we're almost out of the terrible 2's

Yep!

I've been a bit scarce from blogging of late, but with good reason.

We recently (probably in the past 4 weeks) have DOUBLED the number of people we have following us on Facebook! This is VERY exciting for me.  

I have been involved with Sandlewood Op Shop from the very beginning, and even before it's conception.  While the organisation Sandlewood has been around for many years, the Op Shop was the vision of my mum Desley, who spent many hours documenting, tabling and reporting so that the Organisation was able to get a Certificate of Sanction allowing it to operate the Op Shop.  The Op Shop was her "baby" as it were.  However, after ill health in November, she had to give up the reigns, and I was left in charge.

While I had always liked working at the Op Shop, I never enjoyed the mountains of paperwork involved (I still hate it!) and I was very frustrated by the prospect that we had.  We needed to grow the business in order to be able to help more people.  But to grow the business we needed to sell more, and with such limited time due to being taxi driver to my 2 girls, and a lack of honest & reliable volunteers I was stuck. Not only that, but space restrictions at the shop are so prohibitive that we aren't able to sell furniture etc, despite being offered it often by our donators.

When the Shop opened we used to sell things on eBay, but this same became too time consuming, and also very costly. 

Anyway, I started trying to hammer out a few things on Facebook, since anyone will tell you, I'm on it day and night.  Eventually we started getting more followers than just family and friends, and then something happened.  Literally within 2 weeks our followers doubled from around 250 to over 500!!

As a result, I've since been selling more via the Internet and meeting some really lovely, interesting people in the process.

But I digress, the point of my post.  

It's almost our Birthday!
We are turning 3 on the 31st of August.  

Source: enchantedmommy.com via Lee Ann on Pinterest

I need some help to try and think of a good special to run for our Birthday week.  It has to have something to do with the number 3 of course!   

Where have all the Philanthropists Gone?

It is a stark reality which we see every day. Things are tough, and people are doing it tough.  Many people in Queensland have been losing their jobs thanks to Government redundancies and families are struggling.

Sometimes the children from those struggling families, through no fault of their own, end up in Foster Care.  Foster Parents are  angels sent straight from heaven, they really are!  We have several foster parents who come into the shop to get things for "their" kids. One organisation who work closely with Foster families is Kyabra Community Association.  We have worked closely with Kyabra on a number of times, and it's an organisation who does some positively amazing work in our community.

One of the services provided by Kyabra Community Association is a Limited Hours Child Care (LHCC for short).  Kyabra LHCC is really in a bind.  Each year the qualified staff have been taking voluntary pay cuts just to keep the service afloat.  These highly dedicated staff are now in jeopardy of losing their jobs, and the service is in jeopardy of closing since the Federal and State Government has cut all funding to this (and similar) services.

Kyabra LHCC is uniquely different from other LHCC services in Brisbane.  Many of the children attending the LHCC are in foster care, or at risk of being in foster care.  It provides the parents with a respite if you like, allowing them time to attend meetings with Departments etc without having to take the children.

It also has joint programs with two local high schools and assists by placing their senior students who are studying for their Cert III in Child Care. This is such a strong and positive thing and the children at the centre absolutely LOVE the kids from the High School being there.

There is also a much higher child/adult ratio at Kyabra LHCC.  In addition to 2 qualified teaching staff, there are, at any given time up to 5 other volunteer staff.  This means at times the child/adult ratio is 2/1. 

I can assure you there's no place like it!I have myself been fortunate enough to have my youngest daughter attend Kyabra LHCC.  My daughter was experiencing troubles at her Long Day Care, to the point that she would burst into tears every time we drove past the centre, pleading with me "please don't take me there!". On the days she had to attend, she would literally cry and work herself up so much that she would vomit.  


She was 18 months old when she was offered a place at Kyabra LHCC and from day one, she was a totally different child.  In the past 2 years, I have watched her develop into an amazingly confident, happy, loving and playful child.  She wakes up each morning asking if it's the day she goes to "Pat's Kindy" (Pat is the Director in the LHCC).  I have absolutely no doubt in my mind, that Pat, Sannie and the other staff at Kyabra have been instrumental in this transformation in my daughter.

But I digress, the point of this post... Kyabra LHCC is at very serious risk of closing down. At this point in time, it's touch and go - they will be able to get by until the end of 2012, but beyond that, it's anyone's guess...

They are currently looking for benefactors who would be willing to donate money to support their continuing service.  Any support is tax deductible.  


Please, I urge, if you know of anyone, or any companies who would be willing to donate towards this magnificent cause, please do so!


You can find out more information by emailing alani @ sandlewoodprojects. org. au (no spaces)


I can't keep singing "where have all the philanthropists gooooone?" in the ilk of Paula Cole's "where have all the cowboys gone?" ... sorry it's embedded in my head! Anyone else? LOL

have you visited since we remodelled?

Remodelling is almost complete and we would like to thank all our wonderful customers for their patience during our crazy shinnanigans (aka the shop refit). 

The refit has been a huge success, with more people than ever visiting our humble little shop since we reopened with our new floorplan.  We have been receiving many compliments from people visiting ever since!

There is more space to walk around inside, our fitting room has moved, and our front window has had a complete transformation with new shelving which allows us to display many more items than we ever could have dreamed of !!

I must try to remember to take some pictures and upload them to the blog and the website!

Right now I only have this picture, which was taken Thursday night after many hours of frustration trying to assemble the shelves that form the new window display...

The window display is constantly changing as things are sold and new items are donated or unearthed from storage.

Recent new additions to the shelves include some great science fiction novels by Robin Hobb,  Lian Hearn and many many more (we received about 2 full boxes of sci fi books so if this is your genre, please pop in and have a look - we have many that don't even fit on the shelves yet!).

So if you haven't popped in recently please call by and tell us what you think of our new look shop! 

all the cool people come to Sandlewood Op Shop.... seriously!

Yesterday we had the pleasure of having Katie in our shop. 

Katie is a personal style blogger and has created the blog Be Inspired. 

Her blog aims to "teach you a thing or two about how easy it is to be fabulous, confident and stylish, on any budget".

She's also a guest blogger for MTV fora.
Last month Katie bought a great jacket from the shop, which you can read all about by clicking here

Her next piece will also feature another purchase from the shop, so be sure to check it out.

slacker

I'm sure it can't just be me who finds these colder months harder to cope with. Seriously.
I get so slack that many things that I can keep up with in the warmer months (like blogging) go by the wayside.  Perhaps it's because my fingers are like tiny little icy-poles while I type this blog post ...

So, yeah, I've been really slack with blogging lately. Hopefully that will all change soon.

So much has been happening at the shop. If you've popped in recently you would have noticed that we no longer have the adjoining shop :(   Sadly that's been taken over by office space.

Our tiny little shop is literally bursting at the seams while we try to cram everything from 1.75 shops down to just 1.  

We are in the process currently of looking for new shopfittings to refit the shop. 
Well, when I say new I mean new to us... it's silly of me to dismiss the fact that we are an op shop and funds are tight so we'll probably end up with someones second or third hand fittings - it's all about recycling!

So hopefully in the next few weeks you will see a transformation take place.
From crowded & cluttered to slightly more spacious and organised.  That will mean that all our regular suspects like the books, shoes and toys that we keep getting asked about daily, should be able to be moved back in to the shop. 

So please bear with us while we make some big changes to our little place!

1,000 toys appeal deadline rapidly approaches

As you may know we are holding an appeal to get 1,000 new toys for the Fairfield Floods Family Fun Fair on Saturday 16th April.

The event is being run by the Moorooka Lions, and it looks set to be a great fun-filled day with rides, entertainment and food galore (yummo!)

We had been pledged many toys, however many of them were simply not in a condition that we would give away, let alone have Santa deliver.  We have asked for these toys to be NEW and in their original boxes or with original swing tags attached.

Just thought I'd share a few pics of some of the items we have received - this is just a small handful on one of the days where I actually had my phone/camera handy to take pics.

This is one of my favourites - I mean, what kid wouldn't be thrilled to open up their present to find milk bottle lids threaded onto string?!

This poor fellow looked like he'd been in the floods himself :(

And this guy definitely wasn't anywhere near new condition.


So, I'm urging you all, if your children have toys that they have never even taken out of the boxes (mine did!) or you have $10 spare in this weeks pay, please consider buying a toy so we can make these children (who have been through so much) smile!

Pick us! Pick us!

We'd be ever so grateful if you would vote for us in the Suncorp Back to Business Grants.

It gives us the opportunity to win a $5,000 grant to further assist our community. 
As you know, we'll be in it long after the floods - and will continue to help those who need it ;)
Our committment and vision is to improve the quality of lives of our less fortunate community members - flooded or not!


You can vote for us at this page https://suncorpbacktobusiness.com.au/nominations/sandlewood-projects?sms_ss=facebook&at_xt=4d918764601538c5%2C0

Have you ever wondered?

Just how much of your monetary donation is ending up where it's intended?  
It is an interesting read when you sit down and go through the Annual Report of some of the big Charities.

For example, from the 2009-2010 financial report of one big charity, it shows that through their domestic appeals, donations and sponsorships, they raised  $35,299.  Great effort !! But....

Out of that, almost half  ($17,253) was gobbled up by expenses (presumably things like advertising their appeals etc) leaving only $18,046 of the $35,299 to be distributed to where it was intended....

Interesting stuff....

That's the advantage of donating to a small organisation like us. 
We have very few overheads (rent, insurance, power, phone and internet) so what you donate can help us HELP PEOPLE who need it. 

Did you realise that many of the items that are donated to the shop are actually given away free of charge to people in need? 

Food for thought....

Trent - the 7yr old legend

Picture this - your son is turning 7.  He says he wants to have a birthday party but instead of the people bringing presents for him, he says he wants his friends to bring presents for the kids who lost their things in the floods.

Sounds like a story... but it's not!

Young Trent had his 7th birthday party and that's exactly what he did.  He asked his friends to bring along a gift suitable for a child who had lost their toys in the floods - and his mum brought him all the way to our shop to donate them so they could go directly to flood affected kids.

Here's Trent with his load of goodies for the kids!

Quality of Donated Items

We are blessed to have a wonderful relationship with Givit - Quality Giving Network- an amazing website which was created by Juliette Wright, a mum and strong believer of helping those who need it.

Recently she blogged at Giving, naturally about some of the problems charities face in receiving donated goods.

This blog entry rings so true to us!

We like to think that we can find a home for just about everything.
But there are so many times when we donations, and we literally stand there and look at it wondering "what the?".

With the recent flood, people have been giving us things in droves.  Many wonderful things.

But there's also been more than a fair share of things that absolutely, unequivocally would not pass on to anyone.

We get one solitary wheelie bin for use at the shop as part of our rental agreement.  In the last few weeks this bin has been full to overflowing by Monday afternoon!

There are certain networks that we try to utilise to enable recycling as much as possible. But, there's only so much we can do.

We don't sell rags, so any clothes that are stained, mis-shapen or have holes in them we just have to throw away!!  We often get people donating "things" with bits broken or completely missing - a coffee maker, a juicer, a blender, a vacuum cleaner!! (?) and these things are of no use to us, or any of our customers. 

Last week in particular, we received a donation which was left on our footpath - and left me totally astonished. 

It included (amongst other things)

• a childs' stroller covered in mould
• a childs' beanbag chair - also covered in mould and filthy dirty
• a kettle, which was literally black on the outside from grime
• a mattress for a cot, which had been stripped back to the foam and innersprings (there was no fabric on it and therefore it was a safety risk as a baby could easily get stuck in the springs!)
• a single mattress which was wet and smelt of mould.
• used pillows, that were yellow and smelly

What did this mean for us?  My brother had to take time out of his day to come and load it all into his car, drive it to my house and dump it here - where my husband then spent part of his weekend off work taking loads to the tip!! So not only did it cost us money (to take it to the tip), it also meant that 3 people had to take time out of their day/s to help us get rid of it !!

That said, we are often completely overwhelmed by peoples' generosity and kind giving spirit!

We love nothing more, than opening up donations of lovely clean, freshly laundered items, nic-nacs etc and we love the satisfaction that comes from matching those items up with people who want or need them.

Please, don't stop donating to shops like ours.  Your donations help us to help people who need it.
But please consider what you are donating. 

A friend of mine recently had a fantastic status update on Facebook which I put on our page - but I'm going to share it here too as they are great parting words.

"Please remember, if you are going to donate items, ask yourself "Would I wear this? Would I dress my child in this? Would I use this?". If the answer is no, then it belongs in the bin. People have lost enough, don't try and take their dignity as well."

Many THANK YOU's to some generous businesses!

A HUGE THANK YOU to all who have donated items for people in the community who have been affected by the recent floods.


We have several amazingly generous donations, both from individuals and from businesses wanting to help!

We would like to thank the following companies for their recent donations :

Jacqueline Davis and Paragold for the donation of new womens nightwear

John & Ruth Lui of Winalite Australia P/L for the donation of womens sanitary products

Hailey Douglas and Aqueo Import and Distribution Pty Ltd for the donation of new Havaianas

 

Flood CleanUp

I just thought I would share these Post-flood clean up tips, courtesy of Shannon Lush which I think will probably come in handy for a few of our local residents.

With water comes mold, one of the most stubborn offenders to clean up. According to the cleaning genius of Shannon Lush, there are two main weapons; salt and oil of cloves.




To remove mold from soft furnishings, canvas and outside areas (where the salt won't end up in the garden), mix one kilogram of ordinary house salt into one bucket of water. Wash the affected surface, wait until the salt crust forms and brush off with a broom.



But Shannon says the best killer of mould is oil of cloves, available from the chemist or supermarket.



To use oil of cloves as a mold remover:



Add half a teaspoon of oil of cloves to 1 litre of water - no more than that.





Put it into a spray bottle, spray the surface and leave for 20 minutes.

Wipe the surface clean, then re-spray and leave it.

It will take between 24 to 48 hours for the mould spores to die and drop off.