Another Sewing Group?

Last week I had a meeting with a group of women in Teticic. This is the same group of women that had cooking classes with Ana (an MCCer that was here when we first arrived) and then participated in last year's garden group with Merideth and Kiara. I did a post-garden workshops evaluation with them awhile ago and from that came the idea that they would like to form a sewing group. "Now that we can grow our own vegetables year-round, we'd like to learn to make our own clothes" they said.
So we set up a meeting to talk more specifically about what that would look like.

At the meeting I asked them to think about why they want to form a sewing group. We brainstormed a list of reasons. I asked some more questions - like whether they want to form a group with sewing machines in one space that would be more like a business, or did they each want a sewing machine in their own home just for personal use. They said they wanted to learn to sew for themselves, but they also wanted to do what the sewing group in Zacango is doing, selling products to generate income. Well, for those of you who know about the sewing group in Zacango - the group is really struggling and does not have steady buyers and certainly has very little income. But I didn't want to completely douse their enthusiasm, so we started another list of what all is involved with having a sewing business. The list included things like a space for the machines, sewing machines, material (who will buy the material, where will they buy the material, can they buy in bulk to save money), learning how to sew, selling their products (what will they make, who will take their products to the market, where will they take their products)......etc.
We did all this over a course of 2 hours with lots of discussing, questioning, answering on their part. In the end, they decided that they needed some time to think about all this. They hadn't realized everything that was involved, were grateful for the poster paper with all their ideas and brainstorming, and could we meet again next week. We set another date and I left the poster paper with them so they could continue talking.

I was very excited to go back yesterday. (Isaiah got to go along with me - it was really fun. He played with the younger kids in the middle of the circle of women as we talked. Later on when the older kids got home from school, he played tag and climbed trees with them.)
When we arrived we first ate some scrambled eggs with chile sauce, beans and tortillas, as we always do at Emilia's house in Teticic. Then back to the circle of women.

They had talked during the week. What they really need is to do something that will generate income. Also, they eat a lot of eggs and the price of eggs has gone up recently. So instead of forming a sewing group, now they are thinking that it would be better to raise chickens and produce eggs - both for self-consumption and to sell.
"Great!" I said. I was really impressed with how they had analyzed the situation and come up with a solution. Since I know nothing about chickens (collecting 3 eggs every other day from our 3 chickens just isn't enough), we set yet another date for them to meet with our co-worker Manuel who does have the kind of experience that will be helpful to them.

So no, another sewing group is not in the works.