Giving is True Having
We're a mother and daughter team based just outside of Portland, Oregon. Joan has years of sewing experience, and has owned her own sewing and pattern businesses, taught sewing for 17 years (to middle schoolers!), and made more wedding dresses than she can count, including Katie's.
We started True Having after creating pillows from Pendleton fabrics for our own homes in the summer of 2016. We sold a few of our pillows wholesale to a local shop that fall and decided to turn our efforts into an Etsy shop, which we opened in December 2016. Every item in our shop is handmade by Joan and then styled and photographed by Katie. We source our material directly from Pendleton® Woolen Mills, a company known for its strong community involvement and high-quality wool woven right here in the Pacific Northwest. We’re inspired by the rich colors and textures of Oregon and we're grateful to honor the heritage of this area in our products. We would love to create something just for you, so please message us if you'd like to inquire about a custom order.
Our shop name comes from a Charles Spurgeon quote that says, “Giving is true having, as the old gravestone said of the dead man, ‘What I spent I had, what I saved I lost, what I gave I have.’” It’s a great reminder for us to have a heart of generosity in all that we do.
As a business, we support The Family Room, a local non-profit organization working to increase the likelihood that children in foster care can successfully return to their birth families. We contribute monthly to their work with a portion of the proceeds from our shop. We want to see our business grow, but only if we’re creating quality products for our customers, giving back, and having fun along the way.
