Big love to all of you communards, prospective communards and commune curious folk out there,

It is almost time for our next Quarterly Commune Gathering (Saturday 14th – Sunday 15th December), a weekend of workshops, discussions, learnings designed to introduce and update you about the ambitious project that is A Commune in the North. It will also include a bunch of time working on the farm and visits to both Donny Skate Co-op and our farmhouse home… with the opportunity to stay over at the farm or the farmhouse (see below).

Register here so we buy enough food and find enough sleeping spots.

You’re welcome to come along on Friday night. The earlier you turn up, the more you get to help out with food prep and house/farm prep.

Saturday
breakfast at the farm from 8.30am
An intro to the project from 9.30am

On Saturday we’ll have jobs big and small to fit all ages & abilities, both morning and afternoon – lunch cooks particularly welcome!

Saturday is also the day to visit the skate park if you’ve not been there before.

Once it gets dark, if the weather is good, we will have food, music and conversation around the fire-circle at the farm, or, if the weather is inclement, we will head to the house for a similar event… but with walls. There may perhaps be games…  There will certainly be extreme cosiness.

Sunday
Breakfast from 8.30 at the farm again
9.30am start for general discussion about where we’re at, what excitements we’ve had, what challenges we’re facing, how we’re thinking of progressing, etc. 

Lunch then clear up.

We will be having a commune debrief meeting on the Sunday evening, which you’re welcome to join us for, but we might not be as accessible for questions and small-talk as we will be during the gathering itself.

Kids & Dogs
Most of the weekend can be child-inclusive. The community garden is child-friendly in terms of interesting, but obviously young children need to be supervised around stingy, prickly, pointy, rusty, mouldy and toxic things. 
The only time which might not be quite so interesting to children is the Sunday morning discussion – we’re trying to find someone to hang out with the kids then, but nothing confirmed yet.

The community garden is fine to have dogs in it, and we can shut the gates meaning that good dogs can be off the lead.
However, the house has a cat, so only very good dogs indeed would be ok to be in the house.

We don’t yet have capacity to look after people’s chidren and pets while we run the gathering, so people will need to be resonsible for any small-and-or-furry-footed companion they bring along, or else self-organise any necessary services.

Food, Accommodation & Waste
As previously mentioned, register here so we buy enough food for you and identify enough places to sleep.
Food – all vegan and all gluten-free apart from fresh bread. Cooking and eating together (and clearing up together) is part of the collective culture we’re trying to create, so expect to chop and peel and wash and dry at some point.

Accommodation will be at the house and at Bentley Urban Farm, check out the registration form for the various options.  We may struggle to provide private space, tell us early if you’ll need it.

We’re working towards a zero-waste culture and the farm in particular has no bin services. If you bring items which have single-use packaging, please be prepared to take the packaging away with you. If you bring any interesting initiatives around dealing with waste you will earn extra brownie points and may be entitled to an extra-large portion at mealtimes 😉

Money
Donations for the weekend (esp for food) are very welcome – please give what you can. We’ll have a donations pot around somewhere and bank details are below if you want to transfer some.

We’d love folks to set up regular contributions to help the commune’s progress, or specifically to support Bentley Urban Farm:

To get in touch or for more info:
Cath – 07955 332755
Warren – 07846 439982

Looking forward to seeing some of you soon, love from us all
@CitN