Grill & Chill - A Review

On Saturday 18th June, Curridge Residents' Association hosted the first Grill & Chill family social event at the WI Hall, as a fundraiser to allow CRA to continue to fund free events during the winter and also to make a financial donation to the ongoing redevelopment of Curridge Playground.

The event turned out to be a great success, attended by around 270 local adults and children, including a number of guests invited by the Trustees of Curridge Playground in recognition of their past and present contribution to the development of Curridge Playground as a local amenity.

Food was provided in the form of a professional outdoor barbecue by Texas BBQ (http://www.texasbbq.biz), and iced deserts by Gelarto Ice Cream (http://www.gelartoicecream.co.uk/).

A cash bar run by volunteers offered a range of alcoholic and soft drinks, even if we ran dry of G&T, fruit cider and Punter ale by the end!

Live music was provided by local ukelele trio Mispent Ukes and the fabulous Charley Hart perfoming solo with her guitar. DJ Adam Willsher also gave us a youth disco set in the middle of the evening.

Outdoor entertainments included a large bouncy castle, crockery smash and numerous other games. Curridge Playground itself was re-opened in time for the event and was popular with children throughout the evening for everything from Football to Gymnastics!

The CRA committee could not have delivered this event without the help and support of a number of local individuals that volunteered their time on the day to help setup and run the event. We therefore would like to thank the following people for their help on the day:

Cynthia Bostock
Karel Bostock
Helen Cholmeley
Rob Crispin
Latta Desai
Matt Edwards
Keith Evans
Diana ffrench (& Gavin)
Ray ffrench
Paul Hudson
David King
Helen Mackenzie
Allwin Mercer
Henry Mercer
Kevin Phipps
John Rigby
Neil Wood

We would also like to thank:

• Andy Murray and MoD Hermitage Station for the loan of an army tent (hey, if we hadn't had it we might not have been so lucky with the weather!)
• Curridge Horticultural Society for the use of their tables and 3rd Newbury Scouts for the loan of the chairs
• Thatcham Research Sports and Social Club for the loan of the outdoor games
• West Berks Van Hire (http://www.westberksvanhire.co.uk) for the use of a van for the weekend
• The Bunk Inn (http://www.thebunkinn.co.uk/) and Upham Brewery (http://www.uphambrewery.co.uk/) for heavily discounted supply of Punter real ale.
• Numerous other local individuals for loan of equipment for the event.

The result of this event is that CRA secured funding for two years of Clean Up and Curridge Cheer events, and also made a donation of £500 to Curridge Playground Trustees to be spent on outdoor seating in the coming months.

Thank you to everyone that attended the event and if you have any suggestions on how a future Curridge summer event could be improved then please let the CRA committee know by email or using the contact page.

For photographs of the event, please see the following link (thanks to Paul Hudson - Facebook account required) tinyurl.com/hc5epcu

Would you like to help organise it if we did it again in 2017???

Chris, Alix & James