<p>Wee Mac Arran 2024 is a children&#39;s book festival.</p> <p>There is already a buzz of anticipation and excitement within&nbsp;our island community that some of&nbsp;Scotland&#39;s finest children&#39;s authors will be coming to the Isle of Arran.&nbsp;</p> <p>Travel to and from Book Festivals on the mainland is both cost and time prohibitive for many&nbsp;families on Arran.</p> <p>Bringing authors to the island&nbsp; for a festival breaks down social barriers with the joy of live literature accessible to all.</p> <p>Following on from our successful pilot in 2022, Wee Mac 2024 events will be hosted in the Garden Room and marquees in the grounds of the&nbsp;Isle of Arran Heritage Museum.&nbsp;</p> <p>The enclosed safe setting&nbsp;offers a relaxed and inviting environment for children and families. It provides&nbsp;a&nbsp;fabulous informal&nbsp;festival feel and&nbsp;free for all to enjoy.&nbsp;</p> <p>Having met and interacted with our invited guest authors, we hope&nbsp;our young people will be enthused to read for pleasure and encouraged about the possibility of becoming writers themselves.</p>

<p>SHED is part of Community Roots in West Kilbride which also runs the Village Larder, a subsidised food with dignity project. We have a community garden in the center of West Kilbride and host a drop-in social gardening day once a week there. We have been developing this garden for fruit and vegetable growing so that we can learn how to grow food whilst recognising the mental and physical health benefits of gardening together. Most of what we produce goes to our Village Larder to be accessed for free by our customers there, and some of it is a healthy reward for our hard working volunteers. Our aims are to make healthy food more accessible and create a buzz in the area about the benefits to our health and environment by growing our own food.&nbsp; In the upcoming year we want to further develop our Community Garden and facilitate food growing in people&#39;s own gardens by providing materials, plants and practical support. We trialed offering some plants to our Village Larder customers this summer with great success and think that we can advertise and distribute well from there, with additional advertising of the project on our social media platforms and contacts. We think this will build our connections with people in WK and be the start of a rolling project over the seasons with continual support and materials offered. People will be asked when signing up f they prefer large trugs, 15litre potted veg gardens, or pop up fabric planters and what plants they want to grow from a list. We will have cards to give out with info on growing each plant, fertiliser for the season, canes and ties etc. They will be invited to sow the seeds in our polytunnel on drop in days to see where it all begins and this will introduce people to our growing community. This project will be especially useful for people who aspire to grow but don&#39;t know where to start, people who can&#39;t afford things like soil and fertiliser to sustain crops once established (which is expensive, expanding education on food and its origins, and people who are not able to access the drop in sessions that are keen to connect and grow.&nbsp;</p>

<p style="margin-bottom:11px"><span style="font-size:11pt"><span style="line-height:107%"><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">We would like funding to purchase a new defibrillator to assist with our community resilience volunteer programme. Volunteers will learn how to use it, developing their skills and building confidence.</span></span></span></p>

<p>The Community Garden was established during lockdown when we were able to work outdoors and socialy distance.</p> <p>Over the last 3 years we have welcomed many visitors, gained new trustees, work&nbsp;with various groups including the schools, hosting and organising events.</p> <p>We grow produce which goes back to the community helping with the cost of living.</p> <p>We offer teas and coffees and&nbsp;plenty chat as the last three years have had a devastating &nbsp;effect on people&#39;s mental heath and wellbeing.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>SeaSalt Streets have, as part of their vision, a longing&nbsp;to bring life and vitality into Saltcoats and in particularly to the heart of the town centre. We have successfully completed most of the vision created by the group, a vision inspired through extensive public consultation with members of the local community and beyond. One part of the initial vision remains unfulfilled -- the use of pop-up events as a means of building community spirit and ownership, a&nbsp;series of &quot;different&quot;&nbsp;one-off events to inspire others to think out of the box and to bring people into the town centre thereby stimulating economic growth. The events will also be used as&nbsp;an opportunity for SeaSalt Streets to showcase their group, it&#39;s vision for the future and as a recruitment tool for new members.</p>

<p><span style="font-size:12pt"><span style="font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif">Friends of Trindlemoss and Bourtreehill and Broomlands Community Association would like to hold&nbsp;events on the 5th and 6th of April 2024 just after Easter. The events would be multiculture event to welcome the new Scots to our country.&nbsp; A celebration of the new Scots moving into&nbsp;the area The two organisations would like for the people of Ayrshire to sample the foods from different cultures for the Syrian Shawarma, Manakish, Falafel to name a few&nbsp;the Afghanistan national dish of Kabuli pulae, Ashak Dumplings the Polish dishes like schabowy, mushroom and cabbage pierogi or sernik and Ukrainian dishes like borshch,varenyky, chicken kyiv not forgetting our own good old Scottish food getting the haggis tatties and neeps, scotch pies, Cullen skink. We want to offer the people of Ayrshire and the new Scots two&nbsp;afternoons of free fun having bouncy castles and fun fairs at both events so the children and adults have fun candyfloss, popcorn also market stalls selling arts and hand-crafted wares. we also want to include a canny cooker demonstration.</span></span></p>

<p style="margin-bottom:11px"><span style="font-size:11pt"><span style="background:#fdfdfd"><span style="line-height:normal"><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.0pt"><span style="font-family:&quot;Lato&quot;,sans-serif"><span style="color:#222222">The Vennel Friends Discovery Group meet weekly in the Vennel Gardens Community Engagement Hub and helps older people come together to meet new people and try a whole host of activities.&nbsp; </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom:11px"><span style="font-size:11pt"><span style="background:#fdfdfd"><span style="line-height:normal"><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.0pt"><span style="font-family:&quot;Lato&quot;,sans-serif"><span style="color:#222222">Our group is open to anyone over the age of 50. &nbsp;We participate in a wide range of activities that promote the health and wellbeing of our group members. The group provides a safe and welcoming place for older people to connect socially which helps to combat loneliness and isolation.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom:11px"><span style="font-size:11pt"><span style="background:#fdfdfd"><span style="line-height:normal"><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.0pt"><span style="font-family:&quot;Lato&quot;,sans-serif"><span style="color:#222222">We are applying for funding to enable our group members to experience the positive mental health and social benefits of going to the theatre and having afternoon tea in Glasgow.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p>

<p>As a community organisation and registered charity we provide facilities for men over the age of 18 years where they can socialise and take up new /continue with old hobbies. This helps with social isolation and also enables us to help the local community by making planters etc for local schools and private gardens. All of our products are much cheaper than commercial products as we do not charge for labour. Some of our power tools which were donated second hand are now coming to the end of their working life and we need to replace them bit by bit to continue with our projects.</p>

<p>&nbsp;The Flying Start Toddler Group is a registerd charity and is for families with children under three years, we operate&nbsp;<span style="font-size:11pt"><span style="line-height:115%"><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">in a safe and comfortable environment which &nbsp;can&nbsp; be accesed&nbsp;easily. We provide parent and child sessions to promote friendships and a sharing of experiences among adults, and activities to promote the wellbeing of babies and children. The group members have the opportunity to engage in activities that might not be available to them. The members benefit from companionship, support and social interaction and the opportunity to form new friendships.</span></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom:13px"><font face="Calibri, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px;">The group is open three mornings per week, we use a large hall for active play and snack,&nbsp;small hall for activities and an early years room for baby activities and art and craft. We hold parties at&nbsp; Easter, Halloween and Christmas and any special occassions. The cost for our members is &pound;2 per family including a snack of tea, coffee, juice, crisps and&nbsp; biscuits.&nbsp; All our activities are free, this is possible through grants and awards to cover our core costs and activities.</span></font></p>