Dear %PERS_NAME%,

For those of you with school-aged children, you're probably in the same boat as us ... didn't the kids just have holidays??! To keep your sanity, we think you will find many of these links invaluable:

Holiday Portal - family-friendly accommodation at its best

Parks & local activities - explore your local museum, art gallery or discover a new playground

Playcentres - a healthy indoor option and great for a rainy day

Dining out - kid-friendly restaurants that welcome messy little critters

Story-telling Sessions - find yourself lost in the fantasy of a great book

Cinemas - check out the latest and greatest flicks (but be prepared to share the popcorn!)

Daycare Fundraiser Drive
Monkeys Undies, an Australian auction house, is dedicated to giving daycare centres across the country a serious head start to their 2008 fundraising efforts. The months of April, May, June and July have been earmarked for their Daycare Fundraising Drive. In a nutshell, unwanted items, such as clothes, toys, games, books, etc are collected/donated from the families at your centre, and then sold on Monkeys Undies for FREE.

These are most likely items that families will be giving away to friends and family anyway. Most families have plenty of suitable items - all you need to do is ask for them! Absolutely all the money you make is yours to keep for your centre, Monkeys Undies takes NO FEES. This could very well be the Fundraising Opportunity that makes thousands of dollars for your centre in 2008 and with very little extra effort by parents! For more information, email Monkeys Undies.

Diary Dates
Zoe's Place in Brisbane is having a fundraising dinner at renowned seafood restaurant Bretts Wharf to raise much needed funds for their children's hospice on April 20. After reading our article on their plight below, we're positive you will want to make a different so organise some tickets to head along.

Sydney's Royal North Shore Hospital is hosting a "Celebrating Parenthood Ball" on Friday May 23 at Doltone House, Pyrmont. All funds raised through the ball will go to PRaMM (Perinatal Research and Maternal Medicine) to aid in research for improving the health of mothers and their premature babies. Full event information here.

Playgroup Australia kicks off it's 4th year of celebrating the World's Biggest Playgroup Day at the end of the month, with activities filling the week of April 27 through to May 3, 2008. Make sure you get a group of your friends together and get out amongst it all. See our article below for more information.

Grab yourself a nice cup of tea, sit back and enjoy this month's articles. And remember to take a moment to enter our competitions! With over $1,100 worth of prizes to win, you wouldn't want to miss out.

competitions & giveaways

Win one of two jam-packed hampers of goodies to help beat the travel blues for kids of all ages! Plus 10 runners up will receive an annual subscription to
Holidays with Kids family travel magazine. Total prize pool is over $622.
Enter here...

Be the envy of your mothers group when you win one of five stylish Vanchi nappy bags courtesy of La Toriana. Total prize pool is $500.
Click to enter...

FREE tickets to the Sydney Pregnancy Babies & Children's Expo.
16-18 May, 2008 at the Sydney Showground Dome, Olympic Park. The Bub Hub will have a stand there, so come along and say hello, find out about what's new on the site and get your FREE pram ribbon! We've also got a very special gift from babybuds® for the first 100 pregnant women to sign-up for our newsletter! (Conditions apply).
Get your free tickets here...

articles

National Playgroup Week 2008
Playgroup Australia, in partnership with State and Territory Playgroup Associations, is pleased to announce plans to celebrate National Playgroup Week in 2008. The dates will be ...

First Aid for Children - Part 1
If your child had an accident, would you know what to do? Knowing the correct procedures to perform in the case of an accident could mean the difference between life and death for your baby or child ...

Support needed for Queensland's only Children's Hospice
Zoe's Place is Queensland's first and only purpose built Children's Hospice and only one of three within Australia. Zoe's Place provides paediatric palliative care, end-of-life care and respite care as well as counselling, bereavement and sibling support to families with ...

What's cool and sassy in denim this Autumn?
We've done the leg work and found out what is available in the sassy and stylish market place for pregnant fashionistas and lovers of jeans. Many style savvy mums-to-be know the value in mixing and...