Very Young Friends of West Bank Park: June 2014

Who are the VYFWBP?

We are a friendly community group, run by parents, who meet every Thursday morning in West Bank Park, York. Whatever the weather, school hols included, we spend a couple of hours in the woods and meadows of the Park, doing nature games and crafts, building or making things with materials we find, telling stories and singing songs.

We are open to all - with a contribution of £1 a family (to cover basic equipment) - so if you want to join us, see you on Thursday at 10am at the statue of Queen Victoria, at the top of the Rose Walk. (Bring something simple to share at snack time.)

For more information contact Elly at: westbankparkkids@gmail.com

Sunday 29 June 2014

A LOT OF FUN AT THE FAIR!

So more than 2000 people came to the West Bank Park Summer Fair today.....twice as many as last year. They must have heard about the Young Friends fabulous craft tent (see picture) where Jen, Ruby, Penny, Hanzza and Tanya turned hundreds of children into pirates and fairies with their magic wands...and quite a lot of paper and glue...transformed a dull old beech into The Tree of Local Life and made a bit of bunting too. Over in our Story Tent, I chucked glitter about and warmed up the audience for the real stars: Nettlefoot Kate (Catherine H!), the lovely Lara and fabulous Phil and his slightly naughty puppets.

We are prepared to admit the Bouncy Castle, Mini railway, Morris Dancers, climbing wall, ice creams and community stalls - oh and the face painting, thanks Carolyn! - had something to do with the record number of visitors too, but the best thing about it is that everyone got to experience our beautiful park at its best, all have an e mail to get in touch if they want to support us, and we made rather a lot of money to put towards the park and next year's bash.

Thank you so much to everyone who came to help, join in or simply anyone who comes to our Young Friends group as your £1 s paid for the crafts and story tent and by turning up each week, we can keep going, rain and shine, helping our beautiful babies grow up to realise how much fun it can be to make soup out of twigs and sit in a tree and sing.

Saturday 7 June 2014

Huge thanks to Marilyn, Roisheen and Mavis from the Acomb Flower Guild who came armed with bouquets and helped everyone make lovely little cupcake arrangements under the Story Tree. We made a small donation from our funds to their charity, the RNIB and they have promised to return - thank you so much ladies. It was a magical event.

Don't forget the Big Day is coming up - please get in touch if you would like to volunteer to help in the Young Friends Craft Tent on June 29!

Tuesday 3 June 2014

ALL THE FUN OF THE FAIR! Please come along and support the fair which is all about promoting and protecting our wonderful park! Ruby and Jen are running our marathon Young Friends of West Bank Park Children's Craft Tent with pirate and fairy outfits, the Big Bunting Challenge and Tree of Local Life activities and Catherine Heinemeyer, Lara McLure and my good self will be telling tales in the Story Tent - with a guest appearance from Phil the Puppet Man (Cosmo's Dad).
If you would like to volunteer to help on the day, please contact me straight away! xxx

http://festival.yorkshire.com/events/west-bank-park-summer-fair

The Community Arts Project is finished!

We've drawn, we've etched in clay, we've hung leaf sculptures in nets, we've looked at the park through coloured polythene, we've written down our memories and drawn rude pictures....and a beautiful mosaic has now been made! It has been officially unveiled and will shortly be appearing on the wall of the office block in the Park. You will see much that you recognise and you may even have been one of the team of all ages who helped make the mosaic itself. Well done and thanks to our patient, creative, hardworking artists Mary Passeri and Colin Widdup!