it all started with a Braindate during the virtual AGU Fall Meeting in 2020. Myself and AGU member Betsy Wilkening came together to share our passion for quilting and ended up brainstorming a community-wide event called Quilt Your Science. Individuals of all ages and skill levels, members and non-AGU members, were invited to create a quilt themed on an earth/space science topic. For the 2021 AGU Fall Meeting, we organized a virtual gallery in ArtSteps, gathered together on-site at the meeting to share our quilts, and held a session in Zoom open to all 20 quilters to share stories of the 23 quilts with their descriptions (view in Google Slides or YouTube video).

We had so much fun, we decided to do it again in 2022. This time, we expanded our community to include any stitchers (not just quilters) and focused the theme on sharing a climate story for Stitch Your Science 2022 (project website). There were 22 stitchers from 17 states and 2 countries that submitted their climate story via quilt, knit, crochet, embroidery, and counted cross stitch. Feel free to check out our virtual gallery in Google Earth, and our resources are still available on the project website.

For 2023, we decided to tap into the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development and theme our event as Stitch Your Ocean Science 2023. We again developed a project website and put out a call for participation to all stitchers, scientists and non-scientists alike. We received 19 submissions from 13 individuals, two university classrooms, and one oceanographic research vessel’s scientists and technicians. All of the items from crafters across North America, South America, and one oceanographic research vessel were placed in an ArcGIS StoryMap.

It has been so much fun for Betsy and I to collaborate on this global science stitching project, that we are continuing again in 2024! Stay tuned for an announcement of 2024’s theme and follow-up Zoom celebration and in-person gathering at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Meeting in Washington DC in December 2024.