Thank You and Merry Christmas

Repair Cafe - 23rd November 2019

What another great experience at our 4th Chinnor Repair Cafe held at the Village Hall on the 23rd November

It did seem to be a bit slow at times but it was steady and our Fixers had plenty to do.

Time to share some results, we had:

28 broken items brought in, of that 19 items were repaired, 6 items couldn't be repaired and for 3 of the items, appropriate advice was given. Well done team!

In all 51 kilos of broken items were brought to the cafe  – 41 kilos of which were electrical.

To give you an idea of the types of items we will have a go at, these were the items brought in:

2 food mixers, a blender, an iron, a formula dispenser, a CD player, a toaster, a clock, clock radio and radio, 3 table lamps, a floor lamp and 2 Dyson hand held vacuum cleaners! 

We also had a baby monitor, a telephone cable, a coat, 2 saucepans 1 for a handle repair and the other for a lid repair, a cushion that needed a bit of solder on the battery operation, a chair, a vacuum cleaner and then separately, a vacuum cleaner hose, an earring for gluing, a foot pump and a pair of slippers.

Not bad at all. 

We had some very positive feedback and some of the comments were: 

• Friendly, welcoming and very knowledgeable
• Please teach young people to preserve skills
• Such helpful people, very knowledgeable
• Speedy and efficient - very quick to repair
• Fantastic, great
• Absolutely loved it - very positive
• Wonderful
• Helpful advice

Special thanks to Tina for keeping us all well lubricated and to Sandy for ensuring the smooth flow of the process.

Our next Repair Café will be on Saturday 15th February 2020 which ties in with the The Big Fix 2020! The Big Fix is Britain’s BIGGEST repair cafe! All around the country, fixers are gathering on 15th Feb to fix more items in one day than ever before. I think this will be an extra special event. I hope that we will see you there!

If you would like to get involved either as a Fixer, Facilitator or helping out on refreshments, please email me at greeningchinnor@gmail.com.

Repair café – Local Repair Businesses

Greening Chinnor run local repair cafés in Chinnor, our next one being on Saturday 23rd November at Chinnor Village Hall and we would like to promote local repair companies at the café.

As you may or may not be aware, repair cafés are not about taking business away from local businesses but are a tool to promote repair and passing on skills. We have our fixers who will do what they can, but we cannot guarantee that we can fix an item, plus we only have a limited time when the café is open.

We are keen to promote local repair businesses and bring them into this process. To this end, we are putting together a list of local repair businesses that we can promote to our visitors if there is an item that is too complicated or outside our scope. If you run such a business and would be interested in being on our repair companies list, please contact me at greeningchinnor@gmail.com.

If you are interested in coming along and either helping us or just to have a look please feel free to do so. You will be made more than welcome.

Next Chinnor Repair Café

Our next Repair Café will be held on Saturday 23rd November at Chinnor Village Hall 10:00 am – 1:00 pm (last item accepted 12:30 pm).

You can bring any small household electrical item (e.g. kettle, radio, hifi, lamp, food mixers, etc). All electrical items, if accepted will have a safety test carried out before return. Please don’t bring white goods or anything you can’t carry. You can also bring toys and mechanical items. We probably won’t have spare parts, but hopefully will be able to recommend what is needed. We have our fixers who will do what they can, but we cannot offer any guarantee that we can fix an item.

You can bring any broken item that needs gluing – e.g. china, plastic toys etc. We will have various kinds of glue such as araldite, super glue, etc.

You can bring clothes or textiles that need a little stitching whether they’re clothes, bags, accessories, cushion covers, blankets or other fabric items and our team of seamstresses will see what they can do.

This is a brilliant way to make a difference in reducing your ‘waste’ whilst learning how you can make simple repairs. It’s also a great social event where everybody is chatting and sharing experiences and ideas.

This is a free event, although donations towards running the event would be appreciated.

We are keen to increase our pool of fixers and helpers so we can help more people at each event. Please get in touch if you have skills to share to help our event be successful and run smoothly. If you are interested either pick up the phone and give me a call on 07973 788339 or email me at greeningchinnor@gmail.com

Repair Cafe

Autumn Community Litter Pick

On the 27th October we carried out our 16th Community Litter Pick and were delighted with the turn out despite it coinciding with the Welsh Rugby semi-final and clock change day. We were very pleased that again the weather was kind to us and we had a beautiful blue sky. It was lovely to see new (and old) faces and we were particularly pleased with all the families that joined us.

We were able to litter pick most of our most popular footpaths and play areas and were particularly pleased that there was a marked improvement in the level of rubbish found in most areas. Special mention must go to the residents of Old Kiln Lakes who are now really keeping the area litter free.

We will, as usual, be organising a Spring Community Pick, details will be published shortly.

Apple Day at the Orchard

What a day we had at our first autumn apple event on Saturday 19th October and even the weather was kind to us.

We'd hoped for a good supply of apples and we weren't disappointed. Apples came from all over the village plus what we picked at the orchard, a very interesting blend. All in all we managed to produce about 50 bottles of freshly pressed artisan apple juice. Not bad for our first attempt.

We had some great refreshments made by our volunteers which went down very well with the visitors and our helpers! 'Find the tree' quiz, the longest peel competition and guess the weight of the pumpkin kept our smaller visitors entertained.

It was good to see so many people interested in the social history of the site and there was much perusal of our old photographs. We have now identified approximately 1/3 of the heritage apples growing in the orchard and hope to identify the rest next year.

Our thanks to everyone who helped make this a great afternoon.

Station Road Community Garden Planters

The planters have now been winterised and the worn out plants removed. There's been some pruning and tidying with some nice fresh compost and winter Rainbow Chard planted.

The three small adjacent planters have been removed for the winter and will be back in the spring when we start next year's planting.

Autumn Litter Pick

Donkey Lane Community Orchard

Our next orchard working party will be on Tuesday 15 October 2019 10.00 – 13.00 at the orchard.

How to find us: head up Keens Lane, cross at the railway crossing into Donkey Lane. The orchard is on the right hand side. Tools and safety equipment supplied. Bring a cup for refreshments.

If you'd like to find out more about how you can join or support this project, contact me via the listed options or come along to a working party and have a chat with us.

Autumn Apple Day

Autumn Programme of Events

24 September 2019 | General Greening Chinnor Meeting | The Games Room, The Village Centre, High St, Chinnor OX39 4DH | @ 19:30. We will be discussing our ongoing projects and plans for the future. Come and see how you can get involved in some exciting and rewarding volunteering activities. All welcome.

15 October 2019 | Donkey Lane Community Orchard Working Party | 11:00 - 13:00 at the orchard. For directions, see below.

19 October 2019 | Donkey Lane Community Orchard Autumn Apple Event | 14:00 - 16:00 at the orchard.  Come and join us and explore the orchard whilst having some fun and refreshments. There will be apple themed games and bakes. Free entrance - donations towards costs welcome.

20 October 2019 | Station Road Community Garden Winter Planting & Tidy up | Station Road, Chinnor | 10:30 - 11:30. Help us winterize the garden and plant up for the winter. Come and have a chat and find out about the planters. 

27 October 2019 | Autumn Community Litter Pick | Meet at White's Field Car Park, Mill Lane, Chinnor | 10:00 - 12:30.

20 November 2019 | Donkey Lane Community Orchard Meeting | White's Field Community Hall, Mill Lane, Chinnor, Oxon, OX39 4RF | 19:30 - 21:30 | All welcome.

23 November 2019 | Repair Cafe | Village Hall, Church Road, Chinnor, OX39 4PQ | 10:00-13:00 last item accepted 12:30. Free entrance, free repairs – donations towards costs welcome.

As always we are looking for volunteers who would like to get involved in either mending things or to help organise and facilitate the Repair Cafe. We have lots of different roles and different types of involvement. If you want to find out more, please feel free to contact me.

How to find the orchard: Head up Keen's Lane, Chinnor, cross the railway crossing and the orchard is directly on the right hand side. The working parties are to help regenerate and restore the ancient orchard and to explore the social history of the site. Bring some tools if you have them and a cup so you can have some refreshments.

Station Road Community Planters

There has been an amazing crop of tomatoes in the Station Road Community planters. Help yourselves -  they are for picking. 

We were pleasantly surprised to see that our three planters have been joined by three siblings. If the person(s) who built and stocked them could contact Greening Chinnor (greeningchinnor@gmail.com) then we can make sure that next year we can coordinate our joint efforts. 

The autumn and winter restocking will take place at the end of October.

Here's an interesting volunteering opportunity

Volunteers wanted for pioneer Chilterns headwater Study - 'Water in a Dry Landscape'

If you are interested in the springs and streams of the Chilterns and can commit to helping with quarterly water-quality surveys, the Chilterns Conservation Board (CCB) would like to hear from you.

The CCB has been awarded Heritage Lottery Funding for a major series of projects, including ‘Water in a Dry Landscape’ (WDL). In recent years, a lot of attention has been given to the chalk streams of the dip slope – rivers such as the Chess and the Misbourne – but the springs, headwaters and streams draining the scarp slope have been largely overlooked and under-appreciated. WDL, with your help, will change that.

Volunteers, are needed to work in small teams carrying out water quality surveys at up to 8 sites four times over the course of a year. Equipment and training will be provided. The data arising will be used to identify the best aquatic sites on the scarp. These will then be surveyed by specialists for their flora and fauna. Your survey results will also help to identify locations for practical works to improve biodiversity and water quality.

So, if you would like to be part of this ground-breaking study discovering the hidden value of the Chilterns’ springs and streams, please get in touch with Mike Furness, who is co-ordinating the project on behalf of CCB (mfurness@chilternsaonb.org, 07422 501619).

The survey period is expected to run from August 2019 to June 2020. Training is planned for 20th July (morning) at Wendover and 25th July (evening) in Princes Risborough. In total, more than forty sites will be studied by five teams of volunteer surveyors, who will be using the equipment provided to assess a range of parameters on site, reporting the data back to Mike for collation and analysis.

No special skills are needed as full training will be given, but you will need to be able to get to some remote locations, sometimes involving a bit of a walk, and CCB would like you to commit, as far as is possible, to all four survey rounds.

If this sounds like you, please contact Mike on mfurness@chilternsaonb.org or call him on 07422 501619.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard Working Party

Our next orchard working party will be on Saturday 13th July 1:00 - 4:00 pm at the orchard with another arranged for Tuesday 6th August 10:00 am - 1:00 pm.

The main focus for the next few working parties is to keep nettles and brambles from areas already cleared.

How to find us: head up Keens Lane, cross at the railway crossing into Donkey Lane. The orchard is on the right hand side. Tools and safety equipment supplied. Bring a cup for refreshments.

If you'd like to find out more about how you can join or support this project, contact me via the listed options below or come along to the meeting or working parties and have a chat with us.

Repair Cafe

What an excellent event our Repair Café on the 29th June turned out to be. We had 9 fixers and a host of facilitators all ready to help with whatever came in to surprise us. We had radios, amp, TV, chainsaw, toys, lamps, slow cooker, food mixer, trousers, a coffee machine and a brooch to name just some of the items. Of the 28 items that came through the door, we were able to fix 17, give advice on 5 and unfortunately could not fix 6. Some of the items even went home with the fixers to fix in their own time, that’s dedication for you!

We have now run 3 Repair Cafés and are delighted with the level of support and interest from our fellow villagers. This means that we are confident that regular Repair Cafés will continue. 

For those who aren't aware, Greening Chinnor are part of the Community Action Group Project Oxfordshire (CAG Oxfordshire) who are funded and supported by Oxfordshire County Council (OCC). There are over 65 community action groups like us in the network and as part of this network, last year we signed up for the Oxfordshire Repair Cafe Project.

We are pleased to say that OCC and the "CAG project" won two national recycling awards for the Repair Café Oxfordshire project which was recognised by the judges for bringing together communities and positive action to reduce waste. More on this award can be found on the OCC website.

If you wondered if anything was done with the information on items coming through our Repair Cafés, then you will be interested to know that information on all the items brought in and the outcome (fixed, not fixed, advice given) is logged and then fed into two databases, CAG Oxfordshire (which in turn is fed into Oxfordshire County Council) and the "Restart Project’s" national database. This is of particular interest as the data collected at Repair Cafes and Restart Parties is very valuable, as it allows community repair groups to quantify their environmental impact and it helps "The Restart Project" document, over time, key barriers to repairables. 

Our thanks to everone who has been involved in the Chinnor Repair Cafes and enabled this project to be so successful.

Our next Repair Café will be held on Saturday 23rd November at Chinnor Village Hall.

Repair Cafe 29th June 2019 - Booking Form

Plans are now being finalised for our latest Repair Cafe in Chinnor. We will be open from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm and will accept items up to 12:00 pm (to give the fixers a chance to fix things). Check out our FAQs page to see the sort of items we accept.

If you would like to let us know what you indend to bring, our Booking Form can be found here. It is a short form but it will give us an expectation of what will be coming in.

Please note that we cannot guarantee a time slot or that we will be able to fix your item.

Station Road Community Garden Planter List

An updated list of the planting in the Community Garden can be found on the Project tab under Edible Chinnor or by following this link.

Blossom & Open Day

      

We held our first open event on the 28 April. We were concerned that after storms, there would not be any blossom left for anyone to enjoy.

We needn't have worred, there was still plenty for our visitors to see. After erecting our gazebo and putting up photos and information on the history of the site, we had a steady stream of visitors all afternoon who enjoyed a stroll around the orchard and discussions with our lovely volunteers about the project. Then to enjoy some refreshments. Thank you to everyone who came along and supporte the event. And for all the wonderful possitive feedback. Thanks also to Jeanette and Carol for children's blossom trail.

If you'd like to find out more about how you can join or support this project, contact me at greeningchinnor@gmail.com or sign up to our newsletter which is the best way of finding out about volunteering opportunities. Or come along to one of our working parties and pop in and have a chat with us.

Station Road Community Garden

Summer season planting has begun in Station Road Community Garden.

All the Rhubarb Chard has now been removed. Don’t worry, in the autumn we will be planting Rainbow Chard which is even more exotic.

Alan’s been busy growing a selection of amazing veg which went into the planters this week. They will need a little time to grow and require a bit of TLC and plenty of water.

There are various colourful varieties of lettuce which are mixtures of cut and come again, cos and salad leaves – colours ranging from deepest green to dark red.

There’s a mixture of tomatoes ranging from Tumbling Tom which are a trailing variety to Sweet Million which are a children’s delight offering lots of small sweet fruit. In addition there are Black Russian tomatoes – one of the most delicious for salads and also Horn of the Andes  - a memorable tomato that looks just like a sweet red pepper and tastes like tomatoes used to do.

We have planted a small selection of Chilli Peppers for those with more accommodating taste buds – Apache, Cayenne and Jalapeno.

We have been given a generous donation of baby onions and leeks – pick them small and you will find several cucumber plants which should give a tasty treat, again pick them small.

We are hoping for a couple of surprises which we can give more details about when they germinate – fingers crossed. Tall and dwarf Sunflowers are already in place. An updated list of what’s in each planter later will be posted later in the week.

As the summer progresses, you will see that our yellow raspberry will start to come to fruition. A yellow sweet tasty raspberry is an absolute magnet for little fingers.
You will note that there are various plantings to both give a sensory delight and to give support to our local pollinators (aka bees).

To make sure our community gains maximum benefits from the Planters please make sure that you take note of the following guidelines:

•    Only pick when they are ready – there is more than enough for everyone
•    Pick fruit – please do not pull up the plant
•    Be gentle with the herbs – particularly the Bay – Over picking has made it sit there and sulk.

See, Smell and Taste but leave something behind for your fellow villagers.

Finally please, please, please give them some water if you can, both the garden and Alan would be most grateful. And if you have anything that you wish to plant in the planters then let us know and if you see us at the garden, why don’t you stop by and have a chat.

Our Next Repair Cafe

Greening Chinnor Meeting

Come along to our meeting tonight and see what we've learnt from our latest events. Find out about our upcoming events and how you can be involved.

Where:                                         When: 

White's Field Community Hall,    7:30 pm. All welcome

Mill Lane, Chinnor, OX39 4RF

AGM & Celebration Evening

Thank you to everyone who came to help celebrate our amazing achievements over the last year. An excellent evening had by all.

The minutes from the AGM and a copy of the Annual Report can be found on our website or by clicking on the links

Date for your diary

Donkey Lane Community Orchard Blossom & Open Day

Donkey Lane Community Orchard Blossom Day

28th April 2019 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm at the Orchard

Most of the initial clearance work has now been completed and the site is much more safe to visit.

Unfortunately due to safety concerns both the den and tree house have had to be removed. Now that the light can get to the trees we are able to see some welcome fresh growth and considerable blossom.

We all knew about the Chinnor plum and it being a solitary specimen. Well we have now found and cleared three specimens. They are all covered in blossom and we wait with great interest as to the fruits.

For the first time in many, many years the orchard will be open to welcome visitors to see what has been achieved and to find out the plans for the future   Come along and enjoy the blossom. We will be delighted to show you around and we hope that you will enjoy a cup of tea and possibly a cake.

We will also be hosting a free Easter Egg trail for children.

Before we started

Apple tree trunk

Chinnor Plum blossom

Donkey Lane Community Orchard

Our next orchard meeting will be held on the 9th April at 7:30 pm in the White's Field Community Hall, Chinnor, Oxon, OX39 4RF. All welcome. Directions

The next working party will be on Saturday 13th April at the orchard between 1:00 pm - 4:00 pm. All welcome. Bring a cup for refreshments.

Head up Keen's Lane, across the railway crossing and the orchard is directly on the right. These working party are to help regenerate and restore the ancient orchard and to explore the social history of the site.

Thank You

A big thank you to everyone who turned out for our recent (rather chilly)  community litter pick and an extra big thank you to Diane in the Field Café who very kindly donated free hot drinks to all of our volunteers. As we had lots of people, despite it being Mothering Sunday and Clock change day, we were able to cover some new sites. So in total we carried out litter picking on the following areas:

• Whites Field and Mill Lane
• Conigre field and play park
• The footpath from Springfield Gardens back to Holland Close
• The Driftway down towards Kingston Blount
• Footpath 8 towards Thame Road
• Chinnor section of the Ridgeway and the Rec
• Old Kiln Lakes including all of the ad hoc paths
• B4009 from the Henton turn up to the County boundary

Unfortunately, after a few years of decline we did see and collect a lot more litter and as our litter pick was registered with the Great British Spring Clean all our hard work will be collated in the national numbers.

Chinnor Parish Walks Series No 1 Leaflet

We are delighted that the first of the Chinnor Parish walk leaflets produced by Greening Chinnor with sponsorship from Chinnor Parish Council and support from Chinnor and Thame Friends of the Earth has now been published.

Copies can be found at the Parish Office or be downloaded here. This first walk, which takes in Emmington, will be the first of a series of 5 or 6. Watch this space for details of the next walk leaflet which we are sure will be familiar to some of our fellow villagers.

Spring Community Litter Pick

Not long to go now :-)

Spring Community Litter Pick

Donkey Lane Community Orchard Minutes

Thanks to everyone who came along to the Donkey Lane Orchard meeting on the 26 February. A copy of the minutes can be found here.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard Meeting & Next Working Parties

The next orchard meeting will be held on Tuesday 26th February 7:30 pm at White's Field Community Hall, White's Field, Mill Lane, Chinnor, Oxon, OX39 4RF. All welcome.

Our next working parties will be held on:

Saturday 2nd March: 1:00 pm - 4:00 pm ish and
Tuesday 5th March: 10:00 am - 1:00 pm ish

Head up Keen's Lane, across the railway crossing and the orchard is directly on the right. These working party are to help regenerate and restore the ancient orchard and to explore the social history of the site.

Bring some tools if you have them and a cup so you can have some refreshments.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard Working Parties

It is not often we are lost for words but we have to confess to being completely speechless (almost) regarding the change that has already been made to the Community Orchard by the dedicated group of volunteers during the recent working parties.

Most of the fruit trees are clear of Ivy as far up as can been reached. We have probably cleared about 70% of our planned first stage. As we can now see the fruit trees properly, it is obvious that these are the trees in the original photographs standing in the garden of the cottages. Some of the trees are a bit wobbly (but then so would you be if you had been standing for 150 years).

Our objective is for every fruit tree to have it’s own 'Management Plan' with the first stage being to remove the Ivy and brambles and to provide support in the form of crucks. We have made a significant start on this. With respect to the underground den that was onsite, when we turned up for our first working party on Saturday 9th February, we found that some of the den’s supporting timbers had been removed and with the the recent spell of wet weather, the roof had collapsed. Later in the year we will have a small working party to ensure this area is made completely safe. The tree house is still standing. We carried out a structural survey and were disappointed to see that the floor is completely rotten and dangerous to use. To ensure the safety of our volunteers we removed  a few insecure timbers. A plan for the tree house will be made at our next meeting. The priority is to ensure that none of our children or grandchildren come to any harm from the structure and perhaps plan for a safe replacement that will give maximum, safe community enjoyment. Read more ...

Plant and Seed Swap

Our next highly popular Seed & Plant Swap will be held as part of the Chinnor & Thame Friends of the Earth Green Fayre at Mill Lane School, Mill Lane, Chinnor, OX9 4RF on Saturday 11th May 2019 between 10:00 am and 2:00 pm. 

We are already planting some items of interest which we will hope will tempt you to come and join us and make it as big a success as last year when about 1000 plants changed hands. You know how it works now. Bring something to swap or make a small contribution towards costs. 

A request to all of you gardeners out there. We are all trying to cut down our use of plastic or recycle it. Well if you have any spare 3” plastic flower pots (3” is diameter at top) then we can use them for our pricking out. If you have any available please email us at grenningchinnor@gmail.com and we'll collect them.

Chinnor Parish Footpaths - Henton

We're delighted to report that the overgrown wasteland behind the houses on the left hand side of the main street in Henton (Footpaths 13 and 44) have now been cleared by the South Chiltern Path Maintenance Volunteers (SCPMV affiliated to the Chiltern Society) working alongside our Parish Path Warden.

This is still work in progress as the remaining rickety stiles will be replaced by gates once funds are available. Below you will see a couple of before and after pictures.

Meeting

A quick reminder that the next Donkey Lane Community Orchard meeting will be held on Tuesday 15th January 2019 at White's Field Community Hall, Mill Lane, Chinnor, Oxon, OX39 4RF from 19:30 - 21:30.

Come along and take part in the discussion on turning the disused orchard into a community orchard. All welcome

Dates for your diary

15 January 2019 | Donkey Lane Community Orchard Open Meeting | White's Field Community Hall, Mill Lane, Chinnor, Oxon, OX39 4RF | 19:30 - 21:30 | All welcome

21 January 2019 | Greening Chinnor Open Meeting | email for details | 19:30 - 21:30 | All welcome