AUTUMN~WINTER in Parkhead
This term at Play Cafe we’ve been working our way through the families favourite stories and books! Parents write their children’s favourite stories in our giant book and each week we choose one to inspire our playtime! Have a scroll through to spot if your favourite made our shortlist!
See you in 2026 Parkhead for more PLAYTIME 🥰
CHRISTMAS in Easterhouse
Over the past few weeks we’ve been getting in the Christmas spirit- with a festive Make Do in Platform and Future Spa workshops out and about in the community. During these events we’ve written a community poem called “Advent in Easterhouse” which captures the advent anticipation of people aged 3 to 83!
See you in 2026 Easterhouse 😘
Creating climate resilience in communities 🌿
@creativeclimatefutures is a three-year project led by sustainability charity Verture, supporting local climate action in Glasgow through work with embedded artists and community organisations. Artist Rebecca Fraser @artyfraser has been working with @pavillionyouth and communities in Easterhouse, while @elenamaryharris has been embedded in the Gorbals in collaboration with @crossroads_yca .
The artists have been working to involve people in thinking about how to make these locations resilient to the impacts of climate change. In this Q&A we speak to both artists about community participation, their creative practice and the project’s long-term impact. Read the full article via our Linktree in bio!
#cultureSHIFT #CreativeClimateFutures #CreativeClimateAction #ArtsAndSustainability #CommunityAction #ClimateChange #ClimateJustice @communitylandscotland@scotccan@glasgowcc
SPRING 2025
Spring has been spent out and about in the eastend… mostly with my wonderful colleague Mairi Morrison 🩷
We kickstarted the community programme at the newly opened Parkhead HUB with our @platformglasgow Family Fun programme- morning and afternoon sessions for the whole family. I even took my whole family to work one day- for the children and youth open day!
Make Do for @creativeclimatefutures has also been growing in Easterhouse with teens learning to sew, mums getting massages, and dads enjoying their bacon rolls! So grateful for another year of funding to develop Make Do into a sustainable event- if you’d like to volunteer and share a skill (from decluttering tips to football skills, DIY skills to manicures!) we’d love to hear from you!
Mairi and I would then be back down the road to Parkhead on Fridays where we continued our outdoor play sessions as part of our ongoing Gaelic Treehouse @glasgowlifefamilies project.
And last- but definitely not least- my beloved Baby Book project with @starcatchersuk ended this month after a full school year of mums journalling about their babies 🥰 one of the most special projects I’ve delivered and such a joy to see the mums take home their books- as one mum said “it is BIG memories” ❤️
Now for a summer with my gang of boys 🩵 with no school run, less life admin, lazy evenings and some adventures 🌿
WINTER in Easterhouse ❄️
The month of January brought together the installation of the Future Spa- a year long project for @creativeclimatefutures made with the people of Easterhouse to create a relaxing space to dream about their futures. This winter also saw the development of Make Do- a project inspired by the conversations we had in the Future Spa- conversations about intergenerational spaces and skill sharing. These monthly drop ins brought people together to learn about knitting, speaking Gaelic, gardening, solar power, playing outside and so much more. You can join us tomorrow (8th march 12-2pm) for the next one! I also did my Play Cafe sessions for @platformglasgow which are always a delightful way to start the weekend!
1-5: Future Spa (📸 by @ashleighangela )
6-17: Make Do
18-20: Play Cafe
WINTER in Parkhead ❄️
The seasons definitely seem to be changing this week in Glasgow with a little warmth back in the sun- the perfect time to recap what I’ve been up to this winter in Parkhead.
1-2: Art Club (A weekly art group for local adults at @parkheadnazarene )
3-7: Play Cafe (A weekly space for preschool artists at @theforgeshoppingcentre )
8-10: The Baby Book (A monthly journalling session for mums and babies for @starcatchersuk )
11-20: What Was It Like? (6 sessions exploring what it was like to have a baby during covid as part of the Let’s Be Heard Covid Inquiry for @starcatchersuk )
We’ve spent the last week celebrating this little middle apprentice 💙 We kicked off his birthday week with a visit to @platformglasgow to see this wonderful show ⭐️ in his words it was “very dramatic and very silly” (“just like you” his big brother helpfully commented 🙃)
Having @platformglasgow on our eastend doorstep has meant the boys have seen a lot of shows growing up. It makes us sound very cultured but with boisterous boys there’s a knack to achieving these trips. Frequency of visits definitely helps as they can remember the last trip and that I’m not lying when I say “oh but you’ll really like it” because they do always like it when we get there. This is where the local links tickets have been a game changer/ culture changer- it totally reduced the risk of paying a lot for tickets and then being worried they wouldn’t last through it. It’s made it so affordable for them to experience live theatre and dance from babies to now as big dudes.
Another behind the scenes reality is that I had to spend £5 on sweeties and juice to sweeten the deal and we also got a McDonald’s on the way home because they are 7 and (nearly 😮) 10yr old boys and therefore always hungry.
I say all this to paint the picture of what it’s like taking very energetic and quite loud boys to cultural experiences. I still needed to coach them last week- whisper and nudge and banish noisy sweet wrappers- but The Show for Young Men was SO for them 💙 the rough play, the physical props, the soundtrack (cue them joining in with football songs 👀 a nudge and shh moment from me) the young dancer was their age who just wants to throw some stuff over a fence and then end the day with a hug. As a mum of 3 sons it felt like such a honest, joyful, sad, tender, fun snapshot of this wild ride of boyhood 💙
Tomorrow I’ll be starting a monthly creative, chatty, cuddly space at @parkheadnazarene toddler group! Especially designed for little babies 0-6m with their adults 🌈 to journal about all the special memories they are making together each month ❤️ find me in the baby corner with art materials ✏️ and an extra pair of hands for rocking sleepy babies or fetching you a cup of tea so you can play together 😍
Memories from our “5 senses” project at Play Cafe ⭐️ each week we explored a different sense 👁️✋🦷👃🗣️through sensory play, music, creativity and LOTS of wonderful mess! This term Play Cafe will be in the Play Space at @theforgeshoppingcentre on Wednesdays 10.30-12 🎨 these sessions will be run as a drop-in so stay for as little or as long as you like on your visit to the Forge! 🎉
Finishing up for my summer holidays and feeling grateful for these women; Mairi, a new colleague who has become such a good friend over the past year, and Ashleigh my work wifey who’s been there from the very start of @parkheadartist and who still finds pockets of time to help me 💕 a special thank you to @jackieshearer66 as well for all her help this term- both practically and also by caring so much for others 💕 #dreamteam
Yesterday we celebrated the end of the Gaelic Treehouse- Taigh-craoibhe na Gàidhlig 🌿 such a special project with local eastend families and in collaboration with Màiri Morrison 💛 we learned about trees through lots creative play and we all “had a go at Gaelic” 🙌 Every session was a wonderful sharing of the languages in our Tollcross community- we came to learn Gaelic but left with words in Polish, Albanian, Hindi... a beautiful organic exchange in the middle of busy family life 🌈
Thank you to Glasgow Life and Glasgow City HSCP
