Autumn Apple Juice Making at the Community Space

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Autumn Apple Juice
Abingdon Carbon Cutters have their apple crusher, press and pasteuriser in the Community Space in Bury Street.
Autumn Apple Juice
It is a chance to make your own apple juice, or join in with community apple juice making. Many people are donating surplus apples and windfalls, and coming along to lend a hand.

In this short video, Samantha Bowring explains the process of apple cutting, crushing, and pressing; then apple juice bottling and pasteurising.

You can borrow the complete kit for £10 a day (£15 a day at weekends) or book a slot between Sept 21st & Oct 3rd in the Community Space in Bury Street precinct. More information at Abingdon Carbon Cutters.

Splash of Pink Day 2015

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Splash of Pink Day
Abingdon has been turning pink in preparation for the annual Splash of Pink Day organised by Against Breast Cancer – an Abingdon based charity.

Shops joined in by competing in the shop window competition…
Third place went to Rosie’s Tea room,
Second place to Robert Stanley,

The winner’s award was presented at the end of a day of activities on the Market Place.
Splash of Pink Day
As always, the cup cake stall was very popular, as was the design a cup-cake stall.
Splash of Pink Day
The weather could not have been nicer in late September. You could feel the force at times, and people were just throwing £5 and £10 notes into the collecting buckets.
Splash of Pink Day
Otto (pictured above), and Harvey, search dogs from Buckinghamshire, came to let people know that they are trained to locate missing persons.

There was music from the group BMW, Abingdon Operatic, Abbey Sax, and Abingdon Community Choir.
Splash of Pink Day
Entertainment also included Ashnah Tribal belly dancers …
Splash of Pink Day
TheFlyin’ Aces street dancers, Strawberry Fayre Majorettes …
Splash of Pink Day
and Mr Hemmings Traditional Abingdon Morris dancers. There were also appearances from some well known cartoon characters who look much bigger in real life.

Having danced round Daleks earlier in the year, Traditional Abingdon Morris Dancers danced round Storm Troopers, from Star Wars, on this occasion. The sky is the limit as far as they are concerned.
Splash of Pink Day
And the prize for the shop window competition went to …
Splash of Pink Day
Masons, for their double front shop at 20 and 22 Bath Street.

Harvest Donations

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Harvest
These bales of hay, stacked near the Tythe Farm estate in Abingdon, could be seen earlier in the month with the spire of St Helen’s Church in the distance.

Harvest Festivals are not as traditional looking as they used to be.

Canned fruit – not this year’s harvest of apples and pears – are more practical.
Harvest
Last Sunday, St Helen’s Church, had their Harvest Festival. There were autumnal decorations round the church windows.
Harvest
People also brought the harvest from local shops to be donated to the Abingdon Food Bank.
Harvest
Abingdon Baptist church also had a Harvest service, with goods donated to the Abingdon Food Bank.

At Trinity, where I am a member, the Harvest will be this coming Sunday. Donations will go to the Asylum Welcome Food Cupboard in Oxford.

Last week’s church notices said … “The needs of refugees fleeing conflict and oppression and seeking asylum are as great as ever. Items specially needed are:- UHT milk; long-life fruit juice; tea and coffee; cooking oil; tins of vegetables, fruit, soup, fish, meat (preferably not pork); couscous; noodles; lentils; jam; honey; sugar; biscuits; crackers. As the Cupboard tends to receive much of its stock at Harvest, please see that items have a “use-by” date about six months on.”

Reading Festival at Our Lady’s Abingdon

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Reading Festival at Our Ladys Abingdon
Vince Cable was at Our Lady’s Abingdon, as part of the school’s annual Reading Festival, to talk about his new book.

He said that the last five years in government, as Business Secretary, has been some of the most challenging he had ever experienced. Reading novels during those times helped keep him sane, and he was a great advocate of reading, and bookshops.

Vince came to talk about his new book “After the Storm”, a major update on his earlier book “The Storm”.
Reading Festival at Our Ladys Abingdon
He said that sometimes one had to resort to metaphors to explain complicated matters, and a better metaphor for the storm that engulfed us all in 2008, with the near banking collapse, might have been “Heart Attack”. In 2015 the patient is still on life support, with historically low interest rates, and nobody dares take it off.

After talking through the key points in his book, he took questions, and explained economics in a way we could all understand – a very absorbing and interesting evening.

The Principal of Our Lady’s, Mr Stephen Oliver, introduced the evening and thanked Vince Cable at the end.
Reading Festival at Our Ladys Abingdon
Mark from Mostly Books fielded questions, and Nikki from Mostly Books was on hand with a wonderful display of “After the Storm” books that people could buy and have signed afterwards.