HASSRA Fylde Garden Club

Growing that extra mile...

At the HASSRA Fylde Garden Club’s allotments, we always grow too much and have surplus vegetables and fruit. Everything seems to be ready for picking all at once. With freezers full and families & friends only able to take so much, it's a crime to see any go to waste, especially these days.

So, thoughts turned to giving it to food banks. We found out about a local initiative helping families with children, run by Cleveleys Baptist Church, so we contacted them to see if our surplus produce would be useful for them.

Cleveleys Baptist Church is partnered with ‘Transforming Lives for Good’ also known as TLG. One of their initiatives is a scheme called ‘Boxes of Hope’ where they partner with churches to liaise with local schools to identify families at risk of falling into holiday hunger. These families qualified for free school meals during term times, and with the help of TLG and Cleveleys Baptist Church, started to provide free food hampers during the school holidays, along with craft bags and family fun activities ideas.

Moving forward, the church started ‘Make Lunch Clubs’ where families are invited to a free hot lunch one day a week, plus fun and free activities & craft sessions followed by a food bank open allowing them to help themselves. Eventually, the church is hoping to provide some healthy cooking classes so the children can learn about how their food is cooked and improve their own skills.

 

Pictured above: Dave Barrow, HASSRA National Chair, pays a visit to the HASSRA Fylde Garden Club raised gardens.

HASSRA Fylde Garden Club have now started to provide the Church with boxes of fresh vegetables and fruit on a weekly basis. To say they were grateful would be an understatement.

“How lovely to receive your offer, we would definitely find this helpful.”

“It was lovely to meet you and letting me know about the Brian House/Trinity Hospice raised garden - that's so good that they have one and also that we have benefitted from their produce. Thank you so much to you and your members once again”.

We have since been in contact with another local church who also provide food banks and we’ll be helping donate our surplus fresh vegetables and fruit to them as well.

Just one example of how HASSRA Fylde is making a difference by working with and helping the community.