Dirk walks but Jasper RUNS!

My little brother Jasper is going to do a 5km run to raise money for Luton Foodbank.

It would be great if you stopped by his sponsor page and lent him a hand. THANK YOU!

Young Hero of the Year

Last night, Dirk went to the Luton & Bedfordshire Community Awards night with his mum. He'd been nominated for Young Hero of the Year, but really only went along for the four-course dinner! Some of Luton Foodbank's staff went along to support him too.

We were all delighted when it was announced that Dirk had won! Surprised too, because the other nominees were also very deserving of recognition.

The award was presented by Chris Nicholls, Principal of Luton Sixth-Form College

Beforehand, Dirk said he wasn't bothered about the award, and I believe him. He did his sponsored walk to help others, and he's always needed a lot of coaxing to let himself be personally exposed to any publicity. But I think he was as pleased as we were! Nick Coffer gave Dirk an extra mention on BBC 3 Counties Radio. You can listen to it on BBC iPlayer till 15 November. (Dirk's mention starts at 2 hours 19 mins 50 seconds.) 

A proud mum, and a real-life hero

A little bird told me that Dirk was rooting for one of the other nominees! It's easy to see why...

BBC broadcast brings total to £933.76

On Tuesday I went to the studio of BBC Three Counties and talked to Nick Coffer about my walks and about Luton Foodbank.

Mr Coffer was really nice and showed me how he works all his complicated gadgets when he does his show. He talked to me and Dad about Luton Foodbank and about my Ridgeway walk. He said he thinks I might become Prime Minister one day, and he asked what I wanted to do when I grow up. (They cut out my reply where I said I want to open a cheese cake shop! Mr Coffer said I should call it Ricotta Try Some.")

We were told the interview would be broadcast on Friday, but today a lady called Jenny left a message saying she had heard it while she was driving. You can listen to the interview on BBC iPlayer here until 29 October on Soundcloud here.

Before the programme had even finished we had another sponsor (thank you Julie!) Since then, we've had two more (thank you Roger and thank you Jacqueline & Kevin!)

Please share the link above and maybe we can get to £1000 before the giving page ends. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!

New total: £711.26

Thank you so much, Anonymous Person for bringing the sponsorship to £711.26 and for your lovely message. I'm now 51% of the way to my target! But with only a couple of months to go it would be so helpful if anyone reading this could share links to my walk pages. Luton Foodbank is very short on some important food items these days. Spread the word! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!

 

 

£566.26 for Luton Foodbank so far!

 Thank you very much Keith for bringing the running total to a whopping £556.26 (with Gift Aid included.)

 

£516.26 (incl. Gift Aid) raised so far!

What an amazing Sunday! Mary, of our street's residents' association, sent information about my challenge to all the residents and landlords. Within four hours the running total had leapt to £435, which means Luton Foodbank gets £516.26 after the Government's Gift Aid is added. Thank you so much Mary, Hassan, and Shirley! Your names have been added to the Cool Wall on the left of the page.

 

 

 

 

£443.76 (incl. Gift Aid) raised so far!

Thank you to Steve for supporting me I my challenge and for your encouraging message. I'm sure I will enjoy the walk as the weather will be nicer than it has been for training so far.

Everyone's kind donations now total £365, which means Luton Foodbank get £443.76 after Government Gift Aid is factored in.

 

Tour of Luton Foodbank Warehouse

On Wednesday afternoon, I visited Luton Foodbank's warehouse. I was shown around by Thakor Morarji, who is a board member. He told me all about the work and history of Luton Foodbank, and introduced me to some of the volunteers.

Thakor Morarji, Paul Turvey, and me

I told them about my Ridgeway challenge and they said it was great. Mr Morarji said donated money was already being used to buy certain items that they were running low on. (See Luton Foodbank's page of most-needed items.)

It was really interesting seeing how it all worked. One of the volunteers was measuring 500g portions of pasta into bags, and some of the others were sorting out tins and making a note of the use-by dates on them.

I also met Amanda Burnham, who is the Community Life Champion for Asda Luton. She said I could put a Dirk Walks poster in the store. :-) 

£171.50 raised so far!

When Mum and Dad picked me up from school they told me two more people have donated for Luton Foodbank. The total is now £171.50. What a lovely start to the week!

Thank you Deborah Garrand and thank you Connor!

Training Walk 2

Yesterday evening we went on our second training walk. We started from the hospital (Dad was there for a scan) and stopped to get a couple of tins from Tesco for our dinner before heading up the hill from the roundabout at the end of Hatters Way. While we were at Tesco we saw people collecting for Luton Foodbank and we said hello. One of them said he recognised me.

We reached out planned camping site very quickly, and pitched our tent in the woods just as it was getting dark. It was VERY cold out but when we got into the tent and into our sleeping bags we were nice and warm. I fell asleep straight away.

In the middle of the night I woke up and Dad said "Can you hear that?" and there was an owl hooting very nearby.

We couldn't get back to sleep so we decided to pack up the tent and continue our route. We walked through a golf course by the light of the moon and went through two villages before going through Stockwood Park and finishing up back in Luton. When we got home we had a hot drink and a biscuit then went to bed.

We covered 11.73km between the hospital and home.

Asda are going to let foodbank back in their shops

Here's some more great news. Asda said "We are reinstating all previously existing unmanned collections in store, eg Guide Dogs for the Blind collections, food banks, Marie Curie collection trays."

When they said foodbank trolleys weren't allowed any more, there was a petition and 88,000 people signed it. And the mayor of Liverpool wrote to them and said he wasn't going to shop in Asda any more and he was going to tell everyone in Liverpool not to go shopping there.

I found out about the good news here...

 

Show your support for Asda's u-turn by clicking here: Tweet

Asda doesn't walk the walk

Asda's baffling decision to stop allowing foodbanks to leave collection trolleys in its stores has triggered a huge backlash. The consequences for those in need of foodbank help don't need to be spelt out. But apparently the stain on Asda's reputation does - at least it does to its management team, which has yet to reach a consensus on what reasons to give.

Please read the full story in The Guardian, and sign the petition on 38 Degrees.

Shame on Asda! You can call 'em out by clicking this button: Tweet

Please sponsor me

I will be walking the Ridgeway path in the summer holidays to raise money for my favourite good cause.

If you can sponsor me on the walk, it would be a fantastic way to help families who are struggling. You can make a donation via Virgin Money Giving site here:

www.virginmoneygiving.com/dirkwithnail