Siksika woman’s puppets spread culture and joy

What started out as a project to help her daughter in a talent competition five years ago has quickly turned into a creative outlet and promising business venture promoting Indigenous culture for one Siksika native and her family.
Laura Asham, who has always nurtured the creative talents she learned from her mom Donna and older sister Sheila when she was younger, has expanded her repertoire of skills from beadworking to making native clothing and designs and now to puppet making.
“When I make stuff, I make stuff that people don’t already have. I try to do something different,” said Asham, who designs and creates various beadworks, moccasins and puppets that she sells at the Siksika Nation band office as well as at various conferences and markets.
Asham’s first puppet was created for her daughter to use in the talent part of a competition when she was running for the Siksika Indian Princess title. Winter Rose used the puppet as an aid to showcase and teach the audience Blackfoot words. Soon after, Asham started receiving requests from other members of the community for her puppets.
She then got the idea to help spread Indigenous culture even more and to help other students across the province, and later Canada, learn their First Nations’ native languages by using the puppets.
“They just bring goodness to people, they bring people together and I hope they bring the language back,” said Asham.
She has created and sold sets of puppets for schools across Alberta and has had requests and created puppets for First Nation communities in Manitoba and British Columbia.
“If you’re going to be learning and using the language, and some people are visual learners, then it helps to say ‘eyes’ in Blackfoot and use the puppet to point to the eyes. It makes learning more fun,” said Asham, who further explained that by also adding traditional outfits onto the characters it helps to represent a stronger cultural component in the puppets which a lot of users can relate to.
Asham has not only had success with younger students learning Blackfoot with the puppets. She has also created granny and grandpa puppet sets which she says elders often have fun playing with by speaking Blackfoot and other traditional languages with, and that male and female users both seem to enjoy the puppets equally.
With the help of her entire family, she draws out, cuts, glues, sews and puts together the native puppets, before adding traditional clothing to them and sealing them with a kiss to bring them to life, ahead of them travelling to their new homes.
“All my puppets … I always seal them with a kiss on the nose and I give them a hug and tell them to be good,” said Asham. “The hardest part is them leaving me. But I know when they reach where they are going that they are going to be in good hands and that people will respect them. They will also help so many people to learn or practice language.”
Asham can make up to six sets, or 12 puppets a week, with the help of her production line – comprised of her children, daughters-in-law and husband.
Currently, Asham is in the process of applying for some business grants so that she may get some help building a workshop on Siksika Nation where she can continue to make her puppets, beadwork and clothing, and where she can hold workshop classes to teach others the creative traditions of their tribes.
Asham was nominated for the Alberta Women’s Entrepreneur (AWE) Awards due to the rapid success of her growing business ever since AWE featured a profile on her in their November 2018 magazine. Since then, her business has truly boomed – in January alone, she made and sold over 20 puppets.
Asham’s future plans include getting a website up and running so that it is easier for interested schools to contact her with requests to purchase the puppets, for her to build a workshop to work and offer classes out of, and to help use her puppets to spread joy and culture all across Canada.
For those interested in learning more about the puppets or to put in an order, they may contact Asham via her email at laura.asham@hotmail.com. A set of puppets costs $500 and they can be any combination of boy, girl, granny or grandpa.
“My plan and my goal is to try and have most of my puppets across Canada in 10 years. I’m crossing my fingers,” said Asham. “I’m hoping that they will be out there and a piece of our family is going to be in every nation.”