Interchange Illawarra was founded in 1981, and has been serving the Community ever since. For over 40 years Interchange has been servicing thousands of families in the Illawarra, by providing flexible, meaningful support.
Due to COVID-19 we were unable to have the big end of year party and 40th Birthday Party in person so, in place of that, we came up with the idea of an online picnic!
As you know, we are a small organisation that doesn’t think to spend too much money on marketing and special events so we really don’t have much experience in doing big, fancy events, so we kept it small, honest and unique – just like us. Thankfully, we engaged the services of the wonerful people at Community Industry Group to help us with the celebration and would like to thank Nicky, tessa, Sally, Jess and for their expertise and overall support throught the planning and production of the event.
The highlight of the evening was the support we received from everyone that joined us online; it was wonderful to see so many people setting up their own celebration picnics at home, ready to have fun with us!
A special shout out goes to our major sponsor, Webb Financial who, along with our other extremely appreciated sponsors, helped turn our idea into reality.
With the sponsorship we were able to purchase picnic cooler bags, a picnic blanket as well as a few goodies to go in the bags for participants, families, support workers and volunteers that joined us on the night.
Interchange staff and volunteers came in on the Sunday before the event and got a very efficient production line going packing the bags and breaking out in dance when the moment called for it!
Our party opened with Sophie Wallis singing the Australian Anthem, the first verse being sung in the Dharawal Indigenous language – video below
We launched our brand new birthday video, sharing with you a snapshot of our journey over the past 40 years. If you haven’t had a chance to watch our video you can check it out below.
Emma, from Circus Wow, wowed us with a spectacular performance, showing off her juggling, unicycle and hula hoop skills!
We were pleased to have a couple of special guests in attendance, local MP, Paul Scully, as well as Sharon Bird’s Chief of Staff, Alison Byrnes. Paul was a great sport and showed us all how good he is with a Hula Hoop when asked to join Emma.
Thank you all so much for being a part of the Interchange Family and here’s to another 40 years!!
