This year’s Summer Show is going to be a virtual display of exhibits available online.
No judging* (*except for Class 22! – This is a new children’s class sponsored by Carl at The Post Box.) No prizes – Just a wonderful visual miscellany of the produce of the society’s members and friends everyone can enjoy looking at!
Take a look at the classes you can enter ————–
Classes 1 to 9 are the flower and vegetable categories – send a photograph of any of the following you may have grown or that are growing in your garden
1Rose or roses 2 Summer flowers 3 Sweet peas 4 Herbs 5 Beans 6 Peas 7 Salad potatoes 8 Berries 9 Rhubarb 10 Floral arrangement – send a photograph of a floral arrangement you have created 11 Cake containing a vegetable – send a photograph of a delicious cake you have baked – let us know the vegetable included 12 Eggs – if you keep chickens or ducks send a photograph of their eggs
Classes 13 to 15 are craft categories – send a photograph of any item you have crafted, any willow you may have woven or any flower(s) you have painted
13 Hand crafted object 14 Example of willow weaving 15 Painting of flower or flowers
Classes 16 to 18 are photography classes so that’s easy.
16 Photography – “Keep your distance” 17 Photography – “What I saw on my Boris walk” 18 Photography – “In it together”
CLASSES FOR CHILDREN (photographed and sent):
19 Painting 20 Model 21 A cake 22 Planted cress – as part of a model or picture (judged by Carl at the Post Box) 23 Photography – “Wildlife” 24 Photography – “Funny” 25 Photography – “Rainbow”
ALL ENTRIES FOR THE VIRTUAL SHOW NEED TO BE IN BY MIDNIGHT ON THURSDAY 18TH JUNE 2020
Please email completed entry forms with your images in jpeg form to show secretary: claremwinterbottom@googlemail.com
Your mission (should you choose to accept it) is to identify the sixteen numbered locations of these images of bridges and causeways, all of which are accessible on foot via public rights of way or common land in Wolvercote and Wytham. Please observe the current lockdown rules as you explore.
A map can be found here on which you can mark the numbers of the images in the location you have chosen. All the locations can be found on this map
If you would like a further challenge you may answer a question associated with each image, which you can download here.
The locations of the images and the answers to the questions or will be posted on the Festival Website later in the summer.
Good luck and enjoy exploring our villages on foot. Many thanks to Amanda Saville for putting this together on behalf of the Festival Committee.
In his last leading article before retirement as Vicar of St Peter’s and All Saints’ Wytham, Revd Charles Draper reflects on the wildernesses and solitary places which we’re currently inhabiting.
“This is a strange time to be writing my farewell article for the Flying Goose. Our Midsummer Festival cancelled, and with it all our opportunities for farewell services and events at St Peter’s and Wytham, means I shall finish work quietly on Sunday 12th July, at a time when we may, possibly, be just starting to open up our churches again…. If anything is happening at church, Jane and I will certainly want to be there, either at St Peter’s or All Saints’, until we move in mid August. We want every opportunity to see people again before we go – albeit from a distance of 2 metres! The churchwardens have kindly said that they will ask us back for a Farewell Service when restrictions are lifted, so we look forward to that.
It’s a strange time to be leaving – and yet I am glad to have been here through the worst of the coronavirus crisis. It has been like plunging into a wilderness experience. Most of us have been at home during the lockdown, but we are especially aware of those who live by themselves and those who are vulnerable. It has meant our congregations being unable to gather for worship or receive Communion, and adapting to church online, or print-outs through the letterbox for those not online. We have especially focused our thoughts and prayers on those in the thick of it, the NHS staff, care workers and other key workers, and above all, on those who are ill and those sadly bereaved.
There is a lot on the “Wilderness Experience” in the Bible and in Christian tradition. The “Wilderness” is a place of being stripped down and, as it were, brought to our knees. It is often a place of discovery, or encounter. If you are able to respond positively to this, it can become a place of renewal.
For me, the experience of Parkinson’s has been a kind of personal wilderness experience. Dealing with the side effects of Parkinson’s – 2 fatigue, anxiety, and occasional mild depression – has led to new discoveries; not only medication, but vigorous exercise, mindfulness, and what I hadn’t expected – a powerful experience of renewal in my personal faith. I have found that the wilderness really can be a place where new shoots, new life and new growth spring up.
Coronavirus has been a struggle, not only for those who have caught the virus, their families, and those who have cared for them, but also for those who have lost their jobs or their livelihood, those who have had to rely on foodbanks to survive, the homeless, and those for whom lockdown has meant being trapped in abusive relationships. It has been a real wilderness for many.
And yet many of us have found positives emerging from this time: a sense of peace and stillness, with reduced traffic and more time, an appreciation of nature – whether the flowers in our gardens or the sound of birdsong – and for some an experience of the kindness of neighbours or a deeper bonding with others in our household.
Perhaps the greatest positive has been the sharp reduction in pollution and carbon emissions – cleaner air and purer water. Some of us are hoping that we won’t go back quite to where we were before – that through this wilderness time we will have learned to live more simply, to appreciate the good things around us, and to care more both for each other and for our planet Earth. Maybe this wilderness could yet be a time of renewal for us and for our world despite, or even because of, the struggle.
My thanks to you all for your support and encouragement throughout these last five years.
May is the time for Oxfordshire Artweeks – so many artists and craft workers have been working hard for this but now cannot have any visitors. They still need your support so do visit the online tours and see their amazing work in this new socially distant way. Visit https://www.artweeks.org/ to find your favourite, medium or follow the virtual tours
With a huge thank you to all that have volunteered, our Wolvercote and Wytham Friendly Line is now open! It will be open 7 days a week, from 10am to 4pm. Anyone who’s feeling a little low and can do with a bit of company with a friendly volunteer, is free to call us! Please share away our number to all your friends and family in Wolvercote and Wytham! PS: For your friends and neighbours who are not online/on social media, we’ve also created a printer-friendly PDF. You can find it here: https://wytham-village.org.uk/friendly-line.pdf
Thank you to all who were able to attend last night and those who couldn’t.
The consensus of those around the table was that in view of Covid-19 threats, it makes sense to cancel this years festival. When the festival is designed to bring people together, it would seem wrong to continue, when all advice is to stay apart. I personally feel that I wouldn’t want additional stress being placed on committee members finding themselves having to cover additional duties as fellow members fall ill. Not to mention the financial loss of paying for publicity, staging, PA, etc and finding we cant sell tickets to cover these outgoings. We hope you understand.
On a positive note, our conversation extended to considering a late summer event, just a day or a weekend. This provides an opportunity for the village to have a ‘party’ after the ordeal of spring and could allow the hard work already done be usefully put to good use. The suggested weekend is 5/6th September, which would coincide with the Young Peoples club ‘Howl’ event. I will check the Hall’s availability and get back to you.
We can at last inform you that work on the new access and reinforced path
through the orchard will be starting next Monday 16th March. During this
time the orchard will be closed and after the work is completed we will have to
keep it closed until the new grass has grown through the pathway grid. It may
look a bit messy to begin with but once the path is set and the new grass grown
we hope that it will blend in quietly with the orchard. We did hope that we
would be able to have an official opening on the day of Blossom Day Picnic but
sadly it looks as if the grass will not be quite ready for use by then. However, as soon as the path is mowable and
ready for wheelchairs and boots we will organise an official opening, inviting
all the groups who have helped us make this project a reality. Once the path is open and usable it does not
mean of course that you have to use it – those of you who are able may still
weave your way between the trees as you have done before and in fact in the
first year we would probably encourage this rather than constantly using the new
path.
Prayer-for-a-Pandemic.docx