Thanks for making the Repair Café a success!

We want to thank everyone who helped make Woodstock’s first Repair Café possible.

Our volunteers gave their time and, more importantly, their skills. Local businesses contributed supplies and refreshments. And neighbors came through with things that needed fixing and a willingness to spend part of their weekend trying something a little different.

We’re grateful to all of them. Events like this depend on something that can be easy to overlook: participation.

We hear a lot about the importance of community in a place like Woodstock. We want local events, gathering places, active downtowns that serve residents as well as visitors, and opportunities to know our neighbors. But none of those things exist simply because we value the idea of them. Someone has to organize them, someone has to volunteer, someone has to support them, and people have to show up.

That last part may be the simplest, but it matters. Because we’ve gotten very good at creating efficiencies in our lives. We can shop, eat, work, and entertain ourselves without much reason to interact with anyone we don’t already know. There are real benefits to that convenience.

Community, by contrast, asks something of us. Sometimes it’s an hour on a Saturday. Sometimes it’s sharing a skill without being paid for it, talking to someone you wouldn’t otherwise meet, or choosing to participate when staying home would have been easier. You may not know anyone, or you may simply not feel like going. But showing up anyway, however small the commitment, is a real contribution to the community. And more often than not, you walk away feeling so glad that you did.

That was on full display at the Repair Café. Volunteers and participants came together around a simple shared purpose: keeping usable things in use and out of the landfill. Along the way, people taught one another, worked alongside people they may not have known before, and spent a few hours repairing things that, in many cases, would have been easier to replace.

The event also benefited from meaningful local support. Woodstock Farmers Market, Abracadabra, and Woodstock Ace Hardware gave generously so that we could enjoy refreshments together and go home with supplies and goodie bags.

So, to our volunteers, our sponsors, and everyone who joined us: thank you. You gave your time, skills, resources, or simply your presence. All of it mattered.

We hope to see even more of you at the next one.

With gratitude,

Kate Niemczyk, The Bunny Bin
Liza Bernard, Norman Williams Public Library
Heather Knoll, Sustainable Woodstock