Back from West Africa! (plus our footage on the Steven and Chris show)

Hello all! What a great Monday morning it is. We just got back this weekend from our first charity mission to Ghana, West Africa. In only one week, The Sewing Studio's students and generous community members donated 177 new and gently used T-shirts and over 25 drawstring bags and tote bags. Wow, THANK YOU!!

The goods were given out to school kids last week in two villages near Ghana's capital city, Accra. Most of the kids we met own only two outfits: a school uniform and a set of play clothes. Needless to say, they were THRILLED about the T-shirts!! Keep an eye out for the video footage we'll post at the end of the week...

And stay tuned for more charity work that you can be involved in. We'll be starting a charity division of The Sewing Studio very soon. Our hopes are to provide clothes to many more village kids in West Africa. The schools we visited this trip have a total of 1100 students, so we're aiming to bring one T-shirt to each student next February. If all goes well, we'll hit even more schools on our next mission.

We're also looking into creating jobs in West Africa by opening a sewing factory in Ghana that Canadian businesses can depend on for their manufacturing needs. On this side of the pond, that will mean cheaper production costs for local businesses, while over there we'll be creating jobs and pumping funds into Ghana's developing economy.

So there's lots cooking!

Also, did you catch The Sewing Studio on the Steven and Chris show while we were gone? Our segment about shopping for a sewing machine aired February 10th. We'll have the video clip on our website soon. In the meantime, you can see the full episode (#83) online. Forward it to 28minutes and 18 seconds. That's where our clip starts.

Have a great week!
Denise — Founder & Managing Director

Here, some of the excited students poke their heads out of their classroom to wave hello.

School kids in a West African village hold up their new T-shirts donated by YOU.