It has been a busy first month for our newest member of the team Fiona.
Fiona is a member of the South East team working in her own village of Newtown St Boswells as a project worker one day a week supporting our Rural Wisdom and Families Supporting Families project. Fiona has hit the ground running and so far, pulled off 2 community events in her short time with us.
Halloween was first up, with guising & Halloween parties all cancelled what could we do to celebrate Halloween under the new guidance & restrictions in the village? Fiona put together a fabulous Halloween themed family quiz, shared lots of recipes in the week leading up to Halloween, decorated the notice boards & telephone box with pictures drawn by the kids living in the village and put together a pumpkin trail for everyone to enjoy.
We also asked the villagers to donate the treats that they would normally have given to guisers to us. Fiona arranged collection points at the local Co-op and in the primary school so every nursery & primary child in the village could receive a bag full of treats on Halloween.
The generosity of the villagers was amazing, 169 bags were delivered on Halloween by Fiona and a few volunteers, it was so nice to see all the amazing costumes and the smiling faces. We really appreciated all the lovely comments & thank you pictures.
“Well done to Fiona & everyone involved. Such a lovely thing to do for all the kids”
“Great community spirit, well done to all”
Here is a little video montage of Halloween in Newtown St Boswells in 2020.
No sooner had Halloween past and it was onto Remembrance Sunday, again the current guidelines meant that the usual parade and celebrations could not happen to honour all those who have served. Instead Fiona arranged for the kids in the primary school to paint some cd’s to look like poppies which were then hung up all around the village. We also asked people to put a poppy in their window, which the villagers embraced and lots of poppies can be seen throughout village. The village is looking fabulous.
“Would just like to say as a newcomer how moved I was by the Remembrance Day poppies throughout the village”
“My first month has been a whirlwind of sweeties, paint and pumpkins! What an achievement so far. So nice being part of the OTB team and I look forward to the next project.” Fiona
We have lots more planned in the coming months, watch out for details for a virtual St Andrew’s Day Highland Hustle in Newtown St Boswells and how to get involved in our Christmas plans for the village!
For more information about Rural Wisdom visit www.ruralwisdom.org or https://otbds.org/projects/families-supporting-families/ To find out more about the Families Supporting Families project.