Hello! Welcome to Inclusive Story Time, I’m Kelly Bee (she/they)
I am a queer mixed media textile artist, and a white settler living on M’kima’ki, trying to raise a good kid into a good human by leading by example. I started this project in May 2019 as a way to keep our whole family accountable to the picture books on our shelf. truthfully, when the instagram account began, I didn’t think anyone would really be looking! I was just looking for a way to take our deep love of kid lit and be more critical of what we consume. It all began after reading a challenge that The Conscious Kid put out to make sure that the library books we take out have people in them that don’t reflect ourselves.
When we began this journey through children’s literature took stock of what we owned and quickly realized that we had way, way too many animal and anthropomorphic truck books and not enough actual humans on our shelf. So we started collecting a new library, and I started applying a more critical lens to who wrote and illustrated the book as well as it’s actual content, and learning more about the publishing industry.
What has transpired since is the intersection of speaking up and my lifelong love of art (picture books ARE art!) have collided, and I am splitting my time between art and community advocacy, and my work in children’s literature. As funny as it sounds, I believe these things couldn’t be more related, and that reconnecting with making with our hands, speaking up for others, and raising good humans are all one and the same.
Inclusive Story Time 