Fatima is 48, Syrian and came to Turkey from Aleppo about 3 years ago. She is now one of our most talented knitters and the head of our Syrian knitting mother's group...
I am a mumpreneur. I am a social entrepreneur who, like more and more parents nowadays set up a home-based business to be able to take care of my little ones. I am that the stay-at-home mother who keeps one eye on the children and another on a fledgeling business. This comes of course with tones of upsides like being your own boss and spending more time at home but also a few downsides and challenges no one warned me about.
At any given time you will find our atelier crowded, while most of the work is done from home it is our meeting point always busy with knitter sharing their experiences in small groups, mums winding the yarn or taking supplies and ofcurse, kids playing.
I want to share withyou our first training session with our Syrian refugee mum group at the Olive Tree Centre in Istanbul. We will start them as soon as possible to produce some of the toys of our line. I would like to share with you the emotion and theutmost joy this day brought us!
Today we visited the Olive Tree Community Center run by SPI (Small Projects Istanbul) in Istanbul Turkey. The Olive Tree Community Center provides free supplementary education services and community support – primarily to those displaced by the Syrian conflict.