News

We are truly humbled, grateful, and overjoyed to announce that the Dainere’s Rainbow Team were able to give the truly special and meaningful gift of hope to every child diagnosed with brain cancer in Canberra and all around Australia through our Christmas Lights and Stalls, elevating significant and impactful awareness and raising a phenomenal total of $3326.35.

The annual Dainere’s Rainbow Christmas Lights had momentous meaning in 2022, as it was a decade of giving the Community the gift of joy, love, light and hope whilst raising awareness and funds for children diagnosed with brain cancer.

After atrocious and wild weather during Christmas 2021 destroyed many of Dainere’s and our family beloved lights there were some special and captivating new additions; one being a splendiferous sparkling and twinkling rainbow, which many of the visitors to the lights were in awe of and thought was extraordinary, they were also surprised and enjoyed photographic opportunities with Santa and some special celebrities.

We must make special mention of the absolutely extraordinary Brad, whose magnificent and alluring Christmas Lights shone brightly in Ngunnawal and his act of incredible kindness for having a collection tin with donations to go to Dainere’s Rainbow at his display.

For Christmas 2022 we were also able to have the spectacular stalls, which were also Dainere’s creation and something she put numerous hours into and ourselves with the help of some utterly amazing, creative, and caring people. Several families with beaming smiles, took home items to treasure, including Anthony Christmas Bear Book by Jarrett Anthoney, a cuddly Teddy Bear for Brain Tumours, a Book and Bag Pack (where a book is also being donated to a child with cancer or a sibling of a child with cancer), Christmas Candle Holders, Clothing, Cushions, Cards, toys, games, craft kits, ornaments, household items, collectables or jewellery knowing that they had contributed to making a difference and bringing the gift of hope for Christmas.

We wish to extend our most heartfelt and sincere gratitude to several people: Patricia for her most stunning handmade Christmas Cards; Anne and David, Monique, Mark and Annie and Ellen for the beautiful brand new/unused/unwanted items to sell; Bron for the very popular lucky dip and handmade angels, Alba for her gorgeous Christmas Craft, Wendy for her gorgeous handmade items, Sonia V for each year bringing her bottle of saved coins to donate and to those in the Community who visited the lights, purchased from the stalls, made a coin donation and those who wanted to learn more and how they could help raise more awareness.

Together we can continue to bring hope and create change for children diagnosed with brain tumours and one day see Dainere’s greatest wish in life of a cure become a reality.

School of Rock the Musical was the latest spectacular and engaging performance from Dramatic Productions and as part of their Dramatic Difference initiative of giving back to the local community, Dainere’s Rainbow are absolutely honoured, humbled and grateful to announce that through 10% of all ticket sales to the Dainere’s Rainbow Charity Performance a staggering total of $534.20 has been donated to Dainere’s Rainbow.

For those who were not able to attend on the night, School of Rock the Musical followed failed rock star wannabe, Dewey Finn.  Forced to come up with some rent money or be kicked onto the street, Dewey posed as a substitute teacher at a prestigious prep school to earn some quick cash.

He discovers the students are highly talented musicians and he hatches a plan to turn the uptight students into guitar-thrashing, bass-thumping, drum-smashing rockers and enters them in a local Battle of the Bands. He has to try to do this without the school, parents or his housemates finding out.

The show had two exceptional and incredibly talented casts, who totally captivated and astounded the audience, whilst the adult stars were sublime, the young cast were the ones who stole the show with their awesome acting and musical abilities that created show stopping moments as the story unfolded and delighted and led to every performance receiving standing ovations.

Keep an eye out for the next astonishing Dramatic Productions Show ‘Dogfight’, which will be in February 2023.

Teddy Bears for Brain Tumours is a beary special new awareness and fundraising initiative from the Dainere’s Rainbow Team.

Dainere loved teddy bears; from her most beloved Theodore who was a source of comfort throughout her childhood and journey with brain cancer to her collection of Christmas Bears, her numerous beanie bears and a multitude of other bears, including a Paddington Bear.

We are so proud and humbled to be able to offer a selection of totally enchanting bears to continue Dainere’s legacy to bring hope and create change for all children diagnosed with brain cancer.

The bears come in various sizes, types and colours, everyone will be able to find a friend for life and by purchasing a Teddy Bear you helping make a difference for children with brain cancer as 100% of all funds raised through the sales of these bears will go directly to childhood brain tumour research, which following the past two years, these funds are critical.

You will be able to purchase a bear at the Dainere’s Rainbow Celebrate Gungahlin Family Picnic Day on 22^nd October, at the Garage Sale Trail in November and the Dainere’s Rainbow Christmas Light Stalls throughout December.

With humble and heartfelt gratitude to Nalani, Sam and little Ebony who are the geniuses behind this cuddly and exceptional initiative.

“I think that constant kindness can accomplish the most wonderful things in the world, like the sun making snow and ice melt, kindness can eliminate hate, mistrust, anger and misunderstanding. Be kind to all those around you this coming week and the sun will shine on your life always”. (Dainere Anthoney 1998-2013)

We feel so truly humbled, honoured and sincerely grateful to announce that Dainere’s Rainbow have been chosen to be part of the Grill’d Local Matters Community Donation Program this September which is extra special as it coincides with Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.

It is so meaningful and a beautiful act of kindness when businesses have these initiatives to support local charity groups. If you visit the extraordinary team at Grill’d Gungahlin during the month of September, please not only consider placing a token in the Dainere’s Rainbow jar but also smile and thank the wonderful and caring team at Grill’d Gungahlin for this wonderful initiative.

A Little About This Initiative

Local Matters is the Grill’d community donation program that sees each Grill’d restaurant donate $500 back into the community every month. https://www.grilld.com.au/local-matters

How You Can Help

We’d love your support in receiving the greatest number of tokens!

It is easy, simply head to Grill’d Gunghalin during September for a scrumptious burger and drink, then pop your Local Matters token in the Dainere’s Rainbow jar.

The group with the most tokens at the end of the month receives the largest donation.

It’s a simple (and delicious) way to show your support!

You’ll find us on a jar at Grill’d Gungahlin, Gungahlin Village, 46-50 Hibberson Street Gungahlin.

https://www.grilld.com.au/restaurants/australian-capital-territory/canberra/grilld-gungahlin

Elevating awareness and raising funds for research and support is something that cannot be done alone, it takes a team of special and extraordinary people who have the light of human kindness burning brightly, a passion to create change, the gift of a pure heart, outstanding determination, and a spark of enthusiasm.

Those who support Dainere’s Rainbow are considered a part of the Dainere’s Rainbow Family Team and we would like to recognise and express our most heartfelt and extremely humble gratitude to some incredible people who we consider true Dainere’s Rainbow Champions, Advocates and Role Models to others.

On 6th May we had the honour of witnessing and being part of a truly meaningful event, the Burgmann Anglican School Rainbow Run. This is an annual awareness and fundraising event that the Burgmann Community created.

It is in memory of Dainere and her legacy to raise money and awareness for childhood brain cancer research. The phenomenal students who form the Rainbow Run Committee have spent many devoted hours designing and stenciling shirts for the entire Year 12 cohort, shared Dainere’s story at assembly, read her book to younger grades in the School, held a cake stall, had a sausage sizzle, and sold packets of colour to Senior School students.

The final and much anticipated event of the School Cross Country was what has become ‘a rite of passage’ for Year 12, a day for them to remember and one that is filled with hope. As the students proudly and thoughtfully ran down the 100m tunnel, a kaleidoscope of powered colour filled the air in an arching rainbow, was caught in the Autumn breeze and vibrantly covered their special keepsake shirts. It was truly a memorable and splendiferous afternoon.

Dainere’s legacy certainly continues and the students on the Rainbow Run Committee selflessly and inspiringly epitomise the true spirit and values of the Burgmann Community. Endless gratitude to Mr Robertson, Rhea, Mia, Holly, Mya, Kira, Rachel, Laura, Sarah, Zach, Mackenzie, Matthew, Daniel, Hannah, Umair, Manav, Nadeeka, Janakipriya, Aishwarya, Erin, Dakshin, Krishna, Jashanjot, Camdyn, Lara, Christina, and Isabel.

We look forward to sharing the total funds raised as well as other incredible awareness and fundraising initiatives this amazing Year 12 Cohort are planning to undertake.

The year 2021 was another where the world faced the challenges and adversity of the continuing COVID pandemic.  Awareness and fundraising opportunities for Dainere’s Rainbow were again significantly impacted.

We were so fortunate to hold our annual Christmas Light Display, and this year the light display was aptly named ‘Dainere’s Rainbow Christmas Light Display to Bring New Hope’.  It was a very different display with the requirement of many COVID Safe measures: including check in QR code, signage, hand sanitiser and social distancing.  To keep the Community safe, we were not able to hold our usual stalls, have the display as walk through or have Santa or Mrs Claus visit.

The lights were also tragically affected by numerous storms and winds throughout the month of December, which saw several lights viciously ripped from the roof and ground, some totally destroyed.

Crowds were also down on previous years, many families just choosing to do drive by visits to Christmas Light Displays to remain safe.  We are ever so grateful to all the families; those who come every year and those who are new to visiting who ventured out and experienced the joy, hope and Christmas Spirit that Dainere envisioned for the display.

There was a wonderful positive from the display, despite the many obstacles, and that was sales of ‘Anthony Christmas Bear Book’, beautifully and lovingly written by Jarrett Anthoney and creatively brought to life through illustrations and collaboration by John Mikita (Dainere’s Rainbow Patron).

Given the difficult times, a truly meaningful amount of $279.00 was raised from the Light Display and $1520.00 from Anthony Christmas Bear Book, for a total of $1799.00.  This amount is not only sincerely and humbly appreciated but goes a long way to bringing new hope to children diagnosed with brain tumour.

Question: So what do you when you have 3 weeks in lock down, a clever Mum who is looking for something to do, a sewing machine that was rescued from a skip bin, some generously donated fabric, a global pandemic, and a charity (and family) that means the world to you?

Answer: Make about 210 reversible face masks to sell to family, friends and colleagues of course! And what a sale it was (they sold faster than lock down toilet paper..)

Why: Because before I met Dainere, I did not know (like most other people….) that brain tumours are responsible for more childhood deaths in Australia than any other disease YET it receives pittance in Government Funding for research.

As you may be aware, this pandemic has bought out the best in most of us and I am so grateful to be surrounded by those people in my part of the world. Over this last term at school, staff and students at both Black Mountain School and Campbell High School bought most of the masks.

They made a donation by using the Make a Difference link on Dainere’s Rainbow Paediatric Brain Tumour Research Fund webpage. And within seconds they had a tax-deductible donation receipt in their inbox from the Sydney Children’s Hospital Foundation.

I know the kids loved seeing the many colourful and bight masks every day as much as I did, plus it is pleasing to know that are reusable and will not take 450 years to break down like the “disposable” masks.

Thank you to Mum, sister Karen, Wamboin Joyce and Bywong Sally for the fabric, the Gillespie’s, the lovely generous lady in line with me at Spotlight who insisted I take $20 towards some extra supplies, and of course the wonderful people that bought masks. Each and every one of them now know of Dainere’s Rainbow, and Dr Ziegler has a little bit more money to continue his vital research.

Super job team. x

Bron Collins – Dainere’s Rainbow Committee Member

On Saturday 4 December, a special event was held to raise funds for Dainere’s Rainbow at the Belconnen Markets.

The Andante Andante (Abba) Choir performed a number of Abba songs – some popular hits (Super Trouper, Dancing Queen, Mamma Mia) and some while not usually well known, were just as groovy (As Good As New, So Long)! The performance concluded with the choir performing a number of Christmas Carols including the Aussie Jingle Bells! The choir has a long and special association with Dainere’s Rainbow through an annual end of year performance to raise funds for this wonderful cause. The choir welcomes anybody who wants to join – there is no audition process. If you want to sing Abba songs and have fun while doing so, you are very welcome to join in! You can contact the choir through Facebook (Andante Andante Choir) or via email andanteandantechoir@yahoo.com. The choir practices every Monday at the Uniting Church hall in Braddon.

The event also included a very special performance by dancers from the Flamenco Centre of Canberra. Full of expression, passion, intensity and dancing to incredible Spanish guitar music, the dancers transported the audience to the colourful, festive streets of Andalusia in Spain. Angelica Casado and her eight students showcased incredible rhythm and bold dance moves, with their swirling skirts and tapping shoes! The Centre is very happy for people to join to learn this lively and passionate form of dancing. You can contact them through their website or through their Facebook page Flamenco Centre of Canberra.

Chitra Herft President Andante Andante ABBA Choir