Safari Day
Tuesday saw the first of the May half term play days, hosted at St Annes Community Centre.
Planning for this started a good while ago with Lisa and Sam putting their heads together and coming up with the idea of having a safari themed day.
Whilst Lisa and Sam worked hard to put the plans together it soon became a whole community affair.
Sams children collected the wood to make the dream catchers, Susan donated wool and craft items that helped with creating the clues for the scavenger hunt, which Lisa put together.
The women at Make it Mine made the leaves for the palm trees and the Thursday coffee morning folk painted the trunks. A special thanks to our young helpers who were off school and came along and helped paint that morning. Lisa’s Dad lent us his saw to cut the trees to size and we borrowed a drill to attach the leaves to the trees. Community members donated toilet roll holders to help make the binoculars, and a special thank you is extended to Pearl Street, who organised a street collection. Sandra made the safari jeep and as usual had everything we might need in the boot of her car, including a hammer to pin the gazebos down. Sandra made up some examples for the binoculars and magnifying glasses to fire up the imagination. Sam made the lunch and came up with the idea too of making personalised lunch bags.
There’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes to make the play days happen. Sam, Lisa, Angela and Gill got together on Bank Holiday Monday evening to dress the room and were joined by Becki and Abbie who kindly donated a safari themed balloon arch.
It was fantastic to see 52 local children having a good time with their parents, carers, aunts, nans, grandads and neighbours. It’s so good to see families playing and doing things together. And the entertainer in the afternoon provided adults with a breather as children watched and took part in the magic show, played games and had a good dance. The donation box raised £23.90 and a further £6.50 was raised for tea and coffee, which will be put in the pot towards the cost of future days.
We have another day on Thursday planned and there’s some amazing stuff in the pipeline for summer. If you have something to offer or contribute to creating a playful community then do get in touch.
This day was made possible due to some financial support from the Holiday Activities Fund which the Council distributes.