Issue 84
wwww.bendigotoylibrary.org.au
COMMITTEE MEMBERS
Co-Presidents
Minnie Rockes
Robyn Philllips
0407 818 301
0408 225 717
Secretary
Sarah Cody
Treasurer
Robyn Philllips
5444 3999
0417 357 336
Roster/Membership
Kerrie Scolari
0412 038 196
Cataloguing
Anisia Glover
Michelle Woodger
0407 740 065
Toy Maintenance
Monique Baxter
0409 020 158
Website
Kate Pentreath
0418 382 673
Stocktake Coordinator
Chris Walpole
Newsletter
Gemma Wood
5443 3629
0408 422 839
March – May 2015
WELCOME BACK
Brrrr, it seems the colder weather is hitting us sooner than I was expecting this year. So what a
great time to get to know some of our great indoor toys, games and exciting massive range of
puzzles.
It has been a busy start to the year for the toy library and in this edition you will hear all about
our recent events.
We have noticed quite a few absentees from the last roster. Please remember if you can not
make your shift to arrange a swap with another member or contact Kerrie.
See you at the library! Gemma
Co- PRESIDENTS REPORT
I am home in Spring Gully after 6 weeks in gloomy London assisting our daughter Felicite with her
first baby. Lots of advice and help, plus a very good baby with a suck like a poddy calf, we soon
ventured out for coffee and shopping, even a castle before I left.
Around the corner was a really great Toy Shop with quality wooden toys by Tidlo. A pirate ship same
as ours, plus farm sets and fire station that I think would be great additions to our shelves.
Home and poor sleep routines, plus taste testing Cadbury chocolates, then a great dinner at the
Schweppes centre Monday night, has left me feeling rather tired, so when an email came from a
Massage Clinic asking to advertise in our Newsletter, well I had to offer my body for a massage
before I recommended it. 1 hour later, my stressed shoulders had relaxed, and I floated out the
door. Brian offers therapy either at his Clinic or in your home, which would be great for mums tied
to home with small children or carless, with free time when the child/baby is napping.
With a very hectic summer period over, and some bare spaces on our shelves, I hope life eases up a
bit now, and we can all relax in the new outdoor area during Open times. See you there
Robyn
GENERAL COMMITTEE
Simone Williams
0409 231 641
Samantha Humble
Brooke Bennett
Ali Minchinton
Roberta Mathers
Megan McKean
5442 4956
0427 610 680
0407 101 733
0407 664 956
0412 370 862
Annemarie McClure 0466 641 213
Please feel free to call any
committee member if you have any
concerns or suggestions.
EMAIL
You can also email committee
members using:
[email protected]
TOY LIBRARY DATES
FUNDRAISING DINNER Mon
Mar 30th at Schweppes Centre.
RAFFLE for Mens shed Wooden
toys in upcoming months
Wow what a busy term we have had at the toy library! The end of Feb saw our fantastic outdoor
area revitalized. This was made possible by a grant from The Foundry Hotel and our fundraising
efforts from 2014. The yard now has a wonderful riding track for all our ride on toys, a revamped
sand pit, soft fall area and a picnic table. What a drastic improvement to our weed infested
unusable yard! It has been lovely to see children playing outside during our open sessions and we
hope the gorgeous Autumn weather continues to allow more of this.
Our Open Day on the 21st of March saw us open our doors and celebrate our outdoor space. With
membership incentives and face painting offered it was a great morning enjoyed by all. This was
followed by our participation in the Splash into Fun Day on the 24th March. While it was a cloudy
morning loads of families turned out to the Long Gully Reserve to join in the fun. An animal farm,
face painting, lots of children's activities provided by local community organisations and of course
helium balloons meant lots of happy kids.
March rounded off with our Fundraising Dinner at the Bendigo Stadium on Mon 30th March. What
a great turn out we had!! We are yet to receive our money from this event but we are sure it was a
great success.
Behind the scenes the committee has been busy finalizing our rolling stocktake for 2014, applying
for a Fosterville Community Grant and upping our social media presence. I also attended the Toy
Libraries Australia Training Day in Melb at the beginning of March which was a great way to learn
about how other toy libraries conduct themselves. It was a valuable experience and I hope to pass
on a number of ideas to the committee.
At home my girls have been besotted with the toy library dolls and dolls houses - we have one
borrowed in constant rotation! I must admit I've been trying (often in vain) to promote some
UPCOMING MEETINGS
Please note Day change
(2nd Monday of the month),
7.30pm at the toy library.
Monday 9th Mar
All members are welcome to attend
meetings and can become part of
the committee if they wish.
CHAIRS FOR SALE
At the BCTL we currently have some
quality chairs for sale for the bargain
price of $5 each. Feel free to grab a
few when your next in borrowing
toys or pass this information on to
family/friends who might be
interested.
alternatives and we do have the pirate dress up this week to balance the gender bias! After the
busyness of March I'm looking forward to some family time over Easter and some time in my
garden planting our Winter veggie crop.
See you soon at the toy library.
Minnie
TELSTRA MOBILE PHONE DONATION
We are thrilled to let members know that Telstra has donated a brand new Samsung mobile phone
to the toy library! The committee has been exploring ways of moving into the digital, social media,
IT world (the 21st Century!) and a quick email to Telstra has had the fantastic outcome of a new
mobile phone for the toy library. It is planned that this pre paid phone will be used to take photos of
toys for cataloging, used to text people duty reminders, allow for internet access when committee
members are working in the library and potentially even allow for credit card payments! It will take
a little time to set everything up but we are very appreciative of the donation and think it will be a
great asset to the toy library.
WOODEN TOYS- RSL Bendigo Men's Shed
The RSL Bendigo Men's Shed has kindly donated
some beautiful wooden toys. Not one set, but 3
sets of a push along train and truck pairs in
natural wood finish and a fabulous red
aeroplane bookshelf have been generously
donated. All hand made locally we have put a
set into the toy library's collection, have one set
for 2nd prize in our March Membership
Competition and are keeping the third set and
aeroplane bookshelf for our competition in the second half of the year. So keep you eyes peeled
and ears to the ground about our competition later this year - you could win some beautiful toys!
MARCH MEMBERSHIP COMPETITION
The toy library has been on a bit of a campaign to recruit new members and undertook a
membership competition via facebook and our Open Day. Sign up, refer a friend or share our Open
Day event on Facebook and you could go in the draw to win a free membership or a year off
rostered duties!! With second price receiving the wonderful wooden toys. The lucky winners were
drawn on March 31st and they are 1st Prize
Corbi Sharp and 2nd Prize Tara McGowan.
OPEN DAY – March 21st
A beautiful morning meant we had a great turn
out for our annual open day and yard
celebrations! We had 14 new members sign
up, sold off some old toys and had lots of
smiling children in attendance. A special thanks
to Lisa Haythorpe for her stunning face
painting.
COMMITTEE RECRUITING
Do you want to give back to this fabulous service? Why not consider joining our very friendly
committee. We meet at 7pm on the 2nd Monday of every month and are needing some new
members. I have found being a part of this committee a really wonderful experience for a range of
reasons some of these include:
- participating in a vibrant community service
- it's my way of 'giving back' to the community
- meeting other like minded parents - we always share a laugh and don't take anything too seriously
- extending my skills in a number of areas including; communication, problem solving and grant
writing
- informing toy purchasing
- having a key that allows me access to the toy library outside of session times
Not all committee members have office bearing roles and general committee members are vital as
they keep the toy library running literally by opening the doors and manning the desk for our
sessions. We understand that parents of young families can find it difficult to get out to meetings at
FOOD AND FUN STUFF
HOLIDAY SNACK:
night so attending our committee meetings are not mandatory but can be useful to gain a better
insight into the running of the service.
So please consider joining our committee. Our toy library cannot function without a committee and
this year will see a number of our committee members moving on as their children head off to
school. If you are interested please speak to any committee member on duty or give me a call 0407 818 301.
FUNDRAISING DINNER - Bendigo Stadium 30th March
The Bendigo Stadium offers a fantastic service called "The Community Club". It will give back 50% of
all main meals to community group bookings. We had well over 50 people attend so are hoping this
is going to be an successful fundraiser which not only gave us all a night off cooking but allowed us a
relaxed and social time. The meals were quick, reasonably priced and great quality and all the
children loved the playground. We are yet to find out exactly how much we raised but are sure it
was a great success. Thanks to Megan McKean for organizing this!
Hazelnut Oat Slice
INGREDIENTS:
1 cup Rolled Oats
½ cup plain flour
¼ cup plain wholemeal flour
¼ cup chopped roasted plain,
unsalted hazelnuts
½ cup raw sugar
90g margarine spread
2 tbs golden syrup
1 tbs water
¼ tsp bicarbonate of soda
Method:
1. 1. Pre-heat oven to 180°C
(160°C fan-forced) and brush a
27 x 17cm (base measurement)
slice pan with melted margarine
spread and line with baking
paper.
2. In a mixing bowl, mix oats,
flours, hazelnuts and sugar.
3. Using a microwave oven or
stove top, heat margarine spread
with golden syrup until melted.
4. In a small bowl, combine
water and bicarbonate of soda
then add into the golden syrup
mix while stirring.
5. Pour syrup mixture into the
dry ingredients and mix together
to combine.
6. Press mixture firmly into the
prepared slice pan and bake for
20-25 minutes until golden.
7. Allow to cool completely in the
tin before transferring to a
cutting board. Remove baking
paper from the base, cut into
slices and store in an airtight
container.
TOYS IN REVIEW
WePlay: I have always wondered what was in the Wee Play
bag which is part of one of
the party packs. Out of
curiosity I borrowed it for
our 3 year olds birthday and
was delightfully surprised. It
is a toy which is easily
adaptable for different
abilities. You can set up a
course depending on the
children’s
abilities
of
walking
along
balance
beams, and crawling through the hoops. For 3 year olds it did
require supervision from a responsible adult which was happily
outsourced to my sister. This is a toy I would borrow again and
explore with different combinations of challenges.
Weplay balance board; fun for the
whole family!
This is a toy you stand on and by moving
the board from side to side you move
the balls in and out of a a spiral. This toy
is challenging for little members of the
family 2-3 year olds to Mum’s and Dad’s.
The kids will love to show you how much
quicker they can move the balls around
than you! Depending on your balance
you can see if you do it without holding
onto anything or using a chair, bench or
wall for support. A fun toy which
happens to improve the balance and
coordination of the whole family.
MEET YOUR COMMITTEE
Hi, I'm Annemarie. Wife, mum of two, accountant, bookkeeper
for my husband's electrical business and lover of cake. I’m
currently on maternity leave after having my second son but
almost due to return to work part time. I joined the toy library
committee just over twelve months ago after looking for a
way to meet new people and be involved in something. Last
year I took on the role of being the stallholder co-ordinator for
our baby and kids market, however this year I’m just a general
committee member who sits in on the meetings and takes my
turn on the roster. When I’m not at the toy library you can find
me in the kitchen trying to work through my extensive
Pinterest board of recipes to try, pottering around in my
veggie patch (and being proud as punch when I don’t kill
something), and playing water balloons, power swords or on the slide at the local playground.
TOY LIBRARY TRADE DIRECTORY
FUN AT BENDIGO COMMUNITY TOY LIBRARY OPEN DAY
Advertise here for a small fee each year!
Health Haven Bendigo
Relaxation and Deep Tissue Massage
Remedial Massage
Bowen Therapy
Skinny Wrap Massage
Mobile service also available
We also offer Out of Hours and Weekends
39 Abel St. Golden Square
0439 465 767
THANK YOU to the office of
Jacinta Allan MP for printing
this newsletter.