Merry Christmas and Thanks from Wokingham Living Advent Calendar

So we are almost at the end of this years Living Advent Calendar.

I say almost, as we still have our Christmas Eve event to go at Wokingham Baptist Church.  

This is the second year of the Wokingham Living Advent Calendar and I think I can speak for all who were involved in the production of this event that it has gone wonderfully and grown since last years inaugural one. We learnt a lot from last years event and will I suspect learn a lot from this years but for now I wanted to thank everyone who has made this years event so wonderful.

I cannot name everyone individually, there are so many who help to put on this event and that is before we get to all the venues, performers and audience members that support it.

Again it is the volunteers who make this event work. Many thanks to Wokingham Rotary for the technical support for the set up of an evening and many thanks to our charities; JAC, Wokingham and District Cancer Care Trust, Wokingham Foodbank and Wokingham Scouts and Guides for supplying people to assist with collecting money, marshalling events and helping to distribute publicity. Many thanks to all who have also helped in other ways like photgraphing and filming the events and a myriad of other small ways.

Thanks are due to the many performers who have taken the time to entertain you all for no fee, giving the gift of song, dance, magic, etc in these dark December nights. Also thanks to ChristChurch Wokingham for another wonderful Live Nativity.

Thanks again to all the venues, who have given over electricity, space and occasionally shelter from some very inclement weather for this years performances. Staying open later than they usually would do to give something back to the community they serve.  A particular thanks to Wokingham Methodist Church who sheltered us on some very unpleasant and wet evenings.  

Thanks to the members of the Steering group who have seen this through from conception to delivery and have been involved in many ways, including a few already mentioned.

There should also be thanks for all the Town Councillors, especially those who have acted as dignitaries throughout the month. A few of those councillors have also been part of the stage set up crew or have come night after night just to support us all.

And a big thanks is to More Arts who help to organise this event through the year. There are no words to adequately describe the level of work that they put into this event to make it go as smooth as it does.

But the biggest thanks is reserved for all of you who came to the performances. I even hear that there is at least one individual who has been to every Living Advent Calendar performance since we began last year.  So thank you to you all and thank you to the audiences who have come over these last 24 nights. We have very much enjoyed sharing our local talent, charities and businesses with you and hope you will support us again next year.

Enjoy the final performance and we expect the blog entry to be up this evening. 

I will leave you in the immortal words of Father Christmas or in this years case, Kermit the frog…..

“Merry Christmas to All and to all a goodnight!”