There is something magic about getting together face-to-face. Most of us Free Cakes for Kids organisers tend to communicate through e-mail or status updates. We sometimes chat on the phone, but rarely have a chance to meet up outside of our busy schedules. So it is definitely something special when 18 organisers get together for a day to celebrate, discuss and share two of their dearest passions: community organising and cake.

Last Saturday’s Network Day was organised by Lynne O’Brien, who had kindly offered to host the gang in Sutton. The organising team, including Ally Crichton, Andrea Stewart, Andrea Klingel, Henriette Lundgren and Minelle Hemraj, had worked hard over the past five weeks to get everything in place. They had booked the wonderful St Nicholas Community Hall, secured support for tea, coffee, flipchart paper and other stationery, arranged an exceptional potluck lunch and cake buffet, came up with an agenda and ideas for sessions, set up a registration page, took care of those who would have found it difficult to come and were the first to show up on the day (with some getting up well before 5am!).

About 18 organisers had followed the call and came from Bedford, Cambridge, Hackney, Haringey, Harrow, Lambeth, Oxford, Salisbury, Sutton and Wallingford. Clare from Torfaen and Sarah from Cardiff unfortunately broke down halfway on the M4. But apart from such automobile disasters, everyone arrived safely.

So what exactly happened?

The Network Day started with a welcome by Lynne and an introduction to the network by Sophie. Sophie gave an overview of the recent growth of the network and the explosion of inquiries by new organisers, journalists and increasingly commercial companies. At the moment, there are 47 groups in the UK at different stages of development. While some just started and are working on their first cake request, others have been operating for some years and have established themselves as important members of their local communities.

One of the great things about the Network Days is that both experienced and new organisers come together and learn from each other. This was definitely the case in the next session, in which Jules tackled the ever-present challenge of “Find a family and bake a cake!”. In a series of interviews, speed chats and group discussions, people did not only get to know each other very well, but also came up with a treasure trove of tips and ideas to build their groups. In a grand finale, all participants wrote up their personal “Ten-point Cake Scale” with concrete steps for developing their groups.

After lunch, Henriette, who had founded the first Free Cakes for Kids UK group in Oxford in 2008, led a session on “Raising awareness”. The main message here was exactly that: how to raise awareness and support in your community rather than funds or money. As it turned out, this can be quite challenging, but in the end, we managed to put together a long list of strategies for making connections with volunteers, families and community partners.

Finally, we turned to the network and the collective challenges we face at the moment. Malte talked about the recent developments and reported on the work of the currently 10 network volunteers, who have been extremely busy over the past three months. The key challenge at the heart of every network of community groups is this: while each group is responsible for its own activities (local responsibility), we all operate under the same name (shared identity). Managing this tension is especially tricky in view of the recent explosion of inquiries from new organisers, journalists and commercial entities. How can we ensure basic standards of safety, confidentiality and community spirit while maintaining local diversity, individual responsibility and fun?

To respond to these challenges, Malte explained some of the recent and ongoing initiatives, including a bigger network team with more clearly defined roles and responsibilities, an internal workload review and a survey of all current organisers, a new sign-up procedure to better prepare and help new organisers, and a draft for a Starter Guide that will make available our collected wisdom to newcomers. Other issues we discussed included insurance, safeguarding, and support in dealing with local media.

Next steps

At the end of the day, we finally constituted the network volunteer team as a community group in its own right. While this will not change much in practice, the constitution will give the growing team of network volunteers a stable basis to work on, make it more accountable, ensure its existence in the long run and provide guidance for future developments. Based on the network survey and discussions, we decided to focus on the following aims to guide the network team:

1. Facilitate and grow the Network of Free Cakes 
for Kids in the United Kingdom
2. Support Free Cakes for Kids groups across the UK through bringing the Network together to share information, good practice and learning
3. Represent and promote the interests of Free Cakes 
for Kids beyond a local level
4. Uphold the values of Free Cakes for Kids: 
safety, confidentiality, community spirit

To start this process, the current network development team agreed to continue their work for the first year. This includes the current Network Coordinators Julia Clarke (chairperson), Lynne O’Brien (secretary) and Henriette Lundgren (treasurer), but also all other network volunteers like Malte (development) and Sophie (media), who are able to invest time and energy in supporting and coordinating the work of Free Cakes for Kids groups. Specifically, it would be good to find someone with experience and expertise in food safety, who could take over this area in the future. So please do get in touch if you have relevant qualifications and can spare some time!

From left to right: Christine, Andrea, Lynne, Dulce, Hannah, Ally, Andi, Malte, Christena, Helen, Karen, Jette, Jules. Behind the camera: Rachel, Sophie, Minelle. On the M4: Clare, Sarah.

PS: Many thanks to Tesco Sutton and Simon from Press to Print Oxford for their generous support.

Over the past couple of weeks, a restless team of volunteers has worked hard to get everything in place for the second Free Cakes for Kids UK Network Day. Building on the success of our first meeting in Oxford, this year’s Network Day is kindly hosted by Free Cakes for Kids Sutton. Again, this will be a great opportunity for new and experienced group organisers to get together, share experiences and celebrate what we achieved.

The organising team around Lynne O’Brien and Henriette Lundgren is currently putting the finishing touches to the programme. As usual, it will be a mix of sessions, socialising and snacking. Key items on this year’s agenda are:

• Welcome, introductions and network news
• Find a family and bake a cake: sharing tricks and getting started
• Raising awareness: community support, publicity and working with volunteers
• What’s next for Free Cakes for Kids? Updates from the development team, constitution of the network, founding AGM, including appointment of core network roles
• A postcard to your future self

This year’s meeting will be especially exciting since we will discuss a number of initiatives to cope with the increasing demands on Free Cakes for Kids UK. The number of enquiries has skyrocketed over the past few months. And with more and more groups starting up all over the country and baking under the same name, everybody has been working hard on finding ways in which we could support each other even better and make sure that everything remains safe, confidential and community-spirited.

If you are a Free Cakes for Kids UK organiser and have not signed up yet, please do so asap on the registration page. Please also keep in mind that there is some support available for those who find it difficult to come for financial reasons. For more information, please contact Lynne.

We are really looking forward to meeting you all in Sutton!

This year started with a big bang. Free Cakes for Kids was invited to attend the launch of Oxfordshire Community Foundation’s (OCF) Jubilee Fund at the Turl Street Kitchen. On 11 January, the fund was officially launched by HRH Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex, in celebration of the Queen’s 60th jubilee this year. We had been invited to the event as a result of two successful funding applications of Free Cakes for Kids Oxford in 2010 and 2011, granting the group £1,000 each year to support the development of local community baking activities.

A fabulous time was had by all at the launch, particularly Henriette Lundgren (Founder of Free Cakes for Kids in the UK and Oxford Coordinator) and Stephanie Griggs-Trevarthen (Free Cakes for Kids Network Coordinator), who were on hand to represent our project to the Prince. His Royal Highness took the time to speak to each of the projects on display and seemed particularly enamoured with the jubilee-themed cupcakes Jette and Steph had on offer. While not remembering his own birthday cakes particularly well — and no, we weren’t cheeky enough to ask if the Queen made his birthday cakes! –, he was delighted to hear how far and wide the project has spread across the UK in such a short amount of time.

The first Free Cakes for Kids group in the UK was founded in December 2008. Having read about the project in the US, Henriette Lundgren adapted the model to her local community and started the first group in Oxford. Since then the group has grown steadily, extended its activities to community baking sessions and helped others set up groups in their communities. Especially 2011 was an extremely busy year with Free Cakes for Kids UK going from only a handful of groups in January to over 30 by December. Groups now exist all across the UK, including Inverness, Glasgow, Cardiff, Bristol, Torbay, Manchester, Birmingham, Norwich and many parts of London.

Inspired by the dedication and commitment The Queen has shown to community service and charity work during the past 60 years, the Jubilee Fund will create a community fund for Oxfordshire for the next 60 years. It will be used to support future grants to small, local voluntary groups in need of money to continue their vital work providing support and services to those who need them most on our own doorsteps in Oxfordshire.

Free Cakes for Kids Oxford is very grateful for the grants that OCF has awarded the group in the past, and we are excited about the opportunities that the new Jubilee Fund might bring for Oxfordshire. The royal seal of approval will certainly help and maybe even foster similar initiatives in other parts of the country.

See also: Video report on OxBox, Oxford Times article

It’s only been two-and-a-half years since the first Free Cakes For Kids birthday cake changed hands in the UK, but the FCFK network is growing rapidly. Volunteers are now baking for families in Bicester, Bristol, Birmingham, Braintree, Cardiff, Croydon, Leeds, London (Ealing, Hackney, Merton, Redbridge & Sutton), Neath, Newport, Milton Keynes, Oxford, Shipton, Swansea, Waterlooville and Wallingford! And even more groups are currently getting started. You can find an up-to-date map of local groups on our Where we bake page.

With the network now spanning a vast proportion of the UK, we thought that this is a great moment to get together, take stock and celebrate what we have achieved already! As a result, the first-ever Free Cakes for Kids UK Network Day will take place this Saturday in Oxford. For the first time, organisers and volunteers from local groups across the country will come together for a day of celebration and sharing, discussing and exchanging of ideas and best practices. The goal is to get to know each other as a network, compare notes, think about the future and celebrate our common cause. Hopefully, this will become an annual event!

Over the past ten weeks, a busy team of FCFK volunteers has been out and about enabling this day to happen. Big thanks to Henriette Lundgren and Malte Ziewitz (FCFK Oxford), Sarah Williams (FCFK Cardiff) and Steph Griggs-Trevarthen (FCFK UK). We are also extremely grateful for the generous support from local Oxford businesses. These include:

• Debbie Warland and her team at The Picnic Hamper
• Pat Green (Tesco Community Champion)
• Ian (Sainsbury’s, Cowley Road, Oxford)
• Robin (Co-operative Supermarket, Divinity Road, Oxford)
• Honest Stationery (Cowley Road, Oxford)
• Professional Music Technology (Cowley Road, Oxford)

We are very much looking forward to the first-ever Free Cakes for Kids UK Day 2011 and cannot wait to meet everyone on the 10th of September!

For all those who missed Monday’s interview with Sara and myself on BBC Radio Oxford, here is the full recording. We were invited for a 10-minute interview in Malcolm Boyden’s morning show.

Free Cakes for Kids Oxford on BBC Radio (mp3)

As you can see on the photo below, we had a lot of fun. You can get quite nervous about talking live on the radio, but Malcolm Boyden turned out to be a great and welcoming host.

Henriette & Sara getting giggly at BBC Oxford

Malcolm even called on Didcot and Abingdon to set up new groups. So what are we waiting for, Oxfordshire? :)

We just updated our website, and as you can see, not much has changed. We hope that you like the new platform, which will make it easier for us to keep you posted on the latest developments in the growing Free Cakes for Kids network.