Social Events Group

Members of the social events group are:
Caroline Russell, Margaret Gilliam, Jenny Chambers and Allan Budgen.

The Social Events Group organises and stages the various church social events.  In the current PCC year these have been opening the church tower and selling cards on Ashwell Show day; the Patronal Festival followed by the Harvest Supper and Barn Dance in September; the Christmas Fair at the beginning of December; mulled wine and mince pies after the service of lessons and carols and the Shrove Tuesday Supper.  In some cases social events raise money for a charity or the Church Restoration programme but this is incidental to their main purpose of celebrating our faith and providing a warm and welcoming environment, not only for church members, but also for the whole community to come together.

For further information or suggestions please contact Caroline Russell (742515)

Social Group Report 2009

Ashwell has again enjoyed an active year, full of many social and fundraising events, organised by many different people in the Village.
In September, St Mary's Patronal festival was celebrated on 14th, with a picnic on the Rectory lawn.
This was a very pleasant event bringing the congregation together after the summer holidays.
This was followed shortly by the Harvest Supper and Barn Dance on Friday 19th. We celebrated in the Church with a delicious Paella cooked by Ben Tagg and Jonathan Crump and danced away the night to Ceilidh music from our favourite band Tam Lin. We also managed to raise £500, of which half went to the Bishop's Appeal for the people of Mali and the other half we personally delivered to the Holy Land Institute for the Deaf in Jordan.
The Pilgrimage to Jordan, itself, was indeed a wonderful social and spiritual event, led expertly by Rev Maureen Allchin and Rev Simon Chambers. 14 people from Ashwell joined about the same number from Dorset to travel together around Jordan and Sinai, and in January Simon showed lots of beautiful slides
of the journey to a gathering in Church.
October 4th/5th saw the Church full of book browsers for the Book weekend. It was a very successful weekend thanks to Caroline Feast and her helpers.
The Ashwell at Christmas event was again a huge success on 6th Dec. due largely to all the efforts of Eileen ten Hove. Also many thanks to Liz Chandler and all those who worked in the Kirby Manor shop
selling Christmas cards. The profit this year was £735.
On Shrove Tuesday we enjoyed an excellent meal at the Bushel and Strike, while being entertained by Patrick Forbes, who was in fine form.
The Flea Market is imminent and promises to be as popular as ever. Thank you to Claire Lewis and her
team for organising this again.
During next year as well as the usual events there will be an exciting weekend on the 12th-14th June
with an exhibition of Patrick Bright's watercolours together with a cheese and wine reception and a
harp recital.
We rely on all of you who respond so willingly to the requests for help, at the time of an event. That is what makes it all so successful.

Caroline Russell