Saturday Sale: some pictures

A few pictures for now. If you want some of them, email us, we'll send the jpeg files you ask for. I'll try and figure out a way to get bigger photos without slowing down the blog too much. Also, I erased the registration numbers that were visible. Summary of the day coming soon. After a little more caffeine.

Mini Update at 2pm Saturday

Just to say a huge thank you to all those who joined us: apparently, we're sort of pioneers! Lots of visitors and customers said it was the first time they saw that sort of space sharing. If you come back on this blog tonight, I'll have done my best to upload the pictures I taken. I'll try to give a summary of the event as well, for those who couldn't make it.
P.S.: thanks to the various Saints, pixies, fairies Gods, and other entities who managed to clear the bad weather at 9am.  (Most of us did ask, didn't we?). We are very grateful.

Update at 10 am saturday

Sorry about the delay updating, but there were people waiting outside the various houses at... 9am, and with the rain stopping at 8:30, there was a bit of a mad rush to get ready. But it is all happening, the sun is shining, the cakes have sold out, the plants are being sold fast... and the traffic is quite intense, it's going really well, lots of visitors. And it's rather fun knowing almost everybody with stall, meeting their family.
Come and visit!

Preparing for Saturday sale , and for a Sunday 8th little music experiment

A few of us met today at 7 in the community garden. Thanks to Anna, Bradley, Angie, Rita, Jamie, Matie, Paul, Barbara, Paddy, Davina and Jasmin for coming, Rebecca, Linda, Naomi and Ian couldn't make it. So we're all set for Saturday.  We have chosen to concentrate around three areas, in case it rains. We'll set up the gazebos accordingly: there will be a batch of sales around 5 Ashcombe Road (3,5, 7, 9, Ashcombe Road and 19 Fraser Gardens), another one around the crescent  (outside 9-15 Fraser Gardens), and another one at 23 Ashcombe Road and opposite at 8 Fraser Gardens).
Big variety of things were mentioned: plants, DIY equipment (including electrical, but there will be ways of checking with extension leads from a few houses, drum kit bits and other musical things, toys, buggys, prams, books, dvds,  lawn mowers, bikes...
Let's see how it goes on Saturday.

About Sunday 8th: Paul from Ashcombe road, Jamie From Fraser gardens and myself will be getting together on Sunday 8th from 1 to 4 in the community garden... to play some music. We can arrange electricity to reach the garden, although the more accoustic, the better to start with. The session is open: if you play an instrument and want to join for a while, give us a call if you can (it will help preparing rain gear and furniture), or just turn up out of the blue (preferably with your music instrument, though) on the day. See "contacts" for phone number or email address.

For sale on Saturday: your pictures Updated 27/06 21:00

As promised, we are putting the pictures you send us, and if you don't have a picture, putting a mention of the special items you want to show case a little in advance.

There will be no special order: I'll just add pictures into this post as they arrive.
Of course this is non exhaustive, as many people simply won't have a chance to photograph more pricey items.

On the stalls on Saturday 30th:

- Optima Tag-along Bike. 
Very good condition, used for only one season. Reason for selling: child now old enough to ride his own.

 - Ipod touch 8Giga, white (less than 6 months old). Excellent condition. £110

- Ipod touch 8Giga, black (2months old). Excellent condition. £110

(Reason for selling : sellers (2brothers) need ipods with 32G memory). Both will be reset to factory default.

- Stagg Bass, Left Handed. Perfect condition (person chose to learn to play right handed)

Brand New Boxed JD Bug Original Kick Scooter (MS-130B)
"Red and Silver
Unwanted prize - never used.
Retails at £50.00 - make us an offer!

Thanks"

brand new venetian blinds

(here is pic of similar blinds)

Posters in town

A few posters advertising our event are now in town. I'm out of ink, but between my son and Linda, we should be able to print more tonight. For now we want to thank: Waterstone Dorking, MXS Books and the Key Shop on St Martin's Lane, All Sorts, Oxfam Books, Muddy Paws and Sainsbury's on the High Street, and the Triangle Shop on Ranmore Road.
As for the big boards at the entrance of the road, slight delay there, the fabric lining we were going to paint on is not being very cooperative (yet). We'll call it "acrylic on curtain", as soon as the two get along reasonably...

Small leaflets en route to our neighbours

Yesterday we were playing postman again, and we will carry on today after 7. Some friends of my kids are showing great enthusiasm for the project and offered to help dispatch. This is what we looked like last night: (and apologies if you heard our chattering noises).
The leaflets are very very small... We are trying to save paper, ink, etc, to make sure it all remain a free exercice for all participants. My god daughter is patiently cutting them all as I write.
We got two requests for space today, that makes it about 12 host families (1 front garden each) and 6 guests families sharing so far. We still have good amounts of space, and we can always cram a bit, provided we don't flatten our flowerbeds...
We have made the donation to St Martin's school (from some of the money collected on the 3rd), and thanks to Linda waving the wood money (of the Jubilee lunch), we can make nice posters to put in town next week when we have  good estimate of how many families are taking part).

4 additional ideas about the Butterfly Market

Someone said they had a really good guitar to sell on the day, among other things. Another mentioned lawn mower. So what I'm offering to do is: you can take a photograph  of more valuable/ bulky items and send it to me. Then I can put all the pictures as in a catalogue on a post here on the blog, and unless you specifically want to show it's yours, it will appear as "will be on the sale on Saturday 30th". This way, noone can come and bother you at your home, if they want it, they'll have to meet you out there, it is safer.
So, we start with our first example:

This LEFT HANDED Stagg Bass Guitar  (in perfect condition) will be for sale on the 30th.

I'll try to find the best way to group and present the photos as they come, I'm not sure yet if it will be a post, a page, or something else. Just send them on, we'll figure something out.

Second idea of the day: on the day: if you have big things like a sofa, piano, or other bulky furniture, really big or awkward to move, take a good photo and email it here (ashcombe2012@gmail.com), but also print it out(say postcard size, 4x6in?)  and bring it on the day: we'll have a big  board that people can use as an ad wall, just for the day. You can also bring your business cards, offered/wanted, piano lessons, gardening skills, etc.

Third idea suggested today: if you are selling sunglasses, hats, etc, having a mirror handy at your stall will help.

We are thinking of dedicating a whole area -like one entire garden- to the children and young people, with the stalls run by them, with parents helping the youngest. Keep an eye on the blog to see if it will happen, and please definitely get in touch if you think it is a good idea and want to help.

Mini meeting tomorrow night about the 30th June Butterfly Market

As you may have seen, I shifted from our jubilee red-blue colours to yellow and purple for our posters and leaflets, mostly because of personal taste, and because they are "complementary" colours: you don't use yellow in the mix to make purple, yet they like each other as colours.
You may also have seen that there's a new phone number: I have to remove my number from the blog, because I'm getting marketting calls about claims, and debt, and refunds and whatnot. I didn't buy this sim card for the purpose, I happened to have it before, so, no money out, it is ok: we are after all trying to minimise all costs: using private gardens to mind our stalls, optimising advertising by photocopying what we can, or taking a shot of the poster with a smart phone and sharing it on facebook or twitter..., telling everyone about it. Don't hesitate: advertise away!

We won't be putting leaflets in letter boxes as much as for the jubilee lunch, again we are trying to be sensible about expenses: instead, we put some laminated posters here and there in the area, plus our sign boards. But if you want to make a few copies and leaflet neighbours in your street, go for it, and thank you for doing so, it will really help. When we know how many households are involved, we'll put a few more posters in town and possibly let the Dorking Ad know, as it is after all a rather unusual attempt: a carboot sale without cars, (or carboots), or fees... We shall see.

On the sales side, it will be just us neighbours, we simply cannot stretch  to people further away or professional traders. and will have to turn them down if they turn up on the day. We would need a different insurance cover for that: this is only possible at zero cost because we know one another a little bit. We don't even know if we can spill over onto housing association grounds. The lady at MVHA was very helpful, and in principle it is ok to use the community garden "in case" but we need to avoid going on there for trade if we can...

Tomorrow night we will be meeting in the community garden at the corner of Ranmore Road  and Ashcombe Road: there's four of us so far. It will be useful as it has been for the Jubilee Big Lunch: ideas popped up, solutions too. You are more than welcome to join us, just bring your drinks, we'll have chairs and a table, and hopefully acceptable weather.

The Ashcombe Road "Butterfly" Market (as in... not quite a Flea Market): Saturday 30th June from 10am to 1pm

Some ideas just don't pop up unless the circumstances are right. You guessed already? The Jubilee Big Lunch brought about the idea for this event.  Better yet, it is the fact that we all know each other a little bit better after the 3rd June that makes it at all possible. Here goes (and I'll promise I'll explain the butterfly oddity in a moment):
If you do a garage sale on your own, you get all the hassle of having to put flyers here and there, and then you get a few people, but it is a lot of work for not such a big result. Now, what happens if not 1, not 2, but 15 households do a garage sale on the same day, at the same time, in the same street? First it's much more fun, second, if you are a bit shy, it's much easier, and third, if you advertise together about all of them as one event, you are bound to get more interest than on your own.
So... Linda and Jasmin and I talked. Then we talked to Paddy, then to Ian, then bumped into Rebecca, then talked to Rachel, then Iris... they are all doing it: almost all houses from 1 to 23 Ashcombe road, and, so far, all those we managed to disturb on n.8 to 20 Fraser Gardens. Everybody we talked to so far is in.
Now... how do we make it even more fun and interesting for no cost at all? We tell everyone within 2 minutes walk (which means, anyone who will be close enough to bring their stuff and set up their stall without having to use a car) about the spare space we have in our various gardens so that people who don't live on that portion of road can join and mind a stall alongside us. Obviously, this time round, accomodating everyone will be possibly challenging, but if it goes well, we may get permission to close the road next time round, in which case, the space increases enormously.
If all of us are on private property, sharing as friends and neighbours, we can do it, you see? All we have to do is be flexible and a little disciplined about sharing the space. But most of us have already met, which will make it easier.
Therefore: click here to read all about this Butterfly Market (it will be a copy paste of the posters until I can write more). We just made the concept up: like a flea market, but not quite. More colourful, more carefree, and all about cross pollination and looking around rather than other nutritional habits (no offence to the fleas). We may accidentally be the first ones to use the concept of Butterfly market, and this is mostly because one of my friends is dyslexic: today I was telling her excitedly about the fact everybody in the street is keen to do the sale, and she said, great, we can all "browse and just butterfly... I mean flutter by." and there is was... the Butterfly market. After all, we all say "flea market" without flinching, so, time for the butterfly to have a go!

Within 3 days we should place posters and info about the next event.

A very brief post tonight, as a few of us only just decided, after a meet, to set the wheels in motion for a community get-together on the morning of Saturday 30th (of June). We need to chat to a few neighbours on the Ashcombe-Fraser portion of the road (where the event would take place, but without closing the road). If we get enough positive anwers, then we'll go full throttle very quickly, as it is only two weeks from now to then. So, do keep an eye on the boards and blog. More news as soon as we know we are good to go.

Jubilee big lunch: the budget. (It's good news)

The whole budget for the Big Lunch, as in "money out", not counting all the donated, lent, recycled bits and pieces is under £150. And the chipping in on the day brought nearly £100. This is rather terrific news. It means that money won't be a problem when we organising other parties, because we can all chip in a pound or two for a whole event.
I thought it would be boring to check all the various ways Linda and I saved/spent money towards the party. but actually, I ended up having fun: click here to see my  (illustrated) report. And let's have another big lunch soon. When anybody hears the word  "sunshine" on the forecast, let us know straight away!
Addition on 15th June: the Blue T-shirts. I had forgotten to include them, although they were all paid for among the organisers. So, you can go back to the Accounts page if you missed that very important bit!

Sunday photo party is postponed, due to weather forecast

Dear all, we are not cancelling our little photo get-together, but it now seems wise to postpone it by a few weeks: they are announcing rain all day for Sunday. This is not very photo paper or computer/electronics friendly.
But what we'll do is combine the photo mini party with another event this summer. As soon as we work it out, we will announce it on this blog, on the 2 boards and, hopefully we'll be able to play postman again and deliver an invitation to your door (expect a different colour this time: Linda and I both need to refill on blue ink printer cartridges!

Dorking Ad article

Some of you met Sam Blackledge on Sunday, as he walked past our road by chance and stopped to chat with a few people. Linda and I later sent him a picture, and the result is a really nice article in this week's Dorking Ad's  Jubilee Special (page 2-3). Thank you to Sam for that nice extra souvenir of the day.

 

Photo party next Sunday: preparations

Note on the 8th June 2012: this party has been postponed due to bad weather forecast. We will announce a new date as soon as we can. (see post two titles above)

Linda and I briefly met today to do a minimum start up planning for the photo party. My apologies for this post: it is a bit long. scroll right down to the pictures if you don't fancy the read!

We will conjure up a large fabric screen (makeshift but good), we can get our hands on a decent projector which will connect with a laptop. Then we will project what we have, photo and video. We'll put a few tables and chairs in the garden, everyone brings their own drinks and nibbles (and if possible cups/glasses, but i'll have a few basic plastic ones in case). You can also bring a blanket to sit on the lawn. We still have the extention lead from yesterday which we can keep it a bit longer.
We'll need to watch the children and organise an area for them to play safely. Any help with that will be most welcome: the area we can use is much, much smaller than the closed road!
We hope to see many of you again, and also some neighbours who wanted to come to the Jubilee party but were unable too.

About the pictures:
If you have made quite a few pictures and would like to share them on Sunday then you can drop a usb key in my letter box with your pics on it (and your name on the key!); it can be a disk too. I'll give it back to you as soon as I am done copying them (or at the party).
If you only have a couple of photos to share: you can email them to ashcombe2012@gmail.com.
If at all possible, choose jpeg format, and even better if you can do as I did for mine: each file has: the photographer's initials, the date, and a number from 001 to 100, for example: cemc_030612_sp008.jpeg.
If all that is complete alien language to you, no worries, I'll rename the copies I make. This way, we won't end up with several identical file names, and we'll know who the photographer is.

On the day, we'll find a way for you all to pick your favourites and either copy them on the spot or get them emailed to you.

If you want to help in any way preparing this party, please give us a call or email us.
And let's keep an eye on the weather forecast!

More photos : Maya Pulford's first selection of portraits

This is not exhaustive... more great pics will be ready on sunday.
Sorry I can't make it bigger on this post.

First batch of photos

Let's start with the pictures I have at hand. Here is a little composition (made to try and fit the blog). More aboutnext Sunday photo party later tonight. Here are some of the ones already processed:

Thank you all!

Here is a "family shot" we did today. It was worth  the effort, wasn't it?
A massive thank you, from Linda and me, to all of you who joined today. It's 23:45 on Sunday 3rd and I'm still buzzing from the exhilaration of meeting you all (except my feet who went to sleep  roughly 2 hours ago, when  I was busy trying to make a panorama on Photoshop Elements and not paying attention to them). And a huge thank you to all those who helped clearing up the road, assembling and disassembling gazebos, improvising tents for the Sound system, sweeping the mud away, etc.
We'll try and find a way to make it possible to download large  pictures like this one from the blog, although I have no idea how (if any of you does, get in touch!).
We'll write more tomorrow. Keep an eye on the blog (and on the boards) to find out when the photo party is. (it should be next Sunday).

Bunting part one: done!

 

 We have made good progress today, putting bunting on both sides of the road. Linda, David, Ben, Sarah, Paddy, Alex, Raph, Maya and myself took part today. Thanks to all those who brought bunting: we used absolutely everything we had and went to town to get more to put across tomorrow. It is a really big road when you start decorating it!

Here are a few more pictures of the morning's event:

from top to left to bottom right: Sarah and I; Ben and David in backgoound with Alex, Linda and Paddy watching; Linda and Alex; Iris; Sheila (with coronation medal she inherited), Linda, queen of bunting; David;

And after a moment of fairly sustained panic and a fast dash to town ( due to a missing cable, the one with black bit at one end and a red and a white thingy at the other), we are pleased to announce that we have a rather nifty sound system for tomorrow and a thorough playlist (6 hours long, give or take) compiled by Alex.

Wear bright colours tomorrow! Come at 11 if you want to help with the set up, otherwise, see you a little later, and don't let the weather intimidate you.