25 Years & Done!

Another huge thankyou to everyone who helped make the 25th show a success. It was exhausting for me, but for some, it was a sterling effort. Fred (left) was there from dawn ’till dusk (well… almost…) putting up pictures and making sure everyone did what Liz & Joy said. Not bad for a fella with over 90 years of experience. We’ll be sad to see Fred drop off the committee this year, but after spending all 25 years having a hand in the show, we think he’s earned a rest. Thanks Fred!

My two highlights were the children’s entries – as usual. The general committee discussion before the Judges arrived was “Tank or Titanic?” It was an even split, but I personally had my eye on the biggest Wonka bar I’d ever seen. I did have a chat with some of the judges over lunch and they all remarked on how tough it is to judge our show. I think that’s a testament to all of you who entered. Winner or not, it’s all about the taking part.

2019 will unfortunately see the loss of over half our committee. Our volunteers are getting thinner on the ground, and this puts more pressure on those who remain to try and keep the show going for another year. So please – if you can help in any way – even if it’s a couple of hours shifting tables on Friday or Saturday, we would very much like to hear from you and ease the burden on our “usual suspects” who turn up year after year.

I’ll wait for Denise’s summary before a formal “Show’s Over” page, and the Winners table, but I’ll close off with my two highlights. More pictures are available on Flickr here.

Burning Barbie was the entry that I had to do a double take at. Fantastic idea, brilliantly executed and my favourite entry in the whole show.

This 1st prize was awarded to a youngster who beat all the adults with her delicious looking cup cakes. It was wonderful to see her excitement and fab to see the :cough: older hands given a run for their money by a youngster. Well done!

2018 Show On Its Way!

Preparation for the 2018 show is well under way now and we’ve got out colourful posters printed, schedule agreed, and authorisation from the finance department (Peter) to purchase a special “Thankyou” to those of you who choose to support us by entering our 25th show. The children’s pictures are available for download here, and the classes have all been updated for the 2018 categories. Once we’ve got permission from Street Scene the posters will be going up around the village too!

2018 marks the 25th anniversary of the show, and with several committee members departing after “the big one”, it’ll take volunteers from our community to keep it going for another 25 years. So if you want to get involved and keep the show running in 2019 and beyond, please come and speak to anyone with the “staff” yellow rosette on the day or contact us through the website.

2017 Show Classes Complete

The 2017 show categories are now all decided and in place.

Section F (adult handicrafts) has had a bit of an overhaul so if you’re thinking of entering something there, please double check the page because things have changed since last year.

Gardeners – we’ve also added a “Wonky Veg” category (C20) to the fruit & veg section.

As usual, there’s plenty for the youngsters to get involved in – with a handicraft section, an art section, and for our really young villagers we’ve got the picture templates that make the community centre walls so colourful.

We haven’t finalised our wonderful sponsors yet, so we can’t offer the schedule to download, but as soon as it’s available, we’ll let you know. You can grab an entry form though if you’re really keen.

Part of the community…

Majesty

Well November is here and with Halloween out of the way, bonfire night is on top of us and Christmas is not so very far away. It’s been a mild Autumn so far, but there is still a wonderful array of colour to be seen out and about around the village.

And speaking of the village, did you know that the Weaverham Parish Council has a website? It’s here if you’re interested and does detail a lot of the work they do. With 6,000 residents in the village, it’s interesting to note that only around 3% of them ether the show every year. Perhaps you could speak to a neighbour and get them interested?

Another interesting community site I’ve recently discovered is Streetlife. You put your postcode in and register with an email address and it behaves as a geographical social network, allowing you to keep in touch with events/things close to where you live. There are a lot of people asking for recommended handy(wo)men and trustworthy places to take cars, as well as local events happening close to you. Also, we have our very own Weaverham Trust site (the folks behind the Weaverham News) where you can download copies of past magazines or even the most recent one (coming to a doormat near you soon!).

Finally, here at HQ you’d be forgiven for thinking that everyone is taking a well earned break before planning for the 2016 show commences in January. The committee is hard at work though. Peter is doing some wood turning, Joy is busy crocheting pea pods and carrots, Pat is sewing bunting and Liz is making gingerbread men and stained glass window biscuits. Ian is just standing around with wire cutters at the moment, but in December all will be revealed when the Weaverham & Acton Bridge show joins other groups, businesses and schools from around Weaverham in decorating a Christmas tree for the St Mary’s Christmas Tree Festival.

If you’re interested in coming along and seeing more of the fantastic creativity, keep an eye on the site here. I’ll post the dates as soon as they’re official.

Oh, and Liz… Stained glass biscuits….? UhHKGzs

Christmas almost here…

Well Christmas is on the way, and here at Weaverham Show HQ everyone’s been enjoying a few months off. Come January though, we’ll be firing up the grey matter, warming up the blu-tack and beginning to start work on planning the 2015 show.

One of the first jobs is getting the photographic categories organised, and to that end we’ve asked for submissions on our front page (here). Remember that this is a great time of year for photography as there’s lots of colour out there. The cold mornings can really create some nice mist and frost, and whilst we’ve yet to see any snow, we’ve had some beautiful light in the morning & evening with the low sun throwing some dramatic shadows. January will be our deadline for suggestions as we need to get the themes in the Weaverham News to give everyone a chance to get their photos done in time for August.

So if you can, please do take the time to give us some ideas. You don’t need an email address to submit themes, and we’ve had some great topics sent through so far. The form has three categories but if you have more ideas, please contact us using the contact form. We’d really like to see the community help with these themes as it gives people a chance to shoot something that’s interesting to them.

Finally, we hope you all have a wonderful Christmas & New Year. Let’s make the 2015 show the best ever!

Have a Cool Yule!

Ian.

Welcome!

Hi there and welcome to the Weaverham & Acton Bridge show website. This is a new site and we’re getting ready to populate it with lots of information about the 2014 show to be held on Saturday 2nd August.

There’s plenty to do in terms of putting information up on the site and we’d like to see lots of pictures too! So if you’re interested in submitting small images that we can use around the text here, please use the contact form to let us know. You’ll retain full ownership of your images, and if you provide the information, we can add a credit to you as the photographer.

There’s still a fair bit of work to do in populating the site, so don’t worry if it all seems a bit empty at the moment. If you want to subscribe to updates via email, just click those three horizontal bars in the top left corner. The plan will be to have copies of entry forms and the Schedule as well as other useful downloads.

You’ll also notice some “like” and “share” buttons below. If you want to publicise the site via Facebook, Twitter or other social network, please do! Anything that helps us promote or publicise the site would be most appreciated.