Where it all began
The origin story for Cimi began over 10 years ago. I've always been creative and enjoyed sewing and decorating and 'upcycling' items to give them new life. Every Christmas I'd invite some friends round for 'Christmas craft night' and I'd organise a simple activity we could all do over some drinks and nibbles. There was laughter and friendship and at the end of the night we had some beautiful items we'd hand-made and all brought our own unique spin to.
Fast forward to more recent times and I was living a busy city life, working full time, raising teenagers and I had little time for being creative. My daughter bought me a gnome from a $2 shop and I thought to myself 'that doesn't look too hard, I bet I could make a nicer one'. With Christmas behind us and a week or two off work I had time on my hands and a creative itch that needed scratching. So I went in search of some fabric and prototyped a gnome. First one was a bit of a learning curve, but I ironed out the wrinkles and by the second I had a great repeatable process. Holidays ended and everything was put away in a box and forgotten about.
The following year life was insanely busy heading into the festive season and I'd pretty much lost my creative mojo to the stress of work and life. My girlfriends that I'd done a wreath-making workshop with the previous year were keen for another Christmas craft night and I remembered the gnome stuff from the previous year. So despite being pretty overwhelmed with life in general at this point I stepped up knowing I had just the thing.
We had a blast. A couple of us were comfortable in front of a sewing machine, the rest were learning by doing. We pottered our way through making our gnomes, having a few drinks and lots of laughs.
It was such a rejuvenating experience for me. I'd tapped back into my creativity and I'd shared the experience with friends. My bucket had been filled. I realised then that the value was not just in the gnome, but in the process of making the gnome. I didn't want to just walk into a store and buy an object, I wanted something more.
Cimi is born of my love of creativity, my passion for sharing that love with others and my experience of knowing that the joy of making something is as precious a gift as the thing that is made.