CHAPPY CHAT – October 2022

Learning Community

Another term has gone as the year quickly slips by and our local homeschooling families have had two weeks to refresh before gearing up for Term 4 which is always a busy one.

We continue to be blessed with wonderful volunteers from the community involved with our twice-weekly program. In the last few weeks, Jennie Tritton from Jennie’s Cakes helped the children make some great gifts for their dads for Father’s Day, and Kim Velardi demonstrated and helped them to bake and ice cupcakes which were consumed on the spot as they were so delicious!

Our Term 4 program is looking good with visits from Chloe who runs the Gympie Council’s Nature’s Recyclers program, cooking sessions with Gabriella and the Tin Can Bay CWA team, robotics with Curtis from the Gympie Library, a tour of the Rural Fire Brigade and the SES, and outdoor activities such as swimming, tennis, and lawn bowls.

We are looking forward to our K’gari camp in October where we will be staying 2 nights at the Beachcamp Retreat at Eurong Village in their amazing glamping tents and cabins. Ranger Diane from Parks & Wildlife will be briefing us before our trip as several of our families have never been to the island before. It will be hard to decide which highlights to include in the trip, but wherever we go, the trip is sure to be memorable.

The exciting project happening in collaboration with Cooloola Coastcare to create a life-size wire sculpture of a turtle is nearly finished. Our art tutor Mo, with the assistance of the Learning Community children, has used recycled wire and crab pots to make Topsy Turtle’s body and flippers which have been filled with bottle lids. Her shell has been made out of recycled plastic container lids and milk bottles.

Two wire receptacles will be constructed this term for the collection of recyclable drink containers, which will assist Cooloola Coastcare to continue their vital work of caring for the turtles that come ashore at Rainbow Beach to lay their eggs.

We are hoping to place the sculpture and recycling containers on the Rainbow Beach foreshore. Topsy will have signage close by encouraging tourists and locals to place their drink containers into the bins so that Turtle Care may collect the 10c refunds to help fund their protection of the turtle program this season.

Community Pantry

We have some exciting breaking news – from Thursday 6 October, hampers will be available for collection from the foyer of the Rainbow Beach Community Centre instead of in the car park. We are extremely grateful to the Committee for allowing this to happen in time for the warmer weather. We will be providing a cuppa, cake, and the opportunity for a chat for anyone who has a few minutes to spare when picking up their hamper/s, which will be available between 1 & 1.30pm every Thursday.

In the near future we are hoping to be able to offer pre-cooked meals and cooking classes in the commercial kitchen at the Community Centre. If you would like to receive weekly updates of when these will be happening, please like the Rainbow Beach Community Pantry Facebook page.

The majority of our food comes from Foodbank QLD and often comes in catering-size containers. Some is past its ‘best before’ date but can be used up to six months after this date, with many items well within the ‘use by’ or ‘best before’ dates. Woolworths Cooloola continues to donate items each week that are discontinued or past their ‘best before’ date as they strive towards their goal of zero landfill by 2025.

If you would like to order a hamper for your family or someone else who may need a little extra help, send a message via the Facebook page and we will add you to the list for that week. Hampers cost $10 which covers Foodbank’s handling expenses and are worth around $50 even without the extra items from Woolworths.