Blog Updates and inspiration

Earlier this month, Mend launched the Limited Edition Zip Pouch, just in time for Mother’s Day. Our hope was that it could be a gift for moms around the world made by and to empower mothers here in Uganda. This time Mend’s product did more than just support the empowerment of our own seamstresses. We partnered […]

As the Mend program comes to a close, its beneficiaries are models of empowerment. This is a story about 22 war-affected mothers who utilized skills training and education to improve their quality of life, invest in a sustainable future, and grow as leaders within their families and communities. “I am no longer staying in that […]

Last Friday, the seamstresses and staff at Mend celebrated Valentine’s Day together at the workshop. The ladies took tea together outside, as they do each day, but this time they also received personalized valentines from Mend’s social enterprise manager. It’s never hard to remember why these women inspire us through their resilience in light of […]

The seamstresses at Mend have been engaging in an emotional literacy lessons called Knowledge of Behavior and Self (KOBS). KOBS is intended to empower the ladies with a better understanding of themselves and their relationships with others. Since all of the women at Mend were affected by the LRA conflict during their adolescence and early […]

During the Lord’s Resistance Army conflict, Ajok Betty’s entire family was displaced from their ancestral land, and she never finished her primary education. At the time she joined Mend, our social enterprise, Betty was struggling to pay school fees and feed her family, and her health was suffering. By joining Mend, Betty was able to […]

Walk into Mend and you’ll find yourself surrounded by activity. Sewing, snipping and measuring as well as laughter and warm conversation. “For me, my favorite thing to talk about is my children. I have only two children, and I pray for them to have a good future.” Stella’s dream is for her son to become […]

By traveling down some scenic winding roads, past some roadside restaurants, and through small clearings of grouped huts, you will arrive at Irene’s new home – a 6-room building of bright red brick. She bought the land it’s built on with money she saved up as a seamstress at Mend, our social enterprise geared toward […]

Last week the staff and seamstresses of our social enterprise, Mend, visited The Recreation Project, an organization that utilizes a ropes course to teach “the important life skills and character-building needed to navigate a new landscape that for decades has been defined by war and conflict.” Field trips like this also support Mend’s goals of […]

Based on a 2012 survey, more than half of the seamstresses in our Gulu-based social enterprise were operating Income Generating Activities (IGAs)–and 81.8% expressed interest in starting their own. To learn more about how, the ladies stepped away from their sewing machines last week for a field trip. Local facilitators with business skills training experience […]

Three billion people around the world cook meals over open fires, causing families to overuse their resources gathering and purchasing fuel. Ultimately women and children are dying from the effects of smoke inhalation and forests are steadily disappearing as wood is harvested and collected for survival. The end result is also causing  greenhouse gas emissions to increase around the world– […]