There are many things that you may wish would keep going forever, like the thread on your bobbin; the steam pressure in your iron; your favourite piece of fabric you discovered in the back of an op shop that is perfect for just about everything you want to sew; or an especially good cup of tea.

Of all the things we wish would keep going, 2021 is not one of them. But as we prepare to wave an enthusiastic goodbye, it's good to pause and celebrate the many highlights: …seeing students master a new technique; …the enthusiasm of volunteers when we started our new community project, making patchwork blankets for the NICU (Neo-natal Intensive Care Unit); …winning the Dunedin Volunteer Awards 'Heritage and Environment' Award; …or saving over 200kg of fabulous materials from the Clothing and Textile department of the university from going to landfill.

If you can excuse my spot of philosophy, it’s nice to think that after taking a breath, we’ll be able to apply our mending enthusiasm to our own threadbare places and make the next year full of crazy darning, colourful patches, and upcycled plans.

We have definitely succeeded in working towards our three principle goals: reducing textile waste; building community; and creative learning.
Thanks to everyone who has been involved and supported us in small and mighty ways throughout the year!

January

Thanks to the tireless efforts of our volunteers, especially Oliver and Jeremy, we finished the renovations of our studio with front hall complete with grand staircase leading to nowhere (well, extra storage space), bathroom, and bringing colour and educational messages about the fashion industry to our machine area.
Our workshops got off to a fantastic start with a brilliant Visible Mending workshop lead by Kate Watts <3

February

We love having amazing support from students at Otago University & Otago Polytechnic - helping us get a head start on sorting our fabric donations, and making it possible for us to not just divert materials from landfill, but find the real value and make those materials available to local crafters.
We were back at Otago Museum for 'Unvalantines day', and had a ball helping people represent love lost and found with our Mended Hearts workshop.

March

First of our massive fundraising sales with the whole studio transformed and filled with eager bargain hunters!
We started our collaborative project with Arati Kushwaha 'The Quilt Project' with a pop-up at Otago University on International Women's Day. (See our previous post about The Quilt Project)

April

Our 4KT Elephants project visited Queenstown and Wanaka to join with Nina from Tikki Studios and Wanaka Wastebusters in sharing the upcycling love. It was fantastic to meet in person and celebrate the efforts being made in other parts of the country to reduce textile waste <3 (See previous blog post on our adventure).
We had made plans for a public festival of upcycling and sustainability to join with events all over the globe for Fashion Revolution Week... but instead we were able to arrange two fantastic live talks at Dunedin public library with Bernadette Casey (UsedFully), who shared the exciting progress being made towards product stewardship and making the industry more sustainable; and Jane Milburn (Textile Beat) who inspired us to see the importance of our individual actions to reduce, reuse, and restore ourselves and our environment through ideas of permaculture. (See our previous blog post on these inspirational women).

May

We began a new Community Sewing Bee Project, with our wonderful team of volunteers making over 40 cushions and cushion covers to help Te Whare Pounamu Dunedin Women's Refuge brighten their meetings rooms for women and families. (see our previous blog post on this project!).
We also dove into the challenge to make 125 tote bags, upcycled from former street flags, for the national Waka Ama regatta. Thanks to all the volunteers who jumped in to help unpick, sew, and press!

June

Term 2 included two new workshops, with new tutors Dale Smart-Flett (Kids' Sewing Club) and Darlene Gore (Tailor-Made Pattern Making, and Tailoring Masterclass). Both classes were a huge success and both Dale and Darlene are a brilliant boost to our Stitch Kitchen team. We now have regular workshops for all ages and skill levels, which we're looking forward to continuing in 2022!

July

We celebrated Stitch Kitchen's 6TH BIRTHDAY with all our friends, volunteers and families enjoying carrot cake and a preview of our mid year fabric sale.

August

Our Community Sewing Bee team surpassed themselves, using our donated merino off-cuts from Glowing Sky Merino, to make up baby beanies for the Dunedin Neo-natal Intensive Care Unit.
August also brought us back into the almost-familiar territory of working from home (aka spending hours on Pinterest and eating chocolate pudding). But we were soon back in the studio, spring cleaning and working out how to provide access to our Maker's Pantry remotely so people could continue to enjoy new crafty hobbies while also reducing textile waste to landfills.

September

A great way to welcome the freshness of spring with Amber Bridgeman and a beginners harakeke weaving workshop.

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October

Danie from Mughuggers returned to lead an awesome variation of her beginners’ crochet workshop, using strips of scrap fabric and scrap yarn (which are in plentiful supply at our studio!) to make mini mats and baskets <3 Super cute!!
Our awesome Community Sewing Bee team also gave a helping hand to the Yellow Eye Penguin Trust by making weigh-bags to help their rangers monitor the well-being of our local hoiho community.
And a major highlight - receiving the 'Heritage and Environment' Award at the SBS Dunedin Volunteer Awards!!

November

We received a huge (just over 200kg) donation of fabrics, eyelets, and teaching resources from the former Clothing and Textile Science Department at the University of Otago! Many samples brought back strong memories of my (Fiona J) time studying. Very glad that my work now means we can save these amazing resources from being tossed in the skip as the storerooms are cleared.
Desi lead a fantastic beginners' hand embroidery workshop.
The merino knit fabric from Glowing Sky was back in use again with our Community Sewing Bees, this time making up patchwork blankets for NICU. These will be double-sided, with traditional square blocks, and crazy patchwork to use up the smaller scraps.

December

'Tis the season to get crafty, and our collection of seasonal fabrics and trims has been in steady demand, along with curtain samplers which make ideal reusable gift wrap! Our team worked through our bag of off-cuts from the flag bags made earlier in the year to make scrap pom-poms, which we then used to decorate heart-shape 'Christmas wreaths' to adorn our studio windows <3
I perfected my design of the ideal pin cushion, safe (!), wearable, and even with a handy magnet to pick up stray pins (and of course, made from scraps and super colourful).
Our final Mending workshop for the year was a huge success, with 7 participants and over 12 garments creatively repaired and ready for use over the summer holidays (and for a long time after that).

We're looking forward to a break; closing the studio at the end of this coming Saturday (18th December), and returning in three weeks, for our new opening hours... keep an eye on our social media for more details!

Thank you to everyone who has joined us throughout the year, and made what we do here possible!

What are your highlights from 2021? What have you upcycled, created, or learned? If you've been involved in any of our activities this year, we'd love to read your highlights, see photos, and hear any suggestions about how we can do even better next year.

If you'd like to be part of our amazing community in 2022, we'd love to see you!