20112011

Welcome to Northfield Ecocentre’s November newsletter. Thereare developments unfolding at the Ecocentre with a newchildren’s event which will replace the previous Family Hour. Allupcoming dates for this new event can be found on page threeand are also on our website events page.Read on to hear from Georgia who is back as Manager followingmaternity leave and also for all the details on our new Christmasfamily event. Keep in contact with us by emailingenquiries@northfieldecocentre.org or tweet us at@northfieldeco. You are also welcome to visit the Ecocentreon our open days every Thursday and Friday.We hope to see you soon,

Date Time Event Description

Weds Nov 9 7pm -8.30pm

Friends ofVictoriaCommon

All welcome. Meet at theEcocentre. We will be joined bylocal Councillor Mr Randal Brewand the constituency ParkManager, Sue Amey to discusspotential developments within thepark.

Sat Nov 12 10am -1pm

SWAP IT! AndFree EnergySurgery advice

Swap your good quality unwantedclothes for something else forFREE!

Sat 26 Nov 10am -4.30pm

Mosaics forBeginners£45

Learn to mosaic using second handand recycled materials.A School of Green Living course.

Sun 11 Dec 10am -4.30pm

Patchwork &Quilting£40

Designed for beginners. Relaxingday of sewing and quilting usingblock construction.A School of Green Living course.

New activity sessions for children: Eco KidsThe first event is on Saturday December 3 with lots ofChristmas activities for children and families.£1 donation. All children to be accompanied by an adult.More details on this event are on the back page.

Weekly groups

Gardening:Thurs 10 - 12 noon

Sewing & Crafts:Fri 10 - 12 noon

Public OpeningTimes

Thursday 10am - 5pmFriday 10am - 5pm

EcocentreServices

· Loans Library· Fact sheets· Home energy audits· Free advice service· Tours of the building· Free items· Seed swap· Internet access· Interactive displays

This Month…-Welcome back Georgia

-Ecocentre developments

-New Christmas familyevent

-Tips for outdoors and in

November Newsletter

School of Green Living is a series of courses aimed at making sustainableliving easier and fun! For more information visit the courses page of NorthfieldEcocentre website www.northfieldecocentre.org/courses Or for more informationand to book a course, call 0121 448 0119.

ECOCENTRE

NEWS

For more local news read our blog: www.northfieldecocentre.org

Georgia Stokes has been on maternity leave and has just recently returned asManager to Northfield Ecocentre. Read Georgia’s thoughts on returning to the centrebelow…

It's been eleven months since I was officially last at Northfield Ecocentre. I have had awonderful time at home with my beautiful boys but I am excited to be back. Since Iwent on maternity leave last year there have been so many positive changes at theEcocentre and there is much to look forward to.

If you haven't visited recently then do pop by to see thegarden before winter sets in. It is still green, lush andverdant. The sensory garden designed by children atSt Laurence's School will capture your mind and body,and there are so many ideas to take away and use inyour own home. The recent mural really makes thecentre feel alive and welcoming.

The groups (gardening, sewing and family hour) have really developed to become friendly,social settings where people can learn new skills andfind out more about sustainability issues while makingnew friends. A number of courses have successfullyrun through the School of Green Living with manymore planned for this year and next.

On the advice side the Ecocentre is working withpartners to deliver energy use advice, and to developconsultancy services. I am amazed by the number ofreally practical helpful factsheets the staff and

volunteers have produced to help us all reduce our carbon emissions and live in moresustainable ways.

You may have seen the Ecocentre featured recently in the Birmingham Mail or heard ourown Luke Pearson talking on BBC WM about the Northfield’s Orchard project. We areworking with a number of parks and organisations to develop these orchards already, doget in touch if you can provide land for a community orchard, would like to sponsor atree or have time to volunteer to help plant the trees.

Let’s not forget the awards we've won, the West Midlands STARTAward for Low Carbon Communities and the BirminghamEnvironmental Partnership Award. All of these things and so muchmore have helped to create an exciting community in the heart ofNorthfield where we can all work together to live in moreenvironmentally sustainable ways.Thank you to all the amazingstaff and volunteers for workingso hard to make all these thingshappen and thank you toeveryone that has come along

to make the Ecocentre the exciting, dynamic place itis today.I am really excited that I can be part of all this. I hopeyou are too! See you soon.

Welcome back to Georgia Stokes

Georgia Stokes

Ecocentre mural

Interior of Ecocentre

START award

For info on future children’s activities visit: www.northfieldecocentre.org/activities

Northfield Ecocentre Developments

ECOCENTRE

NEWS

It's the last Family Hour: Join us for a party!

Join us on November 3 for a party to celebrate andsay thank you to the supporters of Family Hour. FamilyHour is evolving into Eco Kids, a new initiative startingin December which will replace Family Hour. The lastFamily Hour session will be on November 3rd with acelebration party with food and drink from 4-5pm. Allwelcome, call 0121 448 0119 to book.

Eco kids is aimed at children aged 3-8 years and theaim is to create a welcoming space where they canlearn to be green, have fun, make new friends, takepart in eco crafts, games, quizzes and nature trails. £1donation per child, adults to accompany.Call 0121 448 0119 for more information.Eco Kids upcoming dates:

Spruce up your Christmas - Sat 3 Dec, 11am-3pm

Valentine's Fun Day - Tues 14 Feb, 2pm-4pm

Easter Fun Day - Weds April 4, 2pm-4pm

Spring has Sprung! - Sat 14, April 2pm-4pm

The Big Lunch 2012 - Sat June 2, 11am-3pm

Eco Fun Day! - Tues 5 June, 2pm-4pm.

In the October newsletter we highlightedsome of the key areas that NorthfieldEcocentre offers. We also referred to theprojects and developments that are frequent-ly taking place here as the Ecocentre growsand develops.

Northfield Ecocentre staff and board are cur-rently reviewing all areas of our work and arekeen to hear from you, our visitors.

Do you attend our weekly groups? Have youtaken one of our School of Green Livingcourses? What do you feel is the best aspect ofour work and what does the centre mean toyou? Are there any changes or improvementsyou would like to suggest to us? Email yourideas to: enquiries@northfieldecocentre.org.

Watch this space for news of our continuingdevelopment.

New Children’s Group: Eco Kids

Ecocentre and Sewing group

School of Green Living(SOGL)

Mosaics Sat 26 Nov 10am - 4.30pm. £45Patchwork & Quilting 11 Dec 10am -

4.30pm. £40Book on 0121 448 0119www.northfieldecocentre.org/courses

Things we like…Stirchley Community Market

Freshly baked bread, handmade crafts,hot food, fresh coffee, wholefoods…

Tuesdays 1 Nov & 6 December 2011Stirchley United Working Men’s Club

4pm - 8pm

www.stirchleymarket.wordpress.com

In yourHouse:

Leaf mulch is an excellent soiladdition. It is supplied free bynature, is simple to use, andhas a huge impact on soilhealth.Make your leaf mulch bycollecting fallen leaves. Pile theleaves in an unused corner ofthe garden and let them rotdown. Keep the pile damp. Youcan speed the process up bymowing the leaves first tobreak them up. The processwill still take 6 - 12 months.To store the leaves while theybreak down, you could insteaduse galvanised chicken wire tocreate a simple 4 sided cage, orplace the collected leavesinside a black bag with holesin the sides. Add water if theleaves are dry, every 2 months.

Support ourwork: Become aFriend of NorthfieldEcocentre. Go towww.northfieldecocentre.org/join-us/support-us

Address: 53 Church Road, Northfield, Birmingham, B31 2LB (behind Oulsnams) Phone: 0121448 0119 Email: enquiries@northfieldecocentre.org

Website: www.northfieldecocentre.org Twitter: @northfieldeco

Spruce up your Christmas! On Saturday 3 December 2011 from 11am – 3pm atNorthfield Ecocentre you can join us for a tree themed Christmas event!

There will be Christmas trees, wreaths and hand-crafted gifts for sale, edible treats, festivecraft activities, games and more. You can also join us to ‘dress’ the Christmas tree and tovisit our new community orchard in Victoria Common for its public opening. Adults andchildren welcome, all children to be accompanied.

For more information on this event and our other events, visitwww.northfieldecocentre.org/activities/events or call 0121 448 0119.

In October Crochet for Beginners took place at NorthfieldEcocentre. This was a three hour course led by artist,craft educator and crochet extraordinaire Denise Quinn.In keeping with the Ecocentre’s green values, the coursewas designed to enable beginners to learn the ropes,while up-cycling unwanted fabric to create a useful,hand-made bag. And, as you’d expect it was a greatsuccess…

On the day, participants took little persuasion to delveinto the piles of colourful t-shirts and trousers and createcontinuous strips of fabric from them with which tocrochet. They learnt the basics of crochet starting withthe base, then moving on to make the sides of the bagand finally the straps. Techniques included holding hookand tension; how to chain and double crochet; and howto follow a pattern.

For those who had crocheted before but were a bit rusty,the course was a welcome reminder. For others it wasa completely new skill to master, which was successfullycracked by the end. Well done all!

www.peekocrochet.com

Spruce up your Christmas

Up-cycling: Crochet for Beginners

For event information visit: www.northfieldecocentre.org/activities/events

Outdoors:

Central England Area Quaker Meeting Charities Registered Charity No. 224571

Crochet for Beginners

Ideas for a moneysaving and more ecofriendly Christmas:

Use old wallpaper as wrappingpaper. You can also use oldmagazine or comic pages insteadof buying expensive gift wrap.

Make Christmas cakes as giftsfor friends. Have a look atwww.goodtoknow.co.uk/recipes/christmas-cake for deliciousrecipes.

For a list of inspiring and freeChristmas gift ideas, visitwww.buynothingchristmas.org/alternatives/