Transition Town Tooting

Author: Transition Town Tooting

  • Number 12 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number twelve:
    No.12 tips for Xmas. Celebrate Xmas eve with some English wine from Kent or locally brewed beer from By The Horns! 
    pic.twitter.com/A1c75HsVtt

    And…that’s the last of our twelve seasonal sustainability tweets: each one from a different person, saying something she or he wants to share that fits with this time of year. We hope that each of them gives you something to think about, or follow up.

    We hope you enjoyed them too, whether you saw them on twitter as they came out during the past 12 days, or if you are seeing them gathered here on the TTT blog.
    We’ll list them again in our next TTT monthly mail out. 
    Thanks for following!

  • Number 11 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number eleven:
    No.11 #Xmas Tip: save your Xmas veg peelings for some lovely compost and start growing for 2015! #Tooting #Transition

  • Number 10 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number ten:

    No.10 in TTT’s 12 tweets to Xmas: Midwinter but the sun is heading back our way. In every darkness the seed of renewal lies #Tooting #Transition 

  • Number 9 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number nine:
    No.9 tips for Xmas: Mark The Dark. Sit still awhile without light. Enjoy winter’s dark solstice magic. Today the sun’s new year begins!

  • Number 8 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number eight:
    No.8 tips for Xmas: Take a few moments to think back on the year for 3 things you have been grateful for & 1 thing you’re looking forward to

    Plus a bonus comment for the blog: 

    BOOST YOUR POSITIVE EMOTIONS 
    Sustainability on a personal note….
    Experiencing, savouring and building on the positive emotions you have when you are happy can support your wellbeing and help buffer against the negative things that might happen. These tips could help support sustained happiness and help build resilience to the challenges of climate change.


    1. Reliving great memories make us want to have them even more in our present life– Take five minutes for 3 days over the Christmas period to sit in a quiet room, by yourself and close your eyes. On the first day, think back to a really enjoyable event in the last year. It can be anything, big or small. Try to relive that event through your senses and really enjoy it. On day two, do the same except relive a happy memory and on day three, think of a really successful time you felt totally in control.

    Replay them as though they were a film, rewind the best bits and see them again and again. 

    Think about how you felt, the positive emotions you had, why the event was enjoyable, happy, and successful, who was there, the sounds, smells, textures. Have you felt this way again? Write down the times you have felt this way and see if you can think of any patterns connected with feeling good and what you did.

    2. Take a few moments to think back on this year, for 3 things you have been grateful for, and 1 thing you are looking forward to

    3. On your Christmas cards, write about your gratitude to the person you are sending it to- something they did for you, or you appreciate in them.

  • Reduce, Re-use, RESPARKLE! crafts workshop

    Tomorrow: Saturday 20th December
    TTT crafts with recycled materials, Tooting Library, 2:00 to 4:00

    Our free drop-in seasonal craft making workshop upstairs at the beautiful Tooting Library, 75 Mitcham Road, SW17 9PD. 

    All welcome, all ages, all tuition and materials provided
    Practical and fun session to illustrate making beautiful things from waste – and reduce carbon. Photos from our 2012 event here
     

    We’ll be using recycled materials to make creative presents, decorations or packages (for yourself or for others). 
    With quite a lot of glitter.

    Many thanks to the team at Tooting Library, and to GLL

    Crafts with recycled materials!
    Our biennial free drop-in seasonal craft making workshop upstairs at the beautiful Tooting Library.
    We’ll be using recycled materials to make creative presents, decorations or packages (for yourself or for others). With quite a lot of glitter.
    All welcome, all ages, all tuition and materials provided.
    Practical and fun session to illustrate making beautiful things from waste – and reduce carbon.
    Photos from our 2012 event here on PD:
    http://www.projectdirt.com/project/7213/#!/journal…
    Many thanks to the team at Tooting Library, and to GLL
    Any queries – email us at transitiontowntooting@gmail.com
    – See more at: http://www.projectdirt.com/apps/event/32290/#sthash.fDExqieP.dpuf
    Crafts with recycled materials!
    Our biennial free drop-in seasonal craft making workshop upstairs at the beautiful Tooting Library.
    We’ll be using recycled materials to make creative presents, decorations or packages (for yourself or for others). With quite a lot of glitter.
    All welcome, all ages, all tuition and materials provided.
    Practical and fun session to illustrate making beautiful things from waste – and reduce carbon.
    Photos from our 2012 event here on PD:
    http://www.projectdirt.com/project/7213/#!/journal…
    Many thanks to the team at Tooting Library, and to GLL
    Any queries – email us at transitiontowntooting@gmail.com
    – See more at: http://www.projectdirt.com/apps/event/32290/#sthash.fDExqieP.dpuf
    Crafts with recycled materials!
    Our biennial free drop-in seasonal craft making workshop upstairs at the beautiful Tooting Library.
    We’ll be using recycled materials to make creative presents, decorations or packages (for yourself or for others). With quite a lot of glitter.
    All welcome, all ages, all tuition and materials provided.
    Practical and fun session to illustrate making beautiful things from waste – and reduce carbon.
    Photos from our 2012 event here on PD:
    http://www.projectdirt.com/project/7213/#!/journal…
    Many thanks to the team at Tooting Library, and to GLL
    Any queries – email us at transitiontowntooting@gmail.com
    – See more at: http://www.projectdirt.com/apps/event/32290/#sthash.fDExqieP.dpuf

    Crafts with recycled materials!
    Our biennial free drop-in seasonal craft making workshop upstairs at the beautiful Tooting Library.
    We’ll be using recycled materials to make creative presents, decorations or packages (for yourself or for others). With quite a lot of glitter.
    All welcome, all ages, all tuition and materials provided.
    Practical and fun session to illustrate making beautiful things from waste – and reduce carbon.
    Photos from our 2012 event here on PD:
    http://www.projectdirt.com/project/7213/#!/journal…
    Many thanks to the team at Tooting Library, and to GLL
    Any queries – email us at transitiontowntooting@gmail.com
    – See more at: http://www.projectdirt.com/apps/event/32290/#sthash.fDExqieP.dpuf

  • Number 7 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number seven:
    No.7 tips for xmas: Wear jumpers, hug friends, lower the heating! More energy & money saving tips @thecarbontrust: goo.gl/j0VKqQ

  • Number 6 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number six:
    No.6 in @tttooting 12 tweets to Xmas. Swap screen time for #wildtime Ideas: @wearewildthing @wildlifetrusts @LoveOutdoorPlay @outdoor_nation

    Plus a bonus photograph for the blog only:
    Have a look at the Christmas stamp – obviously it’s showing Tooting, Furzedown or Fishponds…so that’s more encouragement to get outdoors! See you there.

  • Number 5 in TTT’s ’12 tweets to Christmas’

    Here is tweet number five:
    No. 5 in @tttooting‘s 12 days to xmas: Broken Xmas present? Save it from landfill – head to a @RestartProject Party and learn how to fix it!

  • Ethical Investment

    At last week’s Pension Power event, we had a very interesting discussion about how ordinary citizens can start to tackle the behemoth of the financial system, by making choices that avoid destructive climate consequences.

    Share Action‘s Sophia McNab presented some interesting data and ideas.  Sophia says:

    “To kick-off your pension fund activism, you can email your pension fund about your climate concerns. Our e-action makes it really simple; you can send off our template email or edit it to include your own questions: www.greenlightcampaign.org.uk  Beyond that, ShareAction is also coordinating meetings between pension funds and their customers – here is a video of the customers who met with Scottish Widows last week.”

    We were happy to have ethical investment advisor Barchester Green‘s John Ditchfield in the audience who explained some of the problems of changing an industry where so much is invested in the climate busting status quo.  He also forwarded this Guardian article about the “winners and sinners” in ethical investing. We dabbled briefly with SIPPS (self invested personal pensions) such as this one, where you chose the investments. It requires a bit of financial nous, but it does give you control.

    We hope to have more ethical investment events in 2015 and you don’t have to have a pension or indeed any money to be interested!

    This stuff affects us all but most of us tend to bury our heads in the sand don’t we?

    Almost everyone deals with a bank or building society for loans, current accounts or savings. How ethical is yours? Fancy funding the arms trade, big pharma, destructive mining or human rights abuse?  Most of the major banks do, however tacitly. And what about Wandsworth Council, where do they invest their millions of reserves?  Somewhere not very clever from an ethical standpoint I’d wager, but prepared to be proved wrong WBC!