A free weekly arts and crafts club in Cwmbran regularly attracts 40 people.
The members of Allsorts meet every Monday from 11am to 2pm in the annex at the back of Cwmbran Community Council in Old Cwmbran.
It’s run by six volunteers and during last week’s session I chatted to Brenda Flewelling, who the council approached to start the community club. The first session was held in October 2023. Anyone is welcome to join.
Brenda said: “We opened the first day and thought ‘we’ll probably get half a dozen people along’. We actually had 30 people on the first day and it’s just gone up. We’ve got 70 on the books now. We have to limit the room to 40 so if people are not coming we ask them to let us know so someone else can come.
“They just love coming.
“We’re making stuff for St David’s Day today. They’re making book-folded Welsh ladies, they’re also making Welsh ladies out of tubes from kitchen rolls. They’re doing daffodil and leek badges and some people are doing something entirely different. You can do whatever you want.”
Grants from the community council and other organisations have kept it free for participants.
Brenda said: “We don’t charge anything at all. They don’t pay for the materials.
“They make stuff and they take it home so we constantly have to replace it.”
As we spoke in the kitchen, Jackie Hayes, 85, one of the volunteers walked in.
Brenda said: “This lady here, Jackie, is on our committee. She’s a marvel at finding cheap stuff for us. If you want something you say to Jackie, ‘can you find so and so’.”
Jackie said: “I go around five shops to find which is the cheapest. You’ve got to keep going. If you don’t come out you don’t do it, do you? I could sit there and do all that and don’t bother being on the committee.
“But it keeps you young. The young people that come in, they make such a fuss, and when they go they go it’s ‘thank you very much, we’ve enjoyed it’ and it’s worth it isn’t it?”
Join the Allsorts’ Faceboom group here.