Country Ways

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Country Ways: Val volunteers with Transition Horsham which runs the community allotment. She has decades of experience, as since childhood, she worked alongside her father on his allotment.
When she married, she and her husband grew everything: cabbages, turnips,
swedes, cauliflower, runner beans, potatoes, radishes, gherkins, onions…and nothing was wasted. Even the swede and turnip leaf greens were a healthy part of their meals.
Their early home had been derelict, condemned and unmortgageable and it took them many years to demolish and rebuild; everything was a hard slog. At one point a whole bay window fell out, and when it rained the water came up through the floor, so sometimes they ate dinner with friends in the upstairs bedroom! It was definitely a time of ‘Make do and mend’. Read more

Animal Friends

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Animal Friends: On Monday this week, I attended a wonderful open-air theatre performance in a hornbeam circle in a private woodland.
  The tree circle to create the ‘stage’ had been planted many years previously and the play wasn’t unique only in its setting- it had been crafted by the young children who performed it. They designed and produced the whole play, including recording the soundtrack. Read more

Horsham’s Future: Sustainable Developments

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Horsham’s Future: Sustainable Developments.  Although we have had a change of government and Horsham has a Liberal-Democrat MP instead of a Conservative representative, the pressure to build new houses in our local area is not going to change.

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Rainbows and Hope

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Rainbows and Hope.  Rainbows have always been a symbol of hope, and I took this photograph at the weekend, just after my friend had said, “It’s impossible to take a good photograph of a rainbow.”

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Without Nature We Are Nothing

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Without nature we are nothing. With that in mind, Sussex Green Living, Horsham Eco Churches and their supporters joined more than 60,000 people, representing 350 environmental groups on the Restore Nature Now march (led by Chris Packham) from Park Lane to Parliament Square in London on June 22.  It was a well organised family event, with amazing costumes, music, banners and speeches, chants led by children and echoed by adults.  Carrie Cort, CEO Sussex Green Living, said it was her first attendance at an event like that in London, she found it inspiring, empowering and motivating. She felt very honoured to walk with so many others and met people who had travelled from as far afield as Aberdeen, Abergavenny and the Lake District to join the march. Read more

Vote Wisely for the Planet

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Vote Wisely for the Planet.  Sussex Green Living recently hosted the launch of Horsham MP Watch at the Sussex Green Hub. Pat Smith from Dorking introduced MP Watch to explain the nationwide service it provides for all residents.

The idea is that amongst all the spin, information, misinformation, and media stories, the conflicting reports can to some extent be unravelled and facts presented more clearly to inform people about what government advisors are saying, what candidates are saying, what they are doing, and what the MPs are actually voting for (or against).

MP Watch aims to provide unbiased information about MPs across all parties, so voters can be better informed.

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Confessions of a Reformed Lawn Addict

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Confessions of a reformed Lawn Addict.  Oh, the swelling ambition with which I greeted my first lawn! (it was tiny). How I would nurture it!  Feed it. Weed it, ruthlessly. Mow it close, until its stripes looked like the No 1 Court at Wimbledon.

Reality was very different. Inconvenient patches of muddy brown forever reappeared, worsening as my mower’s wheels tore into the damp sward. Which remained stubbornly uneven and tufty. Meanwhile, pesky “weeds” as I called them, just kept coming back. Not only had I committed myself to a futile task, I was looking in the wrong direction altogether. Was it all worth it? Read more

A Small Island

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A Small Island.  I’m currently reading one of Bill Bryson’s funny books and he beautifully describes a little-known area near Heathrow airport which has somehow escaped development. The Staines Moor pocket of land has been untouched for over a thousand years and is the only green space for miles that Staines residents can enjoy. Heathrow has two runways and plans for a third are afoot. It’s already a most polluting airport, second only to Dubai in the world. I mention this because consultations are now well underway for Gatwick to become the same size.  It’s privately owned by Black Rock and Vinci, who also own airports in France and Portugal.  Their desire is to match Heathrow’s income by creating a new runway in place of its existing emergency one. Read more

Horsham Cloth Nappy Library: Changing Nappies Changing Lives

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Horsham Cloth Nappy Library: Changing Nappies Changing Lives

We’re Lucy and Sarah, local mums who loved cloth nappies for our babies so much that we’re now running the Horsham Cloth Nappy Library to support other families! As one of our favourite nappy retailers says, “You can change the world, – one nappy change at a time.”

Most people now recognise the damage single use plastics cause, and we’re making changes.  Let’s now extend our thinking to other single-use products! Read more

Sussex is Really Buzzing

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Getting Sussex Buzzing again!

Sussex is really buzzing in 2024 thanks to exciting new collaborations between Sussex Green Living and local businesses: a new way of combining practical solutions to current and future environmental issues with community outreach, fundraising and business wellbeing. The Pollination Education Stations and Green Business Network have been developed in collaboration with Billingshurst based agency PMW Communications as part of their generous gift of pro bono work with 30 local charities to celebrate their 30 years in business.

One week after Sussex Green Living launched these new endeavours at the Sussex Green Hub, the first Pollination Education Station (PES) has been installed. Horsham based business, Envitia Ltd, a digital and data services company based in Horsham, will focus on one charity each quarter and on Monday 4th March, as part of their fundraising and collaboration with Sussex Green Living, they set up their Pollination Education Station, a haven for pollinators, with a community herb bed and an information board.

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