BODMIN ROAD CHURCH, Bransholme, Kingston upon Hull

This is the start of our next big growing push.  It may look small but acorns turn to oaks, and its only the beginning, We have plans to do gorrilla planting nearby too once we have a trained up team.

This is one of the volunteers unused back gardens round the corner from the church.
The next time you see this we will have dug this over and started to break the soil down and added some compost and manure all being well. If you go to Bodmin Road Church and want to join in get in touch with us or Marie or Tony in church and lets get growing together. Equally if you dont go to any church but want to join in let us know, everyone is welcome.

Bodmin Road Church will be the first place we offer some cooking sessions too shortly, so this is one exciting place to watch. If you or someone you know needs help with money issues we can help with those too so please get in touch with us and we can help meet your needs.

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St Mathews / Hull Youth For Christ, Boulevard.

After a few test digs and a few hard hours trying to clear the site by hand and electric saws and hedge trimmers we resorted to a 1.5 ton digger kindly hired to us for a smashing low price by Humberside Plant Hire.  This enabled us to clear the site in one afternoon, once we had learned how to use it, most of us had a go, but some were better than others...tee hee.  That's Anna at the controls, which made a scream noise each time she used them for some reason. Have a look below at what we did in an afternoon with 3 adults and a few young people, all of whom had to keep a close eye on that digger arm, it had a mind of its own....honest.

John Paul with one of the less exciting tools that day, bad luck son.

At the start of the day, work was slow as we tried to remember how to use all 11 levers !

by the end of the day, one pile of old rotten fence and wood, and one pile of brambles and weeds, oh and no fence anymore !

One clear site - looks good enough to eat out of right ? well you can't see in the pics but that's mostly rubble, broken glass, and grit, but with lots of sieving and care it will grow.

The one lovely tree on site, we really must identify that now its in leaf, a guess anyone ?

Next step is 2 skips, a community meeting to plan the site, and a lot of wheelbarrows, manure and sieving....if it sounds like your kind of fun please come and join in.

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ST STEPHEN'S NEIGHBOURHOOD CENTRE, Greatfield, Kingston Upon Hull

Adrian is working with the ever lovely Sister Anna and Josie to do some growing within the church grounds, but also nearby we have one of our gorilla gardening plots. Please pop in and see the sisters or get in touch with us if you fancy some of the growing action here. We have already put some potatoes in (photos to follow) but have plans for much more.

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BODMIN ROAD CHURCH, Bransholme, Kingston Upon Hull

An amazing place full of people with big hearts, we had to work with Bodmin Road Church.  We will be doing our first cooking sessions here in a couple of months once the bulk of the growing activities have started, but we have a plan for some growing here to, but we are going to do it differently, using redundant back gardens.  We want to try and work in as many ways as possible and experiment with what works best in Hull, based on what has worked elsewhere. There is just a chance that something might happen on that grass there on the left in time too ;-)

If you live on Bransholme and want to join in or would love to volunteer here please let us know.

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LONGHILL LINK UP TRUST, Longhill, Kingston Upon Hull

LONGHILL LINK UP TRUST, Longhill, Kingston Upon Hull

These guys have their own growing group run by the lovely Estelle and are well ahead of the game with lovely top soil delivered and some fab huge tyres on site to grow in.  We will be helping them with some advice and a few tools and things here and there.  Please pop into Link Up and have a look at what they have going on, and join in their growing. We will be offering some cooking sessions later in the year with them too. We will pop some updates of what they do here from time to time.

Here is Estelle and some of her team getting down to some hard work - we dig it.

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ST AIDAN'S CHURCH, Southcoates Avenue. Kingston Upon Hull

The guys at St Aidan's have been so keen about the idea of Living Better for Less from the first glimpse of the idea, so it was only natural that we would get together and start something up.  They have a lovely (well horrid really at the mo) space behind their hall that is begging to become a Garden of Eden. We will be starting this one in a few weeks while we clear the bigger spaces first, but keep looking as its going to be a great place very soon. You can see this place round the back of the church from the public field if its not open.  Do you want to help ? Get in touch and join in from the start.

This site comes complete with a supermarket trolley (we have some fun plans for that, which don't include putting shopping in it) and rubble, well you can see its not much yet.

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ST MATTHEWS / HULL YOUTH FOR CHRIST, Boulevard, Kingston Upon Hul

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With our passion for derelict land we just had to take this place on. As you can see below places don't come more rough and overgrown than this. Together we will make it a jewel, with some time and sweat. Quite a lot of both i suspect !  There is a great group of young people and locals very excited about this place and a groovy vibe already going on. If you fancy a look just wander down and pop in, its not locked. If you want to help transform our greatest challenge please get in touch, all help greatly received. have a look below at what we started with.

Somewhat unwelcoming fence, on the verge of falling over too. We will put it back lower and colourful to attract people, not keep them out.

7ft brambles, rubble, bike wheels, old toilet block foundations, a Victorian stair handrail and a lawnmower were just a few delights hidden in here. Hopefully great fertile soil is beneath.

At least there is a nice as yet unidentified tree and a few Elder trees on site, the only things worth saving sadly.  This one is going to hurt to get sorted...maybe its digger time ?

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ST MICHAEL'S YOUTH PROJECT, Orchard Park, Kingston Upon Hull

For the Youth Project we decided we would use an allotment so we would get an opportunity to take young people away from the area for a little while, and because the project had taken an allotment on a year ago but had no time or expertise to make the most of it. We will in time extend our growing from the hidden away site off Clough Road, but this year all our efforts will be behind its closed doors, but we will let you see regular pics don't worry.  If you would like to visit, just let us know. Here is how the growing space looked when we joined forces to tackle it.

4ft high chunky brambles and thick grass and weeds covered the whole site - eeek !!!

Most of what was left there by the previous allotment holder was rotten, rusty or dead - except the bricks :-)

Watch this space to see a fast transformation of this site in time for first planting in 3 weeks !

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ST HILDA'S CHURCH, Greatfield, Kingston Upon Hull

St Hilda's is one of our first growing spaces. Started early on by Adrian and run along with the gardening club at the church.  The site now has a number of fruit trees, potatoes and a spare dug over veg bed ready for planting some other veg. If you would like to come along and help, and eat what we grow with us, get in touch.

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In the beginning there was....

Well we finally started digging places.  We have decided to start with a smaller number of places to work for the first few months to set some showcase sites up, to help recruit more people over the late summer months to get an early start for next season.

Keep coming back as we will update the blog every week or so and you can check out what we do and where we are doing it. If you follow the web page link you can see our online calendar of when our activities take place, and come along and join in.  There is always a cup of tea and a spare spade for new friends.

Email us; iwant2livebetter@gmail.com or search@care4free.net
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