Maryana Gabria started Beautiful Mines when she couldn’t find the toys she wanted for her two children. Photo: Cassie Huynh.
As a nurse working in a busy Sydney emergency department, Maryana Gabria witnessed much she had not been exposed to while growing up.
“There was a lot of domestic violence,” she said.
“I just couldn’t understand the dynamic of the person that beats you up, would bring you in and be nice to the people asking questions. I decided that I needed to delve into this.”
Maryana headed back to university to study counselling and that’s when she learnt about trauma attachment.
She said from this she underwent her own healing.
At that stage Maryana didn’t have children, but her career in nursing and counselling would later inform her parenting and her role as a small business owner.
After Maryana moved to the Illawarra in 2013, she continued to work as a nurse and her curiosity for understanding how bonds were formed in early relationships strengthened as she began her own family.
“I read a lot before I had kids, so when they were born, I knew I wanted to parent in a certain way,” she said.
For her it was paramount to be present. She said although it was hard work being that “present parent”, it was also rewarding.
Looking online, Maryana found that many of the toys available were too expensive for young families like her own, so she started sourcing the toys elsewhere. Soon after, her friends would ask if they could source toys for their children too.
Maryana then realised there was a gap in the market for people like herself.
She started buying and selling toys on Facebook Marketplace. Two years after her first child was born, the small project continued to grow.
“I started importing a larger amount and would put that on Marketplace. And then I said to my husband, ‘Why don’t we build a website?.’”
Over the next couple of months, Maryana and her husband worked on a website for their growing business and in August 2021, Beautiful Mines was established.
Beautiful Mines specialises in open-ended toys for children, toys that spark wonder. Maryana said she valued toys that allowed you, as the parent, to be present.
“For example, wooden toys are not battery toys.
“You have to sit there with the child, see what they’re going to do, what they’re going to create.
“It starts off as a rainbow. It starts off as a little ring for a zoo, and then it becomes a ball. It becomes a building. It becomes a much bigger structure. Your mind will be blown at just what they can do.
“I have toys for every stage to help with fine motor skills. I have cylinders that are easy to grip with little chunky hands and easy to stack on top of each other.
“It’s teaching them about critical thinking. It’s teaching them that if this isn’t fitting into here, let me try this.”
Maryana said using toys to engage with children was beneficial for their play and learning and the toys she sold could be used as a communication tool with children.
“It’s a lot of thinking and it’s exploring,” she said. “Can you match this with this? Can you point to the color? Can you feel this? How does this feel? Use the colors to match, look at the shapes and see what fits into what.
“A lot of our toys are picked because they can match with other sets of things – a pattern ball for a pattern board; you can use the same ball for counters, for colours.
“You don’t have to buy a massive number of toys, just start off with one. Declutter the playroom, have it clean and open the space, no matter how small the space is, as long as it’s attractive to a child.
“If there’s just one toy that’s on the table, see what they will do with that one toy, be present and just watch their eyes light up.
“There is no wrong way to play.”
Maryana said she had “no idea what was coming” when formalising the Beautiful Mines brand.
“I didn’t have a business before that; I didn’t come from being like a family that has a business and as a working mum it is hard work,” she said.
Yet, as she spoke of the joy of seeing her kids and friends’ kids play with these toys, it was clear that for her, the business was a labour of love.
Click here to visit Beautiful Mines or follow on Instagram @beautifulminestoys.
