Cville TimeBank

Category: Events

  • Get your Holiday Cookie Fix at Cookies for a Cause – December 15

    On December 15, a slew of volunteer bakers will descend on Champion Brewery in Charlottesville, loaded with dozens and dozens of scrumptious homemade holiday cookies for sale for our third annual Cookies for a Cause fundraiser. Want in? Of course you do!

    Cookies for a Cause Charlottesville

    Sunday, December 15 

    1:00 – 3:00 pm

    Champion Brewery

    324 6th St SE, Charlottesville

    Come to Champion, purchase a bakery box and fill it up – creating your own assortment. We’ll have a gift-wrapping table with volunteers to get your purchases ready for gift-giving. Buy one box to share at work, another to snack on at home, one for the sitter, one for the piano teacher…. you get the idea.  And… *ahem*… you can enjoy a frosty beverage while you shop!

    Boxes are just $12 each – what a bargain! 

    What does your purchase support?  100% of proceeds support the Cville TimeBank and our Repair Cafe program.

    Repair Cafe logo

     

     

  • Cookies for a Cause is back in 2018!

    On December 2, a slew of volunteer bakers will Cookies for a Cause Charlottesvilledescend on Champion Brewery in Charlottesville, loaded with dozens and dozens of scrumptious homemade holiday cookies for sale for our second Cookies for a Cause fundraiser. Want in?  Ha-ha — we knew you would!

    Sunday, December 2  1:00 – 3:00 pm

    Champion Brewery

    324 6th St SE, Charlottesville

    Come to Champion, purchase a bakery box and fill it up – creating your own assortment. We’ll have a gift-wrapping table with volunteers to get your purchases ready for gift-giving. Buy one box to share at work, another to snack on at home, one for the sitter, one for the piano teacher…. you get the idea.  And… *ahem*… you can enjoy a frosty beverage while you shop!

    Boxes are just $10 each – what a bargain! 

    What does your purchase support?  Funds raised through this event will support the Cville TimeBank’s Repair Cafe program.

    Repair Cafe logo

     

     

  • New Year – New Orientation Venues!

    If joining the Cville TimeBank is on your to-do list in the New Year, we’re introducing two new orientation venues to our schedule. We’re elated to report that we’ve made arrangements with both the City of Charlottesville and with JABA to hold regular sessions at their facilities, on a schedule that we hope prospective members will find convenient:Cville TimeBank New member orientations

    • 2nd Tuesdays of the month at 6:00 p.m.:  2nd Floor Conference Room at City Hall.  Super-easy to find – right across from the City Manager’s office. Two hour parking validation available for the nearby Market Street parking garage!
    • 3rd Wednesdays of the month at 2:00 pm: Senior Center, 491 Hillsdale Drive (the Center hasn’t moved – the address changed from 1180 Pepsi Place due to the Hillsdale Drive project). This session is also an opportunity for current members to meet with a coordinator to ask questions and get help with the timebank member software. Plenty of convenient, free parking!
    • 4th Mondays of the month at 5:30 pm: Mary Williams Community Center, 674 Hillsdale Drive. This is the new location for the Mary Williams Center, on the right side of the JABA building on Hillsdale. Plenty of convenient, free parking!

    We hope to see you soon!

  • Cookies for a Cause!

    Cookies for a Cause CharlottesvilleOn December 3, a slew of volunteer bakers will descend on Champion Brewery in Charlottesville, loaded with dozens and dozens of scrumptious homemade holiday cookies for sale for our first-ever Cookies for a Cause fundraiser. Want in?  Ha-ha — we knew you would!

    Sunday, December 3  2:00 – 4:00 pm

    Champion Brewery

    324 6th St SE, Charlottesville

    Come to Champion, purchase a bakery box and fill it up – creating your own assortment. We’ll have a gift-wrapping table with volunteers to get your purchases ready for gift-giving. Buy one box to share at work, another to snack on at home, one for the sitter, one for the piano teacher…. you get the idea.  And… *ahem*… you can enjoy a frosty beverage while you shop!

    Boxes are $10 each, and you can purchase in advance on our eventbrite page here.  When you purchase in advance, you get first pick from the incredible selection  – provided you arrive during the first 30 minutes of the event. 

    What does your purchase support?  Funds raised through this event will be split between the Cville TimeBank’s Repair Cafe program and the Urban Agriculture Collective of Charlottesville (UACC):  

    Urban Agriculture Collective of Charlottesville logoThe Urban Agriculture Collective of Charlottesville (UACC) is a non-profit organization utilizing urban farming as a method to connect community members across various racial, social and economic barriers.  Managed by members of the communities in which the gardens are located (South 1st Street, Friendship Court, 6th Street) and cultivated by volunteers from all across the city of Charlottesville and Albemarle County, the farm has the capacity to produce up to 17,000 pounds of fresh produce which it provides to low-income residences free of charge during the weekly Market Day distribution.

     

     

  • This is Where the Magic Happens

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    It’s official – Cville loves fixing stuff!

    It was standing room only at the spring Repair Café on March 5. With nearly 200 visitors and 75 volunteers, this fabulous fix-o-palooza was more than double the size of our first event in November. Everyone had a TON of fun while we fixed and evaluated over 340 items.

    Here’s what we did together…

    We glued, screwed and welded things like a banjo, a Buddha, a camel saddle, an Eames chair, an Olympic torch, and even the barrel tables at the IX Art Park.

    We glued, screwed and welded things like a banjo, a Buddha, a camel saddle, an Eames chair, an Olympic torch, and even the barrel tables at the IX Art Park.

    We sharpened almost 70 tools – pruners, clippers, scissors, knives, loppers and hatchets.

    We sharpened almost 70 tools – pruners, clippers, scissors, knives, loppers and hatchets.

    Learn how to sharpen your tools! Friendly fixers Janet & Charles House of WayCoolTools.com will give a sharpening workshop with Transition Cville on April 10. Click here for details.

    We sewed up 55 buttons, zippers, hems and holes in dresses, coats, sweaters, jeans, pajamas, backpacks – even a tutu.

    We sewed up 55 buttons, zippers, hems and holes in dresses, coats, sweaters, jeans, pajamas, backpacks – even a tutu. Steve Haske and Jesse Chapman from Charlottesville’s Urban Sketchers joined us to capture the event on paper! This is Steve’s sketch of our sewing section hard at work.

    We revived 40 appliances – vacuums, lamps, clocks, blenders, a hair dryer, a battery charger, a turntable – including one item with a cord that was chewed by squirrels!

    We revived 40 appliances – vacuums, lamps, clocks, blenders, a hair dryer, a battery charger, a turntable – including one item with a cord that was chewed by squirrels!

    We restored more than 45 pieces of jewelry – bracelets, earrings, necklaces, watches and glasses.

    We restored more than 45 pieces of jewelry – bracelets, earrings, necklaces, watches and glasses. Two visitors went home with handmade keepsake baby bracelets on their wrists instead of in a tangled heap.

    We fixed up bikes for kids and grown-ups – and a stroller tire, too – at the hands-on bike repair station with Charlottesville Community Bikes.

    We fixed up bikes for kids and grown-ups – and a stroller tire, too – at the hands-on bike repair station with Charlottesville Community Bikes.

    We learned how to maintain a vacuum, fix a flat bike tire, reduce household waste, rewire a lamp, replace a button, and darn a sock at mini workshops throughout the day.

    We learned how to maintain a vacuum, fix a flat bike tire, reduce household waste, rewire a lamp, replace a button, and darn a sock at mini workshops throughout the day.

    Cville Repair Café will be back soon!

    We’re raising funds to hold another free, community-wide Repair Café event in October or November. We’ll announce the date this summer.

    In the mean time, look for us at the Eco Fair on April 24 and stay tuned for other fun fixing news.

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  • Fixin’ to change the throw-away mentality

    “I’m SO happy I don’t have to take this to the dump!”

    Our very first Cville Repair Café was a sweet success. More than 80 visitors brought their stuff to be evaluated and repaired by our team of volunteer fixers on November 15, 2015. We saved vacuum after vacuum, old lamps, piles of costume jewelry, entire bags of mending, and lots more – including a couple of nearly-new appliances that had their cords chewed off by a new puppy.

    Watch the highlights in 60 seconds:

    Our check-out team reported that visitors were “glowing” as they left, and our fixers had at least as much fun as the fixees. But don’t take our word for it. Check out the news coverage:

    WAHU Fox 27 – Repair Café Fixes Old Items for Free on Sunday
    NBC 29 – Charlottesville Service Exchange Organization Hosts First Repair Café
    The Daily Progress – Repair Café brings out community, keeps items out of landfill

    And here’s the best part: we’re doing it all AGAIN in the spring! Don’t miss our next event in March 2016: Click here to join the Repair Café mailing list.

    Until then, take a look at our new Cville Repair Directory to find local repair shops for appliances, electronics, phones & computers, sewing & alterations, bikes, and much more.

  • Repair Café Coming Soon? It’s Up to You…

    One of the beautiful things about the TimeBank is how it shows us the wealth of skills  “ordinary” people have to offer. This fall, we’re working on a new project that highlights one of those skill sets: fixing stuff.

    Cville Repair Café will bring a whole crew of handy fix-it types together for a huge community repair-o-rama! Folks bring in their broken stuff and actually get to watch & learn while volunteer fixers make repairs. Perfectly good stuff gets saved from landfill oblivion, and our fixers get some well-deserved love & appreciation for their special skills.

    Toss it? No way!
    Toss it? No way!

    Our plan is to hold two huge Repair Café events between October 2015 and March 2016. And from there…. who knows? Maybe it will become a community institution!

    It’s going to take quite a bit of work to pull together the whole community and fix a TON of stuff. Our Kitchen Cabinet, in their wisdom, realized that someone will need to pour dozens of hours into managing all the bits and pieces of this project.

    So, they applied for and WON a Neighborhood Challenge matching grant from the Center for a New American Dream! New Dream will match up to $2,000 to help pay the Repair Café coordinator a modest stipend, plus cover all the other expenses of hosting these community-wide events.

    Now, here’s the thing…. a MATCHING grant means that we need to raise $$ in order to get the grant funds. So we’re running a crowdfunding campaign over at ioby.org, and we really hope you’ll pitch in $10 or $20 (or more) to help us create an amazing Repair Café!

    Our project coordinator is already hard at work with a volunteer planning team, and we’ll announce the date & location of the first Repair Café soon. We’ll be recruiting fixers, too, so keep an eye out for that request!

    Please help us earn the matching funds and put on an awesome Repair Café: donate now at www.ioby.org/project/cville-repair-cafe

    PS – Don’t wait! The Neighborhood Challenge fundraiser ends August 31. #fixallthethings

  • PIE & PLAY dates at The Haven!

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    **Pie & Play is on vacation until the Fall 2015**


    Social gatherings play a vital role in building a vibrant community. Potlucks, swaps, drop-in chats, and the like are important opportunities to network. Schmooze. Mingle. Chat. A single personal connection can open many doors, and when you consider that many of our timebank transactions are initiated online, it becomes even more important to make personal connections within our network of members. We realize that – like many things – member satisfaction with timebanking correlates closely with member involvement: the more you put in, the more you get out. It’s the nature of our reciprocal community to give when someone’s in need, and to believe that members will be available for YOU when you need it.   But it’s hard to ask for help from people you don’t know. We want our members to get to know each other, to actually shake hands, look each other in the eye, to converse – and to learn more about each other than their user name. So, starting this month, we’ve set aside the third Sunday of every month at The Haven for Pie & Play Days!

    • 2:00 to 3:00 pm – Sanctuary Stewards:   We asked our newest organizational members, The Haven, about ongoing needs at the facility, and we have been asked to help take care of the Haven Sanctuary with a monthly spruce-up session. Dusting and wiping down the gorgeous 200-year old pews and sills beneath the stained glass windows will really make the space gleam — and we hope you’ll come help! All cleaning supplies (and music!) provided.
    • 3:00 – 5:00 pm – Pie & Play!  We’ll move downstairs into the dining room for some playtime – and yeah, for PIE!  Bring a deck of cards or your favorite game – or join a table!  And if you need a reason to practice your pie-making skills, by all means –  🙂
    • 3:00 – 5:00 pm – Swap!  We’ll have a few tables open at one end of the room for limited quantities of good swap-ables – used or new – odds and ends that might be happier in someone else’s home.  Declutter your heart out!

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  • Community Swap!

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    Sunday, August 17
    3 – 5 pm
    Friends Meeting House
    1104 Forest Street, Charlottesville

    You never know what you’ll find at a swap!
    Bring a few things from your home that would really be happier living somewhere else — it could be CD’s, cookware, clothing, toys, plants, etc — it’s ok if items are used, but they should be in good condition.  How much should you bring?  A few things, or a lot — it’s up to you, but please remember that your swap offerings will be limited to about a card table-sized area.  Tables will be provided — it’ll be up to you to make a fun and inviting display.  And you don’t have to be a Cville Timebank member to participate!

    • Here’s how it works:
    • Doors open at 3:00:  swappers bring items to be swapped and claim their space to display their goods.
    • At 3:30, we say a few words of welcome, and start swapping.

    That’s IT!  Seriously.

    The magical thing that happens is that people not only share their stuff — they share much, much more. Stories are told. Friendships are born. It’s really quite extraordinary, and we hope you’ll come!  And if you brought a snack to share, that’d be nice. 🙂

    So save the date, and start cleaning out your closets!  Please invite your friends, and if you’d like to join and invite friends via the facebook event, click here.

    We hope to see you there!

  • Fixing the Future – Nationwide movie event on July 18, coming to Charlottesville!

    Fixing the Future – see the trailer here!

    Cville TimeBank is hosting a local screening of the film, Fixing the Future, coming to theaters across the US for a special one-night screening event.  We hope you’ll make plans to attend!  Join us on July 18 at 7:30 at the Carmike Cinema, 1005 Gardens Blvd in Charlottesville (behind Pier1 Imports on 29North) for this special screening.

    Cville TimeBank is one of more than 50 groups around the country participating in the campaign, using Fixing the Future to encourage American communities to create resilient, local economies through innovative approaches to job creation. Fixing the Future Across America also links together a national network of business groups and community-based organizations working to improve their local economies.  Timebanking is just ONE of the approaches highlighted in the film – and it’s sure to inspire you to get involved.  There’s also a special broadcast panel discussion after the movie, featuring:

    • Bill McKibben: Author, environmentalist, Schumann Distinguished Scholar at Middlebury College
    • Majora Carter: Peabody Award winning broadcaster & Urban Revitalization Strategist
    • Mike Brady: CEO, Greyston Bakery & social entrepreneur
    • David Brancaccio: Host, NOW on PBS

    Our co-sponsors for this screening are Transition Charlottesville and Better World Betty – thanks for helping us spread the word about this exciting event!  Download a flyer here.

    Advance tickets can be purchased through Fandango here.

    Immediately after the film, stroll with us over to Kirt’s Homemade Ice Cream in Albemarle Square for an Ice Cream Social, where we’ll continue the conversation and networking about local initiatives akin to those mentioned in the film.  Get connected… get involved… and getcha some ice cream!

    We set up an RSVP event page that’s easy to share with your contact lists, and will help us give Kirt a head count for the ice cream social.  RSVP here – and we hope to see you on July 18!

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