Unfortunately the weather took a brief wintery turn on 12th October when James was in the garden and needed to take shelter from the hailstones!

The FROGs (Falkland Road Organic Gardeners) have been busy too. Recent tasks have involved planting onions and moving soil to fill up the raised beds. Take a look at the wonderful range of tomatoes grown in the polytunnel!

We received some lovely feedback from a member of one of our gardening courses: “I have learnt so much in the practical gardening class. It has given me the confidence to grow vegetables and flowers successfully from seed. The class keeps me in touch with environmental issues that I am interested in.

The companionship of the group is invaluable and the friendships I have made are so important. Wednesday is now my ‘me day’ and I would not miss it for the world. Carol is an excellent teacher and she shares her knowledge with us in a relaxed way that is accessible to all.”

If that tempts you to sign up for a course, they run each term, with the next starting dates in January. Read about the courses we offer here.

You can email Carol to make enquiries and put your name down for next term – carol.seery1@btinternet.com

We put out a call for donations of balls of yarn for the WEN Crafters as the group members were running low on supplies. As you can see from the photo below, they now have enough yarn to keep them going for quite some time! The Crafters meet every other Tuesday, 10am – 12pm. If you enjoy making things and repurposing materials and would like to join the group, please email wen@la21.net

On 8th October, we held a planning workshop for the Clothes Swap Cafe at WEN, combined with the WEN Crafters session. Knitting and crocheting were mixed in with the chat about sustainable fashion as we made arrangements for later that week.

The Clothes Swap Cafe took place at WEN on 11th October. We started off indoors but it was such a lovely sunny afternoon that we took the clothes rails outside for the later part of the event and caught the attention of some of the school home time crowd. The children’s favourite cake was courgette and lime!

Thanks to the volunteer team and to everyone who came along, swapped clothes and spent some time chatting with us and looking around our centre. We had 34 visitors and 25 bags of clothes donated, with many of the items finding new homes.

The WEN Reclaimers have been making progress on their woodwork projects, reusing donated wood and learning new skills.  Items completed this month have included a plant stand, a trug, and a noticeboard for the garden to display information about composting. New members of the group are always welcome – please email wen@la21.net to find out more about how to join.

On 12th October, we gave a talk at the Green Day at St James with Emmanuel church in New Brighton. We were particularly pleased to do so since it was organised by Sue Chadwick, who completed her Carbon Literacy training with us and Energy Projects Plus. Amplifying the climate message was one of the actions she committed to.

On 18th November, we dropped off a spare noticeboard for Liscard Community Links CIC at the Cherry Tree Shopping Centre and caught up with the great eco activities that have been taking place there.

Their community shop offers pre-loved adults and children’s clothing, available at the bargain price of £1 per item for adult clothes and 50p for children’s. They are particularly looking for donations of children’s clothes.

They run nature based art projects and hold a weekly Liscard Creates group reusing textiles and other craft supplies. They also look after the planting and maintenance of the flower baskets in Liscard Town Centre. New volunteers to help with this are very welcome. Email Liscardcommunitylinks@gmail.com to get involved.

The Art For Wellbeing course drew to a close this month, after 8 weeks of exploring different artistic techniques and building confidence and self-worth. Angie will be running feeder sessions for people who have completed this programme, taking place at Hoylake Parade Community Centre at a date and time still to be decided. There will be a monthly subscription to use the space and the materials provided and Angie will provide help with developing skills and finding inspiration and direction. For more information, please email Angie at innersanctuarycic@gmail.com

Follow the Inner Sanctuary Facebook page to read more about Angie’s courses and keep up to date with announcements of any new classes.

Looking ahead to next month, we have more Clothes Swap Cafe events planned. The first is at The Quirky Community Hub in Hoylake, with a Sustainable Fashion workshop for volunteers on Tuesday 5th November and the Clothes Swap on Saturday 16th November.

Then we return to Indigo in Rock Ferry on Saturday 30th November for the winter edition of their Clothes Swap.

You can find more details of all these events on the Clothes Swap Cafe page of our website.

Carol will be leading a Composting Workshop at WEN on Friday 8th November, showing the difference between hot composting bins, rotating bins, bokashi composting and much more.

This workshop is now fully booked.

Carol will also be teaching willow weaving at workshops on Friday 15th November and Monday 2nd December. These popular workshops are a chance to get creative making Christmas wreath and heart decorations from willow, with added festive greenery.

If you have secateurs, please bring them if possible. Also please bring any extra ‘bling’ you want to include in your design, such as old Christmas decorations that can be given a new lease of life instead of being thrown away.

We will be holding our AGM and social evening on Wednesday 20th November. The AGM will consist of approving the minutes of the last meeting, receiving the annual report and accounts and election of Trustees. This will be brief.

The main body of the meeting will be five minute talks – an opportunity for members to talk about what they or their organisation are doing to protect and enhance the environment. We will support as many 5 minute talks as time allows. Those members who have pre-registered their interest in speaking will take priority.

There will then be time for networking and chat with other attendees. While you mingle, we will be serving refreshments of soup and bread, and homemade cake!

Book your place here and if you would like to give a 5 minute talk at the event, please email wen@la21.net

November is also the month we hold our Pre-Christmas Fair, with this year’s taking place on Saturday 23rd November.

We will have our usual mix of cakes, crafts, gifts, and eco ideas and activities and would like to invite other environmental groups and businesses to share the day with us. Stalls are free of charge but donations to WEN are appreciated.

Please email wen@la21.net or phone 0151 639 2121 to book a stall.