Ashburton Playcentre unveiled an anniversary bench seat last weekend as about 100 people gathered to celebrate the organisation’s 50th anniversary.
It was a colourful event as balloons, facepainting, morning tea with cake, 50th anniversary T-shirts and a commemorative tea towel featured.
Centre adviser Leanne Miller welcomed guests, life members, and past and present families, and encouraged them to write a message in a memory book.
She had been involved with playcentre for 26 years. She said it continued to offer quality early childhood care and support family friendships.
‘‘It is so lovely to see the next generations of tamariki continuing to play and learn with and alongside others, with grandchildren and babies of previous whanau members including presidents.’’
The playcentre opened in 1974, in St Andrew’s church hall. There were three sessions a week, costing 20 cents per session.
It still had three sessions a week, as well as a space session starting in term four.
Following a strong wind event in 1975, the playcentre moved from the church and took up new residence at its Park St premises.
‘‘The big wind of 1975 damaged the hall causing a venue shift,’’ Miller said.
‘‘We finally moved into our permanent building in 1976 – a school prefab next to Borough school where we currently reside.
‘‘Ashburton Playcentre is a village and continues to provide support and friendships for all wha ¯nau,’’ she said. ‘‘Word of mouth is still a strong part of the promotion of Ashburton Playcentre and we continue to promote the centre online.’’
She had her own friend group which started at Ashburton Playcentre more than 23 years ago. They still had regular catchups and shared stories and memories of their playcentre days, she said.
Playcentre president Amanda Halliday said the centre currently had 18 enrolled families with two session facilitators – Caro O’Neill and Katie Irvine.
They had the honour of cutting the cake and unveiling the anniversary bench seat respectively.
‘‘Caro has been a part of playcentre about the same time as Leanne, starting with her own tamariki and then training to be a session facilitator,’’ Halliday said.
‘‘Katie started with her tamariki with the playcentre space programme nine years ago, which is starting up again next term in Ashburton. Katie is one of the facilitators for it, she’s also facilitator for Mayfield.’’
Halliday has been involved with playcentre for the past seven years, two as president.
‘‘Both my boys have attended and their dad and aunty were Ashburton Playcentre children in the 80s,’’ she said.
‘‘We have made some amazing friends through playcentre. Playcentre is a safe village for a whole family to learn and grow we believe parents are the best educators for there tamariki parents stay on session with their tamariki,’’ she said.
