Can You Give Up Meat for a Month?

When TTT co-chair Richard mentioned he was going to go vegetarian for January, it made me think could I? 

Some vegetables, yesterday

Not eating meat and what it means, touches on so many of the environmental issues that TTT has tried to tackle over the years. Land and water use, global warming, animal welfare, population growth, the carbon cycle, the changing climate, human health and well-being all seem relevant. It sparked my interest. Then I saw an ad for veganuary on the tube, a campaign to encourage people to become vegan for a month.  Could I, a lover of bacon sandwiches, lamb karahi, fillet steak and recently copious amounts of turkey join in with such an endeavour?

I think I can but... how? What will it be like? What about fish? Is anyone else out there interested? There's only one day to decide ... DT

We had a fun & creative seasonal session ReSparkling, Reducing and Re-using materials that would have gone to waste. And Happy New Year!

Thanks loads to our partners in Tooting Library for hosting our fifth annual seasonal ReSparkle! workshop on the 17th December.
Around 40 young people - from four-year olds to teenagers - joined in for two hours, solo or with parents and carers. Everyone learned how to do all kinds of imaginative things that can be repeated or adapted at home using everyday materials saved from going to waste.

We used simple and practical methods and tools that are good for children and adults to learn how to handle confidently - folding, gluing, cutting-out with scissors, hole punching, stapling, decorating.

What did we do? (If you look carefully you can see examples of the different things that participants made in the background of many of the pictures...can you work out how to make them?)

Jane showed how to make angels using the pages of an old book destined for recycling.

Rachel showed how to make snowmen and other figures from cardboard tubes - so simple!
Plus, Hilary made cardboard boxes.

Flora helped make present bags out of the Library's out-of-date foreign-language newspapers.

Below: look at the intense concentration when learning to use the hole puncher.  

how did she keep her hat so straight?

Reduce, Re-Use, ReSparkle! Free seasonal crafts with Tooting Library on Saturday 17th December

We're running our fifth annual free ReSparkle! event at Tooting Library, 75 Mitcham Road, SW17 9PD on Sat 17th, from 2-4pm.

All welcome, for all ages and all materials provided: the theme is learning how to make decorative and interesting things - perhaps presents for Christmas time - using re-purposed materials that would otherwise go to waste.
No experience necessary...you can do all the activities, and take home what you make. And teach others at home how you did it!

The venue is the beautiful Children's Library on the first floor.
We're combining the fun workshop with artist Jeni Walker's monthly Meet and Make sessions, so we can expect a really varied group.

Click on the year to see what we made at Resparkle 2015 and Resparkle 2014 - the theme that year was 'I never knew you could do so much with paper!'


Here are two highlights, and we look forward to seeing you:

Team London's International Volunteering Conference, December 5th at London's City Hall

Egle, Jenny and Chuck were honoured to be able to present our shared experience from the joint CARAS + TTT 'Rooting in Tooting' project at this free conference yesterday. It was run by Team London to celebrate the end of London's tenure as International City of Volunteering for 2016. Over 300 people attended.

We tried to tell the story visually with pictures of participants and activities over 2015 and 2016. Here's a snapshot of our presentation:

You can look at the slides in the normal way by clicking here on the conference website. Our session was shared with Alkisti Macrynikola from Ethelon, an NGO in Greece who also work with refugees.

We emphasised the project benefits for the young people, for CARAS, for the community, and for TTT. A graphic facilitator captured the day's learning and stories, and Rooting in Tooting features in the top right of the image:

We're glad that some of the key points have come through - including achieving a 'Sense of Belonging' with the young people from the CARAS Youth Club. You can see the graphic full size by clicking here.
There's a lot of detail to explore!

The main hall - wow!

It was inspiring and too much to summarise in a few sentences - have a look at all the session presentations by clicking here. (Scroll right to the bottom of the page). One debate was whether 'volunteering' could be called 'social action' to make it sound more focused or more attractive to a different audience -'to be continued!'

London's City Hall is a great venue, and the whole event was very welcoming. Thank you for inviting us!

Tower Bridge, Chuck & Egle

The garden at Potter's Fields

TTT 2016 Gardening Celebration tonight!

Tonight is the TTT 2016 Gardening Celebration - plus we're looking forward to exciting things in 2017. The event is at The Selkirk near Tooting Broadway from 7:00 pm.

To celebrate the celebration:
here are five current growing, gardening and sustainability events and ideas to follow up even if you can't make it tonight:

1 TTT attended the bi-annual Wildlife Gardening Forum last week at the Natural History Museum. This is always an amazing and cross-cutting event with around 100 participants - private gardeners, schools, local authorities, biodiversity and growing charities, researchers, enterprises.

The theme this time was learning from European experience in Germany, Belgium, Austria the Netherlands, Ireland (oh, and Scotland).
Why learn from Europe? Click on the photo...




We learned a German word - schwammstadt  - meaning 'sponge city'. A sponge city is redesigned to be responsive and adaptive to climate change impact and allow for more natural rainfall retention, reducing runoff. (See the event on December 8th in para 4 below).
Anyone can attend the Forum; it's a great day when you can meet experts and work out what ideas you can use yourself. And all the presentations appear for free on the WLGF website in due course.

2 TTT joined Capital Growth's 'Roots to Growth' workshop.
We looked at the experience and potential of farming as an enterprise within London.

There's tons of good info on the Capital Growth site - all these reports are free downloads.


While the pleasure and impact of growing together is not only about saving money and managing our budgets, what do you think is the annual value of the crops grown by 2000 London gardens linked to Capital Growth? Include crops for sharing, not only veg which are sold, so you can include Tooting Community Garden's pumpkins in the calculation. Have a guess - the answer is at the end of this blog.
We could take up the challenge of recording our crops - see the Harvest-ometer from Sustain.  
This kind of data is very valuable in order to be able to make our case for more growing in London!
TTT's friend Mark at Vertical Veg has documented the equivalent value of what he grows - click here to read about it.

Restart and Sew-vember

An afternoon of fixing and mending!

On Saturday 12th November Transition Town Tooting and Restart held an event to get people reusing their broken things. Local connecting hub Mushkil Aasaan hall was a hive of activity with many people so keen they turned up early!

  The Restart project is a London-based social enterprise that encourages and empowers people to use their electronics longer in order to reduce waste.

And so for 3 hours on a very wet afternoon tooting residents brought their broken electronics to be fixed. Around 30 items were brought in to the event and the Restarters worked hard to get things up and running again or identify the problem and give advice on how the residents themselves could solve the problem if it needed parts.

A very lively corner of the room was the Sewvember tables. Set up by local maker Jeni, as part of the TTT Meet & Make workshop series, the aim was to assist people who had clothing, curtains and soft toys that need mending to repair them. Right from the outset there were people wanting assistance and taking advantage of the sewing machine. 

The day started out with one sewing machine but at one point two more had been brought in and there was a whole crowd mending things.

 The rain didn't deter anyone from turning up, it was busy all day right until closing, good thing there were plenty of refreshments to keep people going at the TTT cafe.

 With both restart and Sewvember the great things is that the people bringing the items are an integral part of solving the issues so they learned new skills and hopefully they will be able to be applied to other items they own that could be reused.

Can't wait till the next one. Look out for more Restart parties here https://therestartproject. org/parties/ and more crafty events here https://www.facebook.com/meetmakeswl/

Gardens of Refuge: yes we are through to the finals of the Aviva Community Fund!

Brilliant success at the voting stage: Aviva Community Fund has just confirmed that we're through to the finals for the Gardens of Refuge project! 

 

We now do some further application steps by December 7th, and then there's judging and then the results are announced January 10th '17.

Great news & thanks for all the support!

 

To see the project description, click here: https://goo.gl/y6b66Y

First feedback after voting closed Friday 18th on Gardens of Refuge via Aviva Community Fund

We're proud to share where we reached when voting closed yesterday on the Gardens of Refuge campaign with CARAS.   
Over 600 people supported the project online.
We believe we came THIRD, with over 6200 votes. 
WHICH IS WONDERFUL!

Our formal ranking will be confirmed on 22nd Nov by Aviva & we'll communicate wider after then. 

If we're in the top 4 in our project category, we go through to the next round - to a more familiar bid process.

By the way votes went from 3400 on Weds morning to 6200 by lunchtime yesterday!

Thanks for your votes, patience and energy in this period of repeated messages and nudges in every medium possible, dominating the TTT airwaves.



Normal service can soon be resumed on communicating the rest of TTT's rolling projects.

Every vote really did count!

Please vote by 12:00 Friday November 18th for 'Gardens of Refuge' project funding from Aviva

This week is the home straight for voting online for funding support for Gardens of Refuge at the Aviva Community Fund. It will come down to our tally of votes at the end of 18th November, and of course the other 'Aviva projects' are also doing a push this week.

Please vote by Friday 12:00 for Gardens of Refuge, and ask your family and friends to vote too. Together we can support this creative and forward-looking Tooting partnership project with the refugee and asylum-seeker community centred on the Tooting charity CARAS.
Every Vote Counts, and every vote is appreciated!

How to vote?
You have to register individually before you can vote. To register, please click here for the Aviva webpage
Then search for CARAS or Gardens of Refuge to vote!

Project Details:
Read the description of the project online here.

For the future: bulbs for 2017

You'll see that the project is all about growing the therapeutic benefits of gardening plus greening the community we share in Tooting.
And it's about building ways to enable refugees to share their own knowledge and skills locally.
Together we'll imagine and create a more beautiful neighbourhood as a legacy for all.

Legacy: flourishing from 2015's cuttings

There are three partners in Gardens of Refuge:

CARAS - with whom we have worked in depth for 18 months on Rooting in Tooting.

The Grange - a residential respite and permaculture centre in Norfolk who work with CARAS. Please see The Grange.

& Transition Town Tooting


 Thank you so much for your support & please vote by 12:00 on 18th Nov!

Celebrating and sharing learning from our experience of 'Rooting in Tooting'

This autumn TTT is delighted to be able to contribute to events to share our learning from Rooting in Tooting (our joint project with the refugee and asylum seeker community served by CARAS)
It's brilliant to be meeting new people and groups, and sharing in different ways: thank you for the invitations!
We certainly don't 'have all the answers' but we would like to join others in asking questions and sharing practice.

There are 4 very diverse autumn 2016 events where we're celebrating or telling the Rooting in Tooting story:

1 The Royal Horticultural Society OneRHS managers conference

                  Credit: RHS / Julian Weigall

CARAS & TTT were honoured to be the only outside speakers at this event for 175 RHS managers. We had fascinating discussions about how the RHS can most effectively engage with community projects.



2 Team London Volunteer Awards 2016
TTT is thrilled to be on the awards shortlist in the Greening & Cleaning category of the Awards. We'll be joining other voluntary groups for the ceremony. Here's the Mayor's tweet on Monday morning: @MayorofLondon @SadiqKhan will celebrate the capital's volunteering heroes at tonight's #TeamLdnAwards at City Hall.

 

3 Cause2Create: "where we find specific, targeted solutions to challenges posed by the refugee crisis"
We're invited to Cause2Create's 'hack' weekend. "We know we’re not going to solve the refugee crisis in one weekend, but we can explore some of the specific challenges and develop scalable and actionable solutions."

4 International Volunteering Conference at City Hall, celebrating London as European Volunteering Capital 2016
CARAS & TTT are co-facilitating one of the conference workshops in December. Joining in with the Greek volunteering NGO Ethelon, the aim is to explore training and community engagement aspects of working well with refugees. What benefits do both refugees and communities experience when working together?

Restart and Sew-vember - an afternoon of fixing and mending!

Come and join us on Saturday November the 12th for an afternoon of fixing and mending!

Whether it’s electrical or electronic items that you don’t want to throw away

or a sewing machine that is broken or you’re not sure how to use.

Have a favourite piece of clothing that needs mending or altering and you’d like to learn how?  Or simply good at fixing and mending stuff.

Or maybe you fancy a cup of tea, a piece of cake and a chance to find out more about Transition Tooting and what we get up to?

Come along on

Saturday 12th November, 2 - 5pm

Mushkil Aasaan, 220 - 222 Upper Tooting Road, SW17 7EW (next to Nando’s)    

(Restart Parties are a community self-repair space where you take responsibility for your own gadgets and data, so please don’t forget to take any back-ups beforehand, if relevant – and if possible arrive during the first two hours to allow time for fixing!   More info about Restart including details of regular skillshares at www,therestartproject.org)

                                                          

'Gardens of Refuge': our new partnership project for 2017 with CARAS & The Grange. Vote for funding online through the Aviva Community Fund!

“To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.” (Audrey Hepburn)

We are thrilled that Gardens of Refuge, our new partnership project plan has reached the final public voting stage of the Aviva Community Fund! The project is centred on the refugee and asylum-seeker community who are supported by the Tooting charity CARAS.

Read the description of the project online here.

For the future: bulbs for 2017

Gardens of Refuge is listed under 'CARAS' on the Aviva Community Fund website.
You'll see that the project is all about growing the therapeutic benefits of gardening plus greening the community we share in Tooting.  
And it's about building ways to enable refugees to share their knowledge and skills locally to imagine and create a more beautiful neighbourhood as a legacy for all.

Legacy: flourishing from 2015's cuttings

There are three partners in Gardens of Refuge:

CARAS - with whom we have worked in depth for 18 months  on Rooting in Tooting.

The Grange - a residential respite and permaculture centre in Norfolk who work with CARAS. Please see The Grange.

& Transition Town Tooting

As of today, the website is live for the public to vote for the projects they would like Aviva to support. 
Voting is open until 18th November: but please don't delay!
Please vote and encourage Aviva to support Gardens of Refuge!  

You have to register individually before you can vote: to register, please click here for the Aviva webpage
Then search for CARAS or Gardens of Refuge to vote!

Thank you so much for your support, 

and please contact us by email if you have any queries.

Tooting Green Drinks! Roll up! Roll Up!

Lovely Green Drinks in Tooting last night at The Selkirk, thanks for hosting! 

We got to know the London National Park City initiative better and asked how we would raise London's green cover from 48% (current) to 51%???? Our answer is..., Parklets! Green up the base of trees, hand over 1 car parking space to green infrastructure! Guerrilla Garden where you can! Turn the small spaces green, lobby the council to use http://www.frontyardcompany.co.uk/products/plantlock.html...

So... where would YOU create a Parklet?

We launched Green Book Club! Whoop! Want to join in? We have 2 articles to read which will be part of the discussion at the next Tooting Green Drinks: 

• Is talk about it the most important thing we can do about climate change?

https://thinkprogress.org/end-climate-silence-cbe439a31a8e…

And...

• After plastic bag tax what should we tax next?

https://www.theguardian.com/…/six-billion-plastic-bags-cant…

So... How could Green Book Club work best for you?? Online discussion? Articles? Youtube vids and TEDtalks? Books?

AND... we talked about a programme of short, informal talks in the new year - watch this space for announcements on that.

So... who would you like to come to Tooting Green Drinks to give short talks? What themes could we cover?

AND!!!! We talked up Dipa's secret, tasty idea... but you really will have to wait to hear more about that one... yum!

Green Drinks is an International idea to create informal spaces for discussion and getting to know like minded people in your area. www.greendrinks.org

We host a Tooting Green Drinks on the third Wednesday of every month at The Selkirk Pub, 60 Selkirk Street, SW17 0ES between 7.30pm and 9.30pm

Building on the 2016 Tooting Foodival at home - home-made pasta recipe, plus seed sprouting

There are new posts on our Foodival blog (click on that link) which follow up on two of the fun events at this year's Tooting Foodival: celebrating local food together as a community.
One post gives Minestra Supper Club's recipe based on Elisabetta's pasta-making demonstration.
The other shares all the how-tos of our grow-you-own home seed-sprouting crusade.
Do enjoy both. Maybe you can combine the two...?
Let us know how you get on!

 

Both these posts celebrate local Foodival themes which have been London-wide campaigns in September: Urban Food Fortnight and Zero Waste Week
Click for more information.

Foodival Top Tooting Cook entries - wow!

Feast your eyes on these amazing photos of the #Foodival2016 Top Tooting Cook entries!  All grown principally from donated home grown produce. More details on recipes and prize winners will follow ... but I thought you'd like to see this hot off the press!

Thank you to Charles for these stunning shots.  There'll be some from the Soup Disco photo booth soon too!

What if London were a National Park City?

Next week Transition Tooting will join 100s of others at the Royal Festival Hall to make London the world’s first National Park City.

Hosted by comedian Josie Long, there is a great line-up of speakers. Former Gatton School (in Tooting) Headteacher Rifat Batool, now Principal of The Olive School, Birmingham will be talking about her experiences of outdoor learning and creativity with children at our Tooting Community Garden.

Come along on September 21st;  bring a group of family, friends, Tooting neighbours and colleagues. For tickets visit the Southbank website Tickets start at just £10.

Help make London the world’s first National Park City. A city where people and nature are better connected. A city that is rich with wildlife and every child benefits from exploring, playing and learning outdoors. Together we can make London a greener, healthier and fairer place to live. Together we can make London a National Park.

Tooting's Fishponds Fields

Entertaining, provocative and proactive,The Making of a National Park City will be an evening to remember.

...and while we're talking about London's green spaces,  fantastic news that Tooting's own Fishponds Fields is open for public use for a trial period into October.  More details and times here ...http://enablelc.org/fishponds

Foodival, Top Tooting Cook, Soup Disco

Don't miss the Foodival 2016 Soup Disco at Tooting Market this evening. Low food mile sustainable veg peeled, chopped and cooked up into a community feast to the sound of classic dance beats.  You couldn't make it up!  Well you can if you come tonight ...

Optional checklist: peeler, glitter, apron, platform shoes, wig, chopping board, friend, inner Travolta

Before that, check out the Top Tooting Cook competition from 4pm at Mushkil Aasaan.  Still time to plunder the vegetable patch (or your neighbour's!) and enter. Cooking demos and taster dishes from Minestra.  All sorts of other malarkey.

Foodival 2016 Celebrating Locally Grown Produce

Foodival Growers

Foodival Day One brought a glut of locally grown fruit and veg for the Top Tooting Cook competition and tomorrow's Soup Disco at Tooting Market. See the Foodival blog for more.