Community News – September and October
Kirton Arts and Crafts Fair 2022
Saturday 22 October, 10am-3pm at Kirton Church Hall, Church Lane, Kirton IP10 0PU.
The Kirton Arts and Crafts Fair is back! It promises to be another great occasion with opportunities to buy a wide range of items including crocheted and knitted goods, paintings, jewellery, stained glass and so much more. Our stall-holders are talented local artists and craftspeople.
Admission (and parking) is free, so drop by for coffee, cake or a light lunch and try your luck in the grand draw. As usual, bacon rolls will be available from 10am for the early birds! All profits from the day will be donated to local charities, including The Blossom Appeal.
Why not come along, bring your friends and start your Christmas shopping early!
For more information, contact Julie: 01394 448897 or email jaygard35@gmail.com
Felixstowe Art Group
Graham Webber certainly proved you don’t really need a box full of colours to produce an interesting painting! His demonstration, Landscape in oils using three primary colours plus white, was full of valuable hints and tips. This will be followed by his Saturday workshop in November, which is organised by the group and is now fully booked. He is a popular artist indeed!
Moving on to future meetings, we welcome Paul Bruce, another popular artist, who will be presenting a portraiture demonstration on Tuesday 11 October. Several members have attended his occasional workshops on a variety of topics at Grundisburgh Village Hall.
This is an advantage of being a member of the group, as not only do you get to hear about workshops in the area and further afield, you can also book all-day workshops organised by the group, plus attend evening life drawing sessions. One such evening is on Tuesday 25 October.
We look forward to meeting you at Paul’s demonstration at Broadway House, Orwell Road, at 7.30pm. Entry for members is free and visitors are welcome to attend at the cost of £2.
Further details about Felixstowe Art Group and our future meetings are available on our website: https://www.felixstoweartgroup.org/
Felixstowe & Villages Carers Group
We are a welcoming group of unpaid family carers looking after a loved one or friend.
We meet on the second Monday of each month at Old Felixstowe Community Centre, Ferry Road, Felixstowe IP11 9NB, 1-3pm, for an afternoon of social activities, friendship and a break from caring.
We have a wide range of activities which change every month including bingo, interesting speakers, art and craft activities, chair-based yoga, chair-based sports/exercise, meeting at a café for tea and cakes or just a social afternoon chatting. Cost: £3 including refreshments and a raffle.
We also have close ties with Suffolk Family Carers, who keep us advised of courses available to family carers and the services and help that they offer. What we offer is friendly support and a break from caring once a month. Why not come and join us? On 10 October and 14 November we’ll be having a social afternoon and on 12 December we look forward to our Christmas buffet.
For more information, contact Dennis Weston: 01473 832591 / 07712 672289 or email: dennisweston.49@btinternet.com, or just come along to our next meeting. Please ring the doorbell for the Margaret White Hall so that we can let you into the building.
Deben Flower Club
Our next meeting will be on Tuesday 11 October at Kirton Church Hall, Church Lane, Kirton IP10 0PU at 7.30pm, when our demonstrator will be David Wright from Norfolk. David’s title is 20/20 A Vision. As well as giving us what promises to be an exciting demonstration, David will be bringing along his beautiful wire sculptures for us to purchase. These would make wonderful gifts so why not start your Christmas shopping early!
Visitors are always welcome at the cost of £6. Tea, coffee and biscuits will be available after the demonstration and David’s arrangements will be raffled.
Quiz night
We are holding a quiz night on Saturday 15 October, 7pm for a 7.30pm start, at Kirton Church Hall. Bring along your favourite drinks, snacks and glasses, and we will make tea and coffee and some delicious cakes for you to purchase during the interval. Tickets must be booked in advance and are £7 each. You may have a table of up to six people. Payment is required when booking. Please contact Debbie Doggett on 01394 448415 or email wa@sandlings.co.uk to reserve your place.
Fundraising events at St John’s Church, Orwell Road, Felixstowe
On Saturday 15 October, 10am-noon, we’re holding another Big Coffee Morning. This time we are raising money for Motor Neurone Disease. Entrance costs £3 and includes tea, coffee and homemade cake. Entrance for children is free. There will be cakes and bakes, Angie’s Rail, jewellery, bric-a-brac, tombola, raffle, preserves and lots of local craft stalls too.
Our annual Christmas Fair is on Saturday 3 December, 10am-12.30pm, where you’ll find all the stalls above and more. Proceeds will go towards church funds. Entrance costs £3 and includes tea, coffee and homemade cake.
October events at Two Sisters Arts Centre
On Wednesday 5 October at 7.30pm, we have Satellites, a new piece of drama written and performed by Natalie Songer, based on her search for information about her two great-uncles during the 1940s, one of whom was a leading figure in the space programme and the other perished in a concentration camp.
On Friday 7 October at 7.30pm, we have a jazz evening, Blind Passion, featuring singer Katriona Taylor, Peter Hammond on keyboard and Rob Palmer on bass, in which she celebrates the music of blind artists such as Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, Diane Schuur and José Feliciano.
Friday 14 October at 7.30pm, there is more drama with the welcome return of Giles Shenton (Three Men in a Boat) with his one man show, Old Herbaceous, the story of one man working at the same gardening job on a big country estate for all his working life. He sees the world change from a Victorian age through Edwardian to a modern world in 1970, when the play is set.
On Sunday 16 October at 7.30pm, we look forward to an evening of blues with The Blue Note Collective, featuring internationally renowned saxophone player, Matt Telfer.
On Friday 28 October at 7.30pm, we have a folk evening with singer/songwriter, Blacksheep Lad, and performance poet, Mike Garry.
Tickets are available from the Box Office: 01394 279613 or online at https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/two-sisters-arts-centre
Walton and Trimley Churches
Traditionally, October is the time when we celebrate the harvest in our churches. In centuries past, our churches would have been full of folk thanking God for the harvest and praying for the year ahead. Our farmers would have been a big part of those celebrations.
We still celebrate harvest of course, and it would not be the same without a rousing rendition of We Plough the Fields! However, the world around us has changed considerably. We have become disconnected with the way our food is produced and the source of which it has come from, even in such a rich, fertile county such as ours. It probably does not help that houses are appearing in many of those fields. We also need to acknowledge that farmers are under considerable pressure as margins get squeezed and buying habits change.
We can also think of the countries that have severe food shortages and are experiencing famine. They are likely to be eclipsed by the cost of living crises in our country. Cereal prices alone have risen by a record amount as we struggle to put food on the table. It’s not very joyful is it, but we do still have a lot to be thankful for and maybe this harvest we should be following Jesus’ lead and seeking justice. Justice globally and locally where nobody goes hungry. Justice for our farmers who work long hours in an increasingly difficult industry.
The Christian way has always been about justice and fighting for those who feel marginalised and ignored by society. Harvest is a chance to come closer to that God of justice as we sing those good old hymns of thankfulness and remind ourselves that we are custodians of the world we live in and we need to look after it, and its inhabitants, so much better.
Rev Paul Clarke
St Felix RC Church
Someone asked me how I’d survived the heatwave in July and August. I said I’d found the scorching heat a bit much at times and he replied (jokingly): “I hope that it would at least prepare me for the fires of Hell! “But”, he added, “I don’t suppose the church believes in Hell anymore.” I replied that we do, and, incredulous, the person said: “Well I couldn’t believe all that nonsense about flames and devils with pitchforks and whatever.” “Neither could I,” I replied. “We don’t have to take that figurative, picture and language literally.” “Well what is Hell then?” he asked dubiously. I explained that for the Christian, Hell is more of a state than a place; a state of being separated forever from the love of God. Cut off from the source of all happiness and peace. Always seeking, but never finding. Never fulfilled, never at rest.
“Well why would God condemn anyone to that?” he asked. “He wouldn’t,” I said. “But he allows anyone to choose that. He has given us the gift of free choice. He doesn’t force anyone to accept his gifts, or even to believe in him. He’s given us freedom and he respects our freedom. Hell, therefore, must be possible; if we have true freedom, we can surely use it to reject God, but whether anyone does ultimately make that choice is unknown to us.”
I could have added that the recent burning heat hadn’t made me think so much about the fires of hell, but rather about the fire of God’s love, for me and for all people!
Fr John Barnes
Find more community news in Spotlight on Felixstowe magazine: https://www.spotlightmagazine.co.uk/category/read-online/
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