Annual Parish Meeting 2016

This year’s Annual Parish Meeting will take place on Thursday 19 May at 7.30pm at Natland & Oxenholme Village Hall. All Natlanders welcome! You can read or download the poster with further information here. The Parish Council’s Annual Report to 31 March 2016, and interim accounts, can also be read or downloaded here.

Steam train stopping by on Tuesday

On Tuesday 3 May 44871 (a Black 5) will be southbound at Oxenholme at 20:05. It will be held in the upper goods loop from 20:15 to 20:30 and will then continue its journey to Carnforth.

Pat Williams

Inspiring talk at April meeting of the WI

The speaker at the April meeting of the WI was Wendy Ellwood, author of Gran on the Run, who learned to run in 9 months in order to tackle the Great North Run and ended up raising over £10,000 for a charity related to a rare condition suffered by her granddaughter. The meeting also reported on upcoming WI excursions and featured a limerick competition, won by Kirsten Cannon’s contribution on the theme of the Queen’s 90th birthday.

You can download or read a full report of the meeting here.

Village Hall AGM coming up. Come and have your say on its future.

Village Hall Chairman,  Paul Want, invites all interested members of the public to the AGM for the Village Hall which will be held in the Village Hall at 7.30pm on Monday, 9 May.

He writes:
Looking to see what could happen is the same as using a crystal ball, very unreliable and open to interpretation. Therefore I would like to concentrate on areas that we do have some control over.

So as to maintain and improve the desirability of the halls for our hirers, we need to ensure the fabric is kept serviceable and safe which in turn makes the use of the halls a more saleable product and will make life easier for the cleaners. Long-term it should also make the halls cheaper to run.

For the year hence and given our “business plan”, I would recommend the following:

• continue with planning a major programme of refurbishment works to the lobby, loos and rear corridor
• redecorate the small hall
• review and revise the current level of charges, and
• improve the way in which we advertise and market the halls’ availability and events.

Although we have a healthy bank balance, most of that will be taken up with refurbishment and that is why we need to review and revise our current hire rates. We also need to keep pace with the increasing costs from service providers. Fundraising events alone may not plug gaps in the finances.

None of us are getting any younger and it would be good to try and co-opt others into the running of the halls so as to ease the burden and to also give some fresh ideas. How we do this could be by word of mouth, advertising and even press-ganging.

We have a good resource within Natland and Oxenholme. It would be good to keep it that way and with the efforts of all the committee members this is achievable.

Simon and Garfunkle Tribute Act is this Saturday

All the old favourites will be performed live by 

Tim Chu and Ian Bailey 

Saturday 23rd April in St. Mark’s Church. 

Doors open 7.15pm • Show starts 8.00pm.

Refreshments served during interval  

Tickets £12.

Enquiries call Anna-Marie Jesson 07905 188772,

email anna.jesson@yahoo.com 

or visit www.trybooking.co.uk/351

Thank you to all who supported this super event. At the last count £1433.00 had been raised for essential works to the church building.

Change of Highways Hotline telephone number

The Cumbria County Council Highways Hotline number has changed. The new number is 0300 303 2992. The hotline is one method by which the public can report issues with the highway.

The change from a 0845 number to a 0300 number will mean a lower call cost for the majority of callers, although this will depend on which phone company they are with, whether it is a land line or mobile, and where they are calling from.

April Parish Council agenda

The agenda for the next meeting of Natland Parish Council on Monday 25 April is now available to read or download here.

Natland Volunteers

Spring is here! It’s time to get out and help keep Natland looking fresh and welcoming – following up on the good work of the many volunteers who helped on the latest Spring Litter Hunt. Find out more on our Volunteer! page.

Royal Scot heading south on Saturday

On Saturday 16 April 46100 Royal Scot will be southbound through Oxenholme.    Pat Williams.

Posthumous award given to Bryan Hewertson

The French government has recently awarded the rank of Chevalier in the Ordre National de la Legion d'honneur to Bryan Hewertson for his work in liberating France during the Normandy landings. Bryan - who lived in Stainton and sang in St. Mark's church choir in his youth - sadly passed away last year, but it is good to hear that his bravery has at last been recognised.

Pre-School Jumble Sale

Jumble Sale - Saturday 16th April, 2pm

Natland and Oxenholme Preschool are holding a jumble sale on Saturday 16th April at the Village Hall, Natland. 

£1 entry fee to include a drink and a biscuit.  

If you have any jumble to donate, please bring it to the Village Hall on the mornings of Fri 15th/Sat 16th April between 9.00am and 12.00pm, thanks. 

registered charity no1160505

Monday Club Meeting

The meeting this month, on the 18th April at 2pm, will welcome Hal Bagot who will speak on "Running Levens Estate". New members are invited to join us.

Natland hosts Table Tennis finals

The finals of the 2016 closed table tennis tournament for the Kendal and District League were played on Tuesday March 22nd at Natland Village Hall. This followed the preliminary rounds played at Dallam on Sunday March 20th.
        The two most exciting finals were played just after the interval. In the open doubles final were two scratch pairings – Steve Dixon from IBIS played with Alan Turner from Dalton and they lost deuce in the fifth to Roger Pimblett from Natland playing with Trevor Nicholson of IBIS. Roger and Trevor recovered from 10-6 down in the final game. The final score was 11-9, 8-11, 11-8, 3-11, 15-13.
         In the division 2 singles Craig James (Natland) recovered from 2 sets down against Bernard Pickthall (Natland) to win 8-11, 7-11, 11-7, 11-6, 14-12.
       The other events saw some outstanding table tennis without such close games. The Division 1 singles was won by Steve Dixon (IBIS) who beat his teammate Trevor Nicholson 11-5, 11-7, 11-7.

Andrew Hudson, Bob Gale and Sarah Tyson

Steve has a tremendous record in this event dating back to 1993. The Ladies singles saw a reversal of last year’s result Fran Currie (Burton) beating Louise Thompson (Natland)in the crucial round robin match. Fran also won the mixed doubles playing with clubmate Peter Baxendale. They beat Andrew Hudson and Sarah Tyson (Natland) 7-11, 11-3, 11-5, 11-8. Mike Taylor of Crook was in 2 finals. In the handicap event he beat Trevor Nicholson 11-5, 11-7, 11-8. In the veterans he lost to Steve Dixon 14-12, 11-4, 11-3.
        The division 3 singles belied its lowly status with some superb table tennis – young Archie Catnach (Natland) beating Simon Gregory (Burton) 11-8, 11-5, 7-11, 11-7. Archie also caused a big upset in the round robin of the junior singles beating division 1 player  Aidan Branch. His teammate Daniel Holder also caused an upset beating Ben O’Flynn in the preliminaries. Despite this in the final Ben O’Flynn (Dalton) beat Aidan Branch (Burton)11-5,11-8, 12-10. They joined together in the junior doubles to beat Catnach and Whitehead in the final.
         The finals were played in excellent conditions at Natland village hall. Trophies were presented by the President Bob Gale who was present throughout.                         Bob Bagot.
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Iris is a winner at the Art Exhibition

The recent Annual Art Exhibition was another successful event with £725 raised for Village Hall Funds. Thank you to all the exhibiting artists, visitors, picture purchasers, raffle ticket buyers, café customers and the many volunteers who all contributed.

Almost all the pictures received votes from the visitors in the ‘favourite painting’ ballot. The winner was “Iris – bold print” by Maureen Holmes.

New volunteer needed at the Village Hall

The Natland & Oxenholme Village Hall committee are looking for a ‘Heating Monitor’ to set and look after the heater controls in the building.

No experience necessary. Full training given. To start as soon as the new controller has been installed. It would suit someone available during the day.

Please contact Paul Want if you think you can help.

Royal Scot returns to West Coast Main Line

The ban has been lifted on the West Coast Main Line.

46100 Royal Scot will be northbound through Oxenholme 11:43 on Saturday 9 April.

Pat Williams

Parish Council minutes for March

The minutes of the March meeting of the Parish Council are now available to read or download here.

A mild March

2016		2015
Average temperatures
Temperature at 8am	4.1C		4.2C
Min temperature	2.8C		2.5C
Max temperature	7.7C		7.3C
Total rainfall	mm	in	mm	in
	92	3.7	148	5.9

We had two weeks without any rain in the middle of the month! March is usually one of the drier months and it was fairly average. The maximum temperature on Easter Sunday was the same as Christmas Day (which was very mild last year).

John Dobson

April Parish Magazine now available

Here you will find a fascinating account of the early life of John Ellison who spent his childhood in Oxenholme and went to school in Natland, and who died recently at the age of 95. There is also a report of the problems associated with the church building, a proposal by the school to support a child in Guatemala, and a record of the life of Thomas Young who lived at St. Mark's Home for a while and who died in the First World War. Click here for these articles, and many more.