Merry Christmas from everyone at DRCET!

On behalf of everyone at DRCET we would like to wish you a very,  Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and all the best for a fantastic 2012!

And if you are thinking about your New Year’s resolutions then here are some simple things you can do…

Make recycled Xmas gift tags from your old Xmas cards. This is really easy to do – simply cut a gift tag shape out of the front of cards, making sure there wasn’t any writing on the back so that there is a blank side to write a message on. Then punch a hole ready for twine, wool or ribbon.

Recycle your Xmas cards – Marks and Spencer and TK Maxx are offering a Xmas card recycling scheme in their stores throughout January. The scheme is supported by the Woodland Trust More Trees More Good campaign. Find out more on the M&S website and the TK Maxx website

Recycle your Xmas tree – Glasgow City Council is offering a Christmas Tree recycling service at three locations around the City – Pollok Country Park, Kelvingrove Park and Alexandra Park. More information from the Council website http://www.glasgow.gov.uk/en/Residents/Parks_Outdoors/christmastree…

Kingsway Court Community Garden Open Day

DRCET, Kingsway Court Health and Wellbeing Centre and The Coach House Trust are holding an open day at the Kingsway Court Community Garden.

The open day will give residents a chance to get involved with the new community garden project.

You will also be able to join in some gardening, plant some bulbs and share some tasty soup and mince pies.

So come along and share your ideas for the community garden.

The garden, which is made up of 30 raised beds, is situated at the back of 40 block and has been developed by GHA and Glasgow City Council Land and Environmental Services.
For more information please contact the Health and Wellbeing Centre on 0141 959 0129
KCCG Open Day A4

A Greener Xmas with Big Green Sunday!

The next Big Green Sunday takes place on Sunday 4 December from 1pm to 4pm at the Heart of Scotstoun Community Centre.

Big Green Sundays are family-friendly, planet-friendly activity sessions in our community to help us get active and get connected to make our community a even better place to live.

We’ve had some great feedback from the first Big Green Sunday – it was a fantastic day – the sun shone and people Got Active and Got Connected…

“I saw an extremely positive start to a very worthwhile event and a very enjoyable day. I hope it continues and I would be happy to come back to the next one.”

“I got to meet new people as did my son and he couldn’t have been more pleased and happy on the day.”

“Great atmosphere overall, lovely people throughout, great refreshments and spaces.”

The theme for this month’s gathering is A Greener Xmas and there will plenty on offer including Xmas decoration making, a health issues discussion session, Stitch up craft session, skill sharing, kiddies activities, and carol singing! There will also be free soup and refreshments available too!

So why not come along and have a great day out – learn new skills, meet new friends – and join in and make our community an even better place to live!

We look forward to seeing you at the Big Green Sunday!

Buy Nothing Day

This Saturday, the 26th of November, is Buy Nothing Day. The purpose of the day is to challenge yourself, your friends and your family to switch off from shopping and tune into life.

It’s no coincidence that the campaign focuses on what will undoubtedly be one of the busiest shopping days of the year, being the last monthly pay day before Xmas.

This is a completely FREE event to take part in and aims to raise awareness of the ethical and environmental impacts of shopping and asks people to challenge themselves to not shop for 24 hours.

So are you up for the challenge? Do you think you can go 24 hours without buying anything? Go on – have a go!

And what happens after Saturday? Well the campaign also wants to encourage people to look at other ways to ‘shop’. Suggestions include:

• Buy second hand or pre-loved
• Recycle something you no longer need and turn it into a new present for someone else
• Hold a swap shop event where you exchange things you no longer need with your friends, neighbours and colleagues
• Donate to a charity shop and buy from charity shop
• Make something – bake a cake, paint a picture, knit a hat – use your skills to make something with that little extra TLC – check this website out for some suggestions
• Give an experience as a gift or a locally made product – check out Gifted People for some ideas
• Buy from your local shops and support local business
• Offer your time – how about a baby-sitting voucher? or offering to cook someone a meal?
• Buy Fair Trade and ethical products

As you can see there are lots of different ways in which we can give gifts to the people we care about. Have fun and Happy Buy Nothing Day!

Open Space Strategy for Glasgow – have your say!

The City Council are currently carrying out a consultation on the open space strategy for the city.

The Executive Summary from the strategy document states:

“The City of Glasgow has a long tradition in the pursuit of a high quality built environment and public realm, continuing to the present day. This strategy represents the next steps in this tradition by setting out how open space should be planned, created, enhanced and managed in order to meet the priorities for Glasgow for the 21st century. This is not just an open space strategy. It is a cross‐cutting vision for delivering a high quality environment that supports economic vitality, improves the health of Glasgow’s residents, provides opportunities for low carbon movement, builds resilience to climate change, supports ecological networks and encourages community cohesion. This is because, when planned well, open space can provide multiple functions that deliver numerous social, economic and environmental benefits.

Realising these benefits should be undertaken in a way that is tailored to the needs of the City. As such, this strategy examines the priorities Glasgow has set out and identifies six cross‐cutting strategic priority themes for how open space can contribute to meeting them. It should be noted that the themes are not mutually exclusive and, given the potential multifunctional nature of open space, should be delivered in conjunction with one another. The strategic priority themes are:

1    Place setting for improved economic and community vitality;

2    Health benefits and well‐being;

3    Creating connections;

4    Improving ecological quality;

5    Enhancing natural processes and generating resources; and

6    Managing the micro‐climate.”

The deadline for submitting repsonses is 12 Dec 11 and you can find out more on the Council’s website – this includes the full strategy document, the survey and also a set of postcards that have been produced to make it easier for people to respond to the consultation.

Link to website www.glasgow.gov.uk/glasgowopenspacestrategy

Postcards gosspostcards.pdf