Side by Side: Making Bags Together

We sew, laugh, and learn together—girls from two worlds, stitching not only bags but friendships and futures.

In February 2024, we spent a week in Sosua, DO. We visited the dumpster and the village right beside it, then walked into a small sewing room with no running water and a lot of energy. The girls were 13 to 19. They greeted us with shy smiles that turned into loud laughs ten minutes later. They showed us how fast they could work. Simple designs finished in about thirty minutes. Cut, pin, press, stitch, turn, topstitch. Hand-sewn details at the end. Clean, steady, beautiful.

We didn’t just watch. We teamed up. We picked fabric together and argued (nicely) about patterns with English, Spanish and all hand gestures. We threaded machines and learned their tricks. When our seams went crooked, they cheered us on and fixed them. While we sewed, we practiced English words for tools and colors, then switched back to Spanish and tried again. Hours disappeared. Three days later we had several finished bags and a lot of inside jokes.

Between stitches we talked about life. School. Sisters. Favorite colors. What a first paycheck feels like. The room was simple, but the mood was bright. No sadness. Just focus and a calm kind of hope. Volunteers came to teach. Donations covered teachers and thread and needles. It felt like our school club, just in another place, with friends we hadn’t met yet.

We also rode out to other villages and peeked into their sewing spaces. Same buzz, same pride when a bag turned right side out and the corners sat sharp. Everywhere we went the rhythm was familiar: learn, try, help the next girl, laugh, try again. It’s not just craft. It’s income today and a plan for tomorrow.

That week changed how we think about “help.” We weren’t rescuers. We were partners. We stood shoulder to shoulder, hands on the same fabric, minds on the same future. And when we left, we didn’t feel goodbye. We felt connected, like the last stitch that closes a seam and makes the whole thing strong.