On March 16^th, we closed our doors to the public without any idea if or when we could open them again. Like you, we have felt many mixed emotions during this time. Your kindness and support of our shop was incredible and helped keep our chins up, as we looked forward to an eventual reopening. Thank you for your thoughtful cards, precious pictures that you hung on our front door, and for each message of kindness. We are forever grateful and we’re sending all of that love and kindness back to you.

With social distancing and stay at home orders in place, our team divided and conquered to meet online orders while juggling the responsibilities of being homeschool teachers and short order chefs. Through it all we attempted to balance family care, while rotating store shifts to maintain the responsibilities of our shop. We want to thank you once again for trusting us to be your personal shoppers. As challenged as we felt, we know it does not come close to what the essential workers are experiencing. We are truly so grateful to those who have and continue to battle the coronavirus on top of their regular responsibilities just to keep the rest of us safe. Our prayers have been and continue to be with you.

We continue to stay positive and thankful in all situations. When we reopen, you may notice several changes as we strive to bring another level of safety and cleanliness to our customers. We will continue to be child and family friendly at all possible levels, however we believe these changes will help to ensure the health and safety of both our customers and our team. We have increased our cleaning and disinfecting routines. As we have always tried our best to maintain cleanliness, we recognize the elevated importance at this time. To limit additional areas where germs can spread, we have removed product demos from our shelves and sales floor including all demo tables which will remain removed for an unknown period of time. It’s truly a treasure to have had these special places to play, and we’ll look forward to setting them back up in the future.

In your next visit, you will notice us wearing our personal protective equipment in the form of masks, gloves, and other possible accessories. We ask that you please wear your facial mask. Remember, my mask protects you, your mask protects me. We will have hand sanitizer stations throughout the rooms. Please help yourself to them and use as needed.

If your children are accompanying you on your next visit to our store, we encourage you to talk to them about the changes prior to your visit. Children are curious and intelligent and will certainly notice these differences. It may help ward off any kind of nervousness or fear as they may feel uncertain about the changes. If you would like our team to assist you with this, we would be happy to do so.

 Here’s how we’re working on the inside: Cleaning and Disinfecting with CDC guidelines

• Normal routine cleaning with soap and water to decrease how much of the virus is on surfaces and objects, which reduces the risk of exposure.
• Disinfection using EPA-approved disinfectants against COVID-19 to help reduce the risk on surfaces and objects often touched by multiple people.

 

We strongly encourage ALL EMPLOYEES & CUSTOMERS to maintain safe behavioral practices including:

• Social distancing (specifically, staying 6 feet away from others when you must go into a shared space).
• Frequently washing hands or use alcohol-based (at least 60% alcohol) hand sanitizer when soap and water are not available.
• Wearing cloth face coverings.
• Avoiding touching eyes, nose, and mouth.
• Staying home when sick.
• Cleaning and disinfecting frequently touched objects and surfaces

 

ALERT: If you are sensitive to smells, please call us to help you over the phone. We are using a variety of products and we understand that this can pose a serious threat to those with sensitivities.

In addition, we ask you to please be mindful of the following situations.

If you feel sick or symptomatic, please refrain from coming into the store. We are still happy to help you, we simply ask you to allow us to do it in another way. We offer extremely helpful services such as online ordering, in store pick-up with minimal contact, and curbside pick-up with no contact.

We will also need to enforce a no pets and no food or drinks policy in the store at this time. Our restroom will also remain closed to the public.


We are sorry for any inconvenience, and we're thankful for every step forward.

 

Please be safe, stay well, and thank you.

Phyllis, Sammy, Jody, Tiffany & Tabitha

 

Resources for you and your family:

CDC Coronavirus (COVID-19): https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-nCoV/index.html

American Red Cross: https://www.redcross.org/about-us/news-and-events/news/2020/coronavirus-how-to-talk-to-your-kids.html

American Academy of Pediatrics: https://www.aap.org/en-us/Pages/Default.aspx

Melissa and Doug: https://www.melissaanddoug.com/blogpost/?postId=how-play-can-help-families-interact-connect-and-manage-stress-during-covid-19-pandemic