Hi friends, well … an outbreak in our neck of the woods, a pause, two days of zero cases and the move to stage 3 of reopening - what a rollercoaster of a few days it has been.

At ACC we still don’t have confirmation of exactly where we stand. We’re a sector that sits in the middle of things and NHVic (our peak body) is currently clarifying where we are at as a whole. So once we hear from them we’ll let you know!

BUT … in anticipation of the time when activities and groups can once again gather at ACC … please be aware that we are SUPER COOL and MOVING WITH THE TIMES … and we have a QR code posted around the centre.

If you are on site for more than 15 minutes you must register that you’ve been at ACC. Because we want to be as ace as that cafe in Kilmore right?

A QR code sounds pretty high tech … but it is just a fancy way to access a form that you fill in via your phone … that then automatically populates data in a spreadsheet. All you do is point your phone camera at the code. It then reads it and a link to the form pops up on your phone. Then you need to click on the link and follow the prompts … fill in your name, phone number and the time you anticipate being onsite. This data is automatically put into the online spreadsheet in date order (which we’ll be able to refer to if there is an outbreak).

Anyway … if this is all too much, and you don’t have a smart phone … and you want a less tech option, you can skip the QR code and use the computer in the foyer to register, or if we are in the office, we can do it for you. We’re ALWAYS here to help!

Fun times hey? So many new things to learn. We’re so looking forward to Covid-normal and seeing you soon.

And hopefully this is another way to keep our community safe.

Our annual general meeting (AGM) was on last night (Monday). Thanks to those who came along online. It was lovely to see so many neighbourhood friends.

The AGM is a chance for us as an organisation to look back at what we have done in the last year. When we do this it always amazes me that we can achieve so much from our little neighbourhood house. I hope all the staff, along with our committee and volunteers feel proud of the good things and good vibes we collectively put out into the universe in the last year!

If you’d like to read our annual report you can find it here. If you’d like to check out the presentation we put together for the meeting you can do so here.

Once again I’d really like to thank all our committee for their contribution over the last year and welcome them all back on board, with the addition of local Jane Wilkinson. Welcome Jane.

Yesterday we had a new little street library installed out the front of ACC - not a book library this time, but a seed library!

This is a new initiative of the City of Darebin. There are four of these libraries being installed across the municipality. We’re feeling very lucky to have one of them, and we’d like to thank Natalie at Council for getting such a great project off the ground (and Tommy for making and installing the library at ACC). The little structure is super cute and a great addition to our garden and neighbourhood!

So … now you are invited to use it. You can pop past and take seeds obviously … and then, when you have them .. share some seeds from your garden.

Luckily we had some ready to go. Louise from the Fairfield Community Garden dropped off a big bag of dried out broccoli seeds still on the stems just before Christmas last year. Which we packaged up. And then Win brought some silverbeet seeds to community lunch earlier in the year for friends and fellow lunchers to take home.

if you’ve got seeds to share Darebin has provided cute little envelopes for you to put them in. They’re on the bottom shelf! You can also drop off a bag of seeds (stick them on the bottom shelf as well, with a note letting us know what they are) or leave them with us if we are onsite… and we’ll package them up into the smaller packs if you don’t get the chance yourself.

So now there’s no need to feel bad about letting your veggies go to seed! Instead think of it as an opportunity to be neighbourly. We’re looking forward to seeing more seeds in our new seed library soon. How fun. Aren’t we lucky? Happy gardening friends.

Usually at ACC our Gardening Group comes along each Friday and tends the fruit trees in our little orchard, waters and cares for the community herb gardens, wrangles the leaves (oh the leaves), turns the community compost bins and pulls up the weeds. They keep everything looking so lovely.

Yes, we are missing them!

Everything seemed okay in winter … but then spring arrived. In the last couple of weeks our garden has gone from slightly raggedy to verging on a jungle!

Anyway, neighbours, you’ll be pleased to know that this week we started the process of getting it ship-shape again. We began by weeding along the fence, tidying up the hill and sweeping the concrete.

And we’ll keep going next week until it is all back in order.

Because actually (currently hidden in the there amongst the weeds) some pretty exciting growing has been going on. And we’d like to show off. Like the plum trees. They are full of fruit this year. It’s quite a thrill - the prospect of our first real harvest!

Fingers crossed.

Our AGM is coming up on October 26th at 7pm. Unsurprisingly it is going to be an online affair.

Here’s a little video invitation - that also gives you a nice snapshot of what we have been up to over the last year if you can’t make it.

If you are keen to come along RSVP here and we will email you a Zoom link to join in.

Please join us at our AGM online on October 26th at 7pm. RSVP to info@alphington.org.au to receive the link.