We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Wendy Preslan. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Wendy below.

Wendy, appreciate you joining us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

When one door closes another one opens. Instead of looking at the closed door with regrets too long, look to the other door that is open.

I almost feel guilty about expressing my deep sadness over what Covid-19 has done to my photography non profit because I know there are so many people whose lives have been turned upside down and see no clear path for better days.

It took me many years to uncover my love and passion for photography and several more before I knew exactly what I needed to do with that passion. Nana Sue Photography~Healing Images was entering into its second year with a calendar full of amazing workshops and opportunities for children to connect with their community. On March 16th that calendar was wiped clean. I sat looking at my studio and all my Nikon cameras and I said “now what”? Two months later I still don’t know what is next for NSPHI but I do know that as that door was temporarily closing, another was opening.

My first hobby for as long as I can remember was sewing. I remember in middle school Home Economics making a warm up suit when all the other kids were making tote bags. In 1990 after the birth of my 3rd. daughter I decided to use those skills to start a commercial sewing business. I enjoyed that business for over 13 years. Giving up that business was one of the hardest decisions I had to make but it was the best for my family at the time. I lost my love of sewing and my machine just sat collecting dust in my basement; only getting used for the rare hem or alteration. That all changed after receiving a text message.

I was sitting in my family room on Saturday March 21st AKA day one of Covid-19 quarantine. I was sitting there wondering what I was going to do for the next several months. I thought about catching up on reading, maybe learning to finally make sushi, or dare I say learn a foreign language. As I sat there contemplating my options, I received a text from a friend who was sharing with me all of her amazing projects that she was going to work on during the quarantine. I said how lucky she was that she had that hobby to keep her busy. She then shared a link to Joanne Fabric’s asking for sewers to sew face masks for the front line health care workers. I briefly looked at it and thought wow how cool that would be if I had the materials to do it.

Fast forward to May 29, 2020. I made over 2,000 face masks, and over 50 scrub caps.

I didn’t accomplish this on my own. Through generous donations of elastic, fabrics, cutting assistance and financial donations I was able to donate to several local hospitals, nursing homes, urgent care centers, doctors offices, family and friends.

As I began to find my love of sewing again I decided to expand my non profit to include Stitches of Kindness. My mission was to invite children into my workshop and teach them to sew items for other local non profits. To date we have sewn for 8 non profits and have donated over $10,000 from the sales of some of our awesome items that we sell at local vendor events.

I still don’t know what the future holds for Healing Images but I do know that whatever I am called to do, I will listen and gladly open as many doors as I can to continue to use my talents to serve others.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

As far back as I can remember I have had a passion for creating. I taught myself to sew and crochet when I was still in elementary school. Crafting and creating was always a positive outlet for me. At 25 I was the mother of 3 and wanted to find something to do that helped provide for my family while I was also able to stay home and be as involved as possible. In 1990 I started Top Stitch Sewing Services. I did everything from alterations to custom window treatments. I was in business until 2002. I went through a divorce and some very difficult times and I closed my business, sold my home and all my equipment (except for one machine that was collecting dust) and gave up sewing. I didn’t touch a sewing machine until the day the world shut down. All it took was for me to make one face mask and I was instantly hooked. It felt so good to be able to have a skill that was so needed. I remember waking up in the early days of the pandemic to dozens of texts and emails requesting face masks. As horrible as the pandemic was, I was finding joy in being needed. It was then that I knew I had the start of something special.

The logical next step was to reach out to other local profits to see how Stitches of Kindness could support their missions. I established relationships with other grass roots charities and began to organize workshops.

I began to see the negative impact that the pandemic was having on children and really wanted to find a way to get them to get off of electronics and social media and find a way to give back to the community. I started by inviting local neighborhood children to come and sew with me and before long I had a waiting list of kids wanting to come sew.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Building my audience on social media has been quite the challenge but one that I have been determined to stay on top of. Initially I thought that all I had to do was post a few creative posts with some fun pictures and then everyone would love it and share it and my following will grow. Boy did I learn that lesson the hard way. Growing your audience on social media can be a full time job. I learned that videos will always get more interaction which in turn will lead to your posts being seen by more people. I learned that I had to be strategic about boosting posts in order to get more followers and more interaction.

My advice is to get comfortable making videos and making sure that you are being authentic. I also learned that it’s ok to ask your followers to help you grow your following. Ask people to share your posts, ask them to invite your friends to follow you on Instagram and always interact with them and thank them for their support.

Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?

When I made the decision to officially register Stitches of Kindness as a 501 (c)(3) I had one sewing machine to my name. Currently I have 9 sewing machines, 1 embroidery machine and 2 sergers. Initially I posted on social media that I was looking for donations of machines. At first I received a lot of very old machines, but it didn’t take long for people to take notice of what I was doing and eventually I was given very generous donations to purchase new equipment.

Contact Info:

• Website: nanasue.org
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stitchesofkindness/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stitchesofkindness