Celebrations at Jamie's Farm
It is with great delight that we can now confirm that Jamie’s Farm is the proud new owner of
Hill House Farm. After 6 months of long negotiation we have completed the deal, have the keys and the builders are hard at work. The house is a beautiful Cotswold farmhouse, some parts dating from the 14
th century, with extensive farm buildings; from 200 year old pig sties to modern calving sheds, this combination suits the needs of the charity perfectly. Having this permanent home for Jamie’s Farm will allow us to work with more young people, 350 over the next year, in appropriate, safe and beautiful facilities. It gives us a sustainable future with which to support young people to make positive changes in their lives at home and at school. A huge thank you to all those that have invested time and money into this venture, including our trustees, in particular David Townsend for his daily advice and Peter Clegg for his vision and support. Also, many thanks to the vendors, the Goulstone family, for their patience and understanding throughout the whole process. We first saw the house back in June and it semed like a dream that has now become a reality!
To see a personal message from me, click
here.
We now have four weeks to complete the building work to ensure the house meets all fire regulations and is made into a beautiful home to welcome our first visitors on the 28
th March. It is quite a task – but we’re lucky to have the support of Wraxall builders and Hetreed Ross architects, as well as a whole host of friends and neighbours who are providing everything from their time, energy and support to help us to achieve our ambitious target. We have been astounded by the generosity of so many local businesses who are helping us to furnish the house, with donations from Total Bathrooms, Rossiters, the Granary Trading Company, Shannon, Looking Glass, Global Furniture Alliance and Capital Carpets as well as personal donations from Nicole and Derek Robinson, Gwyneth and Rod Brinson, Robbie and Peter Dixon, Steve and Debbie Carnie and Brian and Margaret Roper. However we are still short of some key items.If you are in a position to help, whether you are de-cluttering your own house (particularly if it is local to us in Bath) or want to organise a fund raiser to purchase a specific item email Ceri (
ceri@jamiesfarm.org.uk).
If you are keen to lend a hand, and are nifty with a paint brush, we would be grateful for support in the last two weeks of March: from digging in the garden, to putting up shelves, moving furniture to moving cows. If you’re available and keen to lend a hand email Ceri (
ceri@jamiesfarm.org.uk).
To see all the latest pictures of the work in progress and the Bath Half Marathon click
here
Visits
Our most recent visit was from a group of 7 young people from Stockport, organised by the Adsworth Youth Centre. Their weekend visit was made particularly memorable as we are in the midst of lambing and within half an hour of their arrival they were helping to deliver twins. Despite the cold and wet weather they all got to experience a range of challenging tasks, and spent time reflecting on their personal ambitions and the qualities they wanted to develop within themselves. They also went back to Stockport with jars of apple chutney, eggs collected that morning from the hen houses and with pottery tiles to follow when they have been fired in our kiln.
Our next visit will be at the end of March which we hope will be our first visit from Hill House Farm. This begins a busy spring and summer for Jamie’s Farm. We currently have spaces available from the end of June so if you are interested in bringing a group before the summer holidays or in the next academic year, email Jane (
jane@jamiesfarm.org.uk) for more information.
Fundraising
Spring Fling – an evening of food, drink, music and dancing, March 19th, The Serpentine Bar and Kitchen As the spring sun sets over The Serpentine, our ‘rustic ballroom’ event will get underway with a live swing band, delicious produce from Jamie’s Farm (including a hog roast and vegetarian foods), cocktails, farm games and a fantastic raffle. It will be a beautiful evening and every penny raised will go straight to Jamie’s Farm, enabling more young people to visit and change the direction in their lives. For more information and to buy tickets visit jamiesfarm.org.uk/springfling
Half Marathon
Sunday 7
th March 45 runners ran the 13.1 mile course of the Bath Half Marathon to raise money for Jamie’s Farm (including the staff!). It was a beautiful crisp day, and the team did us proud. Our fastest runner was Jonathan Stead who achieved a personal best at 1 hour and 14 minutes and our champion fundraiser is Chris Shaw who has astounded us with his fundraising efforts. Our congratualtions and thanks go to all our runners - it was a fantastic day! To sponsor any of our runners click
here
Valentine's Ball
Many thanks to Jo Llewellyn and her team who organised a fantastic event at the Thames Rowing Club on February 13th. The farmyard costumes were fantastic, as were the band, the food and the company. We were thrilled to find out that £9,000 was raised to be shared between Jamie’s Farm and the Burlington Danes Academy. Many thanks to everyone who helped make the event such a successful evening.
Grants and trust
Jamie’s Farm have been extremely pleased to have received support and funding from a number of trusts and foundations in recent months: the support of the Dulverton Trust, Future and the Woodward Charitable Trust will enable us to reach more young people and give them the opportunity of visiting Jamie’s Farm.
Farm News
As spring approaches, it is a busy period for the animals on the farm: three of our sows, Tess, Waynetta and Belinda have farrowed 24 piglets between them; we have one calf already with 10 cows iminent and we have 11 healthy lambs with 21 more ewes left to go. We have also excitedly started moving stock to Hill House farm - our year old bulls and heiffers are looking very pleased with their new grazing and the cockerel is strutting around his new enclosure. We are also busy preparing our new vegetable garden - first jobs include rotivating the land, planting fruit trees and fencing the patch to stop the hungry rabbits and deer.
All the best,
Jamie
