, life, dreams, and passion for Afro Brazilian spirituality, art, culture, food, music, and history is one of the ways I practice mindfulness and self-care during these changing times. It helps me release stress and tap into the love, presence, power, wisdom, and protection of my loving + wise + well ancestors. Also, I get to learn more about them. It’s also fun to create and brings me lots of joy.
HOW ARE YOU TAKING CARE OF YOURSELF DURING THESE CHANGING TIMES?
ABOUT FEBRULLAGE DAY #19 COLLAGE
Pigeon is the Februllage Day 19 prompt. This prompt caused me to do some research on the spiritual significance of pigeons. I learned that a white pigeon is a sacred bird called eyele funfun and associated with peace, purification, and Oxalá in Candomblé, the Afro-Brazilian religion. Oxala (Obatala) is the Orisha (deity) of creation, light, and wisdom and connected to the color white and number eight.
I used Canva to create the light grey background of the digital collage with cowrie and other sea shell. Cowrie shells are called búzios in Candomble. They are used for divination. I added eight white pigeons to honor Oxala.
This week has been a slow one for me. My body has summoned me to rest and sleep deeply. Translation: No digital devices in my bedroom and earlier bedtimes than usual. It’s been dreamy, definitely needed, and delicious to experience!
DEE-LISH-SHUSSSSSSSSSSSS. Yes, I had to spell out the word in all caps and the way I say the word.
And HELL YEAH, it’s EXTRA just like the name of one of my favorite my lip glosses by The Lip Bar. For inquiring minds who might want to know, I am not an influencer for this brand. I just love wearing it cuz’ it is a lovely vegan brand created by an African American woman who was born in my home state of Michigan.
Okay, all that sleep and rest coupled with the Lunar New Year and New Moon Solar Eclipse in Aquarius on Monday created space for me to flow in and out of my ancestral dreams. I don’t remember what the dreams were about. I just have this inner knowing that my loving + wise + well ancestors are reminding me of the power and choice I have to dream, be, live, love, and create freely. They keep telling me they are working on my behalf so that I can relax into a more Jupiter expansive being-ness that opens a portal into my inner truth, beauty, joy, magic, play, and fun adventures.
The Februllage collages I have created for Day 16 (PROMPT – Toilet Paper), Day 17 (PROMPT – Mathematics), and Day 18 (PROMPT – Costume) were born from my journey into this new portal of expansiveness. Check them out below.
FEBRULLAGE DAY 16 (PROMPT – Toilet Paper)
“Pandemic Memories” is the title of my Februllage Day16 digital collage. This collage gave me a chance to make playful art from the rolls of toilet paper and masks many of us kept stocked in our homes.
I started the collage with a photo of a bathroom in the Hackney apartment I stayed in during my visit to London in 2023. I added a photo of myself wearing a mask from 2021 in the mirror. Graphic images of masks and rolls of toilet paper were also included.
FEBRULLAGE DAY 17 (PROMPT – Mathematics)
“Black Mermaid Mathematics” is the title of my Februllage Day 17 digital collage. This collage celebrates the soul sistalove bond I share with my cousin Gail and my childhood and adult passion for numerology and mermaids of African descent. I started the collage with an AI-generated background of numbers and added one of my favorite photos of my cousin Gail and I when we were young girls. I added different mermaids of African descent. The mermaids also represent my connection to Oxum/Oshun and Iemanja/Yemanya, two Afro Brazilian/Yoruba Oxisas/Orishas.
FEBRULLAGE DAY 18 (PROMPT – Costume)
The Costume prompt made me think of Mardi Gras which was celebrated on February 17th this year. I love Mardi Gras and New Orleans art, culture, history, and spirituality. My love affair with New Orleans and Louisiana shows up in my debut novel, Love’s Troubadours – Karma: Book One.
“Great-Great-Grandmother Ida Mae at the Mardi Gras Ball” is the title of my Februllage Day 18 digital collage. My imagination took over this collage and explored what my great-great-grandmother Ida Mae Goins Bolden would have looked like if she attended a Mardi Gras ball.
Great-Great Grandmother Ida Mae was born on December 10, 1866, in Michigan. Her birthday is eight days before my December 18th birthday. We were both born in Michigan. She was a daughter of Franklin Goins and Polly Mary Rickman Goins, sister to three sisters and two brothers, wife, mother, aunt, and grandmother.
She married my great-great grandfather William Henry Bolden on December 29, 1887, in Decatur, Indiana. Together, they raised five children, Ada May Bolden McWilliams (1889-1947), Arthur William Bolden (1890-1943), Clyde E. Bolden (1891-1916), Iona Hazel Bolden Johnson King (my great grandmother), and an unnamed child who died early (1899).
While reading her death certificate, I learned she died of cancer of the uterus, rectum, and bladder on March 16, 1917, in North Vernon, Indiana (Jennings County). The cause of her death is something I will explore in another collage series.
I used Canva to create AI-generated ballroom background. Mardi Gras confetti graphic images and a sign decorate the entire collage. I added a woman of African descent dressed in a Mardi Gras mask and costume. I included a black and white photo of Great-Great Grandmother Ida Mae as a young woman in her early 20s. I think the photo was taken before she got married in 1887.
YOUR INVITATION
Click on the video below and listen to my song, “Ancestral Medicine” that is featured on my debut album, Thriving Mindfully As Theresa’s Daughter. Also, reflect on the question.
What personality traits or experiences you share with your loving + wise + well ancestors
DAFFODIL is the prompt for Februllage Day #15. My collage is entitled “A Tribute to Daffodil Sisters: Mary Etter Bolden and Stella Essa Bolden.” It honors my great-great-grandaunts, Mary and Stella Bolden, the daughters of my great-great-great-grandparents, Sarah Ellen Martin Bolden and John Thomas Bolden Sr. and Sarah Ellen Martin Bolden. They were the younger sisters of my great-great-grandfather, William Henry Bolden.
I decided to honor my great-great-grandaunts Mary and Stella because they both died early in life. Mary was born on June 14, 1877, in Jefferson County, Indiana (estimating the county based on where her family was living at the time of her birth) and died on April 9, 1898, in North Vernon, Indiana (Jennings County). She was only 20 years old.
Stella was born on December 14, 1879, in Jefferson County, Indiana (estimating the county based on where her family was living at the time of her birth) and died on June 28, 1899, in North Vernon, Indiana (Jennings County). She was only 19 years old.
While designing this collage, I did some research on the meaning of daffodils and learned they symbolize rebirth, new beginnings, joy, and cheerfulness.
When I looked at Mary and Stella’s black and white photo, I imagined they were young women filled with joy, dreams, and hopes for their future. Perhaps, they were very active in their church community and were able to read and write, teach Sunday school, and help organize outreach efforts and social events. I also imagined they loved flowers like daffodils which were known to grow during the spring months in their hometown of North Vernon, Indiana. Maybe they loved to pick them and place them in vases in their home. My imagination also had me visualizing their parents, sisters, and brothers bringing daffodils to their graves during the spring season.
I wanted to create a heavenly background with daffodils to illustrate Mary and Stella’s rebirth as loving + wise + well ancestors. Thanks to Canva’s AI-generated tool, I was able to create the perfect one.
Heart is the prompt for Februllage Day #14. My collage is entitled ” The Heart of Father + Daughter Love.” It celebrates the love shared by my grandfather, Robert Warren Gartin, Sr. and my mother, Theresa B. Gartin Leeke.
I used a photo from my mother Theresa’s wedding day on November 25, 1961, at St. Rita Catholic Church in Indianapolis, Indiana. The photo features my mother and grandfather walking down the aisle to meet my father, John F. Leeke at the altar.
St. Rita Catholic Church was established in 1919 as the first African-American parish in Indianapolis. It was her family’s parish. She and her siblings attended elementary school at St. Rita Catholic School. When she was in junior and senior high school, she served as a pianist and organist at the church.
I used Canva to change the background of the photo to an AI-generated blue pattern. Gold Ghanaian Adinkra symbols that represent love were added to my mother’s dress and the blue background: Akoma, Odo Nnyew Fie Kwan, and Akoma Ntoso. The name and meaning for each symbol is contained below.
The colors blue and gold pay homage to my mother’s love for and membership in Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Inc., an African American sorority established by seven educators on the campus of Butler University on November 12, 1922, in Indianapolis, Indiana. My mother joined the Alpha Chapter at Butler in 1959. I joined the Beta Tau Chapter at Morgan State University in Baltimore in 1983.
YOUR INVITATION
Click on the video below and listen to my song, “Ancestral Medicine” that is featured on my debut album, Thriving Mindfully As Theresa’s Daughter as you reflect on the question below.
1) What ancestral relationships remind you of the love shared by a father and daughter?
Watermelon is the prompt for Februllage Day #13. “Imaging A Widow’s Watermelon Salvation” is the title of my collage.
I decided to use a black and white photo of my great-great grandmother Millie Ann Wathen Gartin and her children (includes my great grandfather frank Louis Gartin) as the base of the collage. I used Canva to change the background to an AI-generated background of a farm. Several watermelon graphics are added at the bottom of the collage.
Before I created the collage, I imagined my great-great grandmother Millie Ann growing and selling watermelons to support herself and her children after her husband and my great-great grandfather George Spencer Gartin, a farmer and Union Army soldier who fought during the Civil War, was killed by a man with an ax in 1886.
She was the daughter of Felix Wathen and Mary Sylvia Hayden Wathen, enslaved people of African descent. She was born in March 1854 in Lebanon, Kentucky. When slavery ended, she was still a young girl. Although I don’t know the type of labor she and her family performed during slavery, I used this collage prompt to imagine that they might have grown and sold watermelon after they were freed. In case you didn’t know, once African Americans were freed, many grew, ate, and sold watermelon. It became a symbol of freedom and economic independence.
YOUR INVITATION
Click on the video below and listen to my song, “Ancestral Medicine” that is featured on my debut album, Thriving Mindfully As Theresa’s Daughter as you reflect on the question below.
1) What symbolized freedom and economic independence to your loving + wise + well ancestors?
Today’s #Februllage prompt is MAGNET. My collage is entitled “Dream Magnets Connecting Me to Iemanja, Salvador da Bahia, and Grandma Gartin’s Love, Wisdom, and Protection.”
My dreams have always carried messages of divine wisdom. They often feel like magnets that connect me to grounding forces, experiences, and places.
The collage features blue magnets and photos of my great grandmother Ida Mae Farmer Gartin (Grandma Gartin), me sleeping, Iemanja sculpture on my forehead (located in Rio Vermelho neighborhood in Salvador), and the Casa de Iemanja and Praia do Rio Vermelho (Rio Vermelho Beach) in Salvador da Bahia.
This winter, I have had several dreams about Grandma Gartin, Iemanja/Yemanya (Candomble Oxisa/Yoruba Orisha of the sea and motherhood), and Casa de Iemanja (Yemanya’s House).
Although I never met Grandma Gartin, my mom Theresa told me stories about her. The messages she has been sharing with me in my dreams center around honoring my body as a sacred temple with healthy eating, movement, and living. I call her my wellness shero.
The Iemanja sculpture on my forehead lets me know I am Iemanja’s daughter (like all of my womanline ancestors). When she appears in my dreams, she reminds me to mother myself with great care by standing in my divine power and serving as a better steward of my creativity, gifts, and resources. She has also invited me to visit Casa de Iemanja, Rio Vermelho neighborhood, Salvador da Bahia, and Brazil regularly.
YOUR INVITATION
Click on the video below and listen to my song, “Ancestral Medicine” that is featured on my debut album, Thriving Mindfully As Theresa’s Daughter as you reflect on the questions below.
1) Do your loving + wise + well ancestors visit you in your dreams and offer wisdom?
2) Think of a time when you followed your ancestors’ wisdom. How did it impact your life?
PLANT is the prompt for #Februllage Day 11. My collage is entitled “Two Generations Planting Seeds of Black Girl Joy.” It explores two things that brought joy to my mother Theresa and I during our girlhoods: playing with our dolls and dogs. I included photos of us with our favorite dolls and dogs in the collage.
My mom grew up with a dog named Elmer in Indianapolis, Indiana. She loved him so much and made sure my brothers and I experienced the same love and joy.
I grew up with a dog named Clarence in Landover, Maryland. Due to my mom’s love, he became the fifth Leeke child. We all loved him too. He was one of my best friends. I spent lots of time playing with and talking to him. I still remember his smile and remember him on his birthday each year. I even keep a photograph of us on my refrigerator.
The collage includes graphics of a potted plant and woman gardening and photos of my mom and I when we were toddlers. The seeds in the potted plant represent our joy. Our toddler photos represent our pure joy as children. The woman gardening illustrates our adult responsibility to tend to our own garden of joy.
Several Ghanaian Adinkra Gye W’Ani symbols are featured. They represent joy and living fully with joy.
YOUR INVITATION
Click on the video below and listen to my song, “Ancestral Medicine” that is featured on my debut album, Thriving Mindfully As Theresa’s Daughter as you reflect on the questions below.
1) What brought you joy as a child?
2) What brings you joy as an adult?
3) What are one to three steps you can take to experience more joy in your daily life (they don’t have to take a lot of time or cost you money; consider incorporating simple things you can do in your daily life)?
Yesterday, I discovered that making digital collages dedicated to my loving + wise + well ancestors is a powerful way to care for myself when I experience grief that is born out of the loss of a loved one.
Making ancestral collages is a form of ancestral medicine because it helps you remember your ancestors and express love and gratitude for them.
I had a lot of fun thinking about OBLIVIOUS, today’s #Februllage prompt.
My creative process started with a visit to the internet’s dictionary universe.
After reading several definitions, I made a mental note of the synonyms that resonated. Two words claimed space in my mind: unaware and clueless.
I wondered about the times in my life when I have been unaware or clueless.
I also started looking at family photos and found one of my mom Theresa and three brothers, Mike, Mark, and Matt. It was taken by my father John in 1969.
As I looked at the photo, I realized my little girl self called Puf (“Puf the Magic Dragon” like the song by Peter, Paul & Mary) was experiencing joy sitting with her mom and brothers. She was also OBLIVIOUS to how spiritually and emotionally wealthy she was as a daughter who had an overflowing amount of love, guidance, protection, and provision from her mother and loving + wise + well ancestors.
I ended up using the photo as the base of today’s collage that is entitled “A Little Girl Is Oblivious.”
I added a photo of my current self. That photo represents me as a woman whonnow recognizes and claims her spiritual and emotional weath.
Several Bese Saka symbols were included in the collage. Bese Saka is a beautiful Adinkra symbol that represents abundance and wealth. They are placed in the right-hand corner of the collage.
One last thing! I wrote a statement in the upper left-hand side that expresses how I was OBLIVIOUS as a little girl about the spiritual and emotional weath I had as a result of my mom’s love, presence, wisdom, guidance, protection, creativity, joy, and adventure.
YOUR INVITATION
Click on the video below and listen to my song, “Ancestral Medicine” that is featured on my debut album, Thriving Mindfully As Theresa’s Daughter as you reflect on the questions below.
1) Think back to your childhood and the connections you shared with loved ones like your parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. Can you recall something you didn’t know about them and later learned when you were an adult?
2) Did the new information you learned about them impact you in any way?
Bottle is the prompt for #Februllage Day 9. My collage is entitled Mother + Daughter + Granddaughter Memory from 1986.
I thought about memories I wish I could have bottled. I decided to create a collage about my memory of standing next to my mother Theresa and grandmother Dorothy (known as Nanan) in a family photo that was taken during my parents’ 25th wedding anniversary celebration in 1986.
I remember my mom being so happy to renew her vows with my dad in the presence of her children, family, and friends. I was very happy to serve as her maid of honor and celebrate my parents. I think Nanan was happy to see her daughter so happy.
This photo is one of the only photos I have with all of us together. It’s hard to believe that it was taken 40 years ago. When I look at it now, I can truly appreciate the layers of mother-daughter love that existed between us as imperfect human beings.
I started the collage with a photo that my niece Jordan took of me during our 2021 visit to the KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature exhibition at the New York Botanical Garden that featured the work of Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. She encouraged me to pose by the floral exhibit.
Side Note: We both love flowers.
I was so happy that day because I got to spend it with my niece who is the daughter I never had and one of my favorite people in the world.
I remember telling my mom how happy I was that Jordan and I got to share the joy of seeing one of our favorite artists together. I also texted this photo to my mom. She loved art and flowers just like Jordan and me.
Both photos are filled with moments I wish I could have bottled so I could open them on days when I need a quick reminder of how I blessed I am to be Theresa’s daughter, Dorothy’s granddaughter, and Jordan’s aunt.
YOUR INVITATION
Click on the video below and listen to my song, “Ancestral Medicine” that is featured on my debut album, Thriving Mindfully As Theresa’s Daughter as you reflect on the question below.
If you could bottle moments spent with your loving + wise + well ancestors, what would they be?
Ananda Leeke 