Frog Hall Help Bulletins #11 to #20

These pages have back numbers of the Frog Hall Help Bulletin from 20 April to 24 May, issued and coordinated by Alison and Angus Mitchell so you can look back at information previously published.

Index to back issues on this page

#20: 24 May 2020

From Alison

Deliveries: Another delivery this week that neighbours are willing to add a few items to are:

Please let me know what deliveries are available for additions next week

Gardening The following plants have been offered for free

Masks: We have a few more masks for anyone else who needs some. Please let me know.

I have a 4 litres of a 5 litre bottle of Virgin Olive Oil left if anyone has a 1 litre container to refill. £3.50 a litre

I also have 3 * 1.5kg plain white flour available. £0.75p a bag

I have had another positive comment about WHITE HORSE PUB takeaway/delivery meal service.Evidently good value for money!!

I hear that California Country Park is open with much improved access road and plenty of NEW parking spaces, some with electric charging facilities.

#19: 24 May 2020

From Alison

Deliveries: This weeks deliveries that neighbours are willing to add a few items to are:

Gardening The following plants have been offered for free

Masks: We have some more masks for anyone who needs some. Please let me know.

Request: If anyone is going to Aldi could you please let me know as we have had a request for an Aldi own product.

WBC have send this communication out this week which has some interesting points in it.

#18: 22 May 2020

From Alison

Deliveries:

Please let me know if you have a delivery booked for the coming week that you are willing to add some items to.

Gardening:

The following plants have been offered for free:

Anyone interested please email FrogHallHelp or call Jenny 0118 978 0015

I am told that earlier this week Squires had very few bedding plants, may get some in by the weekend. And Henry Street was well stocked, but much busier.

Request:

A neighbour has sent the following:

I am making rag rugs. It would be useful to have more material to work with and so if anyone is throwing out clothes or other fabric, please throw it my way. Useful to me is cloth with colour on both sides of it and is no thicker than denim. T-shirts are ideal! Any colours (except black and white) are welcome but especially warm colours and green. As I cut everything into small strips, any condition will do. Happy to collect from doorsteps or end of drives!

Please let me know if you can help.

Community Website:

We have had several comments back about the website. It is great to hear that all have been positive, with particular reference to the history pages and the overall concept of the site. We have had suggestions to increase the content on local facilities, more about the road, and to keep the website going once the Covid emergency is over. What do you think? Have you had a look at the website? Does anyone have any other suggestions for added content? It would be great if you could give us your opinion - check under the Contact Us tab on the site.

#17: 17 May 2020

From Alison

Deliveries:

This week's delivery slots which have been offered for neighbours to add a few items are:

Eggs: If anyone wants to change their order for eggs for any week could you please let me know by the previous Sunday evening, thanks.

Ice cream! A couple of neighbours had Ice Cream deliveries from Mr Whippy this week!! It needs booking (it fills up quickly) and paying for in advance and when he turns up he makes the ice creams and lets you collect safely at at a safe distance from the window counter. Now they know how it works, next time there is a slot they are happy to take orders and coordinate for anyone in the street that wants one. You need to choose from the menu below. Wokingham delivery isn’t always available but I’m sure if the order was big enough in FHD, we might be able to request a visit!

[ unnumbered ]: 13 May 2020

From Alison

Morrisons launched their new website. I had to re-enter all my details but then found every delivery slot up to May 26 was available. As of this morning there are a huge number still open. You have to have a minimum of £40 in the basket before it will let you reserve the delivery and each slot costs £2.50. Explains why I have spent the last fortnight cursing Morrisons every night around midnight, they were not accepting new delivery reservations because they were going to wipe the slate clean.

#16: 11 May 2020

From Alison

Thanks again to everyone for making Friday's VE Day celebrations such a success. And especially to those that started the ball rolling by suggesting we celebrated the occasion. The whole thing was very much a team effort.

The next delivery slots which have been offered for neighbours to add a few items are with Sainsburys, Waitrose & (I think) Asda. Sainsburys and Waitrose additions in by 6pm TODAY! Asda additions would need to be in by midday on Wednesday 13th May.

Last orders for flour, olive oil and anything else Brakes offer on their Call & Collect also by 6pm today please.

A spare copy of Private Eye issue 1520 (7 May 2020) has been offered to the first person to reply. It is still in its mailing wrapper.

NHS Contact Tracing App. There is a bit in the media at the moment about the NHS contact tracing App which is being trialled on the Isle of Wight and will be available nationwide soon. The App requires a reasonably up-to-date Smartphone. This might result in a rush to upgrade and possibly lead to a future shortage of phones. So if you don’t have a compatible smart phone and want to be able to run the App, or want a new phone for another reason, now might be a good time to buy.

The App requires Bluetooth Low Energy, the first phone with BLE was introduced in 2011, most phones today have it. The App needs Apple IOS 11 upwards or Android 8 upwards. The App might be changed to run on older versions in the future.

#15: 4 May 2020

From Alison

The next two delivery slots which have been offered for neighbours to add a few items are with Waitrose & Asda. Waitrose is Wednesday 6th May, additions in by 6pm TODAY! Asda is Thursday 7th May, additions in by midday on Wednesday 6th May.

One of our neighbours is planning on doing a Brakes Call & Collect later this week. They are willing to get another 16kg bag of strong bread flour and split it again, (or 25kg if there is enough demand). Brakes are also selling 16 kg bags of wholemeal flour which apparently has added gluten so it should be OK for bread making, especially if it is used 30/70 with strong white. If enough people are interested in having some wholemeal to make up 8kg (ie half a bag) then they will get a bag of this.

They also plan to get some olive oil if anyone wants some. They come in 5ltr bottles and cost £17.49 which works out at £3.50 a litre.

Please let me know if you are interested in having any of the items mentioned. Thanks.

Citizens Advice Wokingham have a link on their website which gives details of services and support. The keep Mobile service is particularly useful for anyone over aged 70 and/or disabled.

Here are their supermarket updates.

The Vintage Hog Roast Company in Hurst are offering a delivery for VE day this weekend. They are sold out for Saturday & Sunday but still some slots available for Sunday. See flyer here.

#14: 1 May 2020

From Alison

Next two delivery slots which have been offered for neighbours to add a few items are both Tesco.

The first is Sunday 3rd May, additions in by afternoon of the 2nd ie tomorrow! The second is Monday 4th May, additions in by Sunday 3rd.

The butchers in Rances Lane is now selling bags of flour although I am uncertain of what type.

The White Horse is now offering deliveries of freshly cooked meals. Here is a list of what they offer. This is what they have said:

All food will be cooked fresh, please where possible place your orders well in advance, giving a time you’d like delivery and we’ll do all we can to get it to you on time!

Their opening times are: Monday - Closed; Tuesday - 5pm - 8pm; Wednesday - Closed; Thursday - 5pm - 8pm; Friday - 5pm - 9pm; Saturday 12pm - 8pm; Sunday - Closed. Phone 0118 979 7402

#13: 27 April 2020

From Alison

The next delivery slots booked are:

Waitrose on 29th April, Additions in by this evening please. (27th April)

Asda on 30th April. Additions in by midday on Wednesday 29th.

It has been suggested that this year's olive harvest may either not happen or be much lower due to the olive blight. In light of this is anyone interested in sharing an order from Brakes while it is still available?

David Roland is happy to split another sack of bread flour if there are enough other people to take about 10kg out of the 16 kg bag. Again please let me know if you are interested.

We have had another neighbour very pleased with the deliveries from The White Horse. They have also pointed out that from bitter experience that the type of yeast needed for a bread machine needs to be labelled 'easy bake' and 'suitable for bread makers'!

One neighbour has had deliveries from local brewers Siren Breweries and Bond Brews. Siren's range is unusual and interesting, Bond perhaps more traditional. Their details are on the FHD Information page.

Has anyone got any spare vegetable plants they are willing to pass on?

After a clear out of our garden shed we found a large number of flower pots (plastic). They are now just inside our gate; please help yourselves (number 36).

It is Captain Tom's 100th birthday on Thursday, shall we sing Happy Birthday to him after our #ClapForOurCarers?

Ongoing requests: strong bread flour, Self Raising flour, Spelt flour, dried yeast, and fast action yeast, Waitrose Canadian very strong stoneground whole meal bread flour.

#12: 22 April 2020

From Alison

Hi

There are more facemasks available if anyone wants any. Please let me know.

Oaktree Nurseries did a delivery today of everything that had been ordered so far. However, they will still do another delivery on Friday for anyone else as originally promised, without the need to make it up to another £100. So the orders need to be in by tomorrow. There is also likely to be another order in early May as other plants become available.

The next two grocery deliveries that neighbours have offered to add items to are both with Tesco. The first is on Sunday 26th April, requests for additions by afternoon Saturday 25th. The second is on Monday 27th April, requests for additions by afternoon Sunday 26th.

Flour: The 1.5kgs of bread flour requested were distributed this morning. I believe that the following places are all possibilities for Bread flour:

A couple of days ago I believe Morrisons & Asda had flour and yeast.

Eggs: I will be billing you all after next week's delivery as it is the end of the month. Huge thanks to the neighbour that has enabled this to happen.

Here is the White Horse price list for what is available from The White Horse on Easthampstead Road. Please note they also have bread flour.

Ongoing requests: strong bread flour, Self Raising flour, Spelt flour, dried yeast

Please note that Antibacterial wipes & cartons of prune juice are not needed at the moment.

Don't forget it's #ClapForOurCarers tomorrow.

#11: 20 April 2020

From Alison

Morning

Delivery slots seem to be getting easier to get thank goodness. Thank you to all who have offered and each one will be in the bulletin closer to the deadline.

Next: 22nd April Sainsburys; need to have any additions by 6pm on 21st April, i.e. tomorrow

Waitrose shopping: One of our neighbours goes to Waitrose first thing on a Thursday morning & is happy to pick up a few bits but would need to know by the Wednesday afternoon. Another neighbour also regularly goes to Waitrose and is also happy to pick up a few bits. So please let me know if there are any items you would like from Waitrose that aren't urgent.

One of our neighbours has sent this advice on how to get a delivery slot:

I can't stress too much how important it is to be signed into their site and through their queue by 23.59 if you want success with Tesco. A tip is to pop a couple of items into your basket in advance; you can always modify once the slot is booked. One night last week I had a slot available but could not reserve it. The only difference I could see between that and my successful attempts was that my basket was empty. Also don't forget to check out within two hours of reservation or the slot is lost.

The same neighbour has also asked if there is any interest in having an instant message sent out, probably by WhatsApp, when it is noticed that there are slots available on a supermarket's website. Several times this past week I have been have notified that slots are available for booking but email is too slow for anyone to benefit from this information. Please let me know if you are interested.

Is anyone else interested in any strong bread flour? 6Kg has been requested so far which isn't worth making a new order from Brakes. However the 1.5Kg lots of strong white flour that have been offered are £1 per 1.5kg and there are 2 more available. Or if anyone is interested in splitting a 6 Pack of 1.5kg wholemeal flour from Brakes? Or even a 16Kg bag?

Don't forget any Oaktree orders for later this week or next week.

Egg delivery tomorrow.

Ongoing requests: