Repair Cafe

We held our second Repair Café towards the end of November and are delighted that our dedicated team of fixers were able to either fix the broken item or gave valuable advice as to where to get parts.

In a couple of instances the fixer even took the item home to either make the missing part or carry out a longer repair. 

Between us over 70 kilos of repairs were carried out. Some of the items included:

A speaker, a CD/Stereo, a drill and charger, a coffee maker, a Kenwood mixer,  a desk fan, a wall clock, a solar light, toy railway pieces, a sports bag, 2 baby changing mats, a fleece, a coat, and an electronic baby toy.

This is a free service to the village and we only asked for a small donation towards the cost of the hall hire. Our intention is to run the next Repair Café in the spring and we will publicise it nearer the date. Keep an eye out for information by subscribing to our occasional newsletter and in the meantime, rather than throwing out items that are broken or missing buttons, put them to one side and bring them along to the next Repair Cafe.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard

Our extremely well attended open meeting was held on Wednesday 21st November and such is the level of interest from the Community, we have organised two site visits during the early part of December.

Once these have taken place we will be setting up a small management group in order to progress this exciting project. 

In the background all of the legalities, finance, training and administrative tasks are progressing nicely. The plan is to start clearing the immense amount of rubbish and brambles once we are into the New Year. 

As we believe that there are some significant heritage varieties to be found there, we are approaching this task with great care and sensitivity to ensure that any ‘at risk’ trees are stabilised. 

We will be calling for volunteers once we get started. However if you would rather help with publicity and planning rather than getting your hands dirty please contact us.

A copy of the meeting notes together with a copy of our aims for the orchard can be found here

Next Repair Cafe - Saturday 24 November 2018

If you would like to tell us what you intend to bring along, you can complete the PRE-BOOKING FORM. We still need some more volunteers to help with refreshments and booking in items. If you would like to help please email Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com or give us a ring on 07973 788339 to see how you can help. 

Donkey Lane Community Orchard Meeting

Come along and find out how we plan to regenerate and restore the old, overgrown orchard in Donkey Lane, Chinnor, Oxfordshire to be a viable and shared community area.

For anyone who doesn't know where Donkey Lane is, it is at the top of Keens Lane, across the railway line and to the right. I'm sure that if you grew up in Chinnor, there would have been a time when you went scrumping there 😀😋

Several rare varieties of apples have been identified here 🍏🍏🍎🍎

Community Litter Pick

A huge thank you to everyone who came along to the community litter pick yesterday. 24 volunteers and 16 bags of litter collected. Well done everyone.

We were surprised at how much litter there was this time as over the years, the amount we have collected at each event has reduced. Sadly, this time it had increased and we're still having to pick up 'poo' bags!!!!!

Our thanks to the Parish Council for the loan of the litter picking equipment and for collecting the bags.

Look out for our next community litter pick which will be held in the spring.

Repair Cafe

Our next Repair Café will be held on 

24 November 10:00 am – 1:00 pm

at Chinnor Village Hall

(last item accepted before 12:00 pm)

At the Repair Cafe, we try to fix broken household items in a collaborative and social way. The idea is to help you learn how to repair items and that you gain knowledge from the fixers. Items we are able to fix will depend entirely on the expertise of our volunteers on the day. This is a brilliant way to prevent waste and save you money and to enjoy our tea and cakes in this most sociable activity.

So, bring along your small portable broken electrical items, household items and clothes and we will try to help you repair them. More details and a full list of what we can and can’t accept will be updated and published on our website alternatively you can book your item in with our online Booking Form.

If you would like to help out at this event as a 'fixer', with registration and facilitation or helping to make tea ... email Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com or call 07973 788339.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard

Greening Chinnor are delighted to announce that we are working with Mr Derek Nixey, Chinnor Parish Council and The Chiltern Conservation Board to regenerate and restore the old, overgrown orchard in Donkey Lane.

Our aim is to restore the orchard to be a viable and shared community area. Not only are we looking at restoration but also about finding out and recording the habitat, wildlife and social history of the site. To enable this exiting project to get off the ground, we are looking for volunteers to help process the project.

We are holding an open general meeting on Wednesday 21 November in the White's Field Community Hall at 7:30 pm. To find out more come along and see what we’re planning. Light refreshments will be served.

PLEASE NOTE NEW VENUE!

Autumn Community Litter Pick

Station Road Community Garden

Have you been down to the new Community Garden yet? It's looking amazing.  A full list of what's available can be found here.

Donkey Lane Orchard

We have some exciting news. 

We are in the process of setting up an Orchard Management group to regenerate the old historic orchard in Donkey Lane (Keens Lane). More details will be published shortly. In the meantime, if you would like to know more or get involved, please email Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com. You can keep up to date on our activities and volunteering opportunities via our website where you can sign up to our newsletter or check out our Facebook page @greeningchinnor.

Station Road Community Garden

You may have noticed the lovely planters that have appeared on Station Road. This is the latest addition to our Edible Chinnor project and complements the community herb planter adjacent to the Pavilion. This was all made possible by a generous grant from the Parish Council. Also thanks to one of our Repair Café fixers who made the planters. This once ‘unloved’ area has been named ‘Station Road Community Garden’ and is currently planted with fruit, vegetables and herbs for all the community to enjoy.

We had an enjoyable open morning on the 21 July where we were joined by members of the public planting up and painting decorative panels which will be attached to the front of the planters.

The planters are designed to fulfill 3 of our senses, sight, smell and taste. All bar one of the plants are edible and a full list of the current planting can be found here. Some of the tasty things planted are: red and yellow cherry tomatoes, chillies, salad leaves, raspberries, spring onions and rhubarb chard.

It is hoped that the garden will soon be joined by a WW1 memorial bench to enable villagers to sit and enjoy the space. So pop along and fill your senses.

New Community Garden Planters

We would like you join us for a little gardening session at 10:00 am on Saturday 21st July 2018 to help plant up our new Station Road Community Garden Planters.

We've found an 'unloved' spot and thanks to a grant from Chinnor Parish Council, we are placing three beautiful and robust planters on the small triangular piece of land on Station Road adjacent to the vehicular entrance to the library, Pavilion and St Andrew's School.

Shortly these planters should be joined by a WW1 memorial bench to enable villagers to sit and enjoy the space. This planting is intended to complement the herb planter we put out in May adjacent to the Pavilion. 

Our aim is to eventually have a network of accessible community food throughout Chinnor – our community’s contribution towards incredible edible Chinnor.

We are delighted that our planters have been fabricated to a professional standard by one of our team of repair café fixers who probably wants to stay anonymous (thanks Ted) and also to the CPC grounds team who have assisted in moving them to site.

During the week the planters will be made ready for use and on this Saturday we will be planting all of our treasures.

Our intention with the planters is to fulfil three of the senses

• ·         Touch – ‘Touch me’
• ·         Sight – ‘See me’
• ·         Smell – ‘Smell me’

We have an extensive range of planting to put in place on Saturday morning and the community garden is for all to enjoy and to take part in. So come and join us and most importantly bring your young growers along to give a hand.

For more information email greeningchinnor@gmail.com or call Linda on 07973 788339

Talk on Air Pollution

Community Herb Planter

Thanks to all for the lovely and positive feedback we have received regarding the community herb planter we put out at the Pavilion in early May. If you haven’t yet seen it, pop along and help yourself to some herbs. We’ve planted them to share with the community. The planter currently contains: Oregano Thyme, Sage, Mint, Salad Burnet, Chives and Parsley. The idea is for people to take a pinch or a snip, only as much as they need for free. More details including some culinary usage can be found here.

We are currently planning an exciting community event for Saturday 21st July. This will involve more planters and an opportunity for families to get involved. You can keep up to date by signing up to our newsletter or check out our Facebook page @greeningchinnor.

Seed & Plant Swap

We would like to thank the good people of Chinnor for their amazing support that they gave us at our recent Seed & Plant Swap. It seems that the whole village was queuing up to donate plants and seeds whilst choosing what they wanted to plant in return. We are delighted to say that we are already starting to plan next year’s event.

What a year... so far!

I think the first part of 2018 must be one of the busiest we've ever had. So just in case you missed it, here's what we have been up to.

First was a tree and hedge planting session in January where together with some of your local Parish Councillors, we put in some glorious young trees to replace those that needed felling in Conigre. In addition a row of native hedging was planted in order to help prevent youngsters having easy access to the traffic dangers of Station Road

Chinnor Repair Cafe We are pleased to say that Greening Chinnor are part of the innovative Repair Cafe Oxfordshire Programme supported by The CAG Network and Oxfordshire County Council. This initiative is happening across Oxfordshire to tackle the growing issue of waste and change the way we view normal household items like toasters and radios. Repair Cafes are a social event where people with broken items are matched with skilled people who like fixing things. The focus being on skill-sharing where rather than throwing items in the bin, attendees will be invited to learn how to fix their item alongside the volunteer fixers. April saw the launch of Chinnor's first Repair cafe. We all had a great afternoon and huge thanks go to our team of “experts” and fixers who worked wonders on the stream of varied items placed in front of them. Also to our team of facilitators who made sure everyone was looked after as well as serving a steady stream of tea and homemade cakes. In addition one of our fixers gave a couple of excellent sessions where he demonstrated how householders can make simple inexpensive fixes to some common plumbing problems.

Our expert team of volunteer fixers were able to mend or offer progressive advice to everything that was brought in with the exception of a single broken iron.

24 items examined
61.6 kilos weighed

Fixed 20 (40 kilos)
Advice given 3 (20 kilos)
Unfixable 1 (1.5 kilos)

The cornucopia of items received were:

a bike, 2 cd players, a ceramic bowl and tray, a waxed jacket, an iron, an extension lead, a printer, a lamp, a padlock, taps, a small watering can, a spider catcher, tent poles, a tyre gauge, a drill charger, chicken bone cutters, secateurs, a hobby horse, small action toys, a small wooden dolls chair, a small Victorian chair and a small leather mystery. If the owner ever finds out what it is, please let us know.

Look out for details of our next Repair Cafe coming up in the autumn. In the meantime, if you would like to get involved either as a fixer or facilitator please email Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com.

Spring Community Litter Pick

We had our belated Community Litter Pick on Sunday 29th April. Despite winter not wanting to finally depart we had an excellent turnout. We were particularly pleased to see some children from the Beavers group turning up to lend a hand. For the first time we made sure that Old Kiln Lakes was included on our clean up. As always, unfortunately, there is still much too much rubbish discarded by the thoughtless.

Incredible Edibles

As part of Chinnor’s contribution to the Incredible Edible Network started in Todmordon, we have planted up our first Community Herb Planter in half an oak barrel outside the Pavilion. There is a good selection of some common and not so common culinary herbs and are there for community use. So go along an take a pinch or have a snip of chives and use them in cooking or in salads. Please just take a what you need and leave some for your fellow residents.




We will be inviting you to join us in placing our next community planters soon so watch this space!

Seed & Plant Swap

Nearly there (phew). We had an excellent turnout of plant donations and garden 'stuff' (as well as customers) at our Seed and Plant swap at the Green Living Event/Giant Swap Shop Event on Saturday 12 May. We even had some garden tools donated which soon found a good home. Last year we swapped or gave, for a small donation, almost 1000 plants - well this year we did even better and totally lost count of what came in or went out. Thanks to your generosity we made enough in donations to help fund next years event. Any plants that were leftover after the event were split and given to Open Gardens and Christian Aid Week.

Sweet Pea - Gardening Advice with an Environmental Slant

Well it looks as though the weather is trying to make amends for the dire period last month. As we have had such a cold and dismal spring, the bees will need all of the help they can get. You will note that there seems to be a record crop of dandelions this year. Don’t rush to cut them down but wait until they are just starting to form seed heads. This will give the bees and ladybirds some valuable support.

Whilst the days are starting to really warm up, the nights can still give us a severe chill. There was a sharp frost last week which has really decimated the early dahlia shoots. You can protect your potatoes by earthing them up. It will also markedly increase the crop

Keep anything that does not need to go in the ground in the greenhouse or cold frame. If you put anything really tender out now then be prepared to replace them. As the soil is starting to warm up you can sow a lot of seeds directly in the ground. Make sure you cover them with fleece as besides keeping them a little warmer it keeps pigeons and flea beetle away.

To keep pests and diseases at bay don’t grow items in the same place every year. Rotate them around your garden or plot on a tri-annual basis.

Good Gardening
Sweet Pea

Repair Cafe Broken Item Form

Some lovely volunteer fixers ready to help you repair your treasures on Saturday 21 April 2018.

To help us manage the repairs, we now have a booking form for you to fill in in advance.

If you would like to let us know in advance what you will be bringing. Find it by following this link

Booking closes Friday 20 April.

Plant & Seed Swap

Saturday 12 May 2018 10:00 pm – 14:00 pm
Mill Lane Community Primary School, Mill Lane, Chinnor, OX39 4RF

Calling all gardeners or would be gardeners

Greening Chinnor's Seed & Plant Swap returns on Saturday 12th May. Once again we will be at The Friends of the Earth Green Living Event at Mill Lane Community Primary School from 10.00 am until 2.00 pm

This will be our 4th Seed & Plant Swap.

Last year we were delighted to swap 1000 plants. So this year, make it bigger! Bring your surplus plants and/or seeds to swap or make a small donation. Free sunflower growing contest for all of the mini gardeners. Get your tomato plants, courgettes and marrows, peppers, sweet corn, beans, brassicas,  lettuce and more – and try some new varieties.

More information contact Alan Brawn on 01844 352753 

Annual General Meeting Agenda

Minutes of previous AGM can be found here. 

Repair Cafe Launch

When: Saturday 21 April 2018 1:30 pm – 4:30 pm
Where: Village Hall, Church Rd, Chinnor OX39 4PQ

Greening Chinnor are delighted to announce their first Repair Café. The idea is to match amazing repairers with people who need stuff fixed … and all for FREE.

You can also pick up ideas on how to fix things yourself, if that interests you. We welcome:

✅ small portable household electrical appliances ✅ electronic items ✅ simple computer problems ✅ toys & mechanical items ✅ bicycles ✅ general bits and bobs 

Please bring items before 3:30 pm 

Bring along items small enough for one person to carry and please back up your data 

 

 Plus we have ‘Plumbing Demo Man’ who will show how it’s possible to make tap repairs with basic tools. 

The repairers are good and can fix many things but there are no guarantees. For further details about the event check out the FAQs on the Repair Café tab. Enquiries: greeningchinnor@gmail.com or call 07973 788339.

The event is entirely run by volunteers and anyone can pop in. As well as repairs you can drop in for a cuppa and homemade cake. The repairs are free but donations towards costs will be gratefully received. There may be some spares/consumables to purchase on the day.

General Meeting Plus Talk: Old Orchard to Community Orchard Shared Supper

All are welcome to come along and join us at 7:30 pm on Wednesday 18 April at the Community Pavilion for a shared supper, short AGM and an interesting talk by guest speaker about how communities can regenerate old orchards. Meet Greening Chinnor and see what we've been up to, our next major project and how you can get involved.

Bring some food or drinks (non-alcoholic) to share and help us celebrate the sterling work that has been achieved by our volunteers.

If you would like to nominate someone for one of the officers role or would like to nominate yourself, the link to our form can be found here.

Rescheduled Litter Pick

A reminder that our Spring Community Litter Pick scheduled originally for the 4th March is now happening on the 29th April.

Come and join us at White’s Field Car Park, Mill Lane, Chinnor, OX39 4RF at 10:00 am. Just bring yourself and some old gloves. Everything else supplied. We will be finished by lunchtime latest. All welcome. Directions to the event can be found here.

Together we can make a difference and clean up the environment on our doorstep.

Notice of AGM plus Talk on regenerating ancient orchards & ‘bring a plate’

Wednesday 18 April at 7.30pm
Council Chamber, Community Pavilion

All are welcome to come along and join us for an interesting talk by guest speaker Claire Conway-Crapp on how old orchards can be regenerated and turned into a community orchard, our AGM and shared supper. Meet Greening Chinnor and see what we've been up to, find out about our next major projects and how you can get involved.

Bring some food or drinks (non-alcoholic) to share and help us celebrate the sterling work that has been achieved by our volunteers.

If you would like to nominate someone for one of the officers role or would like to nominate yourself, the link to our form can be found here.

Free Entrance

For more details check out our website at www.greeningchinnor.blogspot.co.uk and sign up to our occasional newsletter to keep informed or Email: greeningchinnor@gmail.com

POSTPONED - Spring Community Litter Pick

Unfortunately due to the forecasted weather for this weekend we are postponing the Spring Community Litter Pick to Sunday 29th April. Same time, same place.

Keep warm and safe.

Spring Community Litter Pick

Reminder that our Spring Community Litter Pick will be held on Sunday 4th March.

Come and join us at White’s Field Car Park, Mill Lane, Chinnor, OX39 4RF at 10:00 am. Just bring yourself and some old gloves. Everything else supplied. We will be finished by lunchtime latest. All welcome. Directions to event.

Together we can make a difference and clean up the environment on our doorstep.

Repair Cafe Volunteers Meeting

We are holding our first get together for our Repair Cafe Volunteers at 7:30 pm on Monday 26th February in the Games Room at the Village Centre. This will be an open meeting and if you are interested in coming along and finding out about our plans or to volunteer your skills, please feel free to do so. You will be most welcome.

We hope to hold our very first Repair Cafe on 21st April..

As a reminder, we would like to offer a range of fixes/repairs to try and mend broken household items. However this will be dependent on the skills and confidence of our fixers.

The sort of things we would like to be able to offer are:

• mend small electrical items,
• glue broken toys and china,
• replace missing screws
• offer advice with simple computer problems,
• tool sharpening
• mending clothes/up-cycling/fabric crafts

More about Oxfordshire Repair Cafe Initiative

If you think you could help or want to find out more come along and talk to us on the 26th.

Spring Community Litter Pick

Sunday 4th March 2018

Once again, Greening Chinnor is linking up with Keep Britain Tidy for The Great British Spring Clean, a campaign with a simple aim:

... 'to bring people across the country together to clear up the litter that blights our towns, villages, countryside and beaches'.

We are also combining the clean up with the new Scandi craze of Plogging. Do you want to try it? Well now is your chance to stride out energetically and pick litter whilst getting fit.

Alternatively you can join us to amble around some of our beautiful network of paths and catch up with the latest gossip with your fellow villagers (whilst picking up litter).

Either way come and join us at White’s Field Car Park, Mill Lane, Chinnor, OX39 4RF 10:00 Sunday 4th March. Just bring yourself and some old gloves. Everything else supplied. We will be finished by lunchtime latest. All welcome. Directions to event.

Together we can make a difference and clean up the environment on our doorstep.

Repair Cafe

We are hoping to hold our first Repair Cafe in April and are arranging a meeting with all those who have expressed interest in this new exciting project.

We are looking for a range of different 'repair/fixing' skills so we can offer more types of repairs. So if you are an expert on mending small electrical items, gluing broken toys and china, can offer advise with simple computer problems, what about textiles; mending clothes/up-cycling/fabric crafts, why not help. The more diverse our fixers are, the more we can offer to 'fix'. 

The idea is not to provide an anonymous fixing service, but help people learn what needs to be done so that they can gain knowledge from the experts. The items that are fixed will depend entirely on the expertise of our volunteer fixers. There will be some items that will not be fixable as they may be outside our skill set.

We must stress that we are not trying to compete with professional repair shops but help to reduce the amount of small household items that are thrown away.
Contact us if you are interested in helping at the Repair Cafe or want to come along to the meeting.

More about Oxfordshire Repair Cafe Initiative 

Sweet Pea - Gardening Advice with an Environmental Slant

Well we are past the shortest day but some of the coldest weather is yet to come. Sweet Pea is about to give you some contradictory advice. Both to tidy up and to leave untidy.

The cold weather is a gardeners friend it helps reduce pests and disease so get out in your garden and tidy away old pots, slabs, ornaments and general rubbish. Cut back all of the woody stems of perennials like phlox. This will prevent a lot of our garden enemies such as slugs and earwigs having somewhere cosy to pass the winter before coming out to renew the onslaught on our planting. Wash all of your old flower pots and make sure the greenhouse and cold frame are clean. Their time is coming up fast. Put some fleece over treasures that may not be fully winter hardy and trim back items that can be damaged by wind and weather.

Our friends and allies in the form of birds (I’m not sure about pigeons though) need all of the assistance we can give them. So leave a few fallen leaves in odd corners. You will see blackbirds constantly raking through them. Do not be hasty to remove anything with berries, even Ivy. They are invaluable food sources and can be left to stand for a month or two yet.

Make sure that the bird tables and feeders are well supplied and don’t forget some fresh water.

Go through your seed collections and be ruthless and throw out anything that is really out of date. Remember you can always get fresh discounted seeds from the Chinnor allotment and Garden Society on Sunday mornings.

Finally, get planning for 2018. What worked, what didn't and what new wonderful things to try this year.

Happy New Year and Good Gardening
Sweet Pea

Innovative Community Action Groups are taking on unnecessary waste

We're very excited to be part of the successful bid for funding for initial Repair Cafes in Oxfordshire. Working with The CAG Project, Oxford County Council and other Oxfordshire Community Action Groups our aim is to repair items that would be thrown away but could be mended.

We throw away vast amounts of stuff, even things with almost nothing wrong which could get a new lease of life after a simple repair. The trouble is that lots of us have forgotten that we can easily repair things ourselves.

Repair Cafés are free community events where skilled volunteers help people fix their own items to save them from going to waste. The focus is on skill-sharing and an enjoyable ongoing learning process.

Knowing how to fix things is a skill quickly being lost to our modern society and with a Repair Café invaluable practical knowledge is passed on. Items are being used for longer and don’t have to be thrown away. This reduces the volume of raw materials and energy needed to make new items. It cuts CO2 emissions for example, because manufacturing new products and recycling old ones causes CO2 to be released.

With this funding and support we plan to run two Repair Cafes in Chinnor in 2018. To do this, we need your help. What can be fixed is dependent on our volunteer repairers skill set. So if you like fixing things, have a specific skill you could share and like a challenge contact Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com

To find out more about this exciting project go to http://cagoxfordshire.org.uk/innovative-community-action-groups-taking-electronic-waste/

Innovative Community Action Groups are taking on electronic waste - CAG Oxfordshire

Waste electronic equipment is a huge environmental problem in the UK and abroad. There are also huge missed opportunities for communities to benefit from what is…

CAGOXFORDSHIRE.ORG.UK

Happy New Year

We would like to extend a huge thank you to all our volunteers and supporters. As always, without you, Greening Chinnor would not have been able to achieve as much in the community.

Look out for our exciting new community projects for 2018.