Support Seamstress Supermoms! A Mother’s Day special: Shining the spotlight on working moms from Gawad Kalinga

This month of May, we celebrate the special women in our lives who have raised us, nurtured our family, and who have been our source of comfort and strength when times get challenging. Mother’s Day is a time to celebrate moms of all kinds. And even though most of us are currently staying home, there are still many opportunities to make our moms feel loved, appreciated, and special. Now is also the perfect time to extend that appreciation to other mothers and their families that could use the extra support. Fortunately, there are many organizations you can reach out to whose mission is to uplift the lives of women from poverty and hardship.

One great example is Plush and Play, a community and social enterprise based in GK Enchanted Farm, Bulacan that sews educational plush toys. Not just a regular toy company, Plush and Play is comprised of hardworking seamstress mothers from within the Gawad Kalinga community that reside in the farm, as well as moms outside of Gawad Kalinga. Plush and Play has been advocating not just for children’s right to play, but also for the dignity of moms by providing them livelihood opportunities. Since the company was founded in 2014 by Fabien Courteille and Howard Lorenzo, about 90 moms have been employed: 40 moms work full-time either from home or at the workshop located in the farm, while 50 more moms work on a part-time basis to support bulk orders. They are supervised by Operations Manager Angeline De Roxas.

To date, the moms have proudly hand stitched over 100,000 high-quality plush toys ranging from keychains, to sea creatures and giant fruits and vegetables for children across the country. With children’s safety as one of the main priorities, all toys sewn by Plush and Play are made of hypoallergenic material and no hazardous plastic parts.

Aside from their own designs, the moms are talented in hand stitching custom toys for other companies and brand partners. In fact, Wyeth Nutrition has been supporting the Plush and Play moms and the business for a year. Since their partnership began in 2019, they have sewn about 28,000 toys and cloth items for the company’s corporate, marketing, and sales initiatives, including customized cloth books for a Wyeth Nutrition brand, and reusable cloth masks.

For every plush toy you order, you empower one mom from this Gawad Kalinga community to support her family. Their plushies are the perfect gift for your child or pamangkin. You might even consider gifting a plushie to a friend or fellow mom – they’d be sure to appreciate it, knowing that it’s a token of hard work and love from a Plush and Play mother.

This Mother’s Day, let’s celebrate all that mothers do for their family. Pay it forward and support a seamstress supermom today!

Browse their online shop and place your order here*.

Find out more about the Plush and Play moms that you’ll be helping through this video:

*Plush and Play will be able to deliver your order immediately after the ECQ is lifted.

Reference

By: Rebecca Joyce Castro

The views and opinions expressed by the writer are his/her own, and does not state or reflect those of Wyeth Nutrition and its principals.