Craft, chat and connect
Betsy Mann
What do you do when your partner gets a new job and you move to a city where you don’t know anyone? That was the situation Lori Godon found herself in when she came to Ottawa a year ago. How to connect with like-minded people and make some new friends? Lori’s solution has been to organize “Craft and Chat” evenings in the “Story” apartment building at the corner of Rideau and Chapel where she and her partner live.
“When we moved here from Hamilton I was working as a school bus driver,” Lori tells me. “You don’t get to meet and socialize with many adults in that job! And now I’m retired.” How about meeting neighbours in the building?
I’m talking to Lori in Story’s large co-working room where a number of young people are sitting at tables, their laptops open in front of them and their earphones on. Lori confirms my suspicion that most of the tenants in this building are university students who, even if they might share her interest in crafts, probably don’t have the time.
“I decided to put out an invitation on a Facebook community page,” explains Lori. “In the last six months, I’ve hosted six or seven evening get-togethers; three or four people have come each time. We use a corner of this co-working room or if this one is full, there are other common rooms in the building.” People usually bring whatever they’re working on—knitting, crocheting, scrapbooking—but Lori also has some supplies she can share and some for sale if people want to try something new. There is no charge to attend.
Lori herself likes scrapbooking, but she observes that it’s a hobby that takes a lot of time and requires people to plan ahead for supplies. To encourage people to come, in the past she has sometimes offered new attendees the supplies to make one free card. “You can finish a card in an evening, so people leave with a finished product,” she observes. She is considering offering an evening in December to make Christmas cards together.
Lori doesn’t intend for these to be instructional evenings. Everyone brings their own projects and their own ideas. However, just being with others and sharing ideas can spark some new directions. “I’ve learned so much from the ladies who’ve come,” Lori says enthusiastically. “You look at what someone else is doing and you get inspiration.” For example, some participants have introduced her to the idea of “junk journals.” Simpler than scrapbooking, this is a way of collecting up the ephemera of your daily life, often in a reused notebook. Sort of like the junk drawer in your kitchen, it can become the home for a bit of everything: stickers, pictures, sayings you like, tickets from a show—whatever strikes your fancy.
“Craft” is just one part of the name of these evenings. The other part is just as important: Chat. “Evenings last one and a half to two hours, depending on the conversation among the participants,” says Lori. In a world where people often find themselves isolated, crafts become a way to create connections and build a sense of community. Lori realizes this can take time. “We’re starting slowly,” she observes. “I’m still trying things out, like maybe I will try getting together in the afternoon sometimes. In the winter, it may be easier for retired people like me to get out during the day.”
If you are interested in crafting, chatting and connecting, look for Lori’s invitations on Facebook at Lori’s personal page (Lori Godon Trewolla) and at the Sandy Hill (Ottawa, ON) Classified/Services page, as well as on neighbourhood group sites that target residents of Sandy Hill, Lowertown and Vanier. You need to register in advance; the building’s security system means that Lori has to know your name to let you in. Any questions? You can get in touch with her at lori.godon@gmail.com. Happy crafting, chatting and connecting!
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Photo: Glenn Shields