See our website We normally meet very informally every Wednesday evening at The Exmouth Arms
7pm to 9pm.
Come and join us! |
Who are we?
| Wendy - Chair
Clare - Secretary
Angeline - Treasurer
Scarlett - Buy Local
Becky - Go Green
Belinda- Skillspace
Angela - Community
plus all the other members of the CC Steering Groups and Networks
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Meeting Dates
Skillspace Group
Business & Freelancers Networking Evening
August 10th, 2010 from 7:30pm to 9:30pm - The Beehive, Montpellier Villas
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Cheltenham Connect is the proud recipient of a £4000 Cheltenham Borough Council Community Pride Grant
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Become a Sponsor of Cheltenham Connect
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We are actively looking for people to help us grow. If you can help in any way let us know
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JUNE AND JULY 2010The FestivalWhat a fantastic week-end we had! It was a challenge running the festival over two sites but (other than having to move the bouncy castle to softer ground) everything went according to plan. The weather held out and the craftspeople managed to cope with the sudden gusts of wind (although we had to organise emergency bags of pebbles!) Thanks to the sale of programmes and raffle tickets we raised about £1000 (which will go towards the running costs of Cheltenham Connect over the next year). Welcome to AngelaWe are delighted to announce that we have now have a new co-ordinator for our Community Group. Local resident Angela Rimmer will be developing some of the great ideas that this group had (see below for more details) and has already suggested some really interesting ones of her own. New TreasurerAngeline Fuller has done a wonderful job being our treasurer over the last six months, but her work commitments have now changed and we will need to find someone to take over the role later in the year. Other than overseeing the finances for the two big events that we now intend to hold every year the job is not very demanding, but it is an important one as the person involved will become one of the three core officers of the association. If you think that you may have the skills and time to help with this please email Wendy.Increased costsOne bad piece of news is that our Ning networks (which were previously a free resource) are now going to cost us $2.95 monthly for each forum with under 150 members and $19.95 for over 150. With our four networks this is going to massively increase our annual running costs, but we have looked at all the other networking options and nothing seems to give us the same quality of flexibility. Fundraising has therefore suddenly become much more important! If you can help with this (or would like to make a donation to Cheltenham Connect) please let us know. StorageWe are very grateful to member Richard Jackson for offering us storage space for all the items that we have now accumulated. We are still looking for permanent storage space of our own though so let us know if you have anything suitable. |
 | Cheltenham Connect Activities
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CC Buy Local
Dinner at The Daffodil - 2nd July
Cheltenham Connect joined with the St Philips and St James' Area Residents Association (SPJARA) to hold a dinner for 50 residents 'of first respectability' that replicated the one held exactly 200 years before to commemorate the launch of the South Cheltenham Tramroad. The event was attended by all the key people who had been involved with the project together with Cheltenham Mayor Anne Regan. Unfortunately our local MP Martin Horwood was unwell and unable to be there on the night. We were lucky enough to find the newspaper report of the original event and were able to include excerpts in the commemorative menu.
See the photo album of the event
Launch of the newly renovated Norwood Triangle
The opening of the Triangle took place at 12 o'clock on Saturday 3rd and was attended by all the organisers, the Earl of Suffolk, the St James' Primary School Choir and about 200 local residents. The weather was lovely, the new trees and the artwork widely admired and everyone agreed that, instead of a local eyesore, the Triangle could now become a real community space. An exhibition about the history of the tramroad and the Norwood Triangle Project was then held at Bethesda Hall and Wendy used all the research material and old photographs of the tramroad to create a very interesting film that was shown throughout the day.
SEE THE VIDEO!
Furryfeet TV recorded the event and produced a short film that you can see here
SUMMER COMMUNITY, CRAFT AND MUSIC FESTIVAL3RD AND 4TH JULY 2010  We celebrated our first birthday with the Summer Festival that took place at both The Exmouth and The Norwood Arms. The music and entertainment throughout the week-end was wonderful with an amazing display of local talent and more than 25 local craftspeople created a great market feel in the car park area of The Norwood.
See the festival programme
See the photo album
A massive thank you to the Exmouth Arms and Norwood Arns who sponsored and hosted the event and to all the other sponsors and Cheltenham Connect members who helped over the week-end!
CHRISTMAS CRAFT FAIR
We are already taking bookings for the next Christmas Craft Fair (which will be held on the 3rd, 4th and 5th December) and, to add to the fun, we are currently planning for it to be a themed 'Regency/Victorian' event. We are currently in discussions with the Bath Road Traders Association (BARTA) about the possibility of the fair coinciding with its own Christmas Lights Ceremony.
If you are a local craftsperson who would like to be involved please contact Scarlett for an application form.
CC Go Green
The Green Group had a very busy time at the festival with a number of different stands in the garden of The Norwood Arms. The flag decorating was a great success with the children and there were some very charming eco-warriors wandering around!
They Woodland Trust walk to Lineover Wood was really enjoyed by everyone who attended and the group hope to now plan a number of other events for the latter part of the year.
CC Skillspace
In the last two months at the networking evenings the group welcomed Caroline Coats talking about 'Quality without Tears', Greg Hackney from I-Run Business Solutions talking about Getting your Message Heard' and Anthony Salloum (aka Tone) who shared "His Story" and what brought him from the Caribbean to Cheltenham!
As many people (including Belinda) are away in August the next networking meeting at The Beehive on the 10th will be an informal get-together for members who want to catch up or discuss possible future speakers/events.
CHELTENHAM CONNECT BUSINESS AND SKILLS DIRECTORY
The new Cheltenham Connect Business & Skills Directory site is now up and running. All Cheltenham Connect members can get listed by emailing Belinda up to 100 words about their business along with contact details and a logo. A big thank you to Jonathan Pollinger of www.intranetfuture.com for agreeing to help upload the infomation. You can see the new directory site here
This group has been supporting the new 'Cotswold Jelly' co-workers events at the Norwood Arms as an extension of the current 'Moka Mornings' that it already runs. The next meeting is on the 3rd of August and you can see the details here
The 'Evening with Martin Horwood' at The Beehive has now been moved to on Tuesday 5th October at 7.30pm. 'This will be an opportunity to talk to our local MP and ask him what it is like to suddenly be the party in government. What is it like being in the coalition? What has changed about their green ambitions? Not a party political evening, but a find out about politics evening!!!'
Tickets are £15 to include a buffet supper and are available through belinda@cheltenhamconnect.co.uk (available to Cheltenham Connect members only)
CC Community
Local resident Angela Rimmer has now taken on the role of Community Group co-ordinator and is helping to develop some of the ideas that have previously been discussed. Amongst other things the group are now planning to develop the existing Swap- Share and Save Initiative and to start a Wellbeing and Personal Development Group. This group will also be overseeing the main Cheltenham Connect social events and are currently considering a Sausage, Beer and Cider Festival on the 23rd of October and a Murder Mystery Evening on the 31st of October! Please email angela for more details
The summer picnic at Naunton Park on the 18th July was great fun with everyone sharing home-made food and joining in good old fashioned games of rounders.
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Fundraising
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As a voluntary group we are always looking for new ways to help us grow. As we meet in each others homes (and very often in pubs!) our running costs are very small, but we have lots of things that we would like to do and each project needs to be funded.
We are now looking for local people who have experience of fundraising, or who have some ideas about how we might go about this! Please let us know if you would like to help.
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Sponsors |
It's
hard to keep up with our list of sponsors! We are immensely grateful
for everyone's help. Please let us know if we have missed you off the
list.
Jane from Jam Creatives
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for such amazing design work for our summer festival , The Norwood Triangle
Project and the local history project
The
Exmouth Arms for the use of their meeting room and sponsoring our events
The Norwood Arms for sponsoring our summer festival
The Bubonic Wind Band, Rebus, Unjust William, The Coronettes, Materplan,
Corraine Collins Dance Studio, Egyptian Spirit Belly Dancing Troupe, Salsa del
Sol, Tone's Calypso and Reggae, The Incredibelles, Ezekiel Butler. Macaroni
Wood, Sam Jones, Life O'Reilly,
Maya Mogambo, UkeGlos, Thrill Collins, Dram, Neil Morris - for
playing at our summer festival
Dale at Cheltenham Bouncy Castles for his help with the summer festival
Ryan at RS
Audio for his expert technical help with all our events
Duncan at Paperbox for helping us with all our printing jobs over the
last year
Ade at In2DigitalandMailing - for helping us with our printing jobs over the past
year
Taylors Fancy Dress - for supplying the
outfits for the Christmas fair and summer festival
Pip and Jim's Playgroup - for lending us items
for the toddlers play area at the summer festival
The Daffodil - for hosting the
dinner for the Norwood Triangle and local history project
The
Local Church Partnership for helping with the 10:10 Initiative
St
James' C of E Primary School, Naunton Park Primary School, Leckhampton Primary
School and Richard Pate Primary School
for helping us with the 10:10 Initiative.
Robin and Sue at Mobenn
Marquees for helping us with the marquee for
the Christmas Fair and tables for the summer festival.
Richard Walter for D.J'ing at our Christmas party and teaching us
to Salsa!
Greenway
Nurseries for providing the Christmas trees
for the Craft Fair
GlosUke for offering their time at all our major events
The
Dixies for playing such cool jazz at our events
The
Incredibelles for singing at
our events
The La La Lunchtime Chorus for singing at the Christmas Fair
Pip
and Jim's (St Philips and St James' Church) Choir for singing at the Christmas Fair
Thrill Collins for playing at
tour events
The
Music Man - for
entertaining the children at the Christmas Fair
Tivoli
Trading - for providing the signage for the
Craft Fair
Taylors Fancy Dress- for providing the elf costumes for the Craft Fair
Cooks Kitsch-In for providing Christmas lights for the Craft Fair
Morans for providing Christmas decorations for the Craft
Fair
Chris at
Dodwells for regularly providing us with
stationery at cost price
The Beehive for offering their upper room for our monthly CC Skillspace
business network meetings
Graham Boston (from Gloucestershire Connections) for designing the logo
Belinda
at GlosOffers.co.uk for our noticeboard
on The Bath Road
Clare at Cheltenham Directories for providing a page of editorial about Cheltenham
Connect each month.
The Sign Studio for the banner that we used at The Suffolks Fair
Karen at Colourmatters for helping us with the printing costs of our first T
shirts
Matt at The Brown Jug for his help with our events
Mike and Louise Preston at Independent Eye Care for providing two beautiful Bugattis for our launch
adVANce+MAN (01242 517 886) for supplying a man
with a van to pick up the exhibition stands for the launch
ILEC for the loan of their van for the launch
St Philips and St James' Church - for the loan of tables for the launch event and the
Big Picnic Lunch.
Bethesda
Church - for the loan of tables for the
launch event and offering their venue for our Green Group events.
Jan
Vaisey and Ian Harvey for singing at
our launch
St James' Primary School PTA for lending us their pergolas for our events
The University of Gloucestershire for loaning us their exhibition panels and providing
the Park Campus for The Big Picnic Lunch
Simone Williams (freelance artworker)simone@hockeyhouse.co.uk - for designing The Big Picnic Lunch poster
Angeline Fuller from Entire Credit - for giving us a large cash box!
Cheltenham
Bowling Club for the use of
their clubroom as a meeting venue.
St
James' Primary School for the use of
their hall for the Auction of Promises.
Cotswold Linen Care for the tablecloths
for the Auction of Promises.
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Please feel free to send a copy of this newsletter to anyone that you think might be interested in Cheltenham Connect.
If you are an editor please help us to let people know about Cheltenham Connect by asking for articles/editorial.
It really is all about people power.
The Cheltenham Connect Team
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