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Wow, we are totally overwhelmed! The Bridgend Online Winter Auction and Prize Draw 2020 was a huge success and raised the grand total of £2,790 for our community charity, which is beyond our wildest expectations.

Well done to all our worthy winners, who are listed below, and thank you for supporting this event. We hope you enjoy your winnings!We also had a great time at the online party on Tuesday to celebrate the event. Thank you to Daz Antrobus of Silk 106.9 for hosting, the wonderful Nick Degg Poet for keeping us entertained and Andy Hofton Entertainer for injecting that essential Christmas spirit. We can’t wait for next year now!

A massive thank you to all those who donated auction lots or prizes to the event, we truly couldn’t have done it without you, it means the world. Elbow, The Virginmarys, The Creameries; Robert Owen Brown The Hinchliffe Arms, Mel Hood artThe Poachers Inn, The Great Northern Cloth, Bolly b & b, Kate Bush – Planting by Design Conduct IT, We Are Rootstock, Majestic Macclesfield, Megan Dixon Hood, Becca’s Beauty Buys, Hollinhallhotel Bollington, Cakes and cards by JulieShrigley Hall Hotel & Spa, Wonky Bolly Art, Bollington Printshop, Macclesfield Pilates and Yoga Studio, No. 74 Delicatessen, JJJ Heathcote Limited, The Mill Bakehouse Bollington, Cafe Waterside, The Indian Goat, Inland Sea, Co-Op Bollington

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Bridgend walks start again next Wednesday 2nd December as lockdown lifts. Yippee! The first walk will be to the gorgeous Harrop Valley to celebrate National Tree week.

As before places are limited to enable social distancing. Go to the calendar on our website to book your place: www.bridgendcentre.org.uk. The walk will be listed on the relevant date.

We now have a You Tube channel! We have uploaded three videos from our virtual AGM that took place on Tuesday evening, the first of which is a summary of the last year from Becky. You can also download these videos from our website.

There are two more, one on our Buddies service and one about the fabulous Bridgend charity shop.

Thanks to Pete Thorp of visualmachine_ for doing such a brilliant job creating these.

https://youtu.be/eC697Hp0p0c

We received the wonderful news this week that we are to be in receipt of a grant of £20,000 from the Garfield Weston Foundation to contribute towards our  core costs. for the 12 month period September 2020 to August 2021.

Core funding for a charity pays for the basic overheads of running a charity, such as staff costs, heating, lighting, building maintenance, IT, HR and Training. These are essential for a charity to have the foundation and infrastructure to deliver all the support services and activities to the community, but they can sometimes be quite challenging to obtain. Therefore we are hugely grateful to Garfield Weston for their support, Thank you! 

The Garfield Weston Foundation has provided a lot of support to us over the years and gave us an amazing grant of £150,000 to help us purchase our building in December 2018, so we are thrilled that this relationship continues.

Creative crafts are having a catch-up on Zoom! We will be chatting about the projects we have been working on over the last few months and getting ideas for new ones.

We will also be discussing a new very exciting project, the Bridgend Birthday Bunting! More information on which will be available over the next few weeks.

Free of charge, just email Avril for a place at avril@bridgendcentre.org.uk.

Bridgend Spanish conversation is back! Led by our regular teacher Wanda, this class will be over Zoom and will focus on beginners. 

Learn your Hola from your Hello with Spanish conversation with Wanda.

From Monday 14th September, the Bridgend charity shop will be open Monday to Friday 10-4 and Saturday 10-1. This gives you even more opportunities to come and find a bargain!

Donations are still by appointment only please (book your slot on the front page of this site.)

See you soon!!

Restricted in numbers in order to keep us safe, we are delighted that our Wednesday walks are setting off once more. We will be exploring the usual areas of Bollington, along the old faithful routes and maybe some new paths too. The routes and details will be posted for each week on the calendar of our website. Advanced booking will be required.

Obviously, the walks will be different to before in order to keep everyone safe. We will be limiting numbers and maintaining social distancing along the way. As places will be very limited it may not be possible to come on every walk.

Thank you so much for your patience and understanding during this unprecedented and challenging time.

The outside world gathers momentum as social distancing measures are lifted, and at the same time some support and shielding grind to a halt. For people who were shielding this means a sudden dramatic shift from a degree of security to being left to your own devices. The safety barrier has been lifted and it feels strange, scary and rather worrying.

Thoughts that may cross your mind are my local shop delivery services going to cease? When I do venture into a place, am I getting left behind?

Join our chat group for former shielders in order to spend time with others who are sharing this experience. We could perhaps share ways to overcome the fears and obstacles. Join the Zoom chat on Thursday 13^th August at 2pm to see how together we can move from a feeling of disconnect to reconnect

To register email Claire before 5pm Tuesday 11^th August, at happyvalleyvoice@gmail.com. Or phone the Bridgend on 01625 576311 to book your place if you do not have the internet.