(Sewing Enables Women)
The SEW (Sewing Enables Women) project had its genesis in 2011 when Caye heard a talk by Dr. Paul Newman at a hospital near Salem, OR. Dr. Newman had just returned from one of his frequent medical relief trips to East Africa. Among the problems he had observed was the plight of girls in poverty-stricken rural areas. When they reached puberty, many of them stayed away from school because they had no pads to wear and/or no underwear to hold them in place. As a result, the girls kept falling behind in school, and eventually many of them dropped out.
Caye, an expert seamstress, was captivated by the idea. She raised money from friends and relatives and found a school in rural Madagascar that welcomed the idea. The project was a success.
Caye then heard of Your Sisters Orphanage near Arusha, Tanzania, where women had embarked on a program of sewing small items to earn money both for themselves and the orphanage.
In early 2017, Caye delivered eight sewing machines to The Garden of Hope, a small charitable foundation in Kisumu, Kenya. During her month there, she worked with the founder-director, Rosemary Odada to choose products – purses, bags, and possibly dresses – and line up potential markets.
Most recently, she brought in eight machines to Project Manulito, a school for impoverished children in rural Honduras. A group of women from the area are now learning the fundamentals of sewing and pattern making. Project Manulito houses 50 street children and also enrolls about 100 day students from home too poor to send them to a regular school.
Click the links to see details on each project.