"Many of the children who will benefit from this project live in cold homes, so warm pyjamas are just what they need to get through the cold winter months."
If you would like to support our Jarmie Army project - providing thermals (whether bought or sewn), these sizes are much appreciated: size 00 (3-6 months), size 0 (6-9 months), size 1 (9-12 months), size 1 (12-18 months), size 3 and size 4. These can be dropped off at the Flaxmere Plunket site, on the corner of Wilson and Peterhead roads.
We intend to capture outcomes from these families, to see if this has made some sort of difference.
Tanya Jane, Plunket community services leader, says: "It feels great to have so many people and groups come together to keep children warm this winter.
"It is such a privilege for Plunket to be able to be a part of this drive. Our clinical and community services staff are giving out the pyjamas and onesies for children every day and are striving to make sure none of our children get cold and ill."
On Monday, I look out the Bostock office window at the snow swirling and try to concentrate on the Fair For Life gardening audit preparation meeting.
U-Turn Trust receives funding from Jonny Bostock's fair trade apple sales for our garden.
Nagajara, an IMO auditor from India, has just arrived to audit our community garden against the Fair For Life standards. He looks cold. He tells us he has just left 40C temperatures and shows me his woollen hat in his pocket.
I met Nagajara this time last year for our last audit. I understand he is more used to auditing schemes in Third World countries. Our discussion last year with regards to poverty and deprivation was interesting.
Nagajara will look at our books and assess how we work with our local Flaxmere community, also the outcomes we are achieving with our community garden at Te Aranga Marae, gardens in schools and gardens in homes.
I ask him if he has brought his own (packaged) vegetarian Indian food again this year. He shared some with me last time he was with us. It was delicious.
With this first bite of cold weather, I watch people line up at the petrol station to fill gas bottles - most likely for unflued gas heaters. Quick to heat, commonly used to heat our homes, banned in most other developed countries, we still use them.
I worry about that naked flame next to pyjamas and also the elderly who may lean on the heaters for stability getting in and out of their chair.
I worry about the toxic gases and the amount of moisture released indoors which may add to an already damp house.
For those of us who can afford flued gas heaters, they are a great form of heating.
So with heat pumps (with rising costs of electricity) and log burners (with compliance and regulations) and the knowledge that people burn green or even treated timber, heating is a big topic.
Another positive spin-off from our community garden is the local producers who drop off wood pellets at the marae for people to access. Wood has been chopped into manageable sizes and is free. Families constantly come to load up their boots.
As Dr Wills says, when children are warm at night they sleep better and learn better.
-Ana Apatu is chief executive of the U-Turn Trust, based at Te Aranga Marae in Flaxmere.
