It seems ages since we saw you our customers and friends. We are all well and hope you all are too. We are missing you all and can’t wait to welcome you back in just over two weeks.
Quite a bit has been happening here – ‘behind closed doors’ – and we wanted to let you know about it. Our maintenance team, led by the redoubtable Mr John Baker has been incredibly busy building us a new entrance, new delivery bays, a ‘soon to be’ new maintenance workshop, a new office / stockroom for our expanding online sales department and new offices for our staff. That’s a lot of work!
Our Gardens are starting to show that spring is approaching and that the hard work put in last year by our gardening team is paying off. Here is our oldest companion Iain and his trusty wheelbarrow. Iain has worked tirelessly all winter to make our environs pleasant for the community and for you to enjoy when we open.
74 years old in shorts in February! An inspiration to all and he is waiting to welcome back all his old friends…and new ones!
Our Companion Forum is a group of companions that meets fortnightly to discuss issues that affect us and to make suggestions for developing our community. At a recent meeting it was suggested that, during ‘lockdown’, it would be good if we could have some organised social events and develop our interests in hobbies and pastimes. So the companions, assisted by our wonderful staff team, got busy!
We now have a fishing club and a model making club – more to come – and we have a regular ‘walking football’ tournament.
Our Fishing Club got off to a slow start due to: lack of bait (Tesco doesn’t sell fresh mackerel on Sundays!), poor weather and the virus. But we persevered and our latest expedition to Ely was a success!
Quite a few companions have expressed an interest in taking up fishing and Emmaus Cambridge will kindly pay for their Environment Agency licenses. What we are short of is tackle though. Do you have any old fishing tackle sitting in your sheds or attics? If so please donate them! We can arrange for a socially distanced collection or you could drop it off at our gate if we have prior notice. Please drop us a line at [email protected]
Our Model Making Club was inspired by companion Graham who is an experienced aero modeller. Thanks to some financial help from Emmaus Cambridge – and some of his own money – we were able to purchase a number of model kits at cost price from a supplier. There are now four companions engaged in model making and they are demonstrating some serious skills! We are hoping to create two dioramas: one featuring part of Waterbeach airfield during WW11 and the other a Luftwaffe base in northern France. It’s not just historic aircraft and vehicles though, there are fast cars too
We have been holding weekly ‘walking football’ matches every Friday afternoon in the car park. As well as providing a bit of exercise it is a great laugh! It’s not just the young companions who play: two of us are past 60 and our regular ‘Man of the Match’ is over 70! Staff members play too and the wonderful Debbie Jones, our Support Manager, has refereed!
So, as you can see, we are making the best of things as we always do. The community has pulled together, as it always does, and our spirits are high. We miss you though and are so looking forward to welcoming you back as soon as we are able.