A lady from Toronto, Canada is looking to make a trade with Canadian musician Celine Dion.
Ivanka Siolkowsky, a professional organizer, was inspired by a previous trading project, the One Red Paperclip, where a Montreal man-made 14 trades, starting with a red paperclip and ended with trading someone to a house.
Siolkowsky’s idea is a bit different. She started with a Little Teal Hanger, with aim of trading something with Dion.
She started posting videos of her trading projects on TikTok, on her birthday, Aug. 11, 2020, with the idea of making trades for one year. She now has thousands of views on her project, but so far, she hasn’t heard back from the Canadian musician.
In fact, the idea to start trading with a little hanger came to Siolkowsky when she was hospitalized with COVID-19 in April of 2020. She told blogTO she became paralyzed from the waist down, “with nothing to do for three weeks.” So she watched YouTube videos and stumbled upon Kyle MacDonald’s Ted Talk video, of the One Red Paperclip project.
“I thought this is really cool because I am minimalist and because what I do for work — I am always telling people don’t hold on to things,” she said.
Starting with a teal hanger, she traded it for a handbag, which was then traded for a bottle of wine, then a cello, an iPad Pro, a Nikon camera kit, another iPad, and then an antique bike table – which was traded by a father for his little girl who had lost her mother to cancer, and needed an iPad for homeschooling. The family at the time was facing financial hardship, which made the trade really appreciative.
View this post on Instagram
Later on, the table got traded for a $5,000 original art piece by Sarah Phelphs. The two bonded over the musician, and so Phelphs made a custom painting for Siolkowsky with the goal to trade something with Dion.
So far the musician hasn’t responded to trading with the custom painting, however, Siolkowsky is “trying not to give up.” She has posted the photo for the trade on her Instagram and is giving a bit more time to the musician, but if she doesn’t hear back, she may open up the trading to anyone else interested.
View this post on Instagram
Siolkowsky says that with every trade that was made, she wanted to keep the item but the people she met and the experiences were better.
“Just show life is not about the stuff — it is about the people we meet along the way and interactions we have and helping others.”
