Summer festivals, also known as matsuri, are held all over Japan from July through August.

At ACC just before Christmas our Japanese playgroup families held their own summer festival. It was pretty gorgeous to see the kids all singing to their parents and parading along the street chanting and carrying their float. And it is lovely to think that we are helping Japanese families in Australia continue their cultural traditions and witness them passing them on from one generation to the next.

This festival was delayed by our last lockdown, but we were thrilled that they were able to squeeze it in before the holidays. Maimi and the other playgroup leaders put a lot of work into decorating our centre and setting up a whole lot of fun activities for the children in the garden. And we’ll be looking forward to them celebrating it again next year!

In 2022 we will have Japanese playgroups running on Monday and Thursday mornings from 10am-1pm here at ACC.

A lovely photo of local Federal MP Ged Kearney with Maimi who runs our Japanese playgroups, enjoying the festival.

In partnership with Yarra Council we are hosting a visible mending workshop at the end of February to explore ways to encourage our community (us!) to reuse and recycle and keep items out of hard rubbish.

If you have jeans 👖 with a hole or a favourite shirt 👚 with a tear, or a dress 👗 or shorts 🩳 that need a stitch or two don’t throw them out … just come along and learn a range of techniques to fix them (and even embellish them at the same time) instead.

Local textile artist Serene who will be running the workshop has been making some samples over summer of stitches and techniques (you can follow her on Instagram at The Craft Report.)

To book into this workshop just click here. Visible mending costs $15 and runs from 10am-1pm on Saturday 26 February.

We wish you a safe and happy Christmas, New Year and school holiday break.

I know that our staff are all really looking forward to some downtime after another unexpected year … and will hopefully (with fingers and toes crossed) be enjoying some ☀️ sunshiny weather, eating well and spending quality time with family and loved ones … along with all the others things - like reading books and swimming and hikes and relaxxxxing …

We’ll be back in the office on Monday 31 January all set to hit the ground running in 2022.

See you then.

It’s done ✅ (well near enough … there’s some flashing to come but …) hooray 😄.

We are pretty excited to have our pergola built … it really finishes off the front garden and we know it will transform the way we use our spaces right across our site. Already on Friday morning it proved fantastic, providing some lovely light and shade for families who popped in to use our garden on one of our hotter days this summer.

Luckily midway through Thursday Federal MP Ged Kearney happened to come past … the funding for this pergola came from the Federal Government Stronger Communities Grant via Ged … and so it was great to show her that it was FINALLY, NEARLY completed.

A picture of Ged and I (Leanne) amongst the builders tools …

The last few months have sped by and we’re now closing up shop for Christmas. We’re all taking a break from the office for the entire school holidays … we’ll be back on 31 January 2022 raring to go!

Coming up next year as part of our regular program we have:

• Ukulele on Monday evenings

• CWA on Mondays (monthly)

• Collage on Tuesday evenings (6 weeks per term)

• History Group on Tuesday evenings (monthly)

• Toy Library open on Wednesdays

• AAA Bowls on Wednesdays (6 weeks per term)

• Line dancing on Wednesdays

• Women in the Shed with Maylei on Thursdays (6 weeks per term)

• Choir Thursday evenings

• Arty Gardening on Fridays

• Morning Tea in the Garden on Fridays, and

• Observational Drawing with Louisa on Saturday afternoons (6 weeks per term).

Keen to join in? You can book (and pay) on our website now so you are ready to hit the ground running in 2022 …

And of course in amongst all this we have book clubs and playgroups, guitar lessons, ASRC food collections, counselling and … some weekend workshops and events (like the Alphington Show) that you should check out! You can find all the things in our program here.

We hope to see you in 2022.