Recent updates

First of all, sorry for the delay in posting updates, we have had a busy couple of months! There are lots of BLP updates, firstly our kitchen in our new premises is now up and running and we are proud of our 5* food safety rating – look out for exciting developments on this over the next few months. A picture of our kitchen is seen below.

We also have many exciting new projects up and running, Brighter Mondays is proving to be very popular – an additional course is running in January, the High Park Think Family, Think Community project continues to grow and expand and lastly the Healthy Families project is looking for families interested in attending a family based healthy living 12 week programme of activities – more details about these can be found on our website, http://www.brighterliving.org.uk.

As part of the High Park Think Family, Think Community project we recently held a spooky fancy dress party, mainly organised by a group of local parents. The party was a great success with over 50 children and 25 adults in attendance! Healthy food and games were provided and everyone had a great time. There will be more events like this in the future. If you would like to be involved in organising events then please join the contact action group – contact us for more details.

First Free HIGH PARK ‘Have a Go’ Taster proves a hit!

Despite a rather sketchy morning weather-wise, the sun well and truly came out to play this afternoon for the first of our HIGH PARK ‘Have a Go’ Tasters in Devonshire Rd park.

Local children came along and joined in in the free football and park games.

Active Lifestyles  from Sefton MBC and local sports club, Phoenix Football Club, very kindly volunteered their time and skills for the High Park community to get active and have some fun during the school holidays.

Everyone left with red cheeks and a smile on their face and we can’t wait for our next ‘Have a Go’  Taster; Kids Zumba! This will take place Wednesday 13th August on Devonshire Rd field from 1:30-2:30pm.

So, come get active and have some fun. And it’s free too, even better!

 

 

 

Free seed potatoes

Homebase in Formby have kindly donated a load of seed potatoes and we are looking to give them away as soon as possible as they will need planting very soon.

There is a mixture of earlies, second earlies and maincrops with a number of varities including Charlotte, King Edward, Maris Peer amongst others. They are in 1.5kg bags.

We have some ready for collection at the Brighter Living/CVS offices in Southport. Full address is All Souls Church Hall, Norwood Road, Southport, PR8 6HQ, before you arrive please contact us on 01704 517810.

Bags have already been distributed to local growers and children centres within Southport.

Sefton Foodbank Network AGM

Brighter Living and Sefton CVS were asked to provide a light buffet for the Sefton Foodbank Network AGM on Monday 2nd June. As it is Foodbank related we decided to do food inspired mainly from the ingredients you would typically receive in a foodbank parcel including rice, potatoes and pasta. Additional ingredients were used to add more variety and to make the recipes healthier such as fresh peppers in the pasta salad.

A selection of pictures are available below, in addition to the recipe list we produced and costed out. Well done to all of the volunteers receiving certificates, you are providing a great service to those most in need.

Pasta salad                                                     Rice salad                                                       Tuna pasta

Foodbank Network AGM recipes found here!

 

Litherland Think Family, Think Community Project

We held a Food Revolution Themed event on Monday 12th June in association with the Litherland Think Family, Think Community Project. Using the Parenting 2000 interactive bus myself and Anne-Marie Morrison (Sefton CVS) cooked chicken fajitas with freshly made dips of guacamole and salsa. As an extra treat we also made quesadillas. All the food went down a treat! Below is a picture from the event!

Thanks to everyone for participating in the event, it was a great afternoon!

Food Revolution Day Activities

As mentioned previously we fully support the notion of Food Revolution Day at the Brighter Living Partnership. To coincide with this years day on Friday 16th May we will be holding several events in partnership with local partner organisations including Sefton CVS throughout the week ending 16th May.

Our main public event will be held on Monday 12th May in partnership with the Litherland Think Family Project. The activity bus will be based on Kirkstone Road North between 1pm and 4pm. We will be cooking hot food on the day and the event will be attended by other organisations offering support on various issues. The event is an excellent opportunity to be signposted onto the relevent services.

Hopefully there will be other events held across Sefton throughout the week by other organisations – Join the Revolution!

Eat Seasonably!

Everybody knows fresh, seasonal and local produce is best right? No? Well you should!

At Brighter Living we follow the Eat Seasonably calendar as much as possible when purchasing local produce to sell and use within our cookery sessions. People have now become accustomed to supermarkets having everything in, all of the time – this is a shame as we should be supporting our local growers as much as possible. Around Southport and West Lancs we have an abundance of producers who consistently provide excellent produce.

The Eat Seasonal calendar (below) is fantastic to know what produce is in season locally, consider this next time you are purchasing your fruit and vegetable supplies.

Calendar_A3

 

Also Eat Seasonably also provide information for those green fingered individuals amongst who like to grow their own produce, link is found here.

Enjoy!

Food Revolution Day, 16th May 2014

 

Food Revolution Day is on Friday 16th May 2014 and is something we fully support at Brighter Living. The principles of Food Revolution Day are around cooking good food from scratch, with children learning vital cooking skills and knowledge about the food we eat.

Cooking skills used to be passed down from generation to generation, but now millions of people lack even the most basic knowledge to make a simple meal from scratch or have simply lost the confidence to try. We need to get back to basics: to cook and eat fresh local produce; to share cooking skills and food knowledge; to join forces within communities and get as many people involved as possible. Food Revolution Day is our opportunity to get the world to focus on the importance of keeping cooking skills alive for generations to come.

There is plenty of research out there to suggest that children who learn to cook make healthier choices and lead a healthier lifestyle, now is the time to take action!

Norwood Think Family Community Day

Last week we attended the Norwood Think Family Community Day held at Bishop David Sheppard Primary School, Southport. At the event we provided fruit for the children to make their own fruit cup and also a warm fruit dessert, hob cooked apple crumble. Both went down a treat!

 

Welcome

Hello everyone! Welcome to our new blog where we intend to keep you up to date with all things Brighter Living.  We are happy to post anything related to our partner organisations also, please get in touch!

Please check our website for more information, http://www.brighterliving.org.uk.