Eco Toys will be exhibiting at the upcoming Melbourne Baby Show 5 - 7 March 2010.

Our aim is to educate parents about the benefits of natural and sustainable toys and give them the opportunity to see and feel our lovely toys.

We have been very busy preparing and organising for the event and have some fantastic offers and give-aways on the day.

One lucky winner will walk away with this gorgeous organic baby hamper valued at $240! 

The hamper includes a Rainstick Tower, Organic Cozy Lime Doll, Cherry Wood Toddler Zoom, Pintoy Twist Rattle, Peter Rabbit Organic Cotton Book, Organic Green Bean, Hexi Twist, Honey Sticks Beeswax Crayons, Stylish Organic Cotton Kimono Outfit (pic below) and a Luxurious MiniLaLa Dandelion Fields Designer Cloth Nappy, courtesy  of Alipants. 

Plus if you visit the Essential Baby Cafe you can enter to WIN one of our stunning new Baby Gyms and a Wooden  Highchair!!

We will be also offering 15% off our Wooden Highchairs and will have a unique range of handmade soft toys & bird mobiles, made using reclaimed woollen jumpers. All these soft toys are one of a kind and are simply gorgeous! Thanks Renee for all your hard work over the past few weeks.

I want to also thank MoederKip for designing and making us a beautiful baby bunting for our stand (which they sell on their store) and for Natural Family Photography for the amazing photos they have taken of children playing with our eco toys.

Eco Toys is giving away complimentry passes to the Baby Show. To receive your free pass simply sign up to our e-newsletter or join our facebook fan page and post on our wall “I would love to come to the baby Show”.

I look forward to seeing you there and doing what I love the most; sharing my passion to make this world a better place for our children and our planet!

Come  for a drive to the beautiful town of  Woodend this Saturday and see us!

members free, single $5, Family $8 

• sustainable house & garden tours  
• WISE power information
• solar hot water systems
• alternative energy - solar, wind & PV’s
• free energy audits
• bicycle maintenance workshop
• community permaculture garden tour
• fruit tree care demonstrations
• organic / slow food stalls
• organic food exchange
• massage, meditation & yoga workshops
• family entertainment & bbq with local produce

This Festival event in the Macedon Ranges is part of the Local Events Program for the 2010 Sustainable Living Festival. The Main Event at Federation Square in 2009 attracted over 124,000 visits. The 2010 Main Event at Federation Square (19-21 February 2010) promises to be just as inspiring. Visit www.festival.slf.org.au for details.

Last Sunday we attended the Mathilda’s market which was jam packed full of all things beautiful and handmade for kids. They had the most funkiest and most gorgeous clothes, chic bedroom decorations and furnishings, bags and shoes, dreamy vintage-inspired creations, handcrafted musical instruments and jewellery, fabulous dress-up costumes, striking linen … and so much more!

Luckily I was busy at my stall all day, otherwise I could have potentially spent lots of money as the goods on offer were simply stunning.

Our new Plan Toys Airport was set up on display which a lot of people fell in love with! We had so much fun demonstrating how the elevator and backage claim worked to customers, who of course also shared in our delight!

Our Eco Dollhouse was also very popular and definitely caught people’s attention as they admired the solar panels on the roof!

A huge thanks to my wonderful friend Natalie from Moederkip who helped me out on the day & Alison from Alipants who also popped in to say hello and help out.

This Friday 27th November we do it all again & will be at the Surrey Hills Twilight Christmas market, from 6pm - 9pm. There will be free children’s entertainment & live jazz music with a focus on speciality craft and gift stalls. Come along & bring your kids to see Santa (we’ll be right next to him!), the animal farm or join in the many fun activities available during this brillant night market.

It’s at the Surrey Hills Neighbourhood Centre, 157 Uninion Road & 1 Bedford Avenue, Surrey Hills.

Hope to see you there!

Eco Toys will be at the Mathilda’s Market this Sunday 22 November, from 9am to 1pm at Hawthorn Town Hall, 360 Burwood Road, Hawthorn.

We will be showcasing our new range of Plan Toys, our ever so popular cooking centre and many of our other fabulous Eco Toys on the day!

Mathilda’s market is a boutique baby & kids market that sells beautiful handcrafted and limited production baby and kids goods. Carefully handpicked stallholders bring the most divine and original clothing, accessories, homewares and toys for the little ones. Exquisite wares are lovingly made by some of Australia’s most talented crafters and designers – many of them parents themselves.

It’s a shopper’s heaven for those who want to stylishly dress their children or decorate their kids’ home environment, but don’t want to buy mass produced, chain store items. At Mathilda’s Market you’ll see the funkiest and most gorgeous of outfits for the kids, chic bedroom decorations and furnishings, bright and brilliant toys, must-have accessories, pretty and practical bags and shoes, dreamy vintage-inspired creations, handcrafted musical instruments and jewellery, fabulous dress-up costumes, striking linen … and so much more!

As most of the stallholders don’t have a shop front, you are guaranteed to find something truly unique.

With over 80 stallholders and yummy food this will be a fantastic day out for young & old. For a sneak preview, check out their website Mathilda’s market.

We hope to see you there! xx

Last weekend we attended the Stringybark Sustainability festival in Rowville, Victoria and I really wanted to share some photos with you all as it was one of the best child friendly eco festivals I have ever been too!

It was absolutely huge (over 20,000 visitors last year) with so many different areas of interest to visitors, all focusing on the same theme - sustainability!

There was a fantastic fair trade market area and I got to meet so many wonderful and inspiring business owners, all doing their bit to help make our world a better place.  There were handmade crafts, entertainment, music and dancing, a low impact children’s fairground, roving performers, native animal displays, fresh produce market and cooking demonstrations and heaps of eco and recycled activities for kids.

We made it a family event (as we always do!) and enjoyed the festival atmosphere while watching my daughter learn so much about her amazing world!

Learning about native animals and their habitats . . .

Patting a lizard . . .

Meeting a Stick insect . . .

Even an eagle!!

We learnt about the Orangutans and how their environment needs to be protected . . .

There was some great flora and fauna displays for kids . .  . .

And we even managed to stop and do some craft activities from recycled materials!

We ran out of time so took some natural materials back to our stall to play with . . .

Safari was so excited to tell Daddy about all the fun things we did!

Daddy time!

And after all that we still manage to have a quiet moment of play . . .

Sustainable House Day

Around 170 homes will open their doors to the public for this year’s Sustainable House Day as millions of Australians continue to embrace renewable energy, recycling and other practices designed to lessen our impact on the environment.

“Almost 10% of Austarlia’s greenhouse gas emissions come from households. But every Australian can make a big difference to the environment and their wallets through simple, cost-effective, everyday actions. Visit an open home on Sustainable House Day and go to www.livinggreener.gov.au to find out the practical and often easy steps you can take to reduce your impact on the environment as well as your energy and water bills”.

Eco Kids Festival

This Sunday 13th September at Sydney’s Luna Park will be the first ever Eco Kids Festival! This is  your day to be inspired with music,  magic, dancing, singing, face painting,
show bags, video games, solar gadgets, worms and spiders, possums and pythons,
yummy organic food, arts and crafts, clowns, workshops, tree planting, puppetry,
eco-jesters   and  some  of  Australias  best  childrens  entertainment  including
everybody’s favourite - Dorothy the Dinosaur.

Well we had a huge weekend at the organic expo in Melbourne. It was really lovely to meet and chat with so many of our potential customers and share my passion for protecting the environment and keeping our children safe. Thank you to everyone who supported our business and to our gorgeous friends who helped us during the day!

What a great team we make & what amazing husband I have!

Chatting to customers

Another great team!

Proud owner

Children of the world felt hanging mobile

Tea set and cupcake

Frog highchair

At the end of the day

Will the faeries come out to play?

Goodnight xx

For more photos check out the Aust Conserv website.

Just a reminder that the Organic expo and Green show is on this weekend at the Royal Exhibition building, Carlton. We set up today and I can’t wait to check out all the lovely displays and sample products at show.

Our organic cotton toys looked so gorgeous bundled together that I couldn’t resist taking a photo!

And my darling girl couldn’t resist playing with the drums on display.

Yes you read right! We’ve had lots of customers asking us if we have a store to buy from so we decided to be part of the Melbourne organic Expo. I’m so excited that we can finally give our  Melbourne customers a chance to come  and see us and shop directly from us. Not only that we will be launching our new range of felt toys and other new wooden toys that I’m sure everyone will just love.

I went to the Organic Expo in Melbourne 2 years ago (alternates between Sydney each year) and it was one of the best Expo’s I have ever been to. I was carrying  a 4 month old baby in my sling and I got a chance to get lots of free samples of baby care products, food, snacks, you name it as well as see some of the most beautiful organic products available in Australia. Oh did I forget the food? Please don’t eat before you come as you’ll get to sample some of the most delicious and finest organic food in the world and yes that includes chocolate, wine and cheese!

See us in the Green show area on stand 147 and plese come and say hello! For all the kids there is a organic kids fun zone area so penty to do for everyone and a great day for the family to enjoy.

The Winter Solstice is the shortest day and longest night of the year, but marks the moment when the days start to lengthen towards Spring, new hope and new life.

There are lots of magical things to do and see this weekend so grab a warm blanket, beanie and scarf and head out to one of the many child friendly festivals on this weekend. I’m still trying to decide which one to go to but I can’t wait to spend time with my wonderful friends & family.

In Melbourne there are 3 main events: Ceres Yule celebration, Solstice celebration at Federation Square or the Collingwood Children’s Farm.

There is a huge 3 day festival in the Tablelands (near Cairns)  if you are up for some camping, awesome music and workshops (how come I find out about all these great events in Cairns after we move back to Melbourne?).

Some other good festivals are the Burleigh Solstice festival in the Gold Coast which has lots of  fun activiites for children, Northey street city farm in Brisbane, Winter magic festival in Katoomba N.S.W, Lismore Lantern parade or if you are in Hobart then head to the Antartica midwinter festival.

And if you really want to party this weekend there is also a great cultural festival called Emerge happening  this Sunday from 12pm in Melbourne at Fitzroy town hall & adjacent streets. Anyone that knows me knows how much I love African culture, people & music! This festival will feature 2 stages of world music, free cultural workshops & inspiring performances form Melbourne’s most newly arrived African communities, local Indigenous and Pacific artists.

I promise to update with plenty of photos!