If at first you don't succeed.....

 

My Scottish heritage aside, Robert the Bruce would be proud of us! We have try, try tried again and again and again to transform our wonderful idea into an actual legal entity and this week we suffered our latest , time consuming, irritating set- back.  Apparently ‘Filling the Gaps’ is too similar to ‘Filling the Gap’, which, although officially closed, is still on the register at Companies House, so our application has been rejected!  Argh!!  But, being the undeterred little spiders that we are, application number, oh whatever it is now, is already completed and ready for submission and ‘Filling the Gap N15 CIC’ hopes to do better than its dearly departed predecessors….and all of this in the days leading up to the pilot scheme!

On the other hand, I am happy to say that prior to opening the doors and feeding anyone, the pilot scheme has been a great success.  The response from our friends, family and community has been fantastic and we are fully booked for the first three weeks, with only a couple of spaces in week four: any takers?  Folk have even been lovely enough to pay up front, as we the unnamed are as yet to be funded!   I am humbled and grateful you awesome people, thank you and I hope you enjoy the grub.  God willing and the creek don’t rise, we might even break even!  This is in part due to my fab friend Rachel, who introduced us to the wonders of Bookers.  Wow, it was great, who would have known that two grown women, Renee and I, that is, Rachel is no longer such a Booker newbee, could get so ecstatic over giant quantities of olive oil or the price of ground coffee, fair trade,  of course.  It was a proper adventure, akin only to a child being given their pocket money to spend as they wish in a sweet shop, and they did have giant jars of cola bottles too!  Fear not, we were consummately mature and responsible, sticking rigidly to the budget, that’ll be my Scottish roots again!

So with two days to go (GULP), Renee and I are once again riding the seesaw of terror and excitement; it seems to be becoming a theme.  We can’t wait to do it, but it needs to be as perfect as we can make it, because our diners (Oooh, get me) deserve it and because all the eggs are in the basket now, and we seriously want this to work.  When it does, we can start working with Fareshare, save some food, stop some waste and provide the kind of community space we have been dreaming of.  So many dreams……..let’s hope this first step is a pleasant one!