Happy Imbolc, groundhog day, mid-point to spring, dear reader!
Been a weird start to the year. The end of 2025 was just waaaaay too much for us, and we’re still juggling. Plus this extra-intense winter and the mental health struggles that tag along-- it’s been tricky to get our routines back. Scott and I usually book a couple nights at Algonquin in early January or February ("for my birthday", but also to sit down and sketch out our work year without distractions), and sadly we didn’t go this year...which perhaps is also contributing to this lingering overwhelm as we sputter into 2026.
Image caption: Bright and fresh mend on the shoulder of my green sweater...that you might remember from a previous newsletter where I talked about "regretting" the way I repaired the cuffs (also pictured!)
All this to say, for everyone who’s been asking when we’ll have more darning looms in stock, and I replied something like “probably early February! Sign up for my newsletter for updates!”
Well...it’s early February, and I’m sorry to report that we still don’t have a solid date for our next shop restock.
Please continue to stay tuned! As a tiny lil team of friends making stuff, we're doing our best.
One thing that I’ve been focused on is making this a WINTER OF CARE AND REPAIR to remember.
1. I have two free and two paid mending/repair opportunities coming up in February, all at Kwartzlab Community Makerspace.
Click below to learn more and to RSVP.
Feb 19 – free – Kwartzlab Repair Cafe & Mending Night
Feb 22 – $25/NOTA – Give Your Clothes Some Love
Feb 28 – free – Clothing Swap & Mending with Be Gay Do Crafts
Image caption: Adding more patches to these socks that I LOVE... knit in 100% wool by my pal Courtney so they are always in need of a little repair ;)
2. Over our winter break, I kept a list of the damaged garments and unfinished projects haunting the corners of my life, and one by one I stitched them up.
I must say I do feel like I accomplished a lot, even though as I write this I’m looking back at said “winter break goals” list and, well, it’s not quite exhausted (and it never will be).
Another confession. I’m actually in Montreal right now (as much as, for privacy, I don’t usually like to announce travel like this). I’m visiting a friend and I guess still getting my little slice of time away, though I left Scott to fend for himself at home ;) It’s not the same as our camping trip, but I’ve been getting outside on some frigid jaunts around our local parcs et ruelles. I also packed several garments in need of repair so that I would have “no choice” but to fix them. Example:
Image caption: All three repairs I've shared so far, I've completed in the past week while "on vacation". But this one, I started on the train ride to Montreal, maybe you saw it on Instagram. According to the poll results, y'all prefer the more subtle pink side over the bold black, but I'm sure you can guess my preference ;)
That’s how, yesterday, I just couldn’t leave the house until I finished mending this tee. Which led naturally into starting the dinner I was so excited to make, aaaaand maybe poking at that orange sock repair, and then washing some laundry so that I could put the finishing touches on this sweet little tea towel I wove with Yde at Irène Textile on the weekend.
So I’m definitely on vacation, even though I told myself I’d totally do like 2-3 hours a day on my laptop to try and get some momentum going on my invisible-but-equally-haunting piles of digital work. It’s been nice.
Image caption: Couple snapshots from the workshop and my finished linge à vaisselle, which I'm leaving here in Montreal as a gift for my hosts. It was really lovely to just show up and weave on a perfectly dressed loom, meet some sweetie folks and practice my french in patient company. Merciiiiii Yde!
Maybe having you as an accountabilibuddy will help: please expect to see a new Mending Migration blog up this Friday! We just sent all the looms off to new hosts, so I have some lovely people to introduce you to.
Then maybe early next week I can try for a roundup of all my Winter of Care and Repair projects too. I won’t bug you with another email about it, but I’ll share the links on Bluesky//Instagram when the blogs are live.
Once again, we’re so sorry to have left our shop empty for close to a month now, but we’ll be at Hamilton Fibre Fest and Knit City Toronto in March, so we’ll be reeeeealllyy lost to not have anything by the end of the month! Thanks for understanding :) and happy mending in the meantime!!!!!
with appreciation,
elysha <3