OzHarvest is a non-profit organization that collects excess food from restaurants/events and…read moredelivers to people in need. I have been a volunteer with OzHarvest for a couple of months and I am loving it ! Everyone I met through my volunteering is cool, funny, full of love and warmth. Lisa & team do a great job in organizing various events to promote OzHarvest or rescuing more food :) The process to becoming a volunteer is simple. Just click on their website, contact them. Lisa will invite you to their office for a quick chat, fill up a simple form and you are good to go !

This was not my experience, but that of my Partner, and he came home so ebullient, I have sat him…read moredown and made intensive enquiries about his Corporate experience with them. He gave it a hands down 10 stars out of 5! Mal and his team had organised a three day conference, and they wanted to finish on a high note. They decided that volunteering would provide that outlet. One of the experiences Oz Harvest offer, is, for groups or Corporations to pay $175.00 (+ GST) a head to have a three hour cooking and tasting experience. The group of 24 people showed up and were divided into teams, each team was assigned a chef, who instructed them in hygiene, basic knife skills, basic commercial kitchen skills ("Hot Behind" no knives in the sink, etc.) Each team had a different menu to cook. A team may have 1 to 4 dishes to prepare over a three hour period, using ingredients that would otherwise have been put to waste, but will now be distributed to the homeless. (Pretty cool, Huh?) Mal said that there was a huge amount of laughter and camaraderie generated during the experience, and they prepared about 250 meals that afternoon. They also got to sample what they had made once they had finished. They kept the apron that they were given, and most people bought the Oz Harvest Cook Book, that has recipes from just about every Chef and Celebrity Chef you have ever heard of. I know I said I did not need another cook book, ever, but I am so glad Mal's colleague gave him one! The purchase of the book provides 120 meals. (Go on..Jump on the website and buy one, you know you want to!) Mal said it was one of the most thoroughly "Feel Good" things he has ever done in a team building exercise. I would encourage any of you to suggest this activity if you ever have input into Team Building activities. Obviously, of course, you can just volunteer for all other sorts of things, that do not require you paying anything!

As someone with little to no gardening knowledge/skills/motivation, with tight purse-strings and an…read moreappetite for fresh food, I love Norton Plaza Community Kitchen Garden. I often thought that the 'Community Kitchen Garden' signs around Norton Plaza were simply alluding to the couple of planter boxes sitting outside Coles. Then, one day, I decided to follow the signs up the lift to the Level 2 rooftop, where I stumbled upon something lovely. Through the doors and on to the roof I found an open space filled with many more planter boxes full of fresh herbs, fruit & vegetables. Looking around for 'the catch' or waiting for someone to shoo me away from this utopian secret garden I wasn't meant to have stumbled upon, all I found was the inscription "Enjoy, respect and care for our plants as you would your own." When I hesitated still, a man with gardening gloves smiled at me with the hint of a chuckle (pretty sure my mouth had dropped open a little). "Go for it," he said and nodded towards the boxes of parsley and thyme. Catering to kids, this would be a fantastic place to bring your children shopping and indeed to let them enjoy the process of picking fresh produce. It's a fantastic initiative to get kids interested in gardening and to promote kids enjoying and even cooking healthy meals. This place is great if like many inner city houses, you don't have a backyard fit for a garden but like to enjoy fresh home-grown produce - for free. Because what do they want in return? Nothing. The Norton Plaza Community Kitchen Garden is made for the locals, by the locals. They just ask that you make the most of this fantastic commodity and that, if you have the time, you give a little lovin' back in return, in the form community working bees or by joining their Gardening Volunteer Club.

Wayside has just had a massive revamp, and is looking wicked…read more These guys are doing a great community service and provide a couple of services you can use. First up if you're looking to make some space on your bookshelf wayside have a bookshelf for its visitors so you can rock up and restock that. Also a clothes deposit. Which is really useful, I'm talking to you with the overflowing clothes rack and no built ins. Make some space, you always end up wearing that A-team shirt and those cowboy boots anyway, so why not drop off a few items which can be useful to someone else! I'll five star the wayside as a shout out, it takes all kinds of people to make up our neighbourhood, wayside is one of those joints keeping it real.

Balcombe Heights is home to probably the best off leash dog park in the Hills District. The one at…read moreCrestwood can be a dust bowl, Coolong Reserve is filled with weeds and bindiis, but Balcombe is a big lush green grassy area. There is also a few playing fields, loads of parking, a skate park, bbqs, kids playground, and a concrete walking path which runs around the cricket field and is popular with walkers and kids on scooters. If you're there early on weekends there is often a coffee van parked in the first carpark as you drive in. If not, and you want a coffee while your dogs runs around, Arthurs Cafe is only a short distance up the road.

I attended pre-school here. I'm not sure if it's the same location as before, but I recall each…read moreclass was divided into two. The Koalas and the Kangaroos. The Koalas were the younger kids and the Kangaroos were the older kids. There used to be a cement track where kids could ride their tricycles. Nap time was definitely fun.

We love this centre! Our kids (3 & [almost] 2) have attended Lee's since we moved to Marrickville…read moreand they've flourished there; they actually look forward to going. Before we moved to the area we were used to family daycare so moving up to such a large centre was quite confronting at first, but the staff are amazing; they do a great job creating a family atmosphere. The mix seems perfectly balanced between play and education too. Cannot recommend highly enough.

great spot for a first date!! really romantic setting and so quiet! its a little dead but good for…read moresome intimacy!

The Australian Red Cross stores do op shop with style. Not a far cry from your neighborhood Vinnies…read moreor Salvos in terms of selection, their design and display put it step closer to classy. I walked off Oxford and into the Paddington Red Cross shop the other day in search of a facincator for the upcoming Melbourne Cup. To my delight, I found a pretty decent selection as well as a good array of inexpensive costume jewelry. With earrings and bracelets at $5 and necklaces $10-$15, you can afford to pick up that slightly tacky, one-time-wear accessory that will likely get lost behind your bed for the rest of time. In the front of the store you will find a rack of new spring dresses. New should be in quotation marks here, but who's getting picky. I also enjoyed the display of colorful hats hanging on a row of sewing machines. With a few small design details and some organizational care, the Australian Red Cross is in the standing for awesome thrift shop in Paddo. And with a good cause to boot? Well done, you.

Buying recycled clothing has never been as much fun as when the Red Threads boutique opened in…read morePaddington. A Red Cross thrift shop, this store has premium recycled clothing from celebrities such as Cate Blanchett and one-new off fashion pieces from top Australian designers like Sass and Bine. This line of clothing is called their Celebrity Threads line. They also have fashionable clothing collected from op-shops and vintage fashion stores from all across Australia. All the items are sold at bargain prices and every cent is donated to fund the work of Red Cross. Buying trendy clothes to bump up your wardrobe for a cause is definitely the way to go. Red Threads should be everyone's number one vintage shop!