This is a blog for you if

This is blog is for you if you are serving families, mother, father, children in Leicestershire to
- To take care of what we have in common: The planet
- To encourage them to be open and inclusive of others
- To support them in sharing their gifts for the local economy to be more resilient.

If you tick more than one of this boxes, i am inviting you
- To Get inspired by the stories of people who are in Leicestershire trying to enact change and empowered people to direct their lives
- To share those stories to people around you so they can get inspired
- To submit your story.

Why? Because the power of stories can change the world as long as they are shared widely.

So get sharing!

About me

My name is Marie. I live in Leicestershire since 2012. In my first year of arrival, i engaged with Transition Leicester, Positive Money and Footpaths Leicester. I ran the positive money leicester group.  I organised events, a discussion group and the Money workshop to help people reflect upon their relationship with money. I also train as a facilitator to run a Footpaths group to support group and families to reduce their carbon footprint. End of 2014, Zina Zelter from Footpaths and I, we decided to run a year of events culmutating into a day of festival: The Green Festival of Making and Mending. From the festival, Leicester Fixers emerged and has been running Restart Parties since May 2015. In 2018, The project received a grant from Leicestershire County Council to help set up 6 repair communities across Leicestershire. It is currently the main project I am working on.

Apart from those projects, I work and study. I freelance for The Crop Club a social enterprise which supports people to grow food. I have a certificate in Permaculture and teaches from time to time at the Permaculture course in Leicester. I am also a doctorate from Loughborough Design School. My thesis is on the factors influencing user repair propensity. I support students with their work.

Outside of it all, i am a keen dancer (salsa), a beginner violonist, i draw with wax crayons and garden. I live with my husband, embrace our mixed heritage and spend lot of time with our family.

in facilitating a Footpaths Leicester grouprun projects to engage family's members with different communities of knowledge and this mainly through events.

The blog provide an account of the progress of some of the projects and how you can get involved and it features different initiatives in Leicestershire that engage the public on enbironmental and social

Meeting with Tushara Canekeratne in the Studio, Loughborough University

Tushara Canekeratne, fellow at Stanford University, CEO at Nadastra Inc. and Co-Founder Virtusa Corporation had a full day of tours and meetings in order to learn more about current work taking place at Loughborough University. One of her last stop of the day was in The Studio. To welcome her, Meg and 10 entrepreneurs eager to learn from her life experience. The following piece tells what happens and some of the lessons taken from the interaction.

As she came into the room, we felt a rise in energy. She was ready to interact, meet with people and engage with them - eyes wide-opened, curious and interested, a ravishing smile. We could only be fond of her from the get go. She introduced herself. She is an entrepreneur, a mentor, a passionate philanthropist and investor in young people's education, empowerment and leadership development. She is also a mother, a wife, a family member and she cares deeply for the needs of her inner circle.
We are impressed by her achievements as much as her humility.

From what was discussed, these are few things that I am taking with me:

• First, people are VERY important. The strength and cohesiveness of the team you have around you is critical not only when everything is fine but when things get tough too. What we want is someone who is competent and align with the culture of the organisation. The person you definitely do not want is people who are competent but unaligned. Incompetency is not something that someone will usually want. By keeping them on, you are making yourself a disservice and to them too.
• Second, knowing how finance works is a great to know, it helps making the right decisions.
• Third, in regard to philanthropy work,  First, Care for yourself by working and making yourself financially sustainable, then you can care for others.
• Fourth, she said that two things are important in entering an industry: Marketshare & Storytelling. I personally have to look more into it.

The final main thing that I interpreted from the interaction is that having priorities and sticking to them helps to move forward. Having clear goals, remembering them yet let it go of them allows one person to be  fully present and engaged in the now with what needs to be achieved and all other fellow human.

Thanks for Tushara for coming to visit us in Loughborough University and Thanks to Loughborough University and The Studio for organising the informal Q&A roundtable. We were, I am sure, all very inspired.

I have never sewn coffee sacks before

R. have sewn some a number of times. She uses them to grow crops. She also sells them so that people can grow food even in small spaces. It is a cool upcycling of coffee sacks. Recently, R. started collaborating with Muto a community organisation that supports vulnerable individuals in Leicestershire. I love them because they grow people who almost stop believing that they will keep flourishing.
I wrote a blogpost to let the world know more about the collaboration.

Have a read : Collaborating with Muto and vulnerable members of the community to sew coffee sacks for food growing - one way to grow confidence

We grow our world together

Today, students from Loughborough Design School will be presenting opportunities for greater community use of the Old Rectory Museum.
In the last three months, they have been collaborating with community leaders and residents of Loughborough to understand better their needs and wants, the challenges that they face.
They envisioned possibilities for the future and today from 1.30pm in Fearon Hall, they will be sharing with us their inspirations and exhibiting their work.
I am grateful to have been given the chance to participate in this project and hope that together we will be able to restore the Old Rectory past glory and strengthen the bond between all those involved and those who will soon join the next stages of this journey.
Each project reminds us that we can only grow together by connecting and sharing our faith in the future. To the next adventure (cheers)

The best time to plant a tree is today

A company, one that tries to build a sustainable world by sharing its sustainable values can ever only exist online, remotely or in the mind of the dreamers. This company has to grow and connect in order to create a virtuous cycle of opportunities.

To build a garden is to believe in tomorrow.


[Today with the Crop Club, we are at Bom Bom Patisserie in Loughborough creating a garden]

1 year anniversary at the Crop Club on Linkedin

It has been a year already I started to get involved with the Crop Club. Here I give some details on my adventure and how the first year, well the last 6 months went. It is all good :)

1 Year Anniversary at the Crop Club

CropClub Magic Dust ready

I am working with the CropClub - a social enterprise - which have for mission to spread the joy of growing across communities on top of Leicester Fixers, a venture encouraging people to repair and my Ph.D.

With the CropClub, we have just launched a new product - the Magic Dust - it is to feed the bees - a mix of wildflower seeds and biodegradable glitter in an hessian bags.

I love the product - it has a magical side to it. You spread it on a ground, a bit of sunshine and it sprouts! All you have to do is to get it on their website, receive it and spread it!

I have my own bag of Magic Dust, The MarleFeed Magic Dust, a bag full of opportunities for new ventures and adventures with existing partners. It is just waiting to be spread and yet I am not ready. I have to find the ground, the space and time, take a deep breath and finally spread the joy of growing for all those seedling ideas with the gushing uncertainty that they may never grow... or they will, won't they?

It will come. Watch this space