Mothers turn maternity leave side hustle into beloved community pantry

Guyra mothers' roadside pantry hooks community on self-sustainable food Sat 1 Aug 2026 at 8:07am The biting cold of a winter morning in Guyra, northern NSW, doesn't keep new mothers Tash Cunningham and Eowyn Lacey from rugging up their little ones and heading down to the Bus Shelter Pantry. What was meant to be a maternity leave passion project, selling their excess farm and garden produce, has grown into a micro bakery. Dozens of people stop to enjoy baked sweets, jams, and fruit and vegetables all made and grown by the mothers With all their ingredients being self-sustainable, the mothers easily cover the small costs of running the operation. "It stemmed from a love for self-sustainability," Ms Cunningham said. "We both wanted to be self-sufficient. Loading..."We were both about to be on maternity leave, and we thought, 'That gives us six to 12 months, do we just have a go?'" Ms Lacey said they both wanted farm stalls. "It was just one of those dreams we had floating around," she said. "I'm a really big gardener, I always have excess veggies I can't use." The mums started the pantry, with two cartons of eggs, five zucchinis, a couple of punnets of cherry tomatoes, and some muffins. Now their shelves and fridges are loaded. "I'll come down most days to stock up, and its nothing for me to meet two or three people in the five minutes I'm here," Ms Cunningham said. "People leave the highway just to come and see, and they're walking away with an armful of things … you wouldn't believe the fridge would empty, but it does." Ms Lacey said the enterprise had turned into "pretty much a full-time business". "I need employees at this point," she said. "I do all my cooking after [my daughter] goes to bed … I've coming in at 11 at night to fill up the fridges." Community inspiration The work the women put into running the Bus Shelter Pantry is a labour of love for the wider Guyra community. "Being homemade, I think, is the biggest thing [for the community]," Ms Cunningham said. "We've had people tell us that they really appreciate the nostalgia of the recipes. "We're not trying to reinvent the wheel; they are just genuine older recipes people love." Their work has inspired others to get into self-sustainability, with some even asking if they could sell their homemade products at the pantry. "A fella's daughter makes crochet, and he makes all the jams, they're very artistic and the jams are delicious," Ms Lacey said. "The people who supply the honey are local bee keepers out near Tingha." The mothers encourage locals to get into sustainable food, believing locally grown and supplied food is the right direction for food security. "We all get so confident going to the supermarket that food is going to be there," Ms Cunningham said. "But there is no guarantee, I don't think people realised the trucks could have stopped not too long ago with the cost of fuel." Leaving a legacy As the women's children continue to grow, and the mothers approach the end of their maternity leave, it remains to be seen how the Bus Shelter Pantry will continue to run. "We've got some big dreams where we'd like to take it, with getting solar power, so it could keep going," Ms Cunningham said. "I'm trying to wonder if I could fit it all in, I don't need sleep anymore," Ms Lacey joked. Ultimately, the biggest success of the pantry is the legacy it leaves for their children. "Showing them how to grow their own vegetables, make there own bread, be a bit self-sufficient, these are skills that kids are not raised with anymore," Ms Cunningham said. "I can't wait to teach [my daughter] about plants … pass on some skills I spent years developing," Ms Lacey said. Even if the Bus Shelter Pantry does close down, the children will still have a homemade bus shelter to use on their trips to school. "It just might be a bus shelter with sweets in the back, to help them be popular at school," Ms Cunningham said.