Coffee morning a winter pick-me-up
With the baking stall a sellout and difficulty finding a seat, there was hustle and bustle around Ardrishaig Parish Church hall for a Saturday coffee morning.
Tables decorated with vases of colourful tulips had people saying goodbye to the January blues, but they were still not as enticing as the plates of homemade traybakes, scones and cakes that tempted all who came through the door.
Organised by Ardrishaig Guild, the coffee morning on Saturday February 1 was in aid of Guild projects, with £363 raised.
The Church of Scotland Guild partners six projects every three years and is currently supporting:
Malawi Fruits – helping young people to provide solar pumps for irrigation to improve crops.
Seema’s project – helping to protect young children in Pune, India, whose mothers are often prostitutes. The charity has built a home for 32 children and with the guild’s help will double this.
Journeying together, a partnership between the Guild and World Mission – helping teenage mothers in Zambia, who are living in poverty, go back to school and finish their education.
Boys Brigade – developing IT skills.
Join up the dots – a new partnership between Crossreach and the guild tackling loneliness and isolation from care homes, to projects for mental wellbeing.
Sailors Society – placing a chaplain in every port in Scotland to give spiritual and practical support to Merchant seamen who are far from home.
The last three-year fund raising cycle raised in excess of £600,000.
And so far in this current cycle, from 2018-2021, an amazing £296,016 has been raised.