Belly2Brain and Cradlestone partner for charity

After successfully making thousands of sandwiches in 2022, the Belly2Brain organisation partnered with Cradlestone Mall this year to go even bigger.

Founder of Belly2Brain Dominique Tibbles explained that in 2022, she engaged with the mall which provided space for them to host their annual sandwich day in partnership with BNI the Verve. Not only did they agree for the organisation to use parking spots to store the completed sandwiches but they also offered a R1 000 voucher for ingredients.

“Unfortunately, we could not secure the ingredients as time did not allow it, however, the voucher was then used to purchase a washing machine which Belly2Brain donated to Hopelands Baby Sanctuary which will ensure they can keep the babies’ nappies and clothing clean without hand washing.”

This year, the mall contacted Dominique to offer to be the venue sponsor for a variety of the Belly2Brain fundraising activities and provide a monthly voucher to be used for ingredients for their six weekly outreaches. These outreaches are done in partnership with Toekomsvenster and every six weeks they feed the Appelpark community.

“This collaboration is a Godsent and so the Change to Uncage fundraiser was born.”

Dominique locked herself in a cage at entrance 5 of the mall for 67 hours to raise funds, one hour for each of the Mandela Day minutes. The funds went to the various Belly2Brain outreaches of which the first was the yearly sandwich day. This year’s target was R13 000 peanut butter and jam sandwiches.

The annual budget target for the organisation is R3m and the sandwich day target was R20 000, this was to buy 1 650 loaves of bread, peanut butter and jam.

The cage was set up with the help of the Hopelands ambassador Jenny-Lee Swanepoel and Lizeth Rowan from Little Blue Bird events. Dominique was allowed bathroom breaks granted a volunteer sat in the cage for her. She entered the cage at noon on July 15 and exited the cage on Madiba Day to start spreading the love, by making sandwiches.

“An anonymous donor gifted the community with the full budget requirement for the sandwich day allowing me to exit the cage already on Saturday – but a commitment for 67 hours had to be achieved – all other funds raised will be earmarked toward the annual budget with the next outreaches.”

Their outreaches planned for the year are the Handbags of Hope event at Unveiled Church on September 2, and building a play area at Fleurhof Primary in Roodepoort, a promise made by the organisation back in 2019.

“It’s amazing how much activity is in a mall after all patrons and tenants have left – the cleaning crew starts ensuring the mall is fresh and ready for the next day’s activities – security is active all through the night – so sleep was a gift not to be had that night.”

On the Sunday, Dominique was determined to stick out the 67 hours, but with the sandwich goal already reached she questioned her resolve to stay on until the Tuesday.

“Target is reached; let’s go home to a bed and home comforts! I drew inspiration from pastors Steven and Sharon Lamprecht – the founders of Hopelands – who recently scaled Base Camp at Mount Everest, conquering extreme elements, and the courage to stick it out was restored! My sister brought earplugs and with a combination of exhaustion, sleep was most welcomed on the Sunday night!”

Sandwich Day exceeded all their expectations, and with the volunteers manning their various stations and keeping the production line going, they exceeded their target and made 14 000 sandwiches. They called a stop at 14:00 and as they were cleaning up, the Rant-en-Dal Prisma church delivered more sandwiches and they hit the 15 000 mark.

Dominique wanted to thank all the participants, Cradlestone Mall, all the donors, every visitor, and every volunteer.

The sandwiches were taken to The Cradle of Hope, God’s Love to Our World, The Bethany House Trust, Door of Care and Safety, Hopelands Baby Sanctuary, and Just in Time Baby Sanctuary.