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Sandford-on-Thames is a village whose closeness to Oxford means that it long since lost its school, Post Office and village shop.
 
Six years ago a group of local people decided to act. They wanted to start a community shop and other activities that would help bring people together. They called themselves ‘Talking Shop’. First they set up a Saturday market and café in the village hall. Then they started gardening, table tennis, sewing and bike repair groups. They won funding to build their own space linked to the village hall and started opening the café on other days of the week. Six years on they have 80 volunteers with a strong ethos of including and encouraging everyone. Recently they started a pay-what-you-can-afford food surplus café.
 
Ten months ago they fundraised and recruited me to do some training and development work. Sandford happens to be very close to Oxford’s biggest psychiatric hospital and a lot of sheltered housing. Some patients help with the gardening group and in the café so early on I set up mental health awareness courses for the volunteers. I played a very small part in helping with fundraising to set up a Community Interest Company (like blipfuture) to run the embryonic village shop.
 
The funding for my work ended some time ago but I wanted to complete the volunteer handbook and other resources for the group which I’ve been writing and designing. This evening, over a meal, another volunteer and I ran some training for 22 volunteers about the new resources and some new ways of working.
 
Then at 9.30 I handed back my keys, hugged people goodbye, left the building and turned round to take a photo. On the glass door to the café and shop area are photos of the volunteers (and me) and out the other side is the garden growing salad and herbs. 
 
I’ll be back!