Category: Events

Bench to Bench Project with Our Scene CIC

Earlier this month the Friends of Brandwood End enjoyed working with Our Scene CIC on their latest project Bench to Bench, to promote ‘walking, laughing and sitting chatting in lovely our door settings in Brandwood. This project, which includes our neighbouring Friends at Dawberry Fields Park, is also aimed at recommending accessible walks for people with mobility issues.

The poster below invites the very people this is aimed at to come along and share their thoughts on what is needed to entice them to visit, sit and chat in these areas more often. The first meeting has taken place but Suze Carter is still keen to involve anyone with mobility issues to become involved in the designs. The next get together will be in the Lodge at a date to be arranged so watch this site and our Facebook page for more information.

Cleaner and Greener !

The Cleaner Greener campaign week is a little while off, but in Brandwood End we started today at our scheduled quarterly litter pick. It was great to see so many familiar faces but we did welcome a few new ones today who swelled our numbers to 20 including 4 little people !  There were 23 bags collected, and yet again a lot of the litter was flower paper. This March Litter pick is always our last chance to seek out wind blown litter under shrubbery and tangled in brambles. Once everything starts to grow it is all lost till next winter. Thank you to everyone that came along. The Friends really appreciate your support.

Happy smiling faces! That’s what the outdoors does for your mental health.

Advance notice of an interesting talk.

The Moseley Society History Group present an illustrated talk:
Bomb Alley: the World War Two Blitz and Home Front in
Moseley, Balsall Heath and Kings Heath,

by local historians Ian Binnie, Peter Streets and David Vaux.

Tuesday 21st March 7.30pm
There will be two talks each lasting about an hour:
2.00pm at the Moseley Exchange (149-153 Alcester Road, Moseley, Birmingham, B13 8JP).
This will be a live, illustrated talk. There will also be a display, produced by Matt Felkin, which
includes many unique photographs and documents about the Blitz in Birmingham and the local area.
There is no need to register in advance.
The talk will be repeated on Zoom.
The talk will include recent research done by the four historians but will also be based on the
mass of work done by many groups and individuals. If you have done research on this topic or have
personal knowledge join in the talks, either live or virtually and make a contribution.

To register for the Zoom talk email rkt16@btinternet.com . You will then receive the Zoom link a few
days before.

Lots to look forward to !

Winter is a quiet time in Brandwood End but the Friends have been working away in the background on a number of projects.

We are creating a number of ‘Trail sheets’ that will cover Heritage items, trees, interesting graves, fascinating memorials, quiet corners to rest and take in the wildlife and trees plus measured routes to stroll, with distances and surface types to encourage the less able to enjoy them as well.

The sheet below, kindly produced by committee member Lisa Fair, highlights some of the cemetery heritage- both historical and ecological.

Seasons Greetings and thank you all.

Our sincere thanks for all the help we have received from members and supporters over the last year. We would not have been able to undertake many of the projects without your support, financially and physically.

This year has been wonderful with projects being supported by so many different sections of the community from Corporate groups to individuals.  We have welcomed Josie Wall on board as a member of BCC, tasked with supporting Cemetery Friends Groups and much more ! Members of the public and staff from AVOVE have worked hard to remove large areas of Holly on graves and shrubbery in one section of the Cemetery, we have led walks , Josie has offered on line talks via Caring for Gods Acre and we have taken part in Heritage Open events.

  Supporters have gardened, litter picked, provided planters and seeds, crocheted fantastic themed displays by the Lodge, spent hours recording memorial inscriptions, arranged to refurbish benches, searched for graves, supported our Remembrance Service, provided historical information and generally worked along side us to make 2022 a fantastically busy year. No let up yet as lots planned for 2023! Thank you all again but a special thank you to my Poppy Project team and the other organisations that have shared their research with us. Apologies if I have missed you out but I thought this list was worth recording.

Caring for God’s Acre, Balsall Heath History Society, Kings Heath History Group, Mat Felkin (BARRA), AVOVE, Severn Trent, Our Scene CIC (Brightening Brandwood), Ian Binni (Gallipoli Assn),  Lukas (Natural History Museum) Josie Wall and Birmingham Bereavement Services Department…..and especially Tony and the Ground Staff Team and our Patrons.

Looking forward to 2023 and the exciting things we will be planning.

 

 

 

Great turn out for final litter pick of 2022

We were heartened to be joined by 13 supporters of FBEC in our final litter pick of 2022, especially when it would have been inviting to have stayed in the warm and dry! December days seem to be bright and sunny or dull and dank- today was the latter.

The total collection of 18 bags, again mainly windblown flower paper, took some finding under hedges and behind gravestones. It was noticeable today that there were many artificial flowers blown around the cemetery or redeployed and nibbled/pecked by squirrels and crows. Please do check your family graves, as we try to pop the newer flowers back on graves but have no idea where they have blown from so it could be that we have placed them on other graves nearby. Apologies, but they really do need to be secured against wind, Squirrel and Muntjac attack !

Thanks again to our volunteers.

Last Litter Pick of 2022

        LAST LITTER PICK OF 2022

        SUNDAY 4TH DECEMBER

        10AM TILL 11.30PM

We have the litter pickers, we have the bags, all we need is the manpower. This is our last chance to get all the windblown litter that the spring shrub growth will cover.

Meet at the Lodge.(Under 16 must be accompanied by an adult) 

Stout shoes and gloves recommended.

Remembrance Service 2022

What an amazing turn out we had today for this annual Remembrance Service. Our new Bugler did us proud and so did the Flag Bearers from all three sections of 148th St Dunstans Scout Group. We were privileged to have an increased number of organisations laying wreaths this year.

  • Local area City Councillor
  • BCC Cemetery Staff
  • West Midlands Police Local Neighbourhood Team
  • West Midlands Fire Service Heritage Group
  • A representative of the local Freemasons Lodge
  • The Gallipoli Association
  • Representatives of the local Mercian Regiment
  • Representative of the Catholic Womens League
  • FBEC
  • Representatives of 148th St Dunstans Scouts, Cubs and Beavers.

This link will take you to our photo album, where I have tried to incorporate all the photographs shared to our ‘facebook’ page by those who attended, as I know many of you won’t have access to these.  I have also included a few below.

Despite this being a solemn occasion, there was great interest after the service in the helmet of one of our wreath layers!

Our thanks to everyone that attended, especially to those that travelled a distance.

 

‘Planters’ get ready for the Winter.

You may remember that the Friends were lucky enough to receive 3 community made planters complete with Wildflowers that we positioned near the Lodge and notice boards. We did get some wildflowers but were disappointed with the display.

A small team of volunteers have taken over the maintenance of these planters and today they were all emptied of the unsuitable soil and refilled with a better quality compost. (Not an easy job)

They are now ready for their Winter planting, so keep an eye out to see what appears. Our thanks again to Brightening Brandwood for providing the planters.