Garden Walk Street party 2015

Sunny and a great atmosphere.

Today was lovely. so many of our local residents came out to meet up on the streets, children played, people danced, enjoyed the homemade goodies, joined in the games and bought a plant or two.

All in aid of  Winter Comfort, whilst enjoying themselves and getting to know each other.

here are some pictures

Lots of the bunting, cups, paper plates and even an unopened pack of tea (use by 10/2016) are stored in Liz FC loft until next year and Paola's shed.

Global Locals

Global Locals, Celebrate our intentional street.

Paola has put a large map out with a box of pins, if you want to join in and create the picture of where we are all from, just place a pin on your birth place.

So many  faces, so many languages, so many stories, that's what makes living in Garden Walk so interesting.

Connect with your neighbours

With a long street like ours it is not easy to get to know all the residents so a Street Party like the one we have today, will make things a little easier.

Having said that,  after a few months ,names may be forgotten and getting in touch after only meeting once is not easy for everyone.

There are other ways in place, so that if you like to share more with your neighbours it is easy and free.

Why not join the Cambridge Skills Exchange   (for people in walking and easy cycling distance of Garden Walk)

Currently we have  Helene, Liz, Githa, Derek, Gwendolyn, Paola, Karina, Michael and Mark who have been involved in our street, from help with gardening, ironing, baby sitting, baking bread, cleaning windows, giving lifts, help with shopping, sewing, photography, and much more.
If you would like to join us, the more the merrier, just give us a ring (details on the website)

or the Street bank   it is free and a great way to share goods, services, get recommendations and help each other.  little film

There is a gardening group too. If you wish to get involved in this, again let us know, via our blog.

It is just a matter of signing up.

If you would like to set up a group, for young or old, let the others know and maybe they will join in.

Plant Stall - mainly vegetable plants

With the Gardening Club of St Luke's primary school we planted lots of plant for our kitchen garden.
On Friday's we have a kitchen garden shop after school and this Friday we had plants left that we would like to sell and the money made will go to Winter Comfort.

There are a few children in the Street who go to St Luke's school who may want to help with the plant stall. If not, the Gardening Teacher (Karina) will be manning the stall

We have the following plants:

Broccoli, tomatoes, chilies, red pointed cabbages, ornamental gourds, lettuces and celery

We managed to collect £27.93 for the Winter Comfort collection tin

Winter Comfort for the homeless

 This year we shall be raising funds for our local charity Winter Comfort

Wintercomfort is a day centre offering essential welfare services and learning and development opportunities to homeless people in Cambridge. We provide showers, hot breakfasts and laundry facilities and, most importantly, a safe place for vulnerable people to spend their time. As the first point of contact for many homeless people we can help them to source the support they need: counselling, housing, mental health and much more. Our three social enterprises give people the opportunity to gain valuable training and work experience and our other activities range from literacy and numeracy classes to job skills workshops to art and sports. Our aim is to help people escape the spiral of homelessness, supporting them as they get their lives back on track.

We are very grateful for the support of local people and we are always glad to receive donations of 2nd hand clothes. At the moment we could really use new underwear, hats, shoes / trainers, sun cream and waterproof coats / jackets.

I hope this is ok, edit it at will! Fingers crossed for lovely weather - I'd love to see any photos of the event.
If you would like to get in touch with them, please contact

Sarah Pesonen

Community Events and Fundraising Coordinator

Tel: 01223 518140

Email: sarahpesonen@wintercomfort.org.uk

Sewing

Christmas Party

All Fun and Games on Saturday

Having a street party is great fun, a wonderful way to get to know the neighbours and create shared experiences for young and old.

There will be a wide variety of activities for young and old and a lovely space to catch up with our neighbours.  (the road is closed from 2-7pm)

We know many of our neighbours by face but may have forgotten names. To make it easier for everyone we will have labels for you to put your name and house number on. That way no embarrassing moments and easier flowing conversations.

If you have a table, some chairs, gazebo, paper plates and cups, bunting etc, feel free to use it on the day. The more the merrier.

Books and bric a brac items can be donated to Alison number 71


We have put some balloons (Winter Comfort and The Big Lunch) through people's letter boxes, if you would not mind blowing one up and hanging it on your gate, it will cheer up the street without me having to go light headed!

This year we have Mollie the Trike come,  which is homemade ice cream, made by Elizabeth. All profit on the day she will donate to Winter Comfort.

Are you musical? If so, we would love to hear some life music on the street.

Edmund of number 13 will be leading the ceilidh at 5pm so hopefully we can get many of you on the dance floor (street)


We are planning to set up a Residents Association and will be having our first meeting on Monday 22nd June in St Luke's Church hall at 8pm. More about this on one of the stalls in the street (Deborah Latham)

There will be plenty of lovely things to do for the little ones, biscuit decorating organised by the helpers of Metropolitan housing, Street games like hop scotch,  skipping etc will be facilitated by Helen and her daughter of the Sunflower Day Nursery.
Lucky dip,
Guess the number of balloons in car,
And  placing your pin on the world map.  (find your country of origin and mark it with a pin, to show what an amazing diverse cultural street we live in)

Delicious home made ice cream is coming to Garden Walk

Mollie the trike 

Mollie the ice cream trike will be at the Garden Walk Street Party selling a range of handmade ice creams and ice cream sandwiches. All ice cream and ice cream sandwiches are made using natural ingredients, locally sourced where possible in small batches. 

Flavours range from classics such as triple chocolate, rum and raisin and coffee, to  more unusual flavours including  blueberry cheesecake, rhubarb and custard, toasted marshmallow and coconut milk, fried banana and mojito sorbet. 

Ice cream sandwich flavours include a caramel apple ice cream sandwiches between two oatmeal raisin cookies and salted caramel ice cream in chocolate chip pretzel cookie sandwich, and many more…

The ice cream team are already raising money for Winter Comfort for the homeless by undertaking the Ben Nevis Charity Challenge on the 20^th June this year, and all profits made at the street party will be donated to the charity. To see how the team are getting on please visit their Just Giving Page 

Mollie the trike can be hired for weddings and events throughout Cambridgeshire and the surrounding areas. For more information please contact Elizabeth Hall on 01223 967 785/ 07784966387 or visit  Elizabeth Hall Event Design

Last leafletting of the street

Dressed in a big jumper, scarf and coat I set out to drop off the reminder Street Party invitations.
We received balloons from The Big Lunch and Winter Comfort so have asked our fellow residents to blow one up (or a few if the neighbours are not into blowing up balloons) and use them to decorate their gates.  Not only will this help me so that I don't have to blow up 120 by my self  but it will also create a lovely festive feel to the street. It is amazing what a bit of cooperation does for a good atmosphere.

As in other years we expect a few keen bunting hangers, to do their climb on Saturday morning.
Feel free to come and see if you can help them.

It was a great way to meet some more people in my street have a short chat if they could be there on Saturday and if they were happy to bring food or drink, had a table we could use and in 2 cases if Edmund could use their electricity for the Ceilidh music and Elizabeth could use it to keep her home made ice-cream nicely cold for what is forecasted a lovely summer day!  (at least we can be hope)

 I met many more faces this way and am looking forward to meeting them again in a few days time.

Garden Walk Ceilidh starting at 5pm!

Edmund Croft of number 13 volunteered to organise a ceilidh this year.

The dancing fun will start at 5pm.

I asked him how he got into this type of dance. 

For those who are interested this was his reply:

"I went to a couple of ceilidhs when I was in primary school (at Morley at the south end of Cambridge, as it happens), but after that I only danced again at university. I'm half Scottish and thought I ought to try Scottish country dancing. I really enjoyed it, and soon someone told me that there was an English country dancing group on another night of the week. It didn't take very long for me to get recruited into all the folk dance that was going.

I've recently escaped from five years running the university Scottish group, but still teach there, as well as calling for some of the ceilidhs and weekly meetings of the English group.

I also do molly dancing (Cambridge's version of morris), which is why in several previous years I have cycled back through the street party in bright colours with a green face - it's normally the day of the St Neot's folk festival!

A ceilidh is a celtic dance party with a caller (and if you come to some of our larger events, live music). Anyone can do it - the caller explains how each dance goes, then calls the moves as they happen. You don't need to bring a partner - it's normal to ask a different person to dance each dance (but I won't mind if you choose just to dance with your significant other, as long as we're not always leaving people out who want to have a go). You don't need special clothes (though to avoid twisted ankles and partners' bruised toes, I would advise against high heels), but if you happen to have something tartan, feel free to wear it. If you enjoy yourself, there are many groups in Cambridge who do this regularly (though some are university groups and only meet during term - you'd be welcome to join in for the remaining few weeks).

Scottish: http://cusarc.soc.srcf.net/

English: http://round.soc.srcf.net/

Molly: http://www.gogmagogmolly.org.uk/

Contra (American version of ceilidh, meets in Chesterton): http://www.cambridgefolk.org.uk/contra/programme.html

I can also bring flyers that give details of several more local folk dance groups (some are run by grown-ups rather than students, and thus continue to meet over the summer holidays).

Hope to see many of you there.