Christmas Fun Day in Lymington for Small Business Saturday 6 December - the Lowdown!

• Lots of great “one day only” Special Offers throughout Lymington - click here!
• Activities and entertainment in Angel and Earley Courtyards - see timetable below
• FREE Parking in all New Forest District Council car parks
• Father Christmas will visit  between 12.00 and 14.00 in Lymington Community Centre - take part in a fun treasure hunt to get a gift from him (while stocks last)! - Entry forms available on Saturday morning - see below
• Inaugural “Lymington Business Expo” in Lymington Community Centre
• Launch of Lymington as 2015 Brand New Forest Town of the Year - buy one get one free special launch offer
• Get your Christmas shopping done while having a great time in Lymington!

There will be FREE all day parking in Lymington town centre car parks all day Saturday, with entertainment, and edibles and activities for all ages in Angel & Earley Courtyards, a new "Business Expo" in the Community Centre, plus a few Christmas Surprises in store. 

Small Business Saturday is a national “shop locally” initiative, designed to encourage us all to shop as much as possible in our local towns in the build up to Christmas.  Lots of Lymington businesses (shops, restaurants, cafes) have now released their one day only special offers,  many involving spending or saving a “Fiver”.  There are loads of fun and great value deals to be had in Lymington on Saturday!  Special One Day Offers

Treasure Hunt Entry Forms wll be available on Saturday morning:

• In Angel Courtyard at the Brand New Forest Stand close to the HIgh Street
• Behind Tesco, outside Cafe Grand at the Information Point
• In Lymington Community Centre in the foyer of the Fuller McClellan Hall
• In Earley Courtyard outside Lymington Tile Centre
• At Old Guys Rule on Quay Hill
• Handed out in various parts of Lymington!

Saturday’s event is being organised and promoted by Brand New Forest together with local businesses Bartley Marketing/Lymington.com, Thebestof the New Forest, and Totally Locally Lymington, all of which in their slightly different ways help to promote and champion local business and encourage us to spend locally.  

There are some really great one day special offers available throughout the town from the Quay to St Thomas Street, so although the hub of activity is around Angel and Earley Courtyards, everybody is recommended to take a stroll right through town next Saturday.  It’s a great opportunity to venture inside some shops for the first time.   All the businesses with offers will be displaying Small Business Saturday posters, so they should be easy to spot. Special One Day Offers

Lymington Business "Expo"

There will be an informal exhibition throughout the day, in the Lymington Community Centre Fuller McLellan Hall.  This will include the plans for the new Centre, and a number of local businesses who will be displaying their products and services to you.  Please do take a walk around the Hall and have a chat with them! To see a list of businesses exhibiting at the inaugural Lymington Business Expo please click here

Programme of entertainment in Angel Courtyard

This is the approximate timetable of entertainment, subject to changes on the day:

10am – Ian Halliday

10.30am – Speech and Drama Group

11am – Speech and Drama Group

11.30am – Lindyhoppers Jive!

12.30pm – Ian Halliday

1pm. Presentation - Lymington, Town of the year 2015

1.30pm – The Blue Tides

2.30pm – Intreg8 Dance

3pm – Zapp Dance

3.30pm – Intreg8 Dance

3.45pm – Clive’s Music School

4.15pm – The Diamonds

* The Liberty Owls will be displaying birds of prey between 11am and 2pm.

Brand New Forest

Small Business Saturday also sees the launch of Lymington as Brand New Forest 2015 Town of the Year, heralding the start of what promises to be a busy year in Lymington for local business - and a great year for local shoppers.  The new 2015 Brand New Forest Cards normally priced £5 will be on sale on Small Business Saturday one day only, “buy one get one free”.  These enable local consumers to benefit from long term discounts and special offers when they shop locally in a growing number of participating shops, restaurants and activities.

Monkeys and Moustaches today in Lymington for Prostate Cancer Research and Awareness

This Sunday morning there is a charity rugby match for Movember - mens' health charities -organised by the Monkey House Lymington, playing New Milton First Team (??!!) at Woodside Park at 10.30. A lot of people will be playing who've not played in a long long time....not sure if that's good or bad for spectators but should be a laugh! (First aid qualified ones might be particularly welcome.)

Then, the fabulous Zac and the Zeros are playing at the Monkey House in Southampton Road from 3pm, and there's loads of fun stuff like beer tasting etc. Later on still it's Fine Southern Gents playing live to round off the weekend (8 pm).

Christmas lights switch on in Lymington Friday 28 November

Review of the Event!

What a wonderful start to Christmas in Lymington !

Santa arrived to the delight of hundreds of children – both big and little (actually estimated to be in the 1000s). 

The Mayor had the privilege of switching the Christmas lights on to the joy and delight of all.  St Thomas Church with its magnificent stained glass windows lit up was a majestic back drop to the huge Christmas tree and blessing of the Town Crib.  (There are lovely happy and excited photos on Facebook and other digital media as witness to the occasion.)

The Christmas tree festival in United Reformed Church created a buzz of anticipation, with the huge tree donated by some members of the Community standing proudly in the front of the Church. 

It seemed that every store was open, some even offering their own complimentary mulled wine and mince pies – adding to the delight of shoppers.  There may have been 30 market stalls in the High Street, ranging from Christmas light up wands and headgear to hog roast, delicious homemade sweets to specially crafted Christmas gifts; mulled wine to candy floss; children’s entertainment and many different choral groups singing at different venues up and down the High Street, some in the Angel or Henderson courtyards, some outside the Catholic Church.

Mataata was making his famous curry goat and other Caribbean dishes outside Stanwells Hotel, with the assistance of their electricity.  Elmers Court was entertaining the public with their roulette wheel and the Garlic Factory was keeping the evil spirits away from all of us.

The Masonic Hall was packed with artists and crafters, from photographers to florists, from candle makers to ceramics, from furniture to finely crafted jewellery.  It was delight to view all these wonderfully created items.

Thank you to all the organisers – Churches Together, the Lymington & Pennington Town Council, the Lymington & District Chamber of Commerce & Industry,  all the participants from so many different community bodies, schools, choirs, Churches and Clubs; the stores, pubs and hotels who all came together, who participated and to those who contributed so much in sponsorship – to put on this wonderful event.

May it go from strength to strength. We all look forward to seeing Santa in his wagon with his elves on his tour through Milford, Sway, Hordle, Lymington and in his grotto in Pennington. 

Merry Christmas to you all.

Review by Fran Perks, Blue Dog Art

Santa arrives in his Sleigh, carol singing, free parking, late shopping 

On the evening of Friday 28th November the High Street will be closed to welcome the arrival of Santa, and to turn the lights on at the Christmas Tree at approximately 6pm.

Santa arrives in his Sleigh 

Father Christmas will arrive in his Sleigh, to make his first Christmas appearance of 2014.

Father Christmas visits Lymington and District every year and uses the Rotary Club Sleigh to travel around. He is looked after by Rotary Elves who also carry collecting buckets raising money for local youth organisations - you can see a list of donations by clicking here. Please give generously 100% of what you give goes to good causes and if you sign a gift aid slip, the Rotary Club can claim another 28p for every £1 you give.

Free parking and late shopping in Lymington

The High Street will be closed to traffic from 3pm to make ready for all the fun.  There's free parking in the town's car parks, and many of the town’s shops will be open for late night shopping.

Lots of fun activities for all

There will also be lots of gift and craft stalls, and plenty to eat and drink for all appetites and tastes. Face painting by Santa's little helpers, Santa's post box, and lots of amusements and family entertainment.  

Carols on the Quay
and around the Crib at St Thomas Church 

Twenty five children from the Rising Star Academy will sing carols on the Quay at 5.15, then a procession will make its way up the hill (via Quay Street and Quay Hill),to join the action at St Thomas Church.

Carols around the Crib will begin at 5:45pm with the Lymington Choral Society in full song with Carols that everyone can sing along with and enjoy. The blessing of the Crib will then commence outside St Thomas Church. Lights will be switched on at 6pm.

Autumn is about designing........ with plants
Debby Lockey gives us some great tips on how to regenerate our Autumn gardens, even though some plants may be beginning to die back, let's make the most of the change in the air, the milder temperatures and start planning how to inject some harmony into our New Forest and Lymington gardens.  Read article here

Let us Promote and Champion your Business to Thousands of Local Consumers this Christmas Time! 

Reach your local marketplace directly and inexpensively with your Christmas Advertising Message: 

Menus, Events, Parties, Shopping Ideas - in fact ANY special Christmas offers at all!

Just email us and include in your message:

• Your business name, address, telephone, email, and weblink 
• A couple of lines about your Christmas offer, plus if you like:
  • up to 6 photos (jpg attachments)
  • pdf brochure with more detail about your offer
  • your own social media links

 We’ll set up your listing in our special Lymington Christmas Advertising Feature, and we’ll actively promote it throughout November and December:

• continuously on the home page of the lymington.com website (hundreds of visitors daily)
• weekly by social media to our Facebook and Twitter followers (8,000)
• by email to our email subscribers (3,000)
• all for £50 plus VAT

If you’re a current paid advertiser on lymington.com and you set up your Christmas listing yourself, it’s FREE to advertise in our Christmas section if you log in on lymington.com home page and follow the instructions to “add a listing”. (If you’d prefer us to set it up for you, it’ll cost £25 plus VAT.)

If you’d like to sign up now for a 12 months listing on lymington.com at £100 plus VAT, the above terms for current paid advertisers apply.

Sign up now – Christmas Promotion on your behalf begins 1 November!  Any questions, please email lymington.com or call Jane (numbers below).

If you don't currently advertise with lymington.com and don't have a Christmas Special to promote, but would like to discuss your marketing needs and find out about the ways in which Lymington.com with Bartley Marketing can actively promote and champion your business, please call or email as below. 

Contact us by email

Or call 07782 167862 or 01590 612902

Local charity celebrate their 50th anniversary.

Well established local charity, The Wilverley Association, were thrilled to celebrate their 50^th anniversary this weekend with a tea party held for all their residents, families, staff, special guests and trustees. The party was held at their Forest Oaks, Brockenhurst care home with nearly 100 local people attending, and those residents well enough to travel being transported over from their Little Haven home to join in the celebrations.

The party was held to thank everyone for their continued hard work and to commemorate their founding members and remember how and why this charitable organisation was set up in the first place. The Wilverley Association was founded in 1964, with its original premise being to ‘provide housing and care for retired people and to give security in case of illness’.

In the 1960’s the local community was still recovering from the fall out of the First World War, a time when they had lost a great many young men, who gave their lives fighting for their country . This meant that once the war was over a great many local women, who had been left behind, never married and as a result spent their formative years looking after relatives and their relative’s children rather than having their own. By the 1960’s these women had become the spinsters of the parish and approached their dotage without anyone to look after them. Blanche Hindson, an extremely capable and determined spinster of the parish, recognised that there was a need for someone to provide high quality nursing and residential care for over 65’s in the New Forest. She worked tirelessly to set up the charity and succeeded in acquiring the land where their first home, Forest Oaks, stands today and then securing their second home, Little Haven.

One of the House Committee members, Tim Thomas gave a speech at the party and the cake was cut to rapturous applause. As the Chief Executive, Gail Pussard told me, “we have expanded beyond all recognition over the last 50 years, I’m immensely proud of our team who continue to provide dedicated care for over 65’s year after year, we look forward to the next 50 years.”

Author: Vicks Ward, on behalf of The Wilverley Association, a charitable organisation running nursing and residential care homes in the New Forest since 1964.  For more information visit www.wilverley.org.uk

Person centred care is about ensuring both the individuals who receive it and the carers who give it, work together to plan, develop and assess ongoing care to ensure that care is always as effective and appropriate as possible. Click here for the full article.

Lymington Community Centre unveils £1.5m plans

Ambitious plans to upgrade Lymington Community Centre and bring it into the 21^st century have been unveiled for consultation. Entitled 20:20 Vision, the project is expected to cost £1.5 million and take at least five years to complete.

Funding has already been secured for the first phase of the development project which will focus on the Malt Hall, the Centre’s film and theatre venue. Work is scheduled to start in November and be completed by the end of the year.

To officially launch 20:20 Vision, a week-long exhibition opened in the Centre’s Fuller McLellan Hall on Monday (22 September).

On show were architect’s plans and artist’s impressions of the new-look Community Centre – complemented by a display showing the difficulties and costs of maintaining and heating the current buildings plus a video explaining the rationale behind 20:20 Vision.

To underline the value of the Centre to generations of people in and around Lymington, the exhibition began by telling its story from 1948. Coming up-to-date, there were displays by user groups including the pre-school, theatregoers, the Lymington Players, the Film Society and Brockenhurst College. Visitors to the exhibition were even invited to have a game of short mat bowls, one of the many sporting activities enjoyed on the Cannon Street site. “We were delighted to be able to invite everyone with an interest in the Community Centre to drop into our exhibition and give us their feedback on our plans,” said Pete Wagstaffe, acting chairman of the Lymington Community Association board of trustees. “Now we face the challenge of raising £1.5 million. It’s an ambitious target but we believe this project is vital to ensuring the Community Centre continues to exist for future generations and to offer a place for people of all ages (in Lymington, Pennington and further afield) to enjoy their leisure time together, learn new skills and make friends.”

What's on at the Forest Arts Centre this Autumn?  A great variety of entertainment; from grumpy old woman Jenny Éclair performing her new show, live music from the winners of the Best Duo Award at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, to a poignant theatrical production to mark the 100^th anniversary of the outbreak of WWI. To find out more go to our Arts page. Click here to read full article.

"Nocturnal Encounters" an exciting new exhibition of prints by Colin See-Paynton

St Barbe Museum & Art Gallery, Lymington are pleased to announce the return of Colin See-Paynton, the world’s most revered engraver. Exhibiting his new collection, ‘Nocturnal Encounters’, including a mix of both new and earlier prints of the natural world by this wood engraver extraordinaire.

Click here to read full article.