Christmas Under the Elms 2023

Gary Maas. Thank you to Pauline Richards, MP Cranbourne who redirected our invitation to Gary Maas, MP Narre Warren. Big thank you to Gary for attending the event and for offering kind words of encouragement and support. I think the event offered an excellent opportunity for the community to meet you in person.

City of Casey. To the Grants Officer from the Active Communities department for granting us $1,000 which was greatly useful to support the event’s expenses. Also to the Event Officer from the Active Communities department for supporting and guiding us with the event permit application. Special mention and thanks to also the Head of Open Space and City Greening City Presentation and also to the Urban Forest City Presentation department. You made the venue ready in time for the event.

Alkira Secondary College. We wrote to 12 primary and secondary schools within approximately 5km radius of the Elms. We are grateful that John Shaw, principal of Alkira Secondary School came back saying that he would come and support us. We also want to say thank you to Janelle Sale and Sean Taylor from Alkira who supported us with the school band performances. Sean was especially God-sent as he managed the sound systems for the event. The school’s band Label#04 were amazing and gave a rocking finale to the event. Please give our best compliments to these talented kids.

Heather Arnold. Our retired local historian turned down our initial invitation to speak at the event and only agreed after we persisted. We are very grateful that she came and spoke to the community about the history of the land in which we live.

Bec Hyland. For your generous motivation and support throughout preparations and for coming to the event and speaking to the community. Thank you very much.

Savanah Academy of Performing Arts (SAPA). Chloe Savanah was the first person who agreed to perform at the event when we started reaching out to the performing arts schools in the neighbourhood. Thank you very much for your excellent and professional support. Your students were outstanding at the show and please sent them our best wishes and compliments.

Vocal Performance School. Louise Berkelmans not only agreed to bring her students to sing in the event but also agreed to be the main master-of-ceremony of the event. Thank you for being funny, professional and a big motivation for the event. You, our stage management team and Sean moved the stage program forward smoothly. Your students are gifted with exceptional talents and please give them our highest regards.

Ila Kolhatkar. For organising the raffle gifts and hosting the five Christmas raffles diligently and efficiently. This was a very challenging task and Ila managed it exceptionally well without hiccups. Kudos to you Ila.

Jannali Sri Lankan Dance Academy. Big thanks and respects to Jannali Herath who brought her young students to perform the Sri Lankan dance in their spectacular costumes. Much appreciated and thank-you very much.

Bhangra Grooves. Priyanka Sharma, your students were just explosive. They rocked the ground and did you and their parents proud. We are very fortunate to have your high-octane dance performance in our event. Thank you very much.

Sangeetha Vibi. Sangeetha lives in our neighbourhood and reached out to us and said that her daughter and her cousin would like to do a Bollywood mash-up dance (students of Nritya School of Indian Dance). The kids did an excellent job and thank you for reaching out to us.

Lalitha Nair. Thank you for bringing your highly talented daughter Anouksha Rajan Nair to perform the South Indian semi classical dance. Anouksha lives in Glen Waverly and accepted our invitation to perform at the event. It was an excellent rendition to a beautiful song.

R Bros Cafe. Thank you for putting up your hand to be our first stall holder. We appreciate you for constantly feeding us with new ideas, for leveraging your connections in the community to support us and for your kind words of encouragement and motivation. Your café eventually became our preferred venue for several of our event management meetings. Thank you very much.

Dukes and Western. Fab Creations. Etched By Emma Louise. JC’s Customisations . Evergreen Creations. The Stampers Mess. Impressed Silver. Craft by C6. Pinnacle Finance Solutions Pty Ltd. VAT Consulting / Addrezz Property Group / Pinnacle Accounting & Advisory / Jar’d in Cakes.
Thank you for stepping forward to support the event as stallholders, for sponsoring the raffle gifts and for your wonderful cooperation. Not to mention your kind patience to sort out the public liability insurances and food registration certificates :). Some of you have given us feedback that you would like to continue this partnership with us and we will come back to you to discuss further.

Other sponsors. Rekha Bhabi, Sarah Marshall, Dawn Cartwright from Aurora Fitness and Health, Mandy Walker from Sweet Scents and Gaynor Muller from Gaynor Muller Photography. Wonderful souls who did not set-up stalls and in some cases could not join the event but nevertheless supported the event with generous Christmas raffle gifts. Thank you very much.

Soap Queens Laundry Lounge. For coming up with the best dressed dog competition idea and for sponsoring it.

Craig Krygger. For answering our last-minute call for a Santa and being the families’ favourite person on that day. A big shout out to VAT Consulting / Addrezz Property Group / Pinnacle Accounting & Advisory / Jar’d in Cakes for sponsoring the Santa and for also running an impromptu mini raffle of their own.

Big Red Bows. For coming down and opening a shop with us upon our invitation in our bid to decorate the Elms with red ribbons for Christmas. I don’t think our work is done here and we will stay in touch.

Volunteers. The Marzec family (Maggie, Laura and Stefan) for their excellent stage management support for the event. Alexis Michael for supporting with sponsoring as well as wrapping the raffle gifts, flowers, reception and in countless other small ways. A big shout-out to also your family. Thank-you Erin and Steve – you were God-sent. Pavithra Sethsigma Wijayamanne for supporting us with first aid and reception duties with special thanks to your daughter and her wonderful friends who took up the ushering and set-up duties. Last but not least, big thanks to my family for their understanding and support.

Shantanu Kulkarni. For being our only other committee member and for being the unsung hero and my constant companion throughout the journey of organising this event.

Our communities. A big thank you to the communities of Cranbourne North, Narre Warren South, Cycle North, Berwick and other areas for coming down, despite the unpredictable weather, to support this event. End of the day, you made the Christmas Under the Elms 2023 a true success.

Our deepest appreciation and thanks to anyone else whom we may have regrettably left out of this thank you list.