Events

Festive events in Charlton for Christmas 2018

Lara Ruffle Coles
The King’s Troop Royal Horse Artillery passing Charlton House, December 2016
© Rob Powell

As Christmas creeps closer, it’s quite possibly time to purchase some presents for your nearest and dearest – unless they only deserve a lump of coal this year…

Here is a round-up of the festive events The Charlton Champion has details of so far, but please let us know if you’re organising something that we’ve not spotted yet. Send us a message or leave a comment below, and we’ll update this list over the coming weeks.

  • On Saturday 24 November Pound Park Nursery hosts their Winter Wonderland from 10am to 1pm, head to the school for wintry treats, a raffle and extra special guests.
  • The Corner at 96 is open for Christmas on the 7th, 8th and 9th of December, keep an eye on their Instagram for further details.
  • On Sunday 9 December at 5.30pm, St Thomas Church presents their Community Christmas sing-a-long, song sheets will be provided and there will be a retiring collection.
  • Friends of Charlton Park have a Mince Pies and Meet Up evening at 8pm on Wednesday 12 December at the Big Red Bus Club.
  • Thursday 13 December has the British Oak pub on Old Dover Road hosting an 8pm Beer and Carols night in conjunction with St John’s Church, Blackheath.
  • On Christmas Day The Old Cottage Coffee Shop in Charlton Park are running its annual Christmas lunch for the elderly and it need volunteers and donations for the day. Please get in touch in person or on Twitter.

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What’s on in Charlton: February

Neil Clasper1 Comment

Thames Pilots at the Anchor & Hope
Thames Pilots at the Anchor & Hope – photo © Neil Clasper

Dates for your diary
A round-up of February events we’ve found in and around SE7. What have we missed? Let us know in the comments below or email neilclasper[at]gmail.com, and we’ll update the post as we get the chance.

4th Feb, 7pm: Charlton Rail Users Group (CRUG) annual open meeting, Charlton Liberal Club, Charlton Church Lane.

7th, 14th, 21st, 28th Feb, 1pm: Friday Lunchtime Concerts, Charlton House.

13th Feb, 8.30pm: Charlton Pub Quiz, Rose of Denmark, Woolwich Rd.

15th Feb, 2.30pm: Charlton Society talk – John Beckham on ‘Wildlife in our local parks‘, Charlton House.

20th February, 7-9pm: Death Cafe at Charlton House. “Join us in the comfortable Dutch room to drink tea, eat cake and discuss life, death and what comes after!”.

20-22nd February, various times: the Alexandra Players’ performance of ‘Sleeping Beauty’, Alexandra Hall, Bramshot Avenue.

26th February, 6.30pm: Global Fusion Music and Arts’ Fairtrade Fortnight Networking Event, Charlton House. “Fairtrade stalls including clothing, food, gifts, books, arts, and massage; plus dance, music and poetry – including a few songs from the GFMA singing group. Topping the bill will be the amazing Kora player Mosi Conde from Guinea – and if fancy trying your hand at drumming, Tai Chi or African dance, there will be some fun taster sessions”. Free entry. Email globalfusionarts@yahoo.co.uk.

Disclaimer: These listings are up to date to the best of our knowledge, but we advise checking  details with the event organisers before attending any events.

Photo feature
Have you got a Charlton photo you’d like to share with the world? A shot of your favourite part of SE7, or a recent event? We’d love to feature some readers’ photos in our monthly diary round-up. Send your image to neilclasper[at]gmail.com with a title and – if you like – some words to tell us what the picture means to you (don’t worry: we’ll attribute the photo as you wish, and you’ll keep full control of copyright).

PS. The Charlton Champion is now on Facebook – you can ‘like’ us here: https://www.facebook.com/CharltonChampion!

Charlton Toy Library’s 30th anniversary party

Neil Clasper

Charlton Toy Library are having a birthday party on Saturday – and they need your help to secure the future of this local service…

Charlton Toy Library celebrates its 30th Birthday on 10th November 3pm-6pm at Charlton Assembly Rooms with a spectacular party. Everyone with children is invited to come and enjoy a music session with Boppin Bunnies, theatre workshop with Theatre bugs, balloons, bubbles, birthday tea, party games, face painting and much, much more.

The library is based at Charlton House and runs a borrowing service of toys, books, DVD’s, CD’s, baby safety equipment, dressing up clothes, games puzzles and lots more. It also runs stay and play sessions three times a week 09.30-12.30 on Tuesday, Thursday and Fridays.

Charlton Toy Library does not receive any public funding and relies on a diminishing number of grants. It is likely to lose its outreach programme, which provides a much needed service in the local community for disadvantaged families, in the next few months due to lack of funding.

The service in Charlton House is run solely by a tireless team of dedicated volunteers but the Outreach service delivered by a part time qualified worker and, until recently, a big friendly red van is a cost that the library can no longer afford to run.

Colin Brown, chair of the management committee of the library, said “After 30 years serving the community it will be a terrible shame for the toy library to have to cease running its outreach programme. The ‘stay and play’ and borrowing sessions in Charlton House are also at risk as we rely very heavily on volunteers.

We hope that, following the volunteering boost triggered by the Olympics, we may be able to attract some more help but the running costs needed to keep our outreach worker are increasingly difficult to come by, indeed we have already had to sell the ‘friendly red van’ to cover salary costs for the next few months.  This has not been helped by the fact that applications to charitable trusts have been increasingly unsuccessful in recent months due to the economic climate and the number of other organisations applying for them.

We will keep the Toy Library going in its present format for as long as possible and will enjoy celebrating our 30th birthday on 10 November”

The party will be a fundraising event with an affordable ticket price and an auction of promises for the adults. We are very grateful to Asda on Bugsby Way who is sponsoring the event.

If you would like to help us celebrate and support Charlton Toy Library, tickets can be purchased online at uk.virginmoneygiving.com/charities/charltontoylibrary.  If you are unable to attend but would like to support the Toy Library you can still do so by visiting the Virgin Money Giving website and making a small donation or by donating a ‘promise’ for the auction (details of which can be found on our website www.charltontoylibrary.co.uk).

If you would be interested in becoming a volunteer, helping run our weekly sessions, helping with fundraising or have any services you could offer directly to the library, please contact us on 020 8315 0055 or e-mail us at charltontoylibrary@gmail.com.