Caring about the future of our community
in Thornbury and the surrounding villages

ST Bulletin

Local smallholding visit

There will be a visit to Jules Moore's smallholding at Mumbleys Farmhouse, Sweetwater Lane near Alveston on Friday 18th June starting at 10:30am. Jules keeps and breeds a range of rare breeds (including poultry, cattle, sheep, pigs and bees), and she runs courses on smallholding. The cost of the visit will be £4 each, including refreshments. All are welcome, but we need to know names in advance. There are limited places, so please email names to the secretary or ring 01454-416604 to book places.

Help needed on stalls

We are planning to have a number of stalls at local events this summer. Please come and help if you can, even if its only for an hour. The proposed dates so far are:

• Sat 19 June at the Food Fair, Thornbury, 9am to 2pm;
• Sat 19 June at St Helen's Primary School fete from lunchtime;
• Sat 4 Sept at Alveston Parish show in the afternoon.

To offer help please email the secretary or ring 01454-416604

Meetings

The dates of future ST general meetings have been changed. From July they will be on the fourth Wednesday of every month at 7:30pm at The Chantry. This changes the date from the third Wednesday, as was previously published, so please change your diary. The next three meetings are Wed 16 June, Wed 28 July and Wed 25 August. All are welcome to all our meetings.

Grow Your Own Food

The Grow Your Own Food group has a meeting most months, usually on a Thursday. The next meeting is a visit to a field garden on Thursday 10 June. Please ring 414611 for more details. Click here for meetings after that or ring 01454-412165.

Dates

Saturday workshop

There will be a Saturday workshop on Sat 17 July at the Chantry, 1pm to 5pm. The topics are likely to include drinking water, waste, housing and the EcoFair. These workshops are great fun, informative and creative. All are welcome; please bring some food to share for lunch.

Marlwood School

We want to run two sustainable activity days with Marlwood School this summer on 28 June and 1 July. We have a team planning the activities, but they need help on the days. If you would be interested in helping please email the secretary or ring 01454-416604.

EcoFair

The EcoFair was a fantastic success, and very well run, thanks to everyone who helped with the planning, on the day and with the clearing up. There are reviews and photos on the EcoFair website pages - please email further photos to Alan and feedback to Judith.

Over 750 people came (plus the 120 stallholders and helpers), and saw lots of ways to be more environment-friendly and still have a good time. It was a perfect, hot, sunny May day, and there was a relaxed feeling of community. We were entertained by wonderful local talent, and the children had a whale of a time without buying anything or using electricity or batteries.

We had 40 excellent entries for the card competition. The entrants were aged from 2.5 years to adult. The six winners have received their prizes and all the cards were displayed in the St Mary's Shopping Centre in Thornbury.

New officers

Our AGM was in May, and we now have several new officers. Paula Hunt is chair, Freddie Keey is secretary, Bob Dale is treasurer and Derry Jordan is membership secretary. We thank the outgoing officers for the work they have put in keeping the group running in the previous very busy year.

Membership subscriptions

The AGM decided to start charging for membership, in order to raise funds and make membership mean something. The subscription will be £5 for individuals or £8 for a household per year. We shall be writing to members about this later in the year. We hope no-one will feel this deters them from being a member.

Give-It-Away Take-It-Away Day postponed

We have decided to delay Give-It-Away Take-It-Away Day this year. We did not have anyone to organise it or enough volunteer stewards to manage it in June. We will consider doing it later in the year (possibly 19 September), and will think about other ways to reuse goods that charity shops cannot take.

Now that we have run the day twice, it is fairly straightforward to set up. We are looking for an individual, a team or an organisation to join with us to take on the arrangements for the next Give-It-Away Take-It-Away day. Anyone interested please telephone Bob on 01454 415345.

Thornbury CSA local food scheme

Thornbury CSA, our local food scheme, is up and running, and is now a separate organisation. It has held an Inaugural Meeting, approved a constitution and has members. They do not have vegetables yet, but should have by July. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, the term used for consumers working with farmers and growers to grow and eat local food.

This is an exciting chance to be in at the beginning of a new sustainable project. The plan now is for members to collect and weigh their share of the vegetables each week. The vegetables will cost about £10 each week for a standard share, but different sizes will be available. The annual membership subscription is £10, and you can join without buying vegetables if you want to support the scheme or keep in touch with it. We still need more people, so please pass this message on if you know someone local who may be interested.

They will soon be contacting all those who expressed an interest with more news. If you did not respond before and want to buy good local food and support local growers please email or ring 01454 416778.

This email was sent by info@sustainablethornbury.org, telephone 01454-416778