Jo Milton

TODAY WE ARE 3!!

Harvest@Home (part of the Cherwell Collective/Cherwell Larder) aims to provide the equipment and skills necessary for people to plant, care for, and harvest their very own produce at home. They have been popping up all over Cherwell district with seed swaps and advice sessions, and are establishing allotments both for teaching/community growing and to grow produce for the Cherwell Larder. We have already helped Harvest@Home and Cherwell Larder a few times in Kidlington and have done one previous session at their plot at South Ward Allotments.

The allotment plot in South Ward Allotments will be used for some experimental growing projects, but it needs a bit of work to get it ready for that. We have previously cleared the long grass and brambles, and over the winter months Harvest@Home have worked hard to get all the broken glass off the plot. It is now ready for strimming the grass, laying cardboard and spreading woodchip. Please bring your sturdiest gardening gloves and shoes just in case a few bits of glass might still be lurking on site.

Getting there:
The allotments are a bit tricky to find, tucked away past the static caravan park and through a locked gate, so for anyone who doesn't know the way we will meet on the opposite side of the road from the Redbridge Household Waste Recycling Centre at 10:50am and walk down to the plot together.
If you are getting the bus to the meeting point please keep your bus ticket as Harvest@Home have a volunteer fund and would like to reimburse your travel costs.

Marston Forest Garden is part of the Marston Community Garden cooperative, which comprises a community allotment, the Forest Garden, a chicken coup, an orchard and a new Community Wood on New Marston Recreation Ground plus much more.

Jobs at Marston Forest Garden ususally include digging out bramble roots and ivy roots before they get out of hand in the spring, laying cardboard for weed suppression, spreading wood chip etc. Wellies are advised as the ground can get quite muddy at the Forest Garden through the winter, and please bring your gardening gloves. Tools will be provided.

Meeting point: Outside the Court Farm Allotments gate at the end of Boults Lane near Marston Saints FC.

Oxford Mutual Aid is a 7-days-a-week operation, delivering food parcels to people across the city. They are staffed almost entirely by volunteers, so we try to help out once or twice a week to keep that vital food getting to people.

For the last few months Oxford Mutual Aid have been very short-staffed on Saturday shifts at the food bank, so we have spent much of our time on this shift catching up on packing food parcels to be sent out that afternoon. We will give training on this if you haven't done it before. Obviously, providing the food is the highest priority, but we always try and make sure we do some cleaning and sorting out too, as there aren't many opportunities to do that throughout the week.

Please wear a mask.

For anyone looking for a new challenge for the new year that supports both physical and mental health - why not try a 30 day yoga challenge.

We suggest 30 Days of Yoga with Adriene but other programmes are available online.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oBu-pQG6sTY

There won’t be task for the larger group this Wednesday, but we’ll maintain our commitment to the food bank. Afterall, people don’t stop needing food between Christmas and New Year!

We will be based inside Richard Benson Hall preparing food parcels in the food bank and helping the delivery drivers load them into their cars. We will do some restocking of the shelves too if there's time.

Please wear a mask. Anwen will be at the hall from about 4pm, so feel free to turn up any time between 4pm and 4:30pm.

Inspired by our 2020 Book Relay, today's GoodGym Advent Calendar suggestion is to share a book recommendation or podcast fav with your fellow GoodGymers. We'll all be keen for new reading and listening material through the remaining winter months, so share your top choices.

You can comment your recommendation below, or comment on today's social media post, or put it in our GoodGym WhatsApp Group.

You could even go one step further and donate a book to one of the local 'help yourself' book shelves. There's one outside St Mary and St John Church on Cowley Road (the church next door to the Oxford Mutual Aid food bank).

Looking forward to all your recommendations!