With presents at the Launceston General Hospital yesterday are Lara Camino, 10, of George Town, Bubbles the Rainbow Fairy, Jason Camino, of George Town, Darth Vader and event organiser Indiana Edge, 6, of Longford. Picture: PAUL SCAMBLER
Longford girl Indiana Edge is six going on 60 and she knows a thing or two about being sick in hospital.
So her mother, Louise Pickett, was not surprised when she emerged from her bedroom a few months ago and said that she had been thinking about the children who would have to stay at the Launceston General Hospital for the Christmas holidays.
``She wanted to ask friends and family and their friends and families if they wanted to help find toys and presents and craft packs for the children in hospital,'' Ms Pickett said.
What surprised Ms Pickett was just how successfully her daughter's first attempt at fund-raising turned out.
Yesterday Indiana, her mother and a few helpers such as Bubbles the Fairy and Darth Vader delivered two trolley loads full of boxes jam-packed with everything from baby socks and rattles to colouring books and craft sets.
The goodies were put together with the help of old and new friends from as far away as Western Australia who saw the Facebook page that Indiana asked her mother to post about her fund-raising plan and Indiana's pocket money that she had saved since last September.
Ms Pickett said that she thought it was her daughter's own experience of hospitals that made her think of the fund-raising that snowballed.
Indiana was a seriously ill patient at the LGH for several weeks when she was four years old.
``She was very unwell with an immune and blood disorder called Kawasaki disease,'' her mother said.
The children's ward play co-ordinator would drop by and bring a teddy to keep Indiana company or some art packs to keep her distracted, Ms Pickett said.
It was after Indiana returned to the LGH briefly for tests last year that she had her big idea.
Her mother said that she was already planning a similar campaign next year.
