Happy Easter! We hope you have been overeating chocolate and hot cross buns, relaxing and making the most of the festive season with family and friends.

Easter also marks the start of the school holidays this year and we are taking a break from our regular programming for 2 weeks. Our office is closed but if you need us then please email - I will be able to respond to any urgent emails as I walk along the beaches at Aireys Inlet or from my sister’s farm up at Cavendish I am sure (as long as I have internet access - it can be a big dodgy in Western Victoria). In any case Kalimna is going to be doing a bit of work from home in the break - she’s been keen to carve out some time to reorganise our photo library. It is an amazing resource full of 8+ years of her beautiful photos and it will be even better once everything is sorted and labelled etc.

We’ll be fully back on deck on Monday 20 April and keen to see everyone for Community Lunch on Friday 24 April at 12pm, or before that if you want to pop in.

Also to note …

• We have John running the Men’s Breakfast here on 11 April at 8am-10.30am. If you are interested in connecting up with other local men to share a meal and talk about men’s stuff (mysterious!) then you can book in online. It costs $15 for brekkie and a discussion facilitated by John who has years of experience running these types of things (and yes he’s super nice).

• In other news Yoyo is running some Violin Lessons over the holidays, Daniel is in Japan (lucky thing - so no Guitar Lessons), CWA is crafting here one Saturday and some of our Book Clubs are meeting as scheduled (I am sure you know who you are). Our U3A Armchair Theatre group is taking a break - lots of grandparenting duties in school holidays even though they are retired! But I am pretty sure Line Dancing is continuing on down at the Scout Hall on Wednesdays at 10am (they generally only take a break at Christmas!).

In addition, we are hoping to start our 2nd Tuesday of the month Book Club in Term 2. We just need 1 or 2 new people to join up to kick it off. It costs $70 for the year and will meet at 11am - our only daytime Book Club! Join online.

Okay - I am writing this on Thursday before Easter … and hoping the weather is as great as predicted today (Monday) and I can enjoy my last day on the beach and be brave enough for a swim. Fingers crossed.

See you on the other side of the holidays.

Cheers Leanne

Two weeks of holidays coming up … so don’t forget to get your tips in! Corrado is leading, Thomas is Soarin’ (jumped 5 spots last week).

Hi everyone,

It’s our last week before the Easter holidays. Programs this week will wrap up early on Thursday as Lee is on school camp with her baby Oscar who is at FPS and I have to get to parent teacher interviews at NHS for my baby Scarlett who is in year 12 … which sadly means we won’t be running Crunch or Community Lunch this week.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) evening at 7.30pm Village Power will be coming to ACC for a Q&A about Alphington’s new community led battery, and if anyone is interested in getting involved and helping to reduce carbon emissions you are more than welcome to come along!

Coming up during the holidays we will have another of our monthly Men’s Breakfasts on Saturday the 11th of April from 8am-11am. Don’t forget to book in online here.

And next term is going to be really fun with Sustainability Workshops, Thrift-Seeking opportunities, and Community Yoga.

Keep an eye on our newsletter in the coming weeks for further information.

For now we want to wish everyone a happy Easter, and we’ll see you in term 2.

Also … check out all the amazing photos in the posts from this week (below) specifically thanking volunteers, showcasing the dog show … and all the other things! As usual Kalimna did an amazing job in capturing our event in pictures (on top of all her back-end organising!). We’re so lucky to have her here!

Cheers Leanne

Our red carpet edition … kids, adults and fur babies galore!

We owe a big thank you to the following people who volunteered their time on both Saturday 21st and in the lead up to make the Alphington Show a great day.

Thank you to the judges of the Alphington Show entries. We had Noela, Michelle and Anne from the CWA, Bill and Wayne from the Preston Garden Club and Local artist Kate Herd here to judge. And Lynne and Margaret came to help set up.

Thank you to all the entrants to the Show. We are thoroughly impressed by the many skills in our community.

Thank you to the CWA for the delicious Devonshire tea they hosted. Michelle baked an incredible amount of scones and the ladies sold about 150 on the day. They donated the proceeds from the sales to ACC which is amazing!

Thank you to Anne and Jenny for registering all the dogs for the Dog Show. We could not run the show without getting all the details for all the cute dogs that entered.

Thank you to Beth, Rachel and Emily for judging the Dog Show. Not an easy task with so many well behaved and adorable dogs. And of course Jill who does a fabulous job as MC.

Thank you to Alphington & Fairfield Vets, Northside Vets and E & A Salce for sponsoring the prizes.

Thank you to Elaine and Marie-Louise for minding the craft sales in our street kiosk. And thank you to our Preserves Group who gather monthly to cook up our preserves for sale. We greatly value their time, knowledge and friendship as we cook and chat.

Also a thank you to Alex and his family who kindly donate the items Alex makes that we offer for sale on our Makers’ Market days.

Thank you to Norma, Margaret, Ina, Jill, Corrado, Anne M, Adele, Anne C, Taras and Clive for doing such a great job running the Sausage Sizzle.

And thank you to the Alphington Uke Group and Jemima for the live music performances. It was great to watch and enjoy.

Volunteering your time really adds something special to events like these.

Thank you to Nelson Alexander for sponsoring the show with the boards and corflute posters to aid with promoting the event.

And finally thank you to the politicians that were here with us for the whole event and those that popped in to show support.

Amazing!