Penge Green Gym Newsletter July 2019

Penge Green Gym Newsletter  Another fun filled Open Day Our annual open day was once again a great success.  Many local families and residents came to celebrate with us in June.  Lots of fun was had painting pebbles with our friend Jennifer of @pengeontherocks, our wonderful colleague Ching formally of Bromley Green Gym was, once again busy doing wonderful face painting and selling beautiful cards. Children made fat balls for the birds and painted on wood to make a sign for our fence.  The plant stall was very popular this year as were our home-made cakes which were all created by our wonderful volunteers AGM We are sending out notification for our next AGM on Wednesday 7th August 2018. PENGE GREEN GYM COMMUNITY GROUP/ FRIENDS OF WINSFORD GARDENS NOTICE OF SIXTH ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING WEDNESDAY 7TH AUGUST 2019, 12.30pm at WINSFORD GARDENS, GARDEN ROAD, PENGE SE20 7XW And Finally... Here's a little resident of our wildlife pond who popped up to say hello.

Penge Green Gym Newsletter June 2019

Penge Green Gym Newsletter Penge Green Gym receives a QAVS Penge Green Gym is very excited announce we have been awarded the Queens Award for Voluntary Service.  This is a wonderful acknowledgement of all the hard work done by the volunteers over the last 8 years.  We were nominated by Peter Hutchings at TCV and received a visit from Deputy Lieutenant, Colonel Ray Wilkinson  who chatted with all the volunteers and discussed all of the work done at the gardens and benefits of being at volunteer at Penge Green Gym. The Queen's Award aims to recognise outstanding work by volunteer groups to benefit their local communities.  It was created in 2002 to celebrate the Queen's Golden Jubilee.  Winners are announced each year on 2 June - the anniversary of the Queen's Coronation. Representatives of Penge Green Gym Community Group will receive the award from Sir Kenneth Olisa OBE, Lord Lieutenant of Greater London Later this summer.  All of the volunteers were given a QAVS badge.  Brenda and Keith attended the Queen's garden party in May to celebrate the awards. PGG Chair, Brenda Little says:  "We are absolutely thrilled that the hard work, resilience, tenacity, adaptability and forward-looking mind-set of our long-standing group of volunteers has been honoured nationally in this way."  Open Day 2019 We are very excited that the local community can celebrate our award with us at the open day which is this Sunday 11am-4pm!  There will be lots to do and you can enjoy some lovely live music and homemade cakes too.  So come along and see what the fuss is all about! And finally... If all of that wasn't exciting enough, the garden looks spectacular at the moment.  The roses (which we pruned hard in the spring) are looking fabulous, and the old varieties are very fragrant.  So come and have a sniff.

Queen's Award for Voluntary Service 2019

Queen's Award for Voluntary Service 2019

This year we have been honoured to be recipients of the Queen's Award for Voluntary Service, equivalent to an MBE for voluntary groups.

It was given to us for for helping people to learn gardening skills and enjoy nature

The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service is the highest award given to volunteer groups across the UK.

Winners get a certificate signed by the Queen and a domed glass crystal. Representatives from the group may also be invited to attend a royal garden party. Our Chair and Vice-Chair were invited last month.

Winsford Gardens Annual Open Day 2019

Winsford Gardens Annual Open Day 2019

This year our Winsford Gardens Annual Open Day will be on 

Sunday 9th June 11am – 4pm

Plant sale, refreshments, children’s activities, live music, 

painting with Penge on the Rocks…

Treasure Hunt. Music from Musica Medioca. Homemade refreshments. 

And much more…

– a Penge Festival event – https://pengefestival.org/

Campaign against 'netting' trees and hedgerows.

The Wind in the Willows | Official Trailer |

Penge Green Gym Newsletter March 2019

See what's happening in Penge this week....

Penge Green Gym Newsletter Waitrose Community matters fund Penge green gym has been fortunate enough to be picked by Waitrose once more to be a recipient of its community matters fund.  All you need to do is go to Waitrose in Beckenham (next to the station) in the month of March, pick up a green token at the check out (or self service checkout) and put it in the perspex box.  We will recieve a portion of the money raised along with 2 other good causes.  Thank you to Waitrose in being so generous in picking us again.   Spring at Winsford Gardens After what feels like a fairly short and mild winter the last week has been glorious (if somewhat strange) for February.  Looking back at pictures from last year it is hard to believe it is the same month!  So we have taken full advantage of the good weather and got on with lots of repairs giving the fences and benches some much needed tlc.  We have particularly enjoyed repairing the dead hedges and hazel fences with coppiced hazel and willow kindly donated by TCV groups in Croydon and South Norwood Country park respectively.  We have repaired and varnished some of the benches and cleared the growing area in preparation for sowing seeds in the the new season.   We also received some new shrubs from Idverde including Dogwoods.  We have made new beds and look forward to them filling out in the coming years. Now is the time to come and see the spring bulbs.  They are in full bloom and looking fabulous.  And with the warm weather we have had lots of solitary bees enjoying the Mahonia and other early flowering plants.