August 2022 – The Farm Animal Sanctuary Open Weekend attended by Joanna Lumley and stationery month for Link to Hope shoe boxes
The Farm Animal Sanctuary
Their Open Weekend was a wonderful weekend. It was hot and my gazebo acted a bit like a green house, but it was great to see so many people visit to help raise funds for the upkeep of the animals but also to help raise funds to secure the site by purchasing the land.
There were over a 1,000 visitors and a variety of stalls selling vegan food from sweets, cake and doughnuts, to savoury pasties and Indian side dishes to hot dogs and pizza. There were stalls supporting other animal welfare charities and outreach, and stalls selling eco goods, and my own selling handmade items to raise funds for The Farm Animal Sanctuary.
It meant an early start each morning getting to the Sanctuary in time to set up the gazebo and unload the car before 9:00am – not helped by a road closure on my normal route. I seemed to spend quite a lot on food and drinks – despite taking some with me 😊as the food stalls were too tempting. If you see any of the following at any events I can recommend the frozen Mango and Cream iced drink from Cub Coffee https://www.cub-coffee.com Doughnuts from Golden Glaze Doughnuts, sweets from Bear and Bee https://www.bearandbeesweetcompany.com , cakes from Busy V Bakery https://www.busyvbakery.co.uk including these animal themed cupcakes with 50p per sale going to The Farm Animal Sanctuary.
Unfortunately, I can’t find the details of some of the other food vendors.
On the Saturday Joanna Lumley who is the patron of the charity attended and encouraged everyone to help raise funds to help the charity purchase the land it’s based on to secure it’s future.
A big thank you to everyone who purchased anything from the Bramley Buttons stall – you helped to raise £150.00 for the Sanctuary – next year I’ll need to produce more stock, as I sold out of some items .😊
Post event I’ve now ordered a Tshirt dress in support of The Farm Animal Sanctuary from James Gibson Photography. https://www.jamesgibsonphotography.org/shop-1?Collection=The+Farm+Animal+Sanctuary who had a stall at the event.
You can still visit The Farm Animal Sanctuary at weekends but you do need to pre book – head to https://thefarmanimalsanctuary.co.uk/events to book your tickets for a chance to see the animals with fewer people around.
Link to Hope
This month the theme is Stationery items – suggestions include pencils, crayons, rulers, pads, calculators, notelets. Remember if you are including pencils please also add a pencil sharpener. The family may have a sharp knife they can use to sharpen the end of pencils when they wear down, but some might not and it’s much safer and easier if you include a pencil sharpener. Poundstretcher have 6 Lego shaped pencil sharpeners for 90p – they are quite chunky so they are quite good to put in elderly boxes as well as family boxes.
I always put some sort of notepad and a mixture of pencils, pens and sharpener in every box I do as they are great for elderly boxes as well as family boxes. Poundland still seems to be the best value for most stationery items if you are doing several boxes. 32 non retractable biros for £1.00 (single colour or mixed black, blue and red ink), 30 pencils with eraser tops for £1.00, both work out just over 3p each, and 4 spiral notepads for £1.00 which work out at 25p each.
If you’re doing one box and don’t have anyone to swap items with then both Poundland and Poundstretcher/Bargain Buys have stationery sets for £1.00 which contain all the basics, 3 pencils, 3 biros, eraser, sharpener and a highlighter pen. (The Poundland set does appear to include an additional biro.) Home Bargains have a stationery set that contains one pen, pencil, sharpener, eraser and small ruler for 69p.
Poundstretcher have 10 biros for 50p, and Wilko have 10 for 60p.
Sharpeners – in addition to the Lego sharpeners in Poundstretcher, Tesco have a metal double sharpener for 40p and a large eraser for 40p, or if you have a clubcard you can get 2 erasers for 80p or a double canister sharpener for 80p. Wilko have a single metal sharpener for 50p, or a capsule with sharpener and eraser for 70p, or a double ended eraser and a double metal sharpener pack for 80p. Home Bargains have a metal double sharpener for 29p, or a sharpener/eraser capsule for 49p.
Poundstretcher have several good value stationery items in addition to those already mentioned. You can get 12 double ended pencil crayons for 75p, packs of 12 small erasers for 60p, solar calculators for 90p, rulers for 50p and 2 pairs of children’s scissors for 90p.
Home Bargains have 12 felt pens for 59p, Tesco have a pack of 12 long coloured pencils for 75p.
Bargains this Month
The only bargains I’ve found so far this month are dinosaur pencil cases in Poundland reduced to 50p, and some children’s ankle socks – 10 pairs reduced from £6.00 to £3.00. If I find any other bargains I’ll update the post.
Till next time