Month: March 2017
March Planning Applications
Planning Applications for March
41 Gwenfo Drive. – Retention of two storey and single storey extensions to side and rear of property, and detached double garage. The present construction was larger and had numerous alteration to the previous granted permission, the council now considered this to be overdevelopment and would not support this present application.
Burger King, Brooklands Terrace Retail Park, – One double sided advertising unit fully integrated into bus shelter. The bus shelter has been installed as part of the road works with the advertising board installed. No comment.
March Planning Updates
Planning updates
The following applications have been approved.
4, Station Road West, Wenvoe – Retention of Garden Store/Hobby room
2, Burdons Close, – Installation of UPVC window to rear wall of garage
36, Goldsland Walk, – Conversion of integral garage to living accommodation
Dyffryn Gardens, St. Nicholas – Charging shed for site vehicles and proposed alterations to compost bays and concrete apron.
The council discussed the problems being encountered by unthoughtful parents parking vehicles especially at the end of the school day. There are incidents of cars parking on pavements leaving no room for prams to pass, damaging grass verges, parking on yellow lines at road corners which were installed to allow children to cross the road safely, parking so they prevented the use of drop kerb areas, preventing users of the Village Hall exiting the car park etc. School parking is a problem throughout the county because certain parents feel to have to park as close to the school as possible are not prepared to walk any further than necessary. The police will be requested to attend occasionally when possible and issue warnings etc. Protection of the grass verges will be investigated.
The new junction at Brooklands Terrace is expected to come into use in early March, four weeks behind schedule. Hopefully the signal timings will allow for a smooth flow of traffic and public transport around Culverhouse Cross.
The trees in Grange Avenue have been trimmed, and one felled, making them safer without having to fell them all
Garden 7th Cavalry has Arrived!
Firstly, a big thank you to Trevor for all the good work he has put into his column over many years. Trevor is still available for advice as there is no substitute for experience.
Gardening, whether it's a postage stamp or at a country house, is well known for lowering stress levels. It's easy to get involved, especially in Wenvoe, with allotments, wildlife group, environment team (under Trevor's watchful eye) and, of course, the produce show in September. It's a well known fact that Gardeners love to share their knowledge. So here we go, first bit of advice, if you can get on to your lawn at this time of year, brushing off the worm casts is a must as weed seeds attach to the little mounds causing more weeds than you can shake a stick at.
If you haven't already, cut the dead flower heads of hydrangeas just above first bud or to a lower bud if the plant is outgrowing its space.
Start to grow seeds on the kitchen windowsill and cover seeds and compost with vermiculite to stop the annoying fungus fly laying eggs We are all tempted by the seed and plant catalogues that come via magazines and through the post, but beware that these young plants may be smaller than you expect and will not be hardened off. If given the right care they will be worth the effort.
You should, by now, be chitting [getting them ready to plant] your early potatoes by putting them in open egg boxes in a sunny, frost free place until stalks are shooting. Basic stuff, but I still need to be reminded. Also, plant some peas in pots and keep in a sheltered spot as it is so worth trying to get them to grow early . Eat them straight off the plant – they are truly lovely.
Before the gardening season takes off, there's lots to get ready. Seed trays and pots need to be cleaned, make sure all hand tools are fit for purpose, mowers need to be serviced and if you have a greenhouse it needs to be cleaned with disinfectant.
Did you get an Amaryllis at Christmas? If so when flowers start to fade cut them off but leave the stalk and leaves. Feed and water sparingly and when foliage has died back keep in a cool place ready for next year.
One last thing, I recently put some chive seeds in a pot, sealed in a clear plastic bag, on the kitchen windowsill and they were up in 8 days.
Happy gardening!
School News for March
There is a change to the usual writing of our school “Wenvoe What’s On” entry. Key Stage 2 pupils are in ‘Pupil Voice’ groups and the Communication Group have put their class news together.
Year 6 News has been compiled by Abbie Ringham and Lowri James.
This January, Year 6 have been learning about the Blitz and we have completed a lot of work about it. We went on an Evacuee Walk and Abbie’s nan (in Year 5) came in to tell us about her childhood memories of World War 2. We also went on a trip to Cardiff Museum with Year 5.
Year 5 News has been compiled Milly Jorna and Rhys Hill.
This term in Year 5 we have been learning about WW11. The Blitz and Anne Frank. We have been on a trip to Cardiff Story Museum. We also had an evacuee day where we dressed up and did activities. We went to St Mary’s Church and were put into groups to be ‘evacuated’. We did a class assembly about courage and Anne Frank, where some people readout prayers they had written. Later in the topic, Abbie’s nan came in to talk to us about her family being in WW11. We have now got a quiz for you:
Q1. Who was the Prime Minister at the start of World War 11?
Q2. Who were the 3 major countries who were axis powers?
Q3. In what Years did WW11 start and finish?
Q4. How did Adolf Hitler die?
The answers are below:
Year 4 News has been complied by Mali Robinson.
My name is Mali Robinson and I love reading and writing.
Mali has complied a quiz about their topic, Blood, Bones and Gory Bits!
Q1. How many bones do you have?
Q2. How big is a child’s heart?
Q3. How long is your oesophagus?
Q4. How many miles of blood vessels are in your brain?
The answers are below:
Year 3’s entry has been complied by Rosie Corcoran
On Saturday February 11th, Gwenfo Primary had a huge clean up, ready for Spring. Lots of pupils, teachers and carers came along to help. My mum and I cleared the leaves and weeded the Faith Garden. We then filled it with soil ready for the new plants. It was lovely that so many people came to help even though it was snowing! My favourite part of the day was Sian’s yummy bacon and sausage rolls!!! School is now ready for Spring.
Foundation Phase pupils have enjoyed learning about the orchestra and had a wonderful trip to St David’s Hall where they went to see an Orchestra Adventure. Ryan’s nan also came into Year 1 to talk to us about her cello. Years 1 and 2 have also enjoyed African drumming every Tuesday and have become quite accomplished!
Reception children enjoyed a pyjama party and fun was had by all!
THE GREAT GWENFÔ LEND A HAND
Many thanks to all the friends, families and staff who got together at Gwenfô school on Saturday 11th February. There was a huge list of jobs from weeding and painting to building flat pack furniture. Over 50 people came to help and it was such a joy to see members of the community lending a hand. We plan another session later in the summer so if you think you could lend a hand please watch out for our next date in the newsletter!
Nicola Starke (Acting Head)
NURSERY ADMISSIONS
Nursery Admissions are open. Please see the Vale of Glamorgan website for nursery admission forms. Our lovely new nursery has spaces for pupils the term after their third birthday. We are delighted to be able to work with Wenvoe Playgroup to provide wraparound care. Please pop in for a visit. We'd love to welcome you into our school.
Nicola Starke (Acting Head)
Gwenfô Church in Wales Primary School
AND THE ANSWERS TO THE QUIZ
Year 4
1. 206
2. The same size as your fist.
3. 25cm
4. 100,000
Year 5
1. Neville Chamberlain
2. Germany, Japan and Italy
3. 1939 – 1945
4. Committed suicide
New Vision for the Village Show
These things often start over a meal and a few drinks don’t they? So it was with the village show. We were having a meal one night in the old Traherne Arms and about to tackle the extensive dessert menu they used to have when we somehow got onto the topic of cake and veg. What about, a show where the village could come and display the fruits of their labours? Genius idea – we both agreed, probably well into our second bottle by now, and as we talked more and more ideas popped into our head. Ooh, what about misshapen veg? How about, your three best eating apples and don’t leave out cookers, yes, we’ve got an old apple tree, we can enter some of those. And CAAAAKE categories, which we will be able to taste. Yes!!!
We left the pub with a half formed plan. That was quite a number of years ago now, I forget how many and yours truly has entered something most years. Generally, I have gone for the blitzkrieg approach, entering as many categories as possible and have actually won the produce shield – once I think. Over the years we have had enormous fun. I cannot forget Mr W coming home from scouts one night (9pm) and announcing that he was going to make bread (this was before we had a bread maker) and frantically raiding the cupboard for flour. The resulting ‘brick’ was proudly conveyed to the show and roundly trounced into last place.
And how we giggled the first year watching the cake judge putting on her white coat and getting her note books out and tasting spoons. Oh my god, she is taking this seriously! We peered at this spectacle through the hatch from the old kitchen, trying frantically not to laugh out loud like a bunch of kids.
Although the show has been run by the scout group it has never been run as a fund raiser for the group, in fact it more or less breaks even. It was always intended to be something for the village and over the years I think it has become a feature of the village calendar. We have however found that we seem to have less time available to organise it what with one thing and another. Our pool of kids, who have often been drafted in to help on the day have grown older and are disappearing off to university and, well, life just seems to eat into our time despite our best intentions.
At our last scout executive meeting we decided that we would really like to hand the running of the village show over to the village. We would envisage a small number of people who could be brought in this year and perhaps gradually over the following years, a new group of people would take over. It is not hard to run, mainly thanks to the brilliant programme that Al has written to handle the entries on the day. It is simple, and easy to use.
So this is where you come in. We are inviting anyone interested in running the village show to come forward, contact us and we can arrange a meeting when we can all get together. We could do with some new ideas and fresh blood and who knows, perhaps it can branch out to, ‘cutest puppy class’ and ‘village dash’. It’s up to you but it would be a real shame to see it fade away into a distant memory. Let’s keep it in the village calendar and make it bigger and better. If you are interested, please contact any of the scout leaders in the front of ‘What’s On’. It would be lovely to see you!
SW
Wenvoe Spring Craft Fair
Sunday 14 May 10am – 4pm,
Wenvoe Community Centre
From Wenvoe Craft Workshop, the people who brought you the Wenvoe Christmas Craft Fair, here's another date for your diary. Tables are now all provisionally allocated for the Wenvoe Spring Craft Fair but if you are a local Crafter, are interested in a table and would like us to keep your name on file in case of table cancellations, please contact us for a chat.
To be fair to crafters and visitors we avoid duplications of crafts where possible. We have an impressive line up of crafts signed up and there will be a charity raffle with proceeds being donated to local good causes and projects. The organisers are Glenys and Mike Tucker and you can reach us on 07922109721, by email at pukkatucker@gmail.com or contact us through the events page on face book which you will find under Wenvoe Spring Craft Fair.
This event is one not to be missed!
Recommended Library Websites
The Wenvoe Community Library
Contact us on 029 2059 417
There's an excellent website at www.libraries.wales. Featured at the moment is the Wales-wide project to get every child registered at their local library, particularly in Year 4. You can also link through to the Digital Library at the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth, which is making a wide range of archive material available on-line; for example "Welsh Newspapers Online". You can search and access over 1,100,000 pages from nearly 120 newspaper publications generally up to 1910. This also includes newspaper content that has been digitised by The Welsh Experience of World War One project.
On the Vale of Glamorgan Libraries website are various tools including guides to the e-books you can borrow and a link to a service called "Who Writes Like"; type in the name of your favourite author and it'll throw up a list of authors whose work is considered comparable and should match your taste. We have a physical copy in our reference section.
We don't have any plans for a further Book Sale but are still selling such donated books as we have, many of which have only been read once. There are also some audiobooks and DVDs to buy or borrow.
The Vale of Glamorgan Council continues to develop the Local Development Plan (LDP) and there are “Further Matters Arising Changes” (FMACs). The FMACs consultation will run from Friday 17th February until 31st March 2017 and the documents to support this process are available for inspection in Wenvoe Community Library.
Year end “Wrap Up”
Our final meeting of 2016 was a demonstration by Alison Westwood from Eclipse Gift Wrapping. This family firm is based in Porthcawl and aims to provide a professional gift wrapping service for both businesses and individuals.
Alison assisted by Sam showed how to wrap bottles, CD’s and a variety of different shaped boxes so that they looked too good to unwrap. With Christmas around the corner I hope some of the audience tried some of the techniques rather than taking the shortcut and putting present in Christmas gift bags.
Anyone wanting ideas can look on the website where you can view clips of demonstrations of bow tying and other useful tips.
A Christmas meal at the Beech Tree Inn rounded off our calendar for 2016. As in previous years everyone was very pleased with the venue.
Our first meeting of the next session was a social evening with a Bring and Buy, light refreshments and a quiz. All our members were very generous and the evening raised £120.00.
At our next meeting we welcomed back Sara Jane, a fashion consultant from John Lewis to hopefully get an insight into some of the Spring trends for 2017. Sara explained how one can take advantage of the free service offered in-store to help create an outfit or accessorize an existing ensemble. We were then shown a selection of Spring wear emphasising how by carefully choosing accessories such as handbags, scarves and jewellery one can make a very simple jacket and trousers turn into something that is special. A big thank you to our members Jill and Chris for acting as models for the evening – they both looked good in all the clothes that were chosen for them.
Church News – February
ST. MARY’S PARISH CHURCH NEWS
Discussions have been going on during the month with our architect as to what form our proposed church extension is going to take. We have been talking about what we want the extra space used for, not only on Sunday mornings but its use during the week for church and non- church activities. The plan is that this extra space will be offered to any group in the village to meet, in surroundings that will have kitchen facilities and toilets available. Until we get these initial ideas on paper, and agreed, our architect will not be able to produce any preliminary sketches of what is possible within the means of our budget and available funds. The decision to sell the Church Hall still stands and the proceeds from the sale will be used to fund the extension and we intend seeking other grant aid, so that we have a well thought out design we can be proud of for the future development of our church and community.
We were represented at the eucharist service, to mark the retirement of Archbishop Barry at Llandaff Cathedral. Allen Oliver, attended with Jon, and reported that the cathedral was full but due to the wet weather that afternoon there was space available. We wish Archbishop Barry Morgan peace and joy in his retirement, and trust that he will settle into his new routine and home, to enjoy many years with his family.
The Annual Quiz Evening was a great success with a sell out of tickets well in advance of the evening. The quiz master was Ian Moody and his questions had many scratching their heads for answers. The evening raised the amazing amount of £748.46p and will be placed in the Church Building Fund to carry on the work needed around the church to cure the damp in the walls on the south side of the nave and porch. Our current programme of work continues at a slower pace that we would like, with the church gates having been removed for painting and repair. The large East window remains to be cleaned and new window guards fitted.
Traidcraft Plc… Helping us bring Fair Trade to our parish
Jude Billingham reports.. 2016 was a busy year for our team in Wenvoe. In addition to the usual stalls following the All Age Services and at the Chattery, we held stalls at the Scarecrow Festival, another following the Remembrance service. And at the joint Parish services. Sales to friends and families also help to boost our takings. During the year we sold goods worth
£3166 and gave donations of Easter Eggs to the Foodbank in Barry and for distribution to the congregation on Easter Sunday. We also donated Advent calendars to the Foodbank in Advent.
Last year Traidcraft launched a “Let it grow” campaign to raise money for rural farmers and their families. This aimed to help farmers develop their skills in farming and business know how. This was highly successful raising over £550.000. In Wenvoe we donated £200 of our surplus and are planning to send another £150 later this year as the campaign enters its second year.
Looking ahead… a “Sale table” has been introduced to help clear some of the remaining Christmas stock, to make way for new items when the Spring catalogue is launched before Easter.
Ash Wednesday (the first day of Lent) falls on St David’s Day, March 1st this year. As usual there will be a series of Lent courses running in Wenvoe and Sully. The course in Wenvoe will be at the Rectory on every Monday afternoon in Lent from 2.pm to 3.30pm. Lent lunches in the Church hall begin on the 8th March, when soup and rolls and cheese etc will be served. Volunteers to make the soup have been arranged and a list is available in church to give some idea of numbers attending.
The next showing of “Faith in Film” will be at the Rectory on Friday 3rd March, and again names on the list in church, to make sure there is enough popcorn available. The film is “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen”. is a tale of a fisheries expert is approached by a consultant to help realise a sheik’s vision of bringing the sport of fly-fishing to the desert and embarks on an upstream journey of faith and fish to prove the impossible possible.
Looking further ahead.. on the 30th April after the United service at Sully there will be a Ministry Area Trip to Brecon. The coach fare will be approx £10 with lunch available at the cathedral restaurant, if required, followed by an optional tour of the Cathedral and 3.30pm Choral Evensong before returning home.
Parry Edwards