I have been delighted to lead the CreativiTEA – Wake up the Wonder project which helped those in our community who who are experiencing – or who have experienced- street homelessness. Thank you to the amazing funders National Lottery Community Fund and the Cornwall Community Foundation for making this project possible! A Radio Show showcasing the project as a whole will be being broadcast soon – watch (or listen to) this space!
The Poetry Postie delivers poetic inspiration to the Nation and is now able to fly airmail thanks to the new, international Poetry Plane project.
I have been delighted to work in partnership with Artconnexion UK CIC and our French cultural partners which has seen cargoes of poems-written on seeded paper-being fluttered from the sky. Where the poems land, they grow into flowers…
The project offers workshops which are fun, engaging and memorable, helping schools fulfil their statutory requirements for spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. And because they are led by experts, they not only help raise levels of literacy but also raise aspirations, leading to a lasting sense of pride and achievement.
When I grow up I want to be …you. Do what you do. All this.
The project is now being offered to wider community groups and participants of all ages and abilities, including those with special needs or physical disabilities.
Workshop activities include edible poetry, interactive song writing, flying poems and dancing words and allow those taking part to feel their spirits soar!`
If you’d like to find out more about this project , visit the www.artconnexion.co.uk/projects/the-poetry-plane/ to find out more!
A Day Trip to Happiness offers those taking part a ticket for their journey to wellbeing and I was very happy to be able to work with the Devon and Cornwall Devon Partnership on this wonderful project that was generously funded by GWR!
I have been so lucky to be able to launch the European Literary Train collaboration with wonderful partners in Northern France and we are all now taking to the skies in the new Poetry Plane project which takes literacy sky high!
I was have been delighted to receive funding by Arts Council England to roll out the Birds on the Branchline project, working with wonderful partners and having the invaluable support of GWR, Devon and Cornwall Rail Partnership and Artconnexion UK.
We explored what kind of birds live along our branch lines in Cornwall, how they have adapted, what dangers they face and how we could help preserve their habitat and encourage new species to settle there.
Creative literacy/nature preservation workshops took place either indoors, outdoors or on site visits and were based around the notion of Word Birds and a Poetree.
My very own sing-a-long picture book ‘The Magic Train Ride’ was also used for added inspiration.
Those taking part created songs, stories and poems that could be showcased at final celebration events in our interactive copper Poetree.
I’ve got so much exciting news I’m going to have to write it all in one big blurb! Firstly, I am so thrilled to be working again with the remarkable duo Fran and Nick Brennan, the Beano cartoonists from CartoonFun, on a new project featuring the Parcel Pets (who also were also, incidentally, part of a National award winning project delivered during lockdown in partnership with the Penlee Cluster. We were recognised for all the work we had done to help communities during this difficult time and were praised for our “Outstanding creativity.” We even got driven up to London from Cornwall in a black cab to receive our prize in Westminster!)
I will soon be working with the wonderful Devon and Cornwall Rail Partnership on a community rail project that aims to help reduce loneliness and that has been funded by the Department for Transport and Devon County Council and I’m delighted also that another project on the trains – Birds on the Branchline – has been funded by GWR to explore and celebrate the heritage of song birds and their habitat on the St Ives Bay line. I’ll be delivering this project in partnership with Artconnexion and there are lots of ways for the public to get involved. find out more on the Birds on the Branch page on this website .
Toot Tweet!
Tune in to hear a Valentine special for Poetry Postie FM – delivering poetic inspiration to the Nation!
Thank you to Arts Council England Funding who have given funding for the Poetry Postie to deliver poetic inspiration to the Nation on Coast FM radio station!
Tune in Sundays at 12 noon on Coast FM 96.5-97.2 or listen live on their website www.coastfm.co.uk
It was wonderful to be able to take the Sweetshop of Words to the Scottish Poetry Library in Edinburgh and to perform the GOBstopper show alongside it – which featured the PinARTa. Great content filling and bashing by the audience! 
Dylan Thomas’s writing shed has always been my inspiration. Once in a while, in my own little shed, I feel a little bit of that magic…
I was thrilled to be invited to take part in a creativity boost event at Spotify in Sweden and look forward to working with them again! 
Many thanks to Arts Council England who supported the wonderful Postal Service of Happiness project which filled us all with so much delight! Next stop the Happiness Lounge at Penzance train station to celebrate International Day of Happiness which takes place on 20th March.
It was such fun delivering the Pass the Art Parcel to the Hypatia Trust and then discovering all the incredible art and poetry under the layers. Thanks to everyone who contributed.
Here are some of my favourite pictures from the recent international Postal Service of Happiness project
I was thrilled to be able to deliver an international Postal Service of Happiness project with thanks to the Arts Council and Cultivator’s generous support. It delivered the Poetry Postie – Communities Communicating scheme to 4 communities in rural Cornwall linking them, through a cultural exchange, to a community in El Cobre, Cuba. It also developed animated Parcel Pets with the help of fantastic Beano cartoonist Mick Brennan and Fran Brennan from Cartoonfun – make one of your own!https://www.thepostalserviceofhappiness.com/parcelpets.html 
As I was leaving Mousehole school at lunchtime , having worked with the lovely little ones, some of the children ran up to say goodbye and one of them thrust me this little present that he’d just found on the ground – half of an old rubber ball – which is now a beautiful little bowl for my flowers! Once a little school girl asked me if I’d like an orange tree as a present and when I said yes please she gave me a tiny orange pip – another time a little boy handed me a piece of gravel as if it were a diamond! Gifts to make your heart sing x
The Postal Service of Happiness was launched on International Day of Happiness and some of the local school children in Plymouth accompanied me on my rounds and helped deliver parcels of happiness to a care home – the grannies were hilarious. They inspired a new picture book called The Runaway Teeth which I hope will come out soon… Here are also some of the parcels and lovely deliveries those taking part in the project helped create.
Parcels of Happiness
It’s National having more fun at work week so I thought I’d post this pic which I love – Can you force yourself to have fun ? Well Voltaire said ‘ the most important decision you make is to be in a good mood’ so perhaps you can! 
Thank you to all who helped 2016 be such a fabulous year! We finished it by making a traditional afternoon tea ( with a poetic twist! ) for an Italian TV Documentary and I can’t wait to host some more CreativiTEA parties in 2017 – I might even get the walking tea table out again! There’ll also be worldwide deliveries from the Postal Service of Happiness and more… Happy New Year!
TV Documentary
CreativiTEA cakes
An amazing time filming with the fabulous poet Hiroshi Taniuchi in Koyoto. Loving Delivering Poetic Inspiration to the Japanese Nation!
Thanks Literature Works, and thanks Arts Council England. Over the moon about this!
Thrilled to say that the Poetry Postie has been awarded a major Arts Council grant to deliver poetic inspiration to the Nation – and beyond! But before all the action starts I am on a writer’s retreat writing new poems and creating art parcels for the post bag….
