The OAK Report (From the Christmas 2006 Messenger) O.A.K. has received enough goods to fill 250 shoeboxes. So many people have been knitting beautiful cardigans, jumpers, hats, gloves, shawls and baby blankets as well as shopping for all the toiletries and toys. Our grateful thanks to everyone and all the ladies and gentlemen who packed and wrapped the boxes. There will be many happy smiling faces in Eastern Europe on Christmas morning thanks to your generosity and Christian spirit. Our thanks also to the New Hope Trust and D.A.R.T. for organising the transportation. We look forward to all our churches worshipping together on 21 January 2007 to celebrate at the end of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. The service this year will be in St. Mark’s Church at 11 am and we look forward to seeing everyone then. O.A.K. is holding a coffee morning on Saturday 10 March in St. Mark’s Church Hall at 10 am and again we appreciate all your support. O.A.K. has been very successful financially this year and this is due to our very dedicated team behind the counter and in the kitchen and our very loyal customers. Thank you for all the encouragement. We wish you all a blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year. This is where the Money went in 2006 | Presbytery of Aberdeen (Malawi Fund) | £ 700 | | DEC Earthquake Appeal | £ 500 | | Aberdeen Cyrenians | £ 400 | | Scottish Motor Neurone Disease Association | £ 500 | | Oxfam East African Food Crisis Appeal | £ 750 | | Cogwheel Trust | £ 1,120 | | CLIC Sargent | £ 500 | | Bluebell Fund (Church of Scotland Social Care) | £ 100 | | RNLI | £ 450 | | Earl Haig Appeal Scotland | £ 200 | | New Hope Trust and D.A.R.T. | £ 400 | | (for transportation of shoe boxes) | | | £ 5,620 |
The OAK Report (From the Autumn 2006 Messenger) OAK has been fortunate in all the help we have had from our many helpers in keeping the OAK Café open during the summer holiday months. Our thanks go to everyone who did extra duties to keep us open. This has been appreciated by many of our customers. We were saddened in June by the sudden death of John Davidson, who worked for OAK for a number of years. John was a very gentle man who endeared himself to the staff and customers alike and he will be greatly missed. Our sympathy goes to John’s family along with our thoughts and prayers. Our next fund raising lunch will be held on Thursday 12 October in St. Mark’s Church Hall with the takings going to CLIC Sargent. This is a charity caring for children with cancer and leukaemia. We look forward to seeing all our friends at the lunch. Our November Coffee Morning is on Saturday 4th with proceeds going to R.N.L.I. Donations of home baking etc will be most welcome. Our Shoe Box Appeal has already produced beautiful knitting and toys and further donations of toiletries etc should reach the church or Café before the end of October so that we can pack them in time to be transported to Eastern Europe for Christmas. Our Christmas lunches will be held on 13 and 14 December with the usual turkey and trimmings and we look forward to our usual happy event. The tickets priced £10 will be available during November and we again look forward to seeing everyone, including Santa. Our evening services on 2nd Sunday of each month continue to be held at Crown Terrace Methodist Church at 6.30pm where there is always a warm welcome. The OAK Report
(from the Summer 2006 Messenger) OAK would like to thank those who volunteered as extra staff to try to keep the café open during the summer months when some of our regular staff are on holiday. Our evening services continue on the second Sunday of each month in Crown Terrace Methodist Church at 6.30 pm. We are having another special lunch when all the takings will be going to help the Cogwheel Trust as they expand their Children's Home in Uganda. The lunch will be Thursday 29 June in St. Mark's Church Hall. Tickets are priced £5 will be available from the OAK café soon. We wish you a sun filled and happy summer. The O.A.K. Report
From the Easter 2006 Messenger OAK has been very busy since our last magazine. We had very successful Christmas lunches, a Charity lunch and Coffee Morning as well as our normal Monday to Friday lunches. When we were told of the famine in Malawi, we were able to give a donation via Aberdeen Presbytery of the Church of Scotland. Individually we are all looking forward to holidays but keeping our rotas complete and the Café open, is becoming more difficult. We are appealing for more helpers to ensure that we do not have to close for part of the summer. A few hours per week, fortnight or month would be a great help for us. If you can help please have a word with Betty Steel or Daphne Cowking or just come and see us at the Café.
We are planning a Coffee Morning on 20 May and a lunch on 29 June. The proceeds of these events will go to Charity and any suggestions charities to be considered would be appreciated. We may not be able to donate to them all immediately but would keep them in mind for future events. The Cogwheel Trust is helping to produce a Recipe Book for fund raising. They are interested in Regional and International recipes so if anyone would like to submit a recipe please let us know before 25 June and we will pass them on to the Trust. We want to thank all our staff for all the hard work and our customers for their support and wish you all a very Blessed Easter. What has OAK done with its money in 2005? We have continued to support two children in India and Uganda via the Cogwheel Trust which is still doing valuable work amid difficult political conditions. We are now using Fairtrade goods wherever possible. The customers and staff of the OAK Café and congregation of St. Mark's have contributed generously to Shoe Boxes for deprived children and adults abroad. 192 Shoe Boxes have been distributed by The New Hope Trust and DART, with OAK giving a donation for transportation. We have donated to: DEC Tsunami Disaster Appeal £800 Local Help c/o Rev. J. M. Watson £50 The Acclamations £ 50 The Cogwheel Trust £300 Ward 23/25 ARI c/o St. Mark?s Church £400 St. Peter?s Ashimoto c/o CTMC £400 Christian Aid £500 MacMillan Cancer Relief £300 DEC Asian Earthquake Appeal £600 Earl Haig Fund Scotland £200 The Cogwheel Trust £620 Visit of Blantyre Presbytery, Malawi (Hospitality) £400 New Hope Trust (for transportation of Shoe Boxes) £200 DART (for transportation of Shoe Boxes) £200 TOTAL £5,120 (From the Christmas 2005 Messenger) OAK has had another successful and very busy year. Many thanks are due to Anne, Betty, Daphne and Jean for keeping the soup pot boiling. Without them and all the helpers we would not be able to do the work at home and abroad. We would always welcome anyone who could share a few hours per week to help. Europe may have a butter mountain but OAK has been given a mountain of goodwill in the avalanche of goods for the shoe boxes. The OAK helpers have packed and wrapped 192 boxes and they are off to New Hope Trust and DART for transportation to Eastern Europe. Thank you for all the goods and encouragement. I have heard that there is some knitting on the needles already for next year's boxes. We had a very busy coffee morning in November for the Asian disaster and our next coffee morning will be on 11 March 2006. We will be having a three course lunch on 16 February. The cost will be £4 per head and all the takings will go to the Scottish Motor Neurone Disease Association. We are looking forward to the Christmas lunches and we will re-open again on 9 January 2006. We wish all our customers and friends a very Happy Christmas and peaceful and joyful New Year. From the Autumn 2005 Messenger Now that the summer holidays have passed we are looking forward to seeing all our friends old and new again at the OAK Café in St. Mark's Church Hall and at the OAK evening services in Crown Terrace Methodist Church on the second Sunday of each month at 6.30pm. We are holding a Coffee morning in St. Mark's Church Hall on 5 November and our Christmas lunches will be on 14 and 15 December. Some of our friends are already preparing goods for the ?shoe boxes? which will once again be distributed by ?The New Hope Trust? and ?DART?. We welcome goods for the boxes at the OAK Café or collected at the churches for the first Sunday in November so that we may pack the boxes and pass them on to be delivered in time for Christmas. The OAK Café has been busy during the Summer and we look forward to a busy Autumn but would appreciate some help so that we can continue with this part of our outreach. We look forward to seeing you all soon. (From the Summer 2005 Messenger) As we are getting ready to pack our suitcases for our summer holidays OAK is already thinking of packing the shoe boxes for distribution in Eastern Europe at Christmas. We would welcome donations of knitted goods, toys, toiletries etc., in fact anything you think a child or adult would like to receive at Christmas. If the goods could be delivered to the OAK Caf� by the beginning of November that will give us time to pack the boxes and take them to the New Hope Trust and to DART (Deeside Aid to Romania Trust) for distribution in time for Christmas. During the summer, CrownTerraceMethodistChurch will be saying �good-bye� to their Minister and OAK to their Chairman. Rev Colin and Mrs Joyce Wilson have given much support to OAK in leading the evening services and working in the Caf�. They will be greatly missed. We wish them both a long and happy retirement. The OAK Caf� is going from strength to strength but we desperately need more helpers, especially for the summer months. If you can help, have a word with Daphne Cowking or Betty Steel or just come in and see us at the Caf�. We hope you will all have a very happy summer.
(From the Spring 2005 St Mark's Messenger) One of the first things that OAK did was to sponsor two children in India through the Cogwheel Trust. Time has moved on and those children have grown up but we still sponsor through the Trust. The following is a letter received telling us about Ramachandran who has been sponsored for a number of years and Praveen who is new to us. �Ramachandran is now 17 and has left the children's home. He has decided not to continue with higher studies and is doing vocational training. As a Trust, we will continue to support him until he can stand on his own two feet but it is time to replace him with another child for you to sponsor. I would like to express my thanks for your loving support which has enabled him to achieve much more than he could otherwise have hoped for. Praveen Kumar is 12 years old and his birthday is 16 January. He was admitted to our home last June but has never had a sponsor. He comes from our nearby town of Arakkonam where he was living in poverty with his father and brother. His mother died early last year. He missed a lot of schooling but is trying his best. He is currently Sixth Standard. Praveen generally keeps in good health and is a happy boy who has made a lot of friends in the home". The Cogwheel Trust also has a home in Namugongo, Uganda and we sponsor Jessica there. The OAK lunches are thriving and we would appreciate help from anyone who could spare a couple of hours or a morning once a week or fortnightly. We will have a coffee morning on 21 May 2005 in St Mark's Church hall and look forward to seeing all our friends either for lunch or coffee. From the Winter 2004 St Mark's Messenger OAK is looking forward to a busy Christmas period. We have packed and dispatched more than 165 shoe boxes of goods for Eastern Europe. Our customers and friends have been most generous and in turn a lot of families and children will have a very happy Christmas. Thank you all very much! We will have an OAK evening service at 6.30 pm on 12 December in. CrownTerraceMethodistChurch and Christmas lunches will be served at the OAK Cafe, St. Mark's Church Hall on 15 and 16 December. Tickets are available from the OAK cafe. The cafe will be closed from 20 December and will re-open on Monday 10 January 2005. We will have our annual United service on 23 January 2005 and look forward to joining together in worship. Our February evening service will take the form of a Songs of Praise from the Sankey Hymn Book and will be led by the Acclamations. We look forward to meeting you at some of these events. We wish you all a very Happy Christmas and a peaceful New Year. What OAK has done with their money in 2004 Christian Aid | £200 | Scottish Bible Society | £400 | Christian Aid for Haiti | £400 | Church of Scotland HIV AIDS Project | £400 | HazlewoodSchool Senior Library Fund | £750 | Aberdeen Women's Aid | £400 | St. AndrewsChurch, Jerusalem | £400 | Fighting for Sight | £400 | Paper Chase Trust (AfricanHospital Appeal) | £400 | D.E.C. Sudan Appeal | £400 | Guide Dogs for the Blind | £150 | Grampian Society for the Blind | £150 | Cruse Bereavement Care | £550 | New Hope Trust (for transport of Christmas boxes) | £250 | Earl Haig fund | £200 | Cogwheel Trust | £580 | TOTAL | £6,030 |
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