Matt Gentry | The Roanoke Times

On Friday, Gavin McKee and Phurbu Dolma-McKee of Floyd opened The Treasured Toy, selling wooden, handmade children's toys, organic clothes and children's educational videos.

FLOYD -- A Floyd couple are working to preserve Tibetan heritage.

On Friday, Gavin McKee and Phurbu Dolma-McKee opened The Treasured Toy, selling wooden, handmade children's toys, organic clothes and children's educational videos.

The store also houses McKee's business, NRV Hypnosis, and serves as a base for Dolma-McKee's online business, Baby Sambhota, which sells Tibetan language videos she created.

The idea for the Baby Sambhota videos started when one of the couple's two children was watching a Baby Einstein video.

Dolma-McKee grew up in India in a Tibetan refugee camp in the town of Tezu and wanted to provide educational opportunities to Tibetan children in their native language.

"It made me wish they had these for Tibetan children," Dolma-McKee said.

So she created the videos and started selling them online, along with clothing and other children's items. The Web site, babysambhota.com, led to the store.

Sambhota is the written language of Tibet, named for Thonmi Sambhota, who was thought to have brought it to Tibet in the seventh century.

The idea for the store came from what the couple saw as a need for a dedicated toy store in Floyd, especially one that sold natural toys and a base for Baby Sambhota sales.

"There are stores that sell toys, but you have to drive to Christiansburg or go on the Internet for most things," McKee said.

The couple have two young sons, Garvey Tenzin Kelsang McKee, 3, and Giovanni Tenzin Choeyng McKee, 4. The parents buy them as many all-natural toys as possible but wanted to offer a place where many natural toys and organic clothing were available in one place.

"Realistically, we can't compete with Wal-Mart or big-box stores, so we wanted to offer something different," McKee said. "Floyd has a lot of people interested [in natural toys], and we think there's a growing interest in the market."

Most of the toys are also made in Tibet under fair-trade standards, which is important to the couple, Dolma-McKee said.

Since moving to Floyd in 2003, Dolma-McKee has found that many people are interested in the Tibetan cause, especially with the March 10 anniversary that marked 50 years since the Dalai Lama's exile from Tibet.

"People talk to me about it, and I see lots of 'Free Tibet' license plates," Dolma-McKee said. "I am Tibetan, but I like it here. It's free."

When not working to open the toy business, the couple own an organic blueberry farm in Floyd called Minick Blueberry Farm.

At NRV Hypnosis, McKee practices time empowerment, which he describes as "doing hypnosis in an extremely light, mutual trance."

The idea behind time management is that people are aware of the process the entire time, McKee said, leading to a change in their habits. It is unrelated to The Treasured Toy and Baby Sambhota except that the office is in the same building.

Sarah LaPointe, who owns LaPointe's Used Books next door to The Treasured Toy, said she thinks the business will be an asset to Floyd.

"Instead of people driving all the way to Christiansburg or Roanoke, there will be something here," LaPointe said. "It's really nice, handmade stuff."

3 businesses in 1

The Treasured Toy, Baby Sambhota and NRV Hypnosis are at 177 Webb’s Mill Road, unit 2, Floyd. Contact: 745-8697 or babysambhota.com