Foxie's First 100 Days of Foxlease Park

Guest Blog - Liz and Janet's 12 months of volunteering.

Mon, 01 Dec 2025 14:42:11 GMT

12 Months of Volunteering at Foxlease Park. – By Liz Linkins and Janet Goring.

Two of our fabulous volunteers wrote their account of 12 months of volunteering for us for us to share with you. We remain grateful for their ongoing support and we hope you enjoy hearing about what they've been up to!

As we sit down to write our reflections on a year of volunteering with Foxie’s Future at Foxlease Park, it now seems odd to think how anxious we were this time last year, waiting for the news that Foxie’s had secured the sale. How much we cried at the announcement and how quickly we answered the call to volunteer.

We volunteered as we wanted to return to Foxlease and help bring it back to life for a wider community use, whilst honouring our happy memories and the history and heritage of what we had since childhood known as “our house in the forest.”

We had sobbed as we drove down the drive in October 2023, they were tears of sadness and frustration. We sobbed as we turned into the drive, halted to deal with the barrier, then drove very slowly to the car park, this time the tears were of joy and the excitement was all about new beginnings.

We arrived at Foxlease Park on the 7th day after the sale was complete to volunteer our time, we eagerly said to Hazel, we don’t mind what we do, will do whatever you need us to do.! This is a good time to say that what struck us first about this new charity was how professional and organised it was. Forms to fill, code of conduct and policies explained, health and safety was paramount, and our well being taken care of with copious amounts of refreshments available at any time.

Over the last year we have offered our time through most of the year, perhaps 1-2 days most months, we now reflect on what we have got up to.

We have together, side by side done the following tasks.

The Saddest One. The f irst day in The Lodge walking round recording all that needed to mended, replaced, repaired or cleaned.

The Most Satisfying. The day we started to clean The Lodge, as the dust, dirt and dead flies were sucked up the vacuum, the mould washed off the windows and frame, and walls washed clean, we could see how our efforts were making the difference.

The Great Team Spirit. The day we helped clean the three properties at the top of the Link field to prepare for their sale. There was an army of volunteers on that day, in and outside of the properties, cleaning, scrubbing, ripping out the overgrown garden, fires burning rubbish, windows being doused with water. It was like a band of ants all intent on doing their little bit. Willing Hands made light work.

The Most Gruelling Task. Without a doubt was spending 5 hours on our hands and knees in the Barn, scrubbing at the floor with a green scratchy pad and cream cleaner to lift off the years of ingrained dirt and splatters of paint. We only managed a strip approx. 1m wide and the length of the barn. It was rewarding to see the bright blue result but still so much left to do.

The Coldest. Taking down the Christmas wreaths and swags from the Front Porch in January.

The Hottest. Weeding the Archery area in full sunshine.

The Wettest. Building a hidden Fairy Grotto in torrential rain.

The Funniest. Moving and hiding a double bed and mattress in a secret cupboard above the coach house.

The Most Pleasant. Strimming and tidying the area around the lake.

The Wow, Look What We Have Done. The afternoon we cleared out a multitude of items, cleaned away cobwebs, scrubbed the walls and floors of the room, which now houses Foxie’s Shop, in readiness for painting.

Our Favourite. Being asked to take the floorplan of the main house and walk around the whole building to mark which radiators were not working. Excitedly, exploring the whole of the house and finding places we had never seen before or knew existed. Such Fun.

The End of the First Camping Season. Taking down the shower curtains, sterilising toilet brushes, moving altar fires into the huts. Checking the camp buildings for any repairs.

Heartfelt Moments. Hearing the sounds of young happy voices back at Foxlease Park. Viewing all the bookings on the board in the office. Driving down the drive and noticing how bright, clean and lush all the grounds look.

Liz’s Favourite Time , was tidying up the tools shed.

Janet’s Favourite Time , enchanting 90 young members of a school with stories traditional and one very new one of the Fox called Foxie.

Our reflection on volunteering even if, a couple of times we have been challenged by the tasks, we have had a great time, lots of fun with others on site, very rewarding to see the progress and it has made us feel very connected with Foxie’s Future and their aims for the future.

Our last note is for two other Volunteers/Trustees, who quite simply have gone above and beyond in all endeavours to bring Foxlease Park up to a very high standard daily. THANK YOU to Hazel and Emma, for your efforts and continued commitment to the Foxie’s Future Charity. We have merely drifted in and out and done what we can, you both are there daily doing what has to be done, with patience, determination, great humour, and true style.

Days 205 to 366 – Year two of Foxlease Park begins….and all the things that happened since we last wrote (or time flies when you are having fun!)

Wed, 19 Nov 2025 11:06:18 GMT

Days 205 to 366 – Year two of Foxlease Park begins….and all the things that happened since we last wrote (or time flies when you are having fun)

So yesterday was day 365 of Foxie’s Future’s ownership of Foxlease Park – we’re not at a year with open doors yet (that’s a celebration for another time in the future when we hit that milestone) but we are officially, as of today, into year two and so today marks the first birthday of Foxlease Park. We thought, in honour of such a momentous occasion, it was time to put paws back to keyboard for something other than bookings emails (we get lots, it’s great!) and to revive the Foxie’s Blog to bring you up to date with everything notable that we can recall from the past 161 days since we last wrote. We might not be entirely chronological….Emma really has no idea how these are going to go when she starts…so let’s see where our journey through the past 44% of the year takes us (photos to follow separately over the coming weeks due to blog post capacity).

So, where to begin….when you last left us (and many of you have visited in person in the in between) we were regaling you with the tale of the Apple Trees River…we’re pleased to say that there has not (as yet) been any reoccurrence of that particular problem. That’s not to say that water hasn’t been a challenge for us throughout, because it has. We still, even a year in, have at least one drippy tap, pipe, toilet, gutter, radiator, sink, shower or something appear most weeks, if not more frequently. Sometimes the leaks are big, sometimes small, sometimes they aren’t as water-based as we would like them to be…but, thankfully, most have, thus far, arisen without significant guest disruption. We’ve had one or two incidents but our valiant team of volunteers have continued to repair as quickly as they can when things arise and when the skilled plumbing volunteers aren’t available its amazing what a bit of what we fondly refer to as “plumber’s gunk” can do in a pinch to shore things up.

In the world of weird leaks, we’ve had continuously flushing toilets in the Main House, a failed shower pump leaking through the reception ceiling (the dripping sound of which was thankfully caught swiftly by plumber Connor who was on site for the heating and apparently has dog-like hearing when it comes to dripping noises) and a flood all the way from the back to the front of the Laundry on one particularly rainy early evening when the old gutters couldn’t cope and the drain behind the Laundry decided it wasn’t feeling like moving things along very quickly. When initially mentioned there was a moment of horror when Emma thought perhaps the Singing Washing Machine was responsible, but then when Zoe explained that the water was in fact pouring out under the front laundry door and seemed to be coming in from the back one it was quickly apparent that that was not the case and the Singing Washing Machine was absolved of all blame.

We did also have some fantastic water saving devices fitted across the site by a local charity scheme and our water bill is happy as a result so the Apple Trees flood was good for something as Southern Water called the day after to offer a charity partner visit.

We’re pleased to report that our lovely lake has seen significant activities action over the season from groups kayaking, canoeing and raft building (some with more success than others). The raft building shed had a new roof fitted and doors, pontoons and random holes were repaired. We also had a gentleman with a fantastic lily clearing machine (think a floating mini tractor) which chugged up and down the surface removing all of the overgrown lilies by chopping them up…other than the swampy piles on the lakeshore for a few days whilst the removed plants dried out, you would barely known he had been but the lake users and the ducks were all much happier as a result. The ducks had lovely ducklings and were around and about over the Summer but they’re enjoying the lake closure period over the past few weeks before the frost hits.

Continuing on the ground level theme, we had intermittent drainage issues throughout the reminder of the season with the site complaining about overuse and some near miss drain blockages (one metal cap the exact shape and size of the pipe which would certainly have blocked the whole thing was extracted by our friends at Dynorod on one visit which saved us from a world of impending disaster. We were so conscious of avoiding the historic poo-related challenges after our initial experiences that we committed to a weekly visit from the Dynorod team to make sure were all on track and working as usual. We’re delighted to share that in the past couple of weeks Dynorod have been back to site and completed part one of three of significant drainage upgrades to, we hope, avoid any future poo-splosions on site. Of course, with the volume of guests on site of all ages (some who do seem to use whole toilet rolls a day) we have had our moments of blocked toilets to clear and thus, “The Poo Patrol” was born (there won’t be badges, no one wants to commemorate the experience) and after the first round Emma invested in elbow-length veterinary gloves and additional plungers to ensure we were fully equipped. All would have been well, and the tools did assist; however, she then very carefully stored the gloves so that they wouldn’t accidentally be used for other things….and then forgot where she put them. This is one example of the fact that we are now sufficiently in to our ownership that we occasionally forget where we’ve put things…someone asked us on week two whether we’d forgotten where we’d put anything yet and we pooh-pooh’d the idea (no pun intended) and now we are definitely, certifiably in the world where that is the case.

We’ve had tree works done to keep some of the ones in check that the various names storms (and notably, sadly one over-exuberant climbing group of children) had broken or damaged and our new campfire circle which so many of you lovingly helped us to fund is so very nearly finished – it was resurfaced, with new steps cut in and posts for the benches installed, we just have the tops of the benches, the edging bricks and some additional drainage (to avoid the campfire pit being a small pond by accident…we’ve had a few floating campfires lately after a dry Summer) to complete it and perhaps some new solar lighting to replace those not currently working. It’s more accessible and we can’t wait for the benches to be in place soon to make sure it is ready to go for the next Season. We’ll share pictures when that work is completed.

And so on to the heating…we worked out why the showers upstairs in The Lodge were never as hot as those Downstairs - no one had ever checked the thermostat on the boiler tank upstairs and it was considerably lower than the downstairs one. As people keep telling us “it was always a problem” we think it must not have been adjusted for some time but we think that’s cracked that problem. With its new backdoor fire doors and the new on added to the back day room The Barn with its new heating has been cosy – we had the hearing engineers back once to replace some parts, thankfully still under warranty, but otherwise it has been cosy and thermostat controllable by our visiting guests. We had the heating turned on the in Main House, which led to many rounds of radiator checking and it has largely gone well – now that is has settled, we have a few cold spots to resolve. Several newer radiator thermostats to be fitted, which we will do in the new year when we have the funds, which will resolve the majority (unsurprisingly, the older radiators are almost universally well), and then we have one branch of the building, annoyingly the one which we are actually using for overnights which isn’t performing as well as we’d like. The Accessible Suite and what is now (and once was in times gone by) the Shop, and currently also Reception, both suffer from several issues – one being the fact that they are the end of the line and therefore are the receiving end for all of the sludge in the Main House heating system…and the second being how they fork off of the main heating network. We have tried a few things, including the boiler men at Normans spending considerable time removing sludge from the system and the conclusion is that some further adjustments are needed to ensure that the water reaches the pipes as it should. We hope to be in a position to have our heating engineers return in the New Year to resolve those additional points and make the whole building toasty warm again. We’re fortunate that thanks to previous generous fundraising the Accessible Suite has its own direct water supply and, if anything, is now too warm at times to the hot tap! We’re making great progress and the significant underground pipe leak which appeared outside near the basement when the heating was turned back on (one leak we forgot to mention earlier) was resolved by our fabulous groundworks contractors, Emkay.

Externally, we have had a number of groundworks jobs completed to level pathways, the planter in the centre of the Walled Garden has been removed and laid to paving slabs which will be the ideal space to house our lovely new firepit purchased for us off of Foxie’s Wish List. We’ve had some drainage ditches cleared in the hope of diverting excess surface water and some of our volunteers have painstakingly been clearing old French Drains to ensure that everything is as it should be.

We’ve had some significant groups of Corporate and Group Volunteering take place. A huge number of groups, and a number of our regular volunteers have contributed to the clearance of the edging bricks around the front of the Main House – we’ve yet to advance down the driveway but we think we might be able to arrange a day in the Spring for people to come and help us with a little section each to get us there but still lots to do before then. We’ve had Dynorod volunteer twice doing non-dynorod things, most recently preparing our Site Office and now hired out Downstairs Meeting Room in the Main House for painting (and we’re now on a deadline to finish the actual painting before Friday’s bookings arrive), Aviva have sent a large number of groups to us to do all sorts of wonderful things inside and out and we had a fabulous group from Sky come along for a day of heavy work. The car park was filled with 19 Sky vans and the engineers confirmed that due to them giving us their time there weren’t a lot of people seeing TV repair action in the Hampshire, Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole areas…their customers’ loss was our gain however and the wonderful chaps cleared the Sleeping Beauty-esque bramble wall from around the Swimming Pool so we can now see the surface cover again. We haven’t got further than that yet and we suspect based on the bullrushes it’s rather swampy underneath the cover (we also suspect some kind of lagoon creature may be living in there too) but the clearance does mean that considering what to do with that space may move higher up the list than it otherwise would next year. We’ve cleared the old yard and some of the back of the estate store yard and we’re in better order as a result – all heavy things which we could only do thanks to dedicated volunteer days of heavy work given to us by people generous with their time.

We’ve had some groups using the Crate Stack and the Climbing Wall and we’ve recently had the checks done to know what needs to happen to get the Zip Wire and High Ropes open again for next season, which will mean all activities up and running again and we’re adding more all the time. It’s been really lovely to see groups back on site and enthusiastically participating – we’ve got lots of bookings in next year already and we’ll be approaching those of you who kindly volunteered to be instructors previously as we’re now in a place to be engaging people to assist with that. We’ve also got a long list of general volunteering offers to contact and we’re working towards finding the time to bring new people on to join our Team – we’re really grateful for the offers. Our small volunteer team manage multiple inboxes and, as an example, we receive an average of 24 emails a day to the bookings inbox alone – our received total to that inbox is in the region of just over 8,000, which does not include volunteer emails, shop, general enquiries, fundraising, site management or the other more specific inboxes. The Team does its best and generally has response times which we are proud of, we are grateful for people’s grace and understanding when we can’t quite achieve them due to unexpected occurrences…of which we experience many.

We’ve mentioned some email-related numbers above, in terms of other numbers we can share there are a few. The system tells us we’ve had 626 bookings made so far since that system went live a year ago and we have some which fall outside the system in addition to this, for example, the schools groups who have visited – some of these are big and some small, a number yet to happen but on average we’re still receiving at least one new request a day. We’re expecting that to increase when our bookings for 2027 go live on 1 ^st December 2025. We’ve agreed that we’ll be running an Early Fox booking discount again to give people early booking pricing rates until the end of May 2026.

We’ve not had time to do the full tally but we think conservatively we’re now well in excess of 25,000 volunteer hours on site, and that’s without counting our overnight volunteers (we have someone everyday on site 24 hours) our wonderful remote volunteers who make us things, attend things and support us in all sorts of different ways – we’ll do a full tally for the New Year’s update to see where we are as against last year’s goals. Particular thanks to Foxie's Satellite Team in Birmingham who visit so frequently with all sorts of things repaired for us and made and who manage our Foxie's Family for us from afar.

We’re in the full throes of PAT-rick the PAT testing machines high period of activity, along with completion of our many other annual compliance checks to ensure that everything on site is safe and working correctly. We have online reporting in place which allows people to tell us if they find a problem, or they can find our onsite team to say hi and explain the issue. The website is improving all the time as we try to include more information to answer repeat questions which appear in the inbox and in doing so reduce the number of things which people need to ask.

We’ve started on the Main House – we had lots of people visit for Heritage Open Days this year and do our “Hard Hat Architectural Tour” – our hugest thanks to our volunteer team who made that happen despite the disgusting weather and earned us excellent central feedback.

We’ve had coffee mornings, quizzes, wooden horse racing, a barn dance, 24-hour sings, third party fundraising days. We hosted the Foxie’s Pumpkin Hunt on site and had over 750 paying guests (and over 1,000 including those non-paying adults who accompanied some of them) visit during that time, including fabulous support from local Scouting and Guiding Groups as well as families who came to visit us. We’re excitedly preparing for Foxie’s Christmas Light Trail happening in early December and tickets are available for that now – The Main House Bar is currently full of Christmas things and it looks a bit like Santa’s Grotto exploded (no exaggeration…there are over 7 Christmas trees in there) – Rosie and Fiona barely made it out a that weekend as the Christmas barricade formed around them.

Our volunteer catering team got us an incredible food hygiene rating of 5 following the local council’s visit to inspect us and that has given us a fabulous foundation for the hundreds who have visited us this year for pre-booked afternoon teas – our Christmas High Tea is still available to book onto now and the Team have prepared something fabulous for those attending. We are so grateful to all of them and have to mention the Queen of Scones, volunteer Ruth, whose baking talents are beyond compare.

We’re about to host our second “Back to Foxlease Park” catered holiday and we’ve got two Christmas/December workshops in the diary – wreath making and willow stars and we’re really looking forward to those.

We've lot count of how many toilets we've cleaned, but it's in the 1000's, even without the Main House there are 106 toilets on site and they've all been cleaned at least once a week, most weeks, 2/3 times a week (as they are cleaned between every booking) and often all on one day - so that give you an idea.

We've changed multiple beds and moved bed linen up and down the site so often that it's all travelled miles - the lifting and shifting is something you really can't quite comprehend until you've seen it in action or done it yourself - we've moved fridges, freezers, tables and chairs and the hill up to The Lodge really is bigger than it looks when you're pushing something. Our fabulous team of Master Drapers and apprentices who have kept out curtains in order following opening now manage The Pantry for us and our linen empire is growing - they label everything new which arrives and keep us from drowing under a pile of duvets. They aren't solely responsible for the laundering of it, although they do lots for us, for which we are very grateful - most of our volunteers have popped in a load of laundry when passing on laundry day.

But back to the other exciting bit, The Main House progress! “When??” we hear you ask…”We don’t know” is sadly still the reply, but we’re working on it, we promise. As we’ve said, we’re advancing the attack through from the right-hand end of the building. The heating was the first step and most of the ground floor, including the beautiful chandeliers have been lovingly cleaned by our volunteers and we’ve ripped up the damp old carpet in some of the key rooms downstairs – this week particularly, our volunteers have rediscovered the wooden flooring under the panelled room, by fighting through carpet and then also significantly attached hardboard – they have also rediscovered the stone fireplace surround on the floor. We’ve got lots of dehumidifiers running (named and unnamed) to try to dry things out now that the heating is on as the Main House has years of damp. The plan is to plan the next steps next…now that we’re quiet…except we haven’t been (isn’t it wonderful! And also tiring!) but we’ll be planning anyway. We expect the ground floor to be first as it’s easier for obvious reasons. The newest meeting rooms are more or less in action and have been booked and are being improved by painting, fixing and cleaning all the time (including this week). We’re back in the offices up the steps, in part, the steps are something to contend with for most people, being quite steep, but the printer was moved up them via some slightly questionable removal techniques some time ago and we go where the printer (and desks) go. The Pantry has been back to being, well, a pantry, for some time now and it’s doing its job admirably. We’re using some of the upstairs warmer rooms for storage. The next thing on the agenda is to fund and action some key guttering repairs to the Main House to ensure that what we manage to dry stays dry. We’ll also have more electrical works to do to the Main House before we can move further back into it and that means more funding. We’re working on it but if you want a fundraising aim for us to talk about then it’s really the Main House Ground Floor in various ways and carpet for lots of places generally…miles and miles of carpet…we’d love to replace some of the less nice carpet in various places but it’s costly.

Our other mini project, which we’ve applied for funding to improve is the site barrier. If you’ve been to the site and battled with it, you know it’s not very nice and inspires annoyance in most who encounter it in the dark, and in many who encounter it in the day time too. We’ve got the quote for replacing it with something more accessible which doesn’t require you to have 20/20 night and day vision and which doesn’t require you to leave your vehicle, shimmy around a post, contend with a padlock and then do the same in reverse once you are through it. We’ll need to match the part funding if we achieve it – Emma’s theory is that most people who’ve used it will probably happily donate £5 or so to see the back of it so we’re going to test that theory when we hear if we’ve been successful – it’s in the region of £10,000 to replace but we really do think it will make a difference to most people’s arrival and to the number of steps our volunteers do running up and down to help people.

We've had exceptional support from Foxie's Fairy Godparents via the Amazon wishlist with, literally, thousands of pounds worth of items and we are SO grateful - you are really helping to kit us out and show us your love from afar. The Wishlist is a permanent thing as keeping Foxlease Park magic takes alot of wishes so we do try to keep it topped up with all sorts of weird and wonderful things needed to keep the site running and to supply the things needed for the various ongoing projects.

So, just a little bit going on since we last spoke, and exciting things yet to come. There’s so much more to share we’re sure, like the lovely city scouter who called at 2am from a campsite because he heard something strange…which turned out to be nature in action in the forest, not strange at all for the site but new if you're not from the country, or the delight the site management team experience watching the innovative ways the D of E visitors to site choose to pack and carry their backpacks when they arrive and leave (think turtle shells in most cases) or the many many things that make the volunteer team laugh on a daily basis, we can almost always guarantee a giggle.

Some of our volunteers have put together some words of their own for us about their experiences and we'll be sharing those over the next few days!

A year in, we can safely say that (unsurprisingly) we still love what we do and we love all of you who join us in doing or support us in your various different ways. We hope to welcome you to site in some capacity soon (we do a great B and B stay above the Coach House) but otherwise we’ll be keeping you updated as things progress into our second year. Thank you for reading and for your support in year one and the difficult years before.

Love Foxie x

Days 183 to 204 - The long overdue tale of the Discovery of the Apple Trees River (or the ongoing repair list)

Wed, 11 Jun 2025 16:05:10 GMT

Days 183 to 204 - The long overdue tale of the Discovery of the Apple Trees River (or the ongoing repair list)

It's difficult to explain how time feels like its both flying and also not on site in the office. We're in a rather unique position now, where bookings are more frequent and we're absolutely, definitely, without question, in operation....and alongside that we're still also trying to do everything else to get the bits that aren't yet ready ready for use. And then, as if two to-do lists wasn't enough to be getting along with for our team, we've also now got an ongoing maintenance list which is rather tidal in nature (i.e. it flows and ebbs, almost daily) and that's really because things are waking up and having not been used or maintaned during the period of closure, in some cases, they don't seem to be entirely happy about it and so they protest when used lots all of a sudden and we have tweaks to make. We're doing well with bookings still coming in daily, and some for this year still, which is great, and we're getting quite a number for next year now too along with some who have been this year and booked to return - those are our favourite kind! I think we aspire to be people's annual treat - a bit of a recharge and escape to bask in the Foxlease Park magic and hearing young people who visit ask if they're coming back next year is just the absolute best thing. So forgive us that we manage to say less in the blog, less frequently than we'd hoped, but we will still keep updating when we can for those of you still reading.

And now, on to the long overdue tale of the Discovery of the Apple Trees River. When we last updated, we wrote (briefly) of our saviours Dyno-Rod, who saved us from the poo-mountain near disaster drain blockage which occured and the Apple Trees River incident occurred just a day or so after poo-mountain weekend when, to be honest, the team were still reeling a bit from the unpleasantness. It was a sunny morning and our lovely boilerman from Normans had arrived to do some further assessment of the three remaining campsite hut boilers to be replaced (Nuthatches, Magpies and Pine Trees) and we were getting on with setting up a few bits for the Coffee Afternoon happening later that day when Gordon returned back from North Meadows and asked Emma if she knew where the water running down the road from Apple Trees was coming from....the response was "what water?"....so off they went to investigate further. At this stage, there was a trickle of water running down the hill from Apple Trees forming a slow puddle but nothing too gushing and it appeared to be coming from under the trees between the Crate Stack Activity Area and the Apple Trees Campsite.

Investigations ensued...pine needles were brushed aside, trees and bushes were climbed in to investigate further and more water appeared, all leading back to Apple Trees. They climbed out of the trees and walked round to the campsite and discovered the bubbling Apple Trees not-so-natural spring coming up from the concrete in front of the hut....where the stop cock should have been firmly off...this was concerning for obvious reasons. Further investigations down into the hole revealed that the plastic stop cock piping joint had blown and, instead of being attached, the vital stopper was instead bobbing merrily around in the fountain of water down the hole. It was decided that plumbing expertise was needed....the plumber on site was called and our mate Steve (the plumber) conducted his own investigations and then, when it was apparent that the water could not be stopped, got his arm very wet indeed up to his shoulder in the hole attempting to feel out what was going on (meanwhile, back on the main path, the river was steadily growing larger and extending further towards The Barn...a concern given the impending coffee afternoon). Steve's arm reappeared and no joy with the repair (momentary concern was expressed by Hazel that his arm has turned blue...but it turned out to just be his tattoo which had been there all along). In the face of the onslaught of water, and the indication from Normans that unless some means of turning off the water could be identified then it would be necessary to dig through the 12-inch thick concrete on Apple Trees, the Team fell back to the area outside of Apple Trees and thus began the hunt for a working stop cock, alongside which reinforcements were called to source a breaker for the concrete, just in case....

Maps were consulted, and then older maps and then older and older maps to see if a stop cock still in existence and worth checking could be identified...drain covers were lifted, even covers which we were certain weren't going to help us were checked...meanwhile, Paul and Ian arrived with breakers and additional support tools. Steve the plumber left until further update was available that repairs couild be undertaken...Paul and Emma both ended up taking turns shoulder deep in water just in case stoppering up to stop the water flow could be achieved...it could not...the Team fell back further to older stop cocks and wider spread locations around the site which might stop the increasing flow...which was edging ever closer to Barn Drive...the day continued...the coffee afternoon departed and no progress was made...the decision was made that breaking the concrete was going to be too big of a thing and cause too much destruction...there was talk of other options and solutions, none of which solved matters or were viable...Paul got back on his tractor and Ian, Emma and Hazel continued to investigate. Every mapped stop cock was found by 5pm...none of them worked...we fell back further to the Main Gate...the water continued its steady progression and we'd have worried we were the cause of the water shortage in Hampshire if it hadn't already been announced prior to our incident by some days. In the Main Gate forest the mains stop cocks were discovered and, after requiring hulk-like strength to uncover them, were also investigated - we were then faced with a movie-drama style decision, not the red wire or the blue one, but stop cock one or stop cock two...for either we then needed a trip to B and Q for a stop cock key as the one we sourced didn't fit...late night B and Q (other providers available) was actioned and it returned as darkness fell and Hazel and Ian ventured into the forest again...to find that it didn't fit stop cock one, so the decision was made for us...we held our breath...it did fit stop cock two! Woohoo! Celebration...but...too soon...as stop cock two was the wrong one! Stop cock one was revisted but needed an industrial-sized hydrant key...which we could not source...we called back Normans for a second day of assistance and called it a very soggy night...the river persisted.

Day two and early starts, back to the discovery exercise, this time with Matt from Normans. No joy, river now forming a rapids and Apple Trees very boggy...wellies were applied to relevant feet and we then determined that Matt's tool was also not sufficient and we called out Southern Water..."Are you sure there's a leak?", they said..."Pretty certain", we said..."Please confirm what leads you to think that"...they asked..."Giant river", we said. Hazel got firm and the little Southern Water man was dispatched with promises to arrive within 2 hours....we continued with things in the meantime....Matt stayed ready for action the second it was off. The Southern Water man arrived and after inviting him for a short walk with us in the woods to find stop cock one (pretty sure he thought it was a murder plot), he had the gear and all the ideas (only one was needed) and he did the magic and turned it off! Celebrations all round! Matt leapt into action and replaced the broken joint (an amazing feat in itself given its location underground) and we extracted contact details from the Southern Water man to return to help us turn the water back on, which he kindly promised to do and then did...he reinstated water, this time unaccompanied in the woods, and we held our collective breath...would it hold or would we be returning back down to fountain town on Apple Trees...it held! Southern Water was thanked and dismissed. Things were tidied and order was restored.

It took some time to dry out and Ian has since procured the right sized stop cock key for us so that we avoid a repeat river if the worst happens.

We'll update on the general happenings very soon, but we hope you enjoyed our storytime today, Love Foxie x

Days 165 to 182 - Half a year gone by and where are we now (or Foxie's Fairytales)

Mon, 19 May 2025 23:07:10 GMT

Days 165 to 182 - Half a year gone by and where are we now (or Foxie's Fairytales).

Well we've hit the half a year mark since our purchase completed so it's a good time to take stock where we've got to.

We've got The Lodge, The Barn and The Coach House (including upstairs) now open for bookings and as of Saturday we've got 9 of our campsites in operation, with another two well on the way. The Boathouse has been repaired and the pontoons checked for our lake-based activities, tunnelling bas been cleared along with the woodland circle and the rest of the activity areas are in progress too. The Walled Garden and Marquee have seen good use and are improving week by week and the grounds in general have had lots more attention too.

We've passed 50 bookings and visitor groups on site so far since we opened the gates, made up of over 1000 guests, with more bookings still coming in daily for this year and next (those Early Fox bookers are making the most of the early bookings discount!). We've been to Annual Meetings and local events and had amazing fundraising work still going on for us by groups near and far. We've got bookings for tea and cake, overnight stays and afternoon tea in The Walled Garden and we've launched our first catered stay.

And Foxie's plans continue thanks to our incredible volunteers and supporters!

In terms of the detail of the past few weeks, the Foxie team have had a world of unexpected experiences since the last update! We'll spare you some of them (the blocked drain poo-nami in particular is one not to be shared in further detail, although we're pleased to say now resolved) but some are tales worth telling....like the Discovery of the Apple Trees River, Foxie-locks and the Skip that was just right and Foxie's Mystery Personal Alarm.

Our volunteers have been pushing on with repairing damaged woodwork on the Link Field campsite huts, retiling broken shower tiles, laying new concrete, filling holes with cold lay tarmac (which rather felt like a misnomer on the hottest day of the year) and so much painting to protect and improve. We're in a cleaning cycle before and after visitors to keep our standards high and we're finding things to improve all the time to keep moving upwards....along with SO much lost property. Our friends at Ferny Crofts brought their mobile climbing wall over which was hired by a large Scout booking on site and the roof on Chaffinch has been repaired by our wonderful friends at Compass Projects;

The Amazon Mountain Range continues to increase and decrease as things are delivered and get put to use on site and our Range is rather more widespread and extends to everything you can think of, including the kitchen sink! (Or, rather, a new washing up sink for North Meadow campsite). We've had some new carpet in the entry and one of the small rooms in The Barn and some amazing Foxie parcels arrive for a mix of the shop and new postbox toppers for Lyndhurst coming soon - if anyone has an Action Man or Barbie kayak lying around then please do let us know as we've got plans for one!

On to story time....

Foxie-locks and the just right skip was a minor but important event on site. Waste is becoming higher in volume as the season builds and it was the subject of much debate as to what size the next skip should be...we started with Big Skip when we first moved in, but decided that was too big this time, then progressed on to Baby Skip, which we decided was too small this time, and so we decided this time to go for Middle Skip, which we decided would be just right!

We've had more minor power cuts over the last few days as SSE have been doing things to their networks (thankfully not at times which have bothered anyone) and the only reason we've really known is because at least one of the buildings has a mystery alarm (not security or fire) which goes off when the power is cut. We can't hear it on site and have no idea what it does but the alarm company let us know when they can! The mystery continues...

Our Apple Trees story we'll share separately because it's a good one.

Finishing off the bouldering wall room tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Days 149 to 164 - When Foxie was activity ready (or when we were fully-booked and everything was blooming!).

Fri, 02 May 2025 22:26:54 GMT

Days 149 to 164 - When Foxie was activity ready (or when we were fully-booked and everything was blooming!).

Spring has sprung at Foxlease Park and there are blooms and green everywhere which has looked especially nice in the bright sun whic we've has over the last few weeks. Camping season has descended on site too and The Coach House is officially open for bookings! We're absolutely delighted that this weekend we're fully booked with everything we have to offer and all of our public camping pitches are booked out as well!

With that on the horizon, the past couple of weeks have been a hive of activity with less people to do the work as our volunteer numbers had been reduced to allow for compliance works. We had lots of snagging bits on The Coach House and we were delighted to welcome the first group in there today, as well as bookings in some of the rooms upstairs, which are now also open to book. We had last minute PAT testing of bedside lamps today to get them in in time in the occupied rooms and some temporary signage to affix whilst we wait for more permanent signs to be fitted to make the place our own.

We had lots of things to move around the site ready for camping, including laying more hard standing areas and distributing altar fires for those sites that need them. We did our pre-occupation fire alarm testing, cleaned many, many, many toilets and sinks and emptied bins from previous occupants' use this week.

We had new boilers fitted on North Meadow and also Birches this week, with Woodpeckers to follow with a new one soon as well and New Forest Trefoil Guild spent a day peparing the Woodpeckers and Birches sites for us to get them ready for forthcoming bookings. Lots more painting still to go, but we're getting there. Noth Meadows got a fit out with new shower flooring following the boiler, it had its starting paint, was stocked with consumables and the doors were what is now being referred to on site as "peeper proofed", which came about when we were working on different parts of the hut and realised we could see each other between the cracks in the door which was far from ideal. A solution was brainstormed and found to stop people's privacy being invaded and brown sealant was applied to fill the cracks.

The grass on site is nearing perfection in places, thanks to Paul's hours spent on the tractor - so good that one of our D of E group's leaders asked if we really wanted them to camp on it as it was too nice! We did and they did and had a good night!

We've got our activity offering out there and there's been lots of self-led prep. We've also opened bookings for 2026 and had a few in already with, we hope, more still to come soon! We've cleaned things ready for future use, like strimming around the archery range and the tunnels and the laminator in the office has been working overtime preparing self-led instructions and activities, some of which are booked this weekend.

We've been to speak at lots of wonderful events and fundraisers being held for us and we've hosted groups here for a small fee to here us talk about where we're at so far. We received more wonderful donations for resale, lots of amazing soap and consumables that we can use on site which saves us cost and also some further very generous financial donations for which we are very gratedul.

With all of that, we just about finshed things in time to welcome this weekend's bookings with everything we wanted in place and everyone's in for the night with a full house, which will only get more full as more campsites open soon! On to Robins next, which had its water connected today, Love Foxie x

Days 128 - 148 - Foxie returns pen to paper (or the next bumper update).

Wed, 16 Apr 2025 21:09:50 GMT

Days 128 - 148 - Foxie returns pen to paper (or the next bumper update).

The blog is back! We apologise for the longer than normal delay in updates...Foxie's ghost writer (along with some of the site team) has been managing holiday, illness and a very busy time on site. We're back in a phase now where we're doing some more new things, as explained below and so we'll try to update more frequently again where we can.

So, since our last update, things have leapt forwards again. We're just a couple of days away from our Alice in Wonderland, Mad Hatter's Tea Party event (likely to be in The Barn due to the weather) so we've had painted playing cards all over the office for a few days whilst they dry.

We've started moving out some of the picnic benches around the site for our volunteers and visitors to enjoy the sunshine outside when it's here. Paul is on his 5th (we think) cut of the grass everywhere around the site and uncovering new drain cover all the time as he cuts things back. It's really lovely to hear how much better people arriving think the site looks now that the wider fields have had some consistent attention.

In terms of bigger things, The Coach House has its first bookings from the end of April and is looking lovely (we'll take some photos soon when it's finished - the last paint is going on at the moment). All three residential buildings are ready for action and have had all their sign-offs, along with all of the campsites on the West of the site - just Chaffinch being finished off this week and then North Meadows and a few bits of snagging on the others which are already in use. Chaffinch passed with its existing boiler (woo hoo!), which was great news for us as it didn't need a new one - but we're so grateful to everyone who responded with offers of funding which helped us fund replacement boilers for the first five or so where we've needed them. The next phase after this one is to start on the huts at the top of the Link Field Campsites and that will mean more new boilers, more painting outside and inside and lots more bits on Foxie's Wishlist - we're ever grateful to Foxie's Fairy Godparents for their continuing support.

The Coach House and the Campsite Huts have probably had the most significant progress since our last update. They've had repairs to panelling, boxing in of exposed pipework, painting, bunk repairs, new shower curtains, toilet brushes and consumables from the Amazon Mountain Range. The kitchen has been stocked with its inventory, it's had it's venting ducts cleaned. Beautiful new nets in the front windows and serious curtain attention upstairs and down. The big fridge is back in the kitchen and nice and clean (no small feat to move, but we'll leave that comedy for another day) and our electrical works have been completed to ensure the cooker in there is all propery connected. The side hallway has had some further plaster repairs and we've just got some little paper things and finishing details to go now really and we've a little time for those.

The other area that had huge attention was The Walled Garden and Marquee which Foxlease Singing Circle took on as a clean up project during their recent "Sing and Scrub" event on sight. If we hadn't heard the singing we'd have thought they skipped that bit in favour of a double scrub for us as the collectively achieved wonderful things and combined with a bit more grass-cutting from Paul it's looking rather smart in there now and ready for event bookings, cake afternoons and all sorts of other things. We were using it as storage for the outside furniture but we've started to clean that up (more scrubbing) and move that out around the site now that the weather has been (intermittently) better and so it's soon going to be clear inside too.

With the campsite huts, it's difficult to truly catalogue the vast quantity of tasks which our volunteers have completed in the last few weeks but they've moved mountains to meet deadlines and with the sunny weather, things are looking lovely on the complete huts. They've repaired lighting, cladding, flooring, plumbing and fencing; they've painted the outside and the inside, they've laid shower matting, installed consumables, mirror tiles (more to come now we know how good they look) and cleared paving; they've fixed guttering and so, so, so much more. We've had some more youth volunteers stop by and we're now in a place where we have some tasks for younger people provided they are accompanied by a parent or guardian so please do get in touch via the website. We are working through our volunteer folder at the moment contacting offers to try and schedule more people in for a whole range of things to help us with this next phase.

We're nearly ready to upload our activites pricing and offering on to the website but if you've got a booking with us get in touch as we've got self-led and instructor activities available to book on site, with more coming online all the time. We've announced that 2026 bookings are going live from 1st May 2025 and we've been doing alot of background work on that to get ourselves ready and to forward plan.

We've planned and announced our next coffee morning (afternoon) on 15th May and Foxie's Flamboree, being run for us by Foxie's Singing Circle, and open to everyone as an evening community campfire event which we're really excited to share as the first of many to come!

We're sure there's been lots and lots more and we'll try to share more photographs soon as things keep progressing - more planning tomorow for the Alice Events at the weekend, Love Foxie x

Days 117 to 127 - Foxie's Bumper Update (or when Foxie made hay)

Wed, 26 Mar 2025 21:50:06 GMT

Days 117 to 127 - Foxie's Bumper Update (or when Foxie made hay)

This one's a bumper update after a big gap and, as always, our Site Team of Volunteers have been very busy getting things ready for guests. The site itself feels more and more like Spring has sprung each day with buds, blossoms and flowers appearing with each day that passes. We've also had the first ice cream treat day for the team when it was sunny and that was most enjoyable!

Since our last blog update we've had more big firsts at Foxlease Park, with our first fundraising coffee morning in The Barn and the first residential in that building too.

The electrical upgrade to The Barn was completed in the week prior to the first overnight and Carol the cooker was ready for guests....possibly a little too keen though as we unwrapped her on the outside but not the inside and so her first official cooking was of her own instruction manual...thankfully, swiftly resolved and she went on to serve our guests well with their weekend catering. We did also discover that the wooden spoon handles are too short for some of the pots so we've now added new one to the list.

Our community mosaic continues to grow steadily with each group of guests and we'll be organising some specific event dates to keep that growing. The Foxie's Shop on site has seen good service so far and it's now residing in the freshly cleaned main hall of The Coach House for the next few weeks.

Paul has spent many hours out on the tractor cutting the grass. He's managed to cut almost everywhere the tractor will fit (and some places it won't...) and he's on to second cuts which are helping to show the fields some love and level them out a bit too. He and Emma had a minor stint in tractor repair one day last week too when some bits needed replacing.

The Amazon Mountain range grew again, was partially used, and it has now been rearranged as we've had a big weekend of sorting things out on site whilst volunteer numbers were a bit lower. We're starting to source things to help progress the camp site huts and we're making steady progress on that, with lots still to do but some additional huts are definitely approaching 'camper-ready'. We've got the next two boiler replacements planned in as our coffee morning and kind donations have funded those two and the repairs completed to two others entirely (just amazing!). We're now working hard towards funding the other boilers needed to get the rest of the sites ready for their future bookings.

We've had floors stripped back and sealed with supplies from Mt. Cleaning and we're nearly there with all 3 residential buildings being fully sealed and protected which will stand us in good stead for the next few months.

We've developed our check-in's and check-out systems a bit more and we're grateful to our first sets of guests for their patience.

We've got our provisional list of activities sorted and if you hold nationally recognised instructor qualification and might be prepared to volunteer to run a session or two for us on the outdoor activities side (archery, paddlesports or ropes) then please get in touch with us.

We've replaced more of the tricky locks on site to make accessing some of the annoying ones easier! We've scrubbed up lots more of the self-led activity equipment and we started on cleaning the indoor bouldering wall today. We're compiling our boxes and sorting the guidance notes.

We've also been talking to our lovely groundworks contractors about upgrading the campfire circle and we hope to have more on that soon. We've got plans to replace the seating there which is in need of a bit of love and we'll be sharing a fundraiser for that soon too.

Archer the industrial Karcher pressure washer arrived unexpectedly the morning of our coffee morning - he was ordered in November and we'd heard nothing so we can only assume he's being on a grand tour and isn't in to postcards - whether he grew during his travels, we'll never know!

Also on the new arrivals list this week was Alice the cooker, named after the literary character and chosen by one of our lovely funders as Foxlease Park is a magical wonderland (the Mad Hatter arrives in April...) - we love that idea!

The fire door in the Lodge and the ceiling tiles have been repaired as they suffered from their first heavy use after a time out of action and we've been giving The Coach House a bit more love before it's final checks in the next 2 weeks. We've boxed in the exposed pipework, filled holes and generally smartened it up, with the hallway being painted after its replastering, the gaps in the rails filled in and old holes being repaired. We don't love the carpet but we'll be living with it having had a good clean for a while until we can fund some new to be fitted.

We had NFNPA's volunteers on site again with Flourish in Nature for more clearance and a bit of a bonfire day to shift the Rhodedendron and then SSE on site to cut back around the power lines for us.

We also sold all the snails for our upcoming snail racing evening at The Crown Stirrup - there's still time to book a table to place a bet if you haven't yet!

Lots of other things too we think, we'll try and leave a shorter gap next time, Love Foxie x

Days 112 to 116 - The highs and lows of camping (or when Foxie did the do-si-do).

Sat, 15 Mar 2025 22:53:25 GMT

Days 112 to 116 - The highs and lows of camping (or when Foxie did the do-si-do).

As ever, lots going on this week on site...lots of it good and some of it bad, or at least unexpected - we'll start with the good, then update on the surprises and then move on to the best news.

Lots more firsts this week at Foxlease Park. We had our first craft workshop on site on Tuesday morning in the Main Hall of the Lodge and our second on Thursday and both went very well with our attendees leaving with finished (or in some cases part-finished) projects, which all looked lovely. We had a hugely busy day on Wednesday with lots of contractors on site and also our friends at the New Forest National Park Service and Flourish in Nature, who were on site to help us by cutting back lots of the invasive rhodedendron in the woodland areas, which has the added effect for us of making some of areas a little less crowded and a little more accessible. We also gave the wisteria at the back of Foxlease House some attention and cutting back and have some lovely wreaths to decorate and sell, courtesy of Volunteer Hilary.

We've had contractors in doing some amazingly tidy groundworks for us, working with our electricians to upgrade the electricity supply to The Barn to make sure that Carol is able to work hard in the kitchen there. The cooker in the Upstairs of The Lodge has been wired in too (name awaited). They've had to dig up a big path from The Barn over past the Walled Garden to connect up to the Main House and they've done such a smashing job for us that you'd barely know they'd been there. We've got more works happening to improve drainage in front of The Barn next week but all is currently running to plan on that. We had SSE visit to scope out tree works needed to protect their network and they'll be back for more works next week and we had our friends at Normans back to help us service the boilers on our first few campsite huts and that was where the bad news struck....with our first two camping bookings happening this weekend, the pressure was on to complete the renovations with the small skilled team of volunteers helping on those works. Lots of bits of wood to make safe, steps to replace and innovative shower re-tiling solutions being implemented in order to get us to the finish line. We had Nightingale and Apple Trees ready to go save for boiler sign-off, an Normans were due to sign off our first five at the same time. Unfortunately, boiler man Neil was the bearer of really bad news for us and despite his best efforts the boiler on Nightingale couldn't be saved....the worse news was neither could a number of the others. Unfortunately the latest round of roofing repairs prior to our ownership seems to have invovled incorrect fitting of the boiler flues meaning that the boilers on huts with a straight flue are waterlogged and unable to be saved. Thankfully Apple Trees was able to be passed with some work from Neil and a few replacement parts, which was a bit of a relief in the context of the others...The Bothy and Orchards were not so lucky.

We commissioned a new boiler for Nightingale but couldn't guarantee it would be in before our school group arriving mid-morning on Friday reached us and so the Team had to abandon Nightingale and think of other options and what could be achieved. Neil then pointed out that Oaks he had looked at had a side-flue and so was in much better shape and could be updated and signed off with only a small amount more work. The Team criticially assessed the hut and we decided to ask our booking to move, provided that we got the work done as we were determined that after all the hard work elsewhere we wanted the hut to be lovely. That meant lots of work for the team on site and late evenings this week to get things done.

Some volunteers scrubbed and then others painted Apple Trees, repairs were done, new rails installed and we were making good progress, although with some things still to go. Oaks needed lots of work as we hadn't really started there yet, save for a previous weekend of volunteers completing a first clean some weeks ago and boy were we glad they did. It was all hands on deck and the Team achieved the impossible in just a day and a half with two sides of the hut repainted, the toilets and showers cleaned and descaled, new shower curtains, rails, towel rails, mats and flooring installed in the showers (as always, a big thank you to Foxie's Fairy Godparents) and all the usual fittings installed in the campsite hut. the wood was repaired on Thursday, with painting and cleaning and everything else happening late afternoon and into Thursday evening. Paul came on site early to get the grass cut back and the last three shower flooring tiles were installed as the school walked up the drive (we had the office stall for a moment to allow us time to remove the tools etc) and then they were in and we breathed a sigh of relief, or rather achievement, that our first camping booking had arrived and were in. Entertainingly, no one actually camped where Paul had carefully mown the campsite, but it was still worth the cut to make it look alot more ready for them.

Our Lodge group checked in on Friday and we were preparing for our Barn Dance Fundraiser in the evening and it went well, Foxie was having a bit of a rest after the pressure of getting Oaks ready in time but everyone else seemed to have a great time. We started our Community Mosaic at The Barn Dance and we've asked more groups on site to add to it since and it looks great so far, with more to be added with each new group that attends the site.

Normans moved everything for us to get a new boiler on Nightingale as well as fixing up Apple Trees and finished a bit later in the day, so that one has been fitted and we can finish that hut off next week (just a little bit left to go) and we're grateful but new boilers are an expensive business (about £1,200 each for these) and we're expecting to find more problems with them as we continue assessing the sites not yet contemplated. That's the worse news (as the price usually is!). Having recovered and cleared up from The Barn Dance we refocussed our efforts on the last bits of Apple Trees - last minute removal of some extra screws, installation of rails, shower matting and the nice new curtains and a final clean of the hut and we were done with two hours to spare, give or take 5 minutes or so.

We gave Sam the Singing Washing Machine a whirl (Sam Sung.... thanks to Volunteer Liz for that suggestion) and had a general tidy up and did more preparations and repairs in The Coach House today to keep that moving forwards and that's creeping towards readiness too, along with painting the front of Orchards to move that along as well. We had lots going on in the office and we're busy, busy, busy!

And the best news really is that tonight is a beautiful clear starry night at Foxlease Park, the site has two full campsites of happy (if not chilly) campers and a Lodge full of brownies. What a great week of firsts and we'll get back to planning more tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 111 - When the Foxlease Park site office felt a bit like Piccadilly Circus.

Mon, 10 Mar 2025 22:12:06 GMT

Day 111 - When the Foxlease Park site office felt a bit like Piccadilly Circus.

It was busy busy busy on site today as our groundworkers broke ground on starting work upgrading our electrical supply to enable us to install some additional things in various buildings and additional external lighting and they finished day 1 of 5 today - they started by The Barn and did such a tidy job backfilling that save for a little bit less grass by the court, it doesn't much look like they've been!

We also had our fire extinguishers across the site serviced for their annual service so that they are good for another year and we're all up to date and we had significant electrical works going on in The Coach House to upgrade the supply in there too. We've assessed some cosmetic improvements to some of The Coach House panelling to bring that back up to scratch and we've planned in some further actions.

We had several prospective bookings come to site to look around and a lovely delivery of some donated items from one of our wonderful supporters. We fixed some small things, like trickle vents and broken clip frames, and some bigger things off the list too. The windows in the Foxlease House courtyard have been sanded down and some re-puttied and undercoated so that those which aren't yet needing significant repair don't decline further.

Our volunteers painted the inside of the Apple Trees shower room to brighten that up ready for its upcoming guests and then they started on the outside of that hut too - there's more painting to do to finish all four sides and we hope that some of out other volunteers attending this week will help us finish that off before the weekend. Meanwhile, we had removal of more barbed wire from around the site and repair of some fencing and we've prepared the first four campsite huts for their boiler servicing happening this week. Our volunteers cut lino for the toilet floors in the Nightingales campsite hut and we've made good progress on making those nicer - we've got some sealing and sticking to do, but we should be able to progress that later this week too ahead of our weekend arrivals.

We've temporarily run out of lino so we'll have to halt progress until we manage to source a further donation from the local flooring place which has been saving offcuts for us but it does seem like it might be a good solution for the toilet floors for this season once complete. They also affixed our new signage to the toilet and shower doors on Nightingale - supplied by our very own Amazon Mountain Range - and progressed some of the further repairs in that hut which are planned to be completed tomorrow.

We had a mini-mountain range delivered towards the mosaic project supplies and the board with its site map drawn on it was cut down to size ready for sealing. We also set up in The Lodge for our first workshop tomorrow morning.

Ticking more things off the list tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Days 106 to 110 - When Foxie fixed floors, doors, windows, walls, ceilings and more (or Foxie's round up!)

Sun, 09 Mar 2025 21:57:47 GMT

Days 106 to 110 - When Foxie fixed floors, doors, windows, walls, ceilings and more (or Foxie's round up!)

We've been really busy on site over the last few days with late nights and early mornings for most of the team and our next weekend of on site overnight bookings has just concluded successfully - as ever, it's lovely to see groups back on site, particularly in the sunny weather!

Since our last update we've had activity going on across the site - we've had emergency lighting replacement and renewal in some of the buildings and lots of annual checks. We've also had preparatory works to upgrade the electricity supply to The Barn to give us options for futher upgrades and to make sure that Carol has the power supply she needs.

We had a late evening delivery of the new upstairs cooker for the upstairs of The Lodge to upgrade that ready for future guests - we won't go into detail regarding the challenges of transporting a new cooker weighing 100kg up the stairs and the old one down them...but based on previous exploits elsewhere on site we're sure you can imagine....the end result was successful replacement of the cooker, yet to be named.

We had more sorting going on in the office, more preparation for our self-led activity boxes and absolutely mind-blowing support for items on our Wishlist - we're identifying new things all the time at the moment as we move onto the next phase of preparations to The Coach House and the activities provision on site.

The Gate House has a new hat on its chimney as we've had the chimney repaired and we've had a new drain cover installed in The Coach House Courtyard to make the olf put lid there safe. We've had significant progression of the preparation of our first four campsite huts - the painting at Nightingales has been finished and all being well Apple Trees will be tomorrow. Our volunteers have been working hard to reinstate the plumbing on the first 4 sites, ready for our boiler servicing in them this week coming, and also to repair the guttering, wood panelling (where needed) and to bird and insect proof to make the huts as shiny as they can be. We've got some retiling to do in one or two of the showers this week and we'll be installing some of our new flooring in the shower and toilet areas of the first few huts which, if it goes well, will allow us to replicate that across our other sites as they re-open. We've also checked and installed the water safety measures around the deep water areas ready for activity in those areas.

We had more clearance around the back of Foxlease House to clear that area and today the former wooden structure had further attention to relocate some of the plants and to remove the broken and damaged decking so that we can start addressing next steps to re-lay the decking and finalise that back area to the house ready for our upcoming spring events on the lawn, starting with our Mad Hatter's Tea Party Picnic. Photos of the clearance work to follow.

On Friday we hosted the New Forest National Park Authority's Education Forum in The Barn and we were delighted to meet the other members of the forum who were able to attend and to show them some of the site. No sooner had that group left on their site tour, then our friends at Sign-It arrived to install our new Foxlease Park sign in the Main Hall in The Barn (just in case any one forgets where they are...) and it looks fab!

We've had Mountains of new Amazon Mountains arrive and be unpacked, lights cleaned in The Coach House, paint scrubbed down, mattresses hoovered and covered. Inventory items prepared ready for stocking that kitchen and lots more!

We also spent Sunday plotting out the Site Map Design for our Community Mosaic Project and we're on good track to have that ready for our attendees at the upcoming Barn Dance to help us start on adding the tiles.

Hoping for more Spring Sunshine as our groundworks on site start tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Days 104 and 105 - When Foxie turned the campsite lights on (or OS day!)

Tue, 04 Mar 2025 22:02:57 GMT

Days 104 and 105 - When Foxie turned the campsite lights on (or OS day!)

It's been a busy start to the week on site at Foxlease Park and the chilly sunshine has been welcomed to allow us to keep going with work outside to the campsite huts and grounds.

Day 104 included clearance of the soakaways and pathways around the back of The Barn to assist with the drainage there and to prevent any further flooding of the pathway behind the building. Volunteers Sue, Angela and Clare work hard for us clearing the wall and the soakaways and rescuing some of the little roaming primroses growing around the wall at the back. Sue even found a bold little one growing through a stacked tile and she's taken that one to attempt a rescue transplant for us and give it a new life! The others have been relocated to the front of The Barn where they can be appreciated. We had a veritable typing pool going on the office, unusual for us, as the team and prepping the risk assessments and documents ready for the launch of our self-led activities offering on site and also our activities offering.

The start of the day included the arrival of an enormous pile to add to the Amazon Mountain Range courtesy of Foxie's Fairy Godparents - we've now had over 1000 listed items purchased for us, and bearing in mind that many of those include many multiple items, that's a seriously amazing amount of support and it's allowing us to do the works on site which we badly need to whilst the site is in this early phase of re-opening. So our biggest "thank-you" to those in the Foxie's Fairy Godparents Crew, which seems to be growing all the time.

Yesterday also included some investigation of a few leaks arising from the recent stormy weather so that we can plan for the repairs of these in the next phase of the plan and lots of strimming of Apple Trees Campsite ready for our upcoming bookings in a few weeks' time.

Day 105, today, had lots more additional strimming on site as Volunteer Peter continued where Volunteer Jim left off yesterday and carried on to strim The Both and most of Nightingale Campsite too, which puts in a good place for our first campers on those sites. We had tonnes of work today going on on Apple Trees and Nightingale, removing towel rails for refurbishment, replacing and repairing guttering and painting some of the internal areas to make them a bit lighter (hopefully!). We also had a Team working on the first clean and clear of the Chaffinch Campsite Hut, making the most of the fine weather to get us ahead.

There was more flooring action in The Barn as the left half of the building has had a further clean and seal (thanks to Volunteer Corinne and Mt Cleaning) and the chairs from the Main Hall of The Barn have been moved out ready for further coats in there tomorrow. That blue floor is just getting bluer!

We also had a great Team of Corporate Volunteers on site from Ordnance Survey today painting the Campsite Hut on Nightingale for us and they did a great job, managing nearly an entire hut between the 6 of them - we're very grateful to them for choosing us as the place to use their Corporate Volunteering hours.

We also ventured around the site, and ran into our deer little friends (see below), to turn the power on in the Campsite Huts across the site - including the lights!

More painting and repairs tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Days 102 and 103 - When The Bothy was revived (or when Foxie's projects continued).

Sun, 02 Mar 2025 22:55:30 GMT

Days 102 and 103 - When The Bothy was revived (or when Foxie's projects continued).

As busy of a weekend as ever in the Foxlease Park sunshine - on Saturday we had a Team of volunteers working on reviving The Bothy for us - cutting back the edges and the brambles climbing over the back of it. Cleaning, removing the old curtains and tracks from the walls, more cleaning, cleaning and cleaning - with toilets and showers that are looking less wild and much more habitable ready for our first guests on site in it soon.

On Sunday we had more hard work on the Nightingale Campsite hut, removing years' and years' worth of old rusty drawing pins, the old signs for the toilets and showers which are broken and discoloured (Foxie's Fairy Godparents are restocking us with new ones as I type) and also painting the base-layer on the new wood fitted this week ready for painting of the whole hut by one of our Corporate Volunteering Groups on Tuesday this coming week. We've got similar tasks to do on the other three of the first four huts in use in March and so we'll be setting people to those tasks soon too as soon as we have people who are happy to tackle those. We'll also be progressing a second and a third clean, along with work on The Coach House in the coming week.

Alongside that we had our wonderful contractors from Compass Projects on site again today, on a Sunday no less, to repair the chimney at The Gatehouse which was leaking following the recent bad weather. It's another unexpected expense but we needed it done to ensure we can keep any visiting volunteers warm and able to shower when they stay as the boiler can't be used until it's repaired. We're just waiting on a new hat for The Gatehouse now (also known as a chimney pot) and that should be ticked off the list this week so we're able to revisit the rest of the site again.

We also had sorting of the AV cupboard cables by the AV Team working on The Garrett Theatre's production of Alice over the Easter Weekend and sound board testing to make sure they know what kit they're going to use. The curtain project in The Barn continued too and we're pleased to say that they are looking smart all over the building now.

Campsites and Coach House Rooms tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 100 + 1 - All signs point to Foxlease Park (or when Foxie took steps).

Fri, 28 Feb 2025 23:18:28 GMT

Day 100 + 1 - All signs point to Foxlease Park (or when Foxie took steps).

Some more of our new signs arrived today and were kindly fitted for us by Sign-It. We're ready to welcome the world from the front gate now and we love our new outside logo sign on the toilet block which will leave visitors in no doubt where they are!

Another set of fabulous volunteers on site again today and they cleaned more of our campsite huts out for us and prepped them for further works. The first clean is the worst but Nightingale, Orchards and Apple Trees are looking much cleaner for our future guests and ready for more repair and repainting.

We'll be completing some bird and insect-proofing works to encourage those little friends to choose other homes this year and also to close the gaps under the doors. We'll be installing new shower curtains throughout so we've added those to the wishlist to stock up and we're seeing the progress, with a couple of weeks still to go until our first booking so with some good weather we should be in good shape (paws crossed!).

Volunteers Gordon and Pete Pete continued on from yesterday's repairs to tackle some of the larger wood replacement needed on Orchards and Apple Trees where the steps were unsafe and the wood damaged. There's a little more work to do to finish those repairs off and to sort the doors too but they certainly look alot sturdier and safer than when they started.

The team tomorrow are starting equivalent works on The Bothy as that's high up the list too. We also managed lots in the office, laminating new information posters for our notice boards, sending out links for snail sponsorship and adding new dates for the Mother's Day Weekend Floristry Workshop.

We also received some wonderful new donations for our on site shop from a supporter who drove a long way to deliver them to us, for which we are very grateful.

Looking forward to getting The Bothy spick and span tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 100 - When Foxie got camping-ready (or when there was 100 day cake!)

Thu, 27 Feb 2025 23:30:24 GMT

Day 100 - When Foxie got camping-ready (or when there was 100 day cake!)

Happy Day 100!!

As Day 100 of our ownership of Foxlease Park draws to a close, it feels like a big milestone and it is, and at the same time, it also isn't as we intend for it to continue for many many thousands of days yet to come! Our lovely Volunteer Eleanor brought us a cake into the office to celebrate and Foxie and friends, along with those on site today, cut it to celebrate yet another big milestone. We've achieved lots in the first 100 days and we're so grateful for the amazing and continuing support of our supporters and especially those who have been able to attend site to assist us with preparing for opening in some way. We'll reflect on some metrics over the weekend as to where we're at but for now we'll just enjoy celebrating the milestone.

In practical terms, on site our volunteer team worked as hard as ever. With some more sewing in The Barn and further installation of Carol and the majority of the team venturing outside to prepare our first couple of campsite huts for their first bookings coming up soon. Work involved cutting back the overgrown concrete and hard standing - thanks to Volunteers Su and Gill who got through three sites-worth of that and some sorting at the back of The Lodge in what was formerly the rented out area. Volunteers Carol and Sandy worked hard to remove old birds' nests (and associated ick) and many many cobwebs from the inside and out of the Nightingale campsite hut.

Volunteers Gordon and Pete Pete (whose plastering in The Coach House yesterday we are pleased to report was a grand success) worked round the hut, fixing, realigning, replacing wood panels, hinges and similar to get it ready for repainting next week and its looking both safer, cleaner and more loved already, with more to come! They were joned by Volunteer plumber Pete who was reassembling the pipework after the winter drain down and also adding in lots of drain points so that next winter is easier for us. It's a great new system but we'll definitely need to fund a large number of bits from Screwfix (other sources are available) to complete all of the campsite huts to the same standard and unfortunately they aren't things we can source through the Amazon Mountain. We've got the boiler servicing for the campsites scheduled in and we're on track to be ready for the first bookings soon, with more hard work planned in so we'll cross our fingers for drier days coming up soon to make sure we get there.

A fantastic effort today by the whole team to end our first 100 days. Now, onto the question you've all been asking....is that the end of Foxie's blog??? We officially said we'd blog to mark the first 100 days and on day one Emma really wasn't sure if it we'd get that far or not but it seems to have proven popular and is a nice way for us to acknowledge the day-to-day hard work of our volunteers and the progress we're making on site and to keep people updated with what is happening and how to support us. We've had a kind offer from one of our volunteers to assist us with publishing the first 100 days into a little book and we'll be exploring that further soon. In terms of the blog itself, we don't want it to become too repetitive and we are nearing a stage where to keep it going daily that might become the case, equally, we have lots to share and lots of progress still to make. So, the answer is...the blog will continue, but it might become slightly less frequent (i.e. every couple of days rather than daily) to make sure we still have something to share with you worth reading!

So, here's to the next 100 days of Foxlease Park and far beyond! Thank you for your ongoing support and readership. We hope you'll keep following our adventures, Love Foxie (and Carol, the Amazon Mountain Range, the Singing Washing Machine, PAT-rick, James and aaaaaaallll the others) x

Day 99 - It was a wet day on site when Carol arrived! (or when the Barn was busy).

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 21:05:20 GMT

Day 99 - It was a wet day on site when Carol arrived! (or when the Barn was busy).

The day started soggy, and early, as we awaited Carol's arrival. Our volunteers got to their tasks across the site, with Volunteer Pete Pete (today just Pete as he was the only Pete on site) starting sealant replacement in The Barn bathrooms to make sure they are nice and fresh, Volunteer Gordon doing some rubbish clearance for us, and our sewing cohort setting up in The Barn Main Hall to work on the curtains in there. Volunteer Ian arrived to complete the boxing in of The Barn toilet following its recent repair and then moved on to prepping space in the kitchen for Carol's impending arrival.

The Bookings Team of two Volunteers were powering through more of our inbox enquiries and booking queries and making steady progess, and Volunteer Karen braved the rain to play in the mud or, rather, to continue tackling the area around the rear of Foxlease House following the removal of the woodpile there and she made steady progess there all day with great results. Pete then moved on to removing some of the broken hand sanitiser units from around the site for us and addressed some patch plastering in The Coach House stairwell (we'll update on success on that tomorrow).

We had contractors on site for heating and electrics, with some replacement lighting fitted in The Lodge (photos of those tomorrow), and measuring up for some replacement doors and windows. We gave our Ali Mac a spring clean with one of the hoover regiment. We all got generally rained on first thing and then the sunlight broke through and things got alot brighter.

And our movie moment of the day was when the phone call was received that Carol's car service was here (for which, read the DPD van) at the barrier. They were directed up to The Barn for her delivery and in a Marilyn Monroe-esque red stairs moment (think Diamonds are a Girls Best Friend in Gentlement Prefer Blondes) or perhaps something between that and the eighties PG Tips: Mr Shifter Commercial piano stairs moment....Carol the Cooker arrived and was safely delivered into the kitchen in The Barn ready for installation into the newly widened space (thanks Ian). Carol has been named by our wonderful fundraiser for that cooker, we understand in memory of a lady who was magic in the kitchen and so we hope Carol will help many a caterer deliver culinary magic at Foxlease Park too! She may eventually be removed to The Coach House but for now she is in The Barn where she is most needed and ready for action soon.

Happy 100 days-eve! It's a big milestone day for us tomorrow and we're looking forward to tackling more on the list, Love Foxie x

Day 98 - When Foxie focussed on things that open (or when the Foxie's Shop badge delivery arrived!)

Tue, 25 Feb 2025 21:24:28 GMT

Day 98 - When Foxie focussed on things that open (or when the Foxie's Shop badge delivery arrived!)

It was another fix-it day for Foxie on site today as our team started by collecting up the red bags of branches and cuttings from the driveway so it's now looking nice and clear again and then they laid some additional matting around our front barrier to reduce further the muddy patches where people walk to open and close it. The wet weather and higher traffic on site have combined to make things muddy again in places and this is a good remedy to this.

We've had notifications that two of our new cookers are on their way later this week thanks to significant donations and fundraising to the cause for those unexpected costs. We've got a few people who pledge to support those purchases to collect from but one was fully paid by an amazing fundraiser and we're waiting to hear what that cooker's new name will be when it arrives!

We had a few other doors which were misbehaving in the wetter weather this week and which needed some attention, one in The Barn (now resolved after Volunteer Gordon had words) and a couple of others which open onto the Foxlease House Courtyard, including our beautiful Georgian Laundry door. It's been behaving just fine, but in the recent weather it decide it was going to be difficult about opening and also that it was going to set its handle free to spin and start coming away from the door (entirely defeating its intended purpose). Gordon did try talking nicely to it, as that worked once before, and that combined with some attention and a new replacement handle clearly won it over as it is now opening and closing splendidly again. We've got further attention to give it in time, some new paint and similar, but for now it seems happy again.

We've had some time checking out the campsite huts on the Link Fields site and we've got two smaller roofs needing attention and some repair work to do before we repaint. We're keen for them to be better than ever so we've got a phased plan to complete the works across the campsites over the coming few weeks, alongside the further work to ready The Coach House for its opening.

We had further curtain sewing in The Barn and the floors were cleaned in The Barn bedrooms, kitchen and hallway by our hardworking volunteers Jacqueline and Corinne. We've got a plan for sealing them but they've done so much cleaning over the last few weeks that we've nearly killed off Mt. Cleaning's supply of floor products so we've added more wishes for those today to stock us up for the next steps next week to make sure the newly blue floor stays its beautiful blue!

This evening we had a lovely parcel arrive will all of Foxie's new Foxlease Park badges which will be in our on site shop very soon!

Curtain action in The Barn tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 97 - When more of Foxie's flowers were blooming!

Mon, 24 Feb 2025 22:41:49 GMT

Day 97 - When more of Foxie's flowers were blooming!

No photos today but we've got a timelapse of the daffodils by the Site Office in Foxlease House Courtyard instead. They're starting to appear slowly across the site and looking lovely.

Action-wise, we've had lots and lots of little jobs being completed all over the place - toilets boxed back in, window arms affixed, sealant applied and much more!

We also had our curtain squad back in The Barn to re-hem some of the curtains where needed and a number of volunteers working really hard for us on tidying up the driveway and the areas at the front of Foxlease House.

We've had some visitors to site for prospective bookings to look round which is exciting progress for us and a big big load of parcels to the post office for shop orders.

We're also expecting the new badges to arrive very soon!

Although the blog isn't about self-promotion, we're a finalist in the Donorfy Outstanding Fundraising Campaign Category. The outcome is decided by public vote so please vote for us and ask anyone else you know to vote too - we'd be really grateful!

https://donorfy.com/outstanding-fundraising-campaign

Cleaning on the cards tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 96 - When Foxie sorted cables and planned ahead! (or when Foxie's adventures grew in number!)

Sun, 23 Feb 2025 21:57:41 GMT

Day 96 - When Foxie sorted cables and planned ahead! (or when Foxie's adventures grew in number!)

Our weekend bookings checked out without any further alarming events and we understand that they had a lovely time. Their Foxie mascot for the weekend had some lovely adventures travelling the world with his passport (and made it home safely to the Site Office) and attended campfire #3 on site - their photos will make some lovely additions to our Foxie's Adventures board.

We had just a couple of volunteers on site today for a couple of hours due to the expected bad weather and they carried out some great jobs for us: starting to sort the AV Cupboard equipment and cables to make sure we have the kit needed for our fabulous Alice open air theater events taking place over Easter weekend. We understand that the music is nearly finished and plans are progressing nicely. We'll be starting to wrangle the flamingos for croquet in readiness soon! They also helped us with some further necessary clearance in The Walled Garden for a few hours, which finished off another area to get us ready for higher guest numbers soon.

We've also spent the weekend ploughing through the huge numbers of emails we're receiving, all of which are either exciting ideas, partnerships or enquiries and we're hoping to get back to everyone as soon as we can. Alongside that we've gone live with another workshop, this time for a Mother and Daughter Floristry Class for Mother's Day Weekend, with more to come and more lovely offers of possible workshops contacting us weekly - it looks like we should have an exciting programme to take us through the rest of this year!

Ready for another week tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 95 - When Foxie did some thinking (or when there was a false false alarm followed by a false alarm!)

Sat, 22 Feb 2025 21:47:16 GMT

Day 95 - When Foxie did some thinking (or when there was a false false alarm followed by a false alarm!)

It was a busy day on site, albeit with guests instead of jobs!

It started early doors for the Site Office as we had to open the gate for those arriving for The Lodge guests' dawn promise renewal ceremony. As we were accommodating at The Gatehouse overnight we took the lazy approach and did a pyjama and wellie boot run and the retreated back to the warm for a bit longer inside with a cup of tea (we thought an 8am proper start on a Saturday was reasonable to aim for. Tea was drunk and contemplation of movement towards getting up and heading for the Site Office was discussed when suddenly plans were accelerated when Emma heard an alarm going off - we're obviously on high alert for problems as it's the first residential weekend - collective listening and awaiting a phone call from the monitoring department...both of which were inconclusive....outdoor clothes were thrown on in a hurry and boots hopped into and then...outside...it became apparent that it was a false alarm...but from somewhere on the other side of Clay Hill...a false false alarm.. Normal service resumed and the Site Office was opened as usual. We then headed over to The Barn for toilet roll restocking and delivery of AV equipment and a quick clean of the kitchen before our day booking arrived. We were nearly done when another alarm sounded...this time much closer and on site and the monitoring service rang...fire alarm in The Lodge...did we need the fire brigade! A 100 metre dash up from The Barn to The Lodge to find guests outside in their dressing gowns confirmed that we did not and they were called off...sausage cooking had gone awry and the smoke had set off the detectors...all was well...not a second false false alarm, but still a false one. All was well and a true test of our systems!

Things got a bit calmer after that - we had a steady stream of visitors all day, not just those arriving to use The Barn, who we understand had a fab time and gave us in the office lovely thinking day gifts of a banner, chocolate campfires and lovely feedback! But also, we had visits from local supporters who wanted to drop in donations and visit our little shop stalls and we were grateful to them for stopping by. We also had two guides on a bike expedition drop in with their entourage to say hello and to refuel before finishiing their journey - long fox Foxie waved them on thier way!

We had a couple of Volunteers drop by including to take advantage of the drier day to fill a bit more of the front pillars of Foxlease House and to help us move some things, along with a mother and daughter volunteering team who joined us to clear some of the fallen wood up the driveway for us which was a big help. We're getting to a place where we will be able at certian times to accept those under 18 to volunteer provided that they are accompanied by a responsible adult/parent/guardian and it was lovely to see the enthusiasm for helping us out at all ages!

The Singing Washing Machine did have its turn at a chorus or two washing off the High Vis jackets from the site office and we got lots of paperwork done too. The campfire count on site since opening, following this weekend, is now 3 and the S'mores count is much much higher - our large wall posters to keep track of those will be on their way to site soon.

We've also been approved on Pitch Up for our family camping offering, starting with the Easter break initially and it is our intention to build on that in a few weeks' time. We've also had our first couple of Trip Advisor reviews from those who've stayed so far and we're really grateful for the positive feedback.

Thinking Day wishes to those who celebrate and here's to a less alarming start tomorrow morning, Love Foxie x

Day 94 - The lights are on and somebody's in! (or Foxie's first sleepover).

Fri, 21 Feb 2025 21:54:04 GMT

Day 94 - The lights are on and somebody's in! (or Foxie's first sleepover).

The lights are on in The Lodge on this very wet evening at Foxlease Park as our first residential booking is in progress and our Foxie mascot is on an adventure with the group staying there this evening so we hope to have some photos to share soon. We've also got a day booking on site in The Barn tomorrow so the day was spent making sure that both buildings were ready for their next visitors. We moved bins to the open buildings, which needed a good clean, and checked the drains were clear of leaves and other bits following the heavy weather recently.

We had cleaning taking place in The Coach House too and some sugar scrubbing ready for the next coat of painting in there soon. Our Volunteers moved around the kitchen equipment to make sure the buildings were stocked and we completed some final signage and our weekly fire alarm testing - our youngest volunteer was back on site for checking of some activity equipment and assisted with our fire alarm testing (with ear defenders, of course) and then the application of some no more nails to stick up some additional signage in The Barn.

We had a pillow delivery from Volunteer Sandy, who has been leading on our pillow recovering project to make them nice and fresh and easier to maintain and the mountain range is on the move - we are grateful to her for the several mini-pillow mountains which she has assisted with so far!

The Singing Washing Machine had a chorus or two in washing the cleaning cloths and towels from the use last week and we spent some time cleaning The Barn following our big quiz event and moving the temporary shop into there ready for the coming weeks' Wednesday Openings.

Hoping for better weather tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 93 - A rainy clean up and the mirror image of Foxie.

Thu, 20 Feb 2025 22:06:32 GMT

Day 93 - A rainy clean up and the mirror image of Foxie.

A quick sign off yesterday as the headlights were coming up The Drive for the quiz and there was no more time to spare!

We started this morning with breakfast for our overnight guests, courtesy of our resident MasterChef, Viv. We're so pleased that our first event went well and our organisers did part 2 of the event (the less exciting clean up part) this morning. Unfortunately it was a rainy day on site today and that made the cleaning up (which was largely putting things back where they belong) a little more challenging, or at least a bit more soggy but our fab team got it done.

Our Volunteers then moved on to putting away tables, hoovering and general cleaning to make sure The Barn and The Lodge are fresh for this weekend's bookings. We had a few finishing off bits to do - some more little repairs and the reinstallation of the mirrors in The Lodge following their painting yesterday evening. Our fab electricians stopped by to complete part 1 of some of the site's new cooker installations so that we're ready to wire in the ones arriving soon when they arrive.

We didn't have any opportunity for outside work much today due to the weather but we did have some visitors stop by to view parts of the site, regardless of the weather, and we spent some time on some paperwork follow up for the quiz, bookings and our upcoming events. We've got some new craft workshops to be scheduled in soon, including a Mother's Day Weekend Floristry Session which we hope to get listed for ticket sales very soon.

Feeling very grateful to our hard-working volunteer quiz organisers and our volunteers who gave their time to help park cars, serve the food, run our shop, serve drinks, do vast amounts of washing up or who made us, literally, hundreds of desserts. It doesn't take a village to run a good event, but it does take a great Foxlease Park Team and we're so lucky to have each and everyone of them!

Looking forward to checking in our first residential tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 92 (again) - Foxie's getting quizzy!

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 18:56:19 GMT

Day 92 (again) - Foxie's getting quizzy!

The eagle-eyed amongst you will have noticed that yesterday was incorrectly labelled Day 92 when it was actually Day 91 - we'd love to pretend we know what day it is but quite often we're not entirely sure - so, we've fixed that and now we're on Day 92 (again)....

We've had a busy day of quiz preparations for this evening, setting up, moving around and finishing off - with chilli-cooking going on since mid-afternoon and a radiator installed in The Barn in the middle of it all - but we're hoping that's the final leak repaired! Volunteer Carol cleaned The Lodge from top to bottom again and Volunteer Gwen did The Barn and then moved on to washing up the plates and glassware, assisted by Volunteer Wendy who came early to the quiz to volunteer for a bit before this evening and everything is nice and shiny and ready to go!

We've updated more signage (we're getting there) and painted the mirrors from The Lodge to make them Foxie-themed ready to be reinstated in there tomorrow.

We definitely did more but we'll update tomorrow with the details as we've got a quiz kicking off shortly - we'll leave you with the photos of the deer joining us early for supper and the flowers on site to enjoy in the meantime! Love, Foxie x

Day 91 - When Foxie waved "bye bye" to Baby Skip #2 (or Deep Cleaning Day).

Tue, 18 Feb 2025 23:14:38 GMT

Day 91 - When Foxie waved "bye bye" to Baby Skip #2 (or Deep Cleaning Day).

Lots happening again today as we prepare for our first Foxie-run on site event and we prepare for the next phase of bookings this weekend.

We're pleased to report that The Barn is drying out nicely following the plumbing repair in there yesterday and that Foxie would no longer be able to kayak in the toilet in there. The Barn had super amounts of attention from our Volunteers Jacqueline and Fiona who spent the day dismantling, cleaning and reassembling the radiators in The Barn to clean inside and behind them and they removed tonnes and tonnes of dust and 1 errant pair of socks which had clearly been there for some time. They worked really hard and to clean all of the radiators in there took all day.

We had some more electrical works on site ticked off the list, we waved goodbye to Baby Skip #2 and thanked it for its dedicated service to Foxie's cause, and we met with several other contractors and partners for quotes around the site, including for management of some of the trees (bonus photo of some of our deer little friends at the top of the site).

We also had a team of Volunteers, Janet and Penny, working hard cleaning The Coach House from top to bottom for its second deep clean ready for the next phase of works. Volunteers Gordon and Paul dropped in to remove some of the metal fittings in the Main Hall and the old cooker, ready for collection and The Coach House is inching closer to looking ship-shape and ready for sea (or guests).

Gordon and Paul then moved on to other tasks in The Lodge (notice boards and clock in the upstairs kitchen, one minor lock repair, and the removal of the mirrors in the shared shower rooms ready for some painting. We also applied some additional signage throughout the building and then Viv moved her equipment into the kitchen ready for quiz preparations tomorrow and chilli cooking to take place for our 80 guests. They had a super busy day with us and managed to move on in their jobs list to fencing repairs and interim maintenance up the main drive.

Volunteers Angela and Claire spent their time in far flung places on site and worked their way around the Nightingale, Orchards and Apple Trees Campsite Huts, assessing works needed and clearing and repairing the guttering from the supplies on site to start getting the Huts ready for their first occupants in a month or so's time and it's so exciting to br progressing towards the camping season.

We also prepped the shop for tomorrow, sorted some additional paperwork in the office (with some interesting finds in the old records from Volunteer Eleanor, which gave us a bit of a giggle - who knew the site once had an arrangement with a zoo for collection of tiger fertiliser??). We also started making our list to contact those who've named a (cartoon) snail for April's snail racing event and there are some great submissions so far - there's still time to sponsor one if you haven't yet and if you name a winner then there's a small prize.

We might have achieved more that we've forgotten but it certainly felt like a busy one!

Final preparations to make sure we're quiz-ready tomorrow for a Foxie's Big Quiz in person and online for those attending, Love Foxie x

Day 90 - Kayaking in The Barn for Foxie? (Or contractors and coordinated chaos).

Mon, 17 Feb 2025 23:07:22 GMT

Day 90 - Kayaking in The Barn for Foxie? (Or contractors and coordinated chaos).

We're at Day 90 and wondering where the time has gone - it's flying by but then we stop and look and we can really see where that time has been spent.

Fresh off of a busy weekend of bookings, we were contractor-heavy on site this morning with more Legionella testing, some electrical works and some heating repairs and LOTS of volunteers doing all sorts of jobs, some planned and some unexpected (hence the coordinated chaos).

After its use at the weekend The Barn had a couple of areas needing attention, a minor radiator leak (radiator is due to be replaced) and a toilet leak too! It started small, but got bigger with investigation (Foxie could definitely have kayaked in there)...and then smaller following a successful repair. We're pleased to confirm it's back in action and no further indoor kayaking will be taking place. Less opportunity for outdoor kayaking too as Paul has been pumping away further water from the front of Barn Drive.

We had more water in the Main Hall of The Barn (deliberate this time) with intensive mopping of the floors and some sealing - Volunteer Corinne has been steadily working her through the floor cleaning supplies from Mt. Cleaning of the Amazon Mountain Range for us and we're getting there with sealing the beautifully clean floors everywhere to try to keep them that way.

Outside The Barn there was further work on the borders taking place - Volunteer Sue has advanced the battle to take back Barn Drive beyond the borders of the Basketball Court and she's winning! The Barn Kitchen was carefully counted and stocked ready for its upcoming bookings and it looks ready for action. Our curtain experts have moved on to the bedrooms in The Barn and they are nicely finishing off in there.

The Coach House has been assessed for painting and further works needed to allow us to programme them in over the next few weeks and we also moved out some of the old furniture in there which is no longer fit for purpose to make way for a re-jig of the Main Hall and some further deep cleaning as we move onto that building.

Two of the Lyndhurst Men's Shed were on site today working on the pillars at the front of Foxlease House and fitting in place some under-sink cupboard doors that they made for us in the Prep Room at The Lodge.

We had some more pot holes filled with scalpings up the first part of the main drive and also lots of the wood from the back of Foxlease House sorted and moved - a hard work day for our fantastic outdoor volunteers and we are very grateful.

We ended the day with a fab delivery of a new to us kitchen which, subject to some checking, we think will be planned in to refurbish the current kitchen in The Coach House - exciting times and we managed a bit of quiz preparation too!

Gutter clearance and repairs on some of the campsites tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 89 - When Foxie's flag was flown (or Opening Day +1)

Sun, 16 Feb 2025 23:12:42 GMT

Day 89 - When Foxie's flag was flown (or Opening Day +1)

Another exciting day on site as Girlguiding's Hurst Castle Division descended upon the Barn in big numbers and the scavenger hunts, cheers and laughter around the site were the absolute best things ever to hear! They've kindly shared some photos with us to share on and it's definitely given us some great material for Foxie's "Wall of Adventures at Foxlease Park", as well as some ticking off to be done on our marshmallow/s'mores and campfire counting charts! We're also delighted to report that The Barn was so well used that it probably now needs a further clean - 160+ pairs of shoes will do that - but, fear not, because it's there to be used and very much still blue!

Before the masses arrived, we managed to raise Foxie's new special events flag - handmade by our Volunteers Christine and Mary just for us and the hours they spent sewing were worth it as it looked fabulous in the slight breeze today. We'll give the flag its own special moment another day soon with some other less "action" photos as it deserves it and we'd love to share the process but you can see the last minute finishing works in the photographs.

Alongside all that excitement we had some wonderful volunteers continuing work on site. The final coat was painted on the toilet doors of the outside toilet block and then work was started assessing and clearing the Nightingale Campsite Hut. It's in great shape, but has work to be done and now we have a good list of what that is and some of it was started today, with edging around the concrete to remove the overgrown grass and some gutter clearance, as well as the first provisional clean of the hut itself. We're looking forward to spending more time on the campsites alongside The Coach House now that The Barn and The Lodge are in action and mostly complete save for some minor further finishing works (like a second coat of paint in the kitchen at some point).

We also had an exciting parcel arrive with our campfire friends, available for indoor campfires (yet to be named), inside and they are so cute!

All in all a great day, onto Quiz Prep and the next things on the list tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 88 - Opening Day! (or what all of Foxie's work has been for)

Sat, 15 Feb 2025 20:20:21 GMT

Day 88 - Opening Day! (or what all of Foxie's work has been for)

An early start today after a late on yesterday...lots of reported issues with yesterday's blog (thanks BT) but hopefully now resolved and the excitement of lifting the barrier for the adults of our first group back on site first thing and finally being open. Well, we say finally, but it's only been 88 days! We set ourselves a punishing, but necessary, target to be open by today and we made it with moments to spare as Emma left The Barn after the Team's "finishing off" this morning and filming The Barn welcome video (on Foxie's YouTube Channel now) as the first of the DofE group arrivals rounded the corner to Barn Drive!

But that "finishing off" this morning was so worth-it, and we hope our first returning guests will agree. Painter's tape was removed, posters were added to notice boards, more gravel was shifted outside (much easier to see where you're putting it in daylight hours), mirror tiles and signage were installed, floors were given a final mop, sinks were cleaned, finishing tape on the floors were applied and a Foxie mascot was delivered for photo opportunities. The most satisfying feeling - we very nearly ticked everything off of our list (and we'll fix that one wonky door sign in the bedroom before the first residential as we have time for that!) - and the floor in The Barn looked even bluer than it did earlier in the week.

Once the Team left the booking in The Barn to it we moved on to some serious (and we do mean serious) sorting in the various stores and in the Site Office as all of them ended up being a bit like dumping grounds for various things over the last week. It was so nice to restore order as that reduces the need for daily scavenger hunts (if anyone finds the Evo-Stick we still can't locate - and Emma has looked, quite literally, everywhere - they'll earn 50 Foxie points!).

Alongside the Team's hard work, we had wonderful Volunteer, Clare from The Thread Studio, drop by with some very special stickers, to install some logos on our signage around the site for us, and a little messge from Foxie to be seen by those leaving on their way out. They look great, and we're grateful to her for braving the rain to apply them for us so that they were up in time for today's arrivals.

With our next goal in mind on the opening timetable our Volunteer Team today carried on working hard elsewhere on site. They removed the old "SHOP" sign on the toilet block and some ivy to prevent roof damage, they re-laid another slightly wonky paving slap, they drilled a cleat into the flagpole out the from of Foxlease House, they distributed the welcome guides for the other buildings, added to the wishlist for The Barn and The Coach House kitchen's desirable additions, put up some new signs and responded to some bookings and emails. We're so appreciative of the hard work in the last 88 days to get us to where we are now and the support from those who can't make it to site to help in that way.

And at the end of another busy day, we got sent the photos in the slide deck below of the first group on site having an amazing time being at Foxlease Park and gearing up for future DofE adventures and isn't that just what's it's all about? We'll be adding some of their mascot photos to our "Adventures with Foxie" wall soon.

Smiling to the tips of my little orange ears that today went well and we made our deadline, looking forward to welcoming booking #2 tomorrow and the many thousands more to come after that, Love Foxie x

Day 87 - The day before...(or what Foxie did!)

Fri, 14 Feb 2025 23:59:55 GMT

Day 87 - The day before...(or what Foxie did!)

The deer had a very chilled out day on the Link Field Campsites today in large numbers and the team were expecting a quieter day as it was deliberately low volunteer day but, instead, with our first booking tomorrow, we were busier than ever although with different timings to usual.

We had contractors to meet for final sign offs of our Legionella risk assessments for The Barn and The Lodge and a final bit of electrical works to finish the heating system. Paul spent a day moving things around the site in readiness for the weekend and also in mowing the lawn behind The Lodge ready for next week, with a speedy relaying of a paving slab near the car park to ensure the walkway is level and unbroken for those guests arriving to join us tomorrow.

With still lots to do, in a moment of Foxlease Park magic, Volunteers Neil and Sue, who arrived for their overnight stay before their first day volunteering tomorrow, arrived early evening and joined in the "finishing off" tasks left in The Barn - some larger than others. Sue got stuck in cleaning windows and helping Hazel to stock toilet rolls and hand soaps and Neil took on the heavier task of moving a huge bag of gravel to fill the end of Barn Drive following Paul's water removal earlier in the day (we don't have a photo unfortunately as he finished in darkness mid-evening, but we'll take one tomorrow).

Alongside that, Volunteer Catherine dropped by to deliver some things to the Site Office and ended up staying to not only give a further intensive mop to the Main Hall floor in The Barn, but also then to don coveralls and to join Emma and Volunteer Rosie in some late night painting of the kitchen in The Barn and we are SO grateful that she did as she saved a world of short people problems in reaching the highest parts of the room - some innovative paint brush extensions on broom handles were adopted to reach the highest places even with the height advantage and we definitely wouldn't have managed to do it all without her.

It's a late blog today as 4 hours of painting later and a pumpkin avoiding finish for the painters (with half an hour to spare before midnight - no Cinderella issues for Foxie) The Barn kitchen is done and looks wonderful in time for the morning.

Time for a lie down like Foxie in the photo, love Foxie x

Day 86 - When Foxie sees clearly now the panes have gone (or when Foxie became an honorary Hampshire Scout for the afternoon)

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 23:58:38 GMT

Day 86 - When Foxie sees clearly now the panes have gone (or when Foxie became an honorary Hampshire Scout for the afternoon)

A busy day today as we prepare for the arrival of our first booking, as you may be able to tell from the time of the blog!

Lots going on on site - we still have electricians carrying out compliance checks in various places and other compliance contractors due tomorrow.

Our volunteers worked hard in The Barn; painting the kitchen pantry and prepping the main kitchen for painting tomorrow. More cleaning and stripping back of floors throughout the building and Mt. Cleaning from the Amazon Mountain Range has really come into its own, along with paint stripper to remove some of the last of the paint on the flooring outside of the Main Hall, which doesn't belong there. We had the last of the light fittings cleaned and lots of equipment moved back from The Barn to the relevant stores.

The window panes in The Barn front doors which needed replacing were fitted for us by Volunteer Pete and they look great, no cracked glass remaining and all either safety filmed or, in the case of the new panels, laminated safety glass. Definitely a good job jobbed today (although we weren't convinced the new panes were going to fit for a moment...but they did) and once the putty has set they can be painted in a few weeks' time. The Main Hall fire doors also had checks and attention to make sure they are as freely moving as they should be.

Elsewhere, we had the hallway by the Site Office cleaned, the outdoor toilet block doors cleaned and repainted and the old notice board frames on the end of the Main House removed ready for the wall to be cleaned. Back in the Site Office we gave PAT-rick a whirl and tested all the equipment for the quiz next week so we're ready to go!

More taps were descaled and Legionella Risk Management Training was completed - fire pits and trolleys were moved out on site ready for our upcoming guests and we really are getting ready for action - it's so exciting!

This afternoon we had a visit from Hampshire Scouts and Ferny Crofts, to discuss furture partnership and support and Foxie was made an honourary scout through a necker loan for the afternoon. Ferny Crofts is now also the proud owner of its own Foxie necker-wearing Foxie, who is going on a little photo shoot there next week to start out "travelling Foxie photo wall" for us. We're really grateful for the support and look forward to working with the Hampshire Scouts and Ferny Crofts Team in the coming months.

We've run out of day for more today, so we'll start again tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 85 - When the Bristolian Foxies arrived (or when Foxie did IKEA)

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 21:25:31 GMT

Day 85 - When the Bristolian Foxies arrived (or when Foxie did IKEA)

Lots of excitement on site today at Foxlease Park.

We started with the arrival of electricians and fire panel installations in various places and the former worked steadily through the day; the latter finishing the smaller task, rather more swiftly. Our volunteers today continued an array of tasks, including lots in The Barn - touch up painting with nearly identical paint - we've gone a bit Jackson Pollock in places with shades of primrose but it looks alot brighter - second coat tomorrow. We had a different contingent of floor cleaners scrubbing the Main Hall Floor in The Barn today and it looks more like the true blue it should be by the day, although it is slow going in there. We're hoping the worst of the paint may nearly be gone and so we'll be on to more standard dirt removal methods tomorrow and in advance of the weekend. We also had further curtain activitiy in the Main Hall in The Barn to ensure that hems are level and looking sharp - unfortunately the Singing Washing Machine set us back a little bit as the material didn't quite hold up as we'd hoped in the cool wash and so they needed some adjustment.

Outside of The Barn we had a host of exciting arrivals, including newly covered window seat cushions made for the Foxlease House bar area (known to many of you as Hampshire), which travelled all the way from Birmingham, and 50 Bristolian Foxie toys transported to us by Volunteer Catherine who kindly purchased and donated them to us, ready for them to be re-dressed in Foxie neckers and sold in the onsite and online Foxie's Shop (listed online now for those who asked). They look like they are happy to be in their new temporary home (and safe from the clutched of Catherine's dog who was keen to meet them) and Catherine then kindly gave us the day of her time cleaning the floor in The Barn before her long journey home again.

We also had great work happening to reinvigorate the border between the outside toilet block and The Barn and our volunteers working in that area worked hard to remove the overgrowth and brambles, including cleaning back the edging to discover the tarmac that hasn't been seen for some time - eight wheelbarrow loads and one large back of brambles cleared - amazing work. Our volunteers who have been working to clear to the rear of Foxlease House over the last few weeks also returned and were determined to make their clearance efforts meet in the middle, which they achieved by the end of the day and that is starting to look fab again, ready for our events on the rear lawn later in the year.

Foxie rounded off the day with a trip to Totton Glass to collect the panels for the front doors of The Barn needing repair, which should hopefully be fitted tomorrow, and also then a trip to IKEA to collect some essentials which just weren't cost effective via Amazon, like cutlery trays, mirror tiles for some of the bathrooms, new plastic plates for one of the buildings and the first set of frying pans.

More electrical works, and system flushing tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 84 - When Foxie spent the day in The Barn (or when barriers were removed)

Tue, 11 Feb 2025 21:52:41 GMT

Day 84 - When Foxie spent the day in The Barn (or when barriers were removed)

It will come as no shock at all, given the last few days' focus, to hear that the majority of time today for a large group of our volunteers was spent in The Barn. To the general dismay of all involved the day was largely spent scrubbing the floor in the Main Hall to remove the years of paint splatters and dirt caked on there. Thankfully the edges of the room were worse than the rest (presumably due to their proximity to the walls and therefore the paint) and so as the edges have now been done, we hope that the Main Hall floor is nearly there. We'll be asking everyone who arrives to the quiz next week to admire how blue and non-paint-y the floor looks....Elsewhere in The Barn, more floors were stripped back with the products provided from Mt. Cleaning, ready to be sealed later in the week, by which time we hope they might have dried - it was taking an age for them to dry this afternoon. Our curtain installing team were back for another day of getting The Barn dressed and ready for its debut at the weekend.

The wandering barriers around the site were returned to their home in the Coach House Courtyard. The covering over the fencing round the former Swimming Pool was reinstated and some brambles removed and old electric fencing and netting which had become damaged and/or surplus to requirements was removed and rounded up from a number of areas on site and things are looking both safer and tidier as a result - some of the netting had degraded to the point that there was a little trail of green to follow and collect up.

We also spent some time, as we were in that part of the site removing fencing clearing the enormous brambles which had taken over one of the tented village platforms so that this can be assessed for necessary repairs and then cleaned along with the rest of the platforms. There were so many thorns that we thought Foxlease Park may have been graced with its own fairytale and we might find a Sleeping Foxie underneath them all! We didn't, but we definitely acquired a newfound respect for that fairytale character who hacked their way through the magical thorny forest - we think we might have given up if it was us! But success was achieved and the platform was cleared and the tangled up netting caught in them was removed. There's more work to do on that area in digging out some of the bramble roots to stop their return but it's a good start in clearing that end of the site to make it useable and much nicer to look at.

We also managed our routine, and very noisy, fire alarm tests across the site.

Work tomorrow depends on the weather but hopefully no monsters to do battle with, Love Foxie x

Day 83 - When all attention was on Barn Drive (or when Foxie met the mud monster).

Mon, 10 Feb 2025 20:49:20 GMT

Day 83 - When all attention was on Barn Drive (or when Foxie met the mud monster).

Our volunteers today braved the chilly weather to tackle the borders in front of the Barn and some serious levelling in front of The Barn on Barn Drive. Volunteers Sue and Hilary made fantastic progress on cutting back and clearing the border and laying some compost to feed the plants there and to give them the best chance of thriving.

Paul and Volunteer Ian made fantastic progress in investigating the drainage issues at the bottom of Barn Drive (water, water everywhere) and expert use of the tractor to move some of the shingle and scalpings to fill holes and displace the water included a brief spot of modern art on the Basketball Court by Paul who produced a shingle wave which The Tate Modern would be proud to exhibit! The drainage investigations and resolutions included significant mud clearance, which led Foxie to meet what we can only describe as a mud monster living beneath Barn Drive, or a Foxie on a scuba/mud adventurer, as one of the other puddles started producing bubbles of its own...the mud monster didn't surface, save for the communicative bubbles (see video), but in any case as it's at Foxlease Park we know the mud monster will be the helpful kind and we'll see if we can persuade it to move on or at least allow Barn Drive to stay puddle free following the work today.

Action in The Barn itself too, with ladder assistance from Ian, our expert drapers, Volunteers Jean and Jan (Jan must have moved up from Apprentice by now Jean?) hung the curtains in the Main Hall and they'll be returning for some further adjustment but the curtains moving back in has started to give us the exciting feeling that a building is nearly there and this is no exception! We'll be ready for our first day visitors this weekend, with the small number of replacement panes needed for the front doors of The Barn being collected on Wednesday, ready for fitting later this week.

We had Volunteer Plumber Pete back to fix a small leak in The Lodge for us - some of the plumbing is protesting across the site from lack of use for a while - and as that turned out to be a quick fix, he moved on quickly to reinstating pipework in the huts on Oaks and North Meadows.

We also had some activity at the front of Foxlease House, removing all the old adhesive and staining from the main signage with some Brillo Pad (other scourers are available) action and the application of some of the new letters from the Amazon Mountain Range (Mt. Fix It, specifically). They aren't exactly the same as the existing letters as that was tricky to achieve but the sign is on its way to looking guest-ready until we're in a place to afford replacements. More to do with touching up some of the letters, but it's nice to see the new name in place.

More Barn Drive and Barn action tomorrow (T-minus 4 days - eek!), Love Foxie x

Day 82 - Stocking the Foxie's Shop.

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 20:03:21 GMT

Day 82 - Stocking the Foxie's Shop.

We're in the final countdown to our initial reopening now and so we're all about the details. With the opening being on a phased basis, we won't have the final form Foxlease Park experience up and running until later in the year BUT we do want our early visitors to have the best experience that we can give them and so we're getting our temporary shop ready for action.

There's more landscaping, paint removal from places it shouldn't be (mostly the floor in The Barn) and cleaning, so much cleaning but we've also got a new set of badges which should be reaching us soon and which will then be available on site to purchase during shop hours. We've got something for the s'mores eaters amongst you (and we've got a s'mores and campfire counting chart coming soon too to help us keep track of our goals for the year); something for those who want to commemorate their volunteering with us; and something for those who come and stay at Foxlease Park. The uploaded pictures are the drafts which the badge designers have been working hard on and so they might change a bit but we'll be able to do a full reveal when they arrive to us in the post soon!

As we don't have any photos of the sorting the draft pictures will have to do for today - and they're more exciting than pictures of the paperwork which was most of Sunday's activity!

Getting ready to start working through our final lists tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 81 - When Foxie made lists (or when fences were repaired)

Sat, 08 Feb 2025 19:08:52 GMT

Day 81 - When Foxie made lists (or when fences were repaired)

Lots of planning going on on site today with the team preparing for the upcoming quiz, workshops and barn dance events happening on site in the first few weeks after we open - lots of counting, room allocation, shopping lists and the like in progress. We also had some of the team taking steps on site to prepare for our self-led activities offering which will be available to book soon.

We also had preparations going on in the office to sort some of the stock which will be available soon in the Foxie's Shop - we won't have a permanent shop open on site for a while but, once the site has reopened, there will be a temporary Foxie's Shop open on site on Wednesday's from 11am until 2pm each week and we will also, in time, be able to arrange for collection of online Foxie's Shop orders during the same time. It's a very exciting time!

Outside on site, we had great work going on despite the slightly miserable weather to repair the fencing by The Gatehouse - it's a temporary repair for now, but it looks so much better, and we're very grateful to Volunteer Kester for his hard work on that for us today.

More planning for next week tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 80 - When we were too busy to take any good photos (or site management day).

Fri, 07 Feb 2025 22:39:29 GMT

Day 80 - When we were too busy to take any good photos (or site management day).

It was a twelve-hour day on site today for some of the team as we approach T-8 days until our first booking and still lots to do.

The downstairs kitchen cooker in The Lodge had its necessary repairs and sign off and so it's ready for our first residential booking in there in a couple of weeks' time. The bathrooms were also one of the final elements on the list in that building needing attention so they don't let the side down when our new guests arrive. Our contractors did some significant works to the flooring yesterday for us and the team continued their work to finish off the job, sealing in various places, and applying finishing trim to smarten it up and to ensure it's as watertight as is needed. A day's work and an emergency B and Q run for more finishing tape courtesy of Viv and The Lodge is looking smarter. Just a final further clean to go following the completed works next week and we should be there!

We want the outside of The Lodge to look as smart as the inside and so, in addition to the replacement paving slabs laid this week, Paul and Volunteer Andy, have been installing some fencing behind The Lodge to demarcate the garden area and that's looking very smart too (we'll take some finished photos of all of the above on Monday).

Elsewhere, in between visits from prospective partners and the return of one of our surveyors to find a couple of rooms which he forgot to check on his last visit, we had a small team working exceptionally hard in The Barn. Strictly speaking, Volunteer Carol, worked some of the day in both buildings, with a further intensive descale of some of the taps and further deep cleaning of The Barn, including the lights throughout.

There was a considerable effort from Zoe, Alison and Hazel to finish off some in-progress painting and to remove the old flecks of paint from the floor in the Main Hall of The Barn. They also did a further deep clean of the kitchen and then Volunteer Gordon arrived to finish off the tiling in the back lobby which is looking much smarter too - The Barn is catching up fast and with some further intensive work net week we're expecting to be quiz and booking-ready in there soon.

Paul also spent some of the day moving the bags of foliage and sand around the site back together and out of the way so that things look a bit more guest-ready and a bit less like a building site!

More focus on The Barn again tomorrow with only a week to go, Love Foxie x

Day 79 - When Foxie reached high places (and laid low ones too!)

Thu, 06 Feb 2025 21:37:33 GMT

Day 79 - When Foxie reached high places (and laid low ones too!)

Less volunteers on site today but the ones we had did so much for us - we have a bit of a dual focus across The Lodge and The Barn as both are due to open at the same time in a couple of weeks, with the first overnight shortly after and we have lots still to do!

We had a number of volunteers picking up where our last volunteers left off with painting in The Barn - the scaffold tower was assembled and Foxie and the volunteers reached the dizzy heights of the top of the walls in the back rooms and hallway and they are looking lovely and fresh and ready for guests now. Our other painters in The Barn continued at the much lower skirting board level, freshening up the white in there and the lower parts of the room look great now too.

We had Volunteers Peter, Ian and Paul working hard to lay some scalpings for us in front of The Barn to level out the pathway there and to make it less muddy following the recent wet weather, and Ian and Paul continued on with Ian's project this week of replacing the broken tiles around The Lodge and the exterior of The Lodge looks fantastic now (people walking round The Lodge this afternoon were on pain of death to avoid stepping on them until they set to make sure they stay level - which resulted in at least one impromptu half-hopscotch to avoid them!)

We had contractor Ryan from Compass Projects who came on very short notice to help us repair some of the flooring in the showers in The Lodge with some very strong glue and it's looking sharp in there and ready for a final clean. We also had our Legionella Risk Assessments going on across the residential buildings on site, again on a tight timeline, courtesy of David from Normans, who is helping us with the heating and plumbing systems across the site.

We had volunteers checking that all the kitchen goodies from Foxie's Wishlist made it in to The Lodge kitchen ready for our guest arrivals and it's so very nearly there in there. We've got some small door fittings to fix, the cooker repair downstairs tomorrow, a further limescale removal to do and some final cleaning, one door sticker and then we're done and ready for action! Not long to go and The Barn is catching up fast!

We've also managed to finalise plans for our Easter Open Air Theatre Event and an upcoming Foxie's Fundraising Coffee Morning on site in March and details of both will be available to sign up to via the website very soon - we can't wait to welcome the world back to site. The deer have been preparing for action too, with one stopping by the main site reception this morning (see video) and a whole group hosting their own campfire chat this afternoon (see photo) - we suspect they may be plotting their escape for when all the children arrive back on site!

The focus is all on The Barn tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 78 - When Foxie's Team was everywhere at once (or corporate day #2)

Wed, 05 Feb 2025 22:16:48 GMT

Day 78 - When Foxie's Team was everywhere at once (or corporate day #2)

There isn't really such a thing as a quiet day at Foxlease Park, at least not in this busy intitial period, and today was absolutely no exception! (although the deer photographed, clearly wasn't finding it remotely hectic from its position outside The Barn this morning).

We started strong with our volunteers arriving, closely followed by our second corporate group from Aviva who kindly gave us their time to help us out with some painting and to have a little tour around some of the best bits of the site before they left us. We were just getting our first volunteers situated and in action, in almost every corner of the site, when another group arrived in the form of some of our local Men's Shed volunteers. They were closely followed by the scrap metal man who removed the first of the defunct cookers for us as it sadly couldn't be used elsewhere, so that there is space to fit the new ones, and the nice delivery man from Elliotts with a sand and cement delivery and he was delighted to see the barrier working fine this time (unlike during this last visit to us). We also had a large number of calls and some partnership meetings and it felt like a very busy one for all involved!

As to progress made, lots of good things to log. Our wonderful volunteers visiting from Wales leave us tomorrow, having done significant painting, cleaning and preparation in The Barn for us and today they finished off the small dorm room and day room at the back of The Barn and tackled the lobby too - fantastic progress, with only a little to go and we'll share pictures soon. In the Main Hall of The Barn we had a second group of painters who worked their way around the room glossing the skirting boards (necessary due to the marks left by the old heating system) and also finishing off the walls in there (again, photos soon). We also had Volunteer Gordon completing step one of laying the replacement tiles in the rear lobby and replacing the missing threshhold - he also finished reinstalling the kitchen hatch for us and then moved on to planing down some windows in the Main House to make sure they closed.

Up at The Lodge (and it is an up as everyone who has ever tried to pull a cart or transport any thing up there by hand will attest to) we had Volunteer Ian digging out the broken paving slabs around the building ready to lay the new ones - he was also in charge of directing the Elliotts man where to unload to make life easier for that next step tomorrow. At The Coach House we had our Aviva Team prepping and painting the upstairs hallway and it looks nice and fresh up there now - more action in there soon.

We had a group working hard in the garden areas at the back of Foxlease House to continue previous clearance and tidying work there - Foxie made a friend in a little ladybird who stopped by to visit them and they made fantastic visible progress in making the rear aspect look lovely again. Their position also helped identify a continuously flushing toilet upstairs in Foxlease House which has obviously been flushing for a while but could only be heard by the water moving down the pipe - the water sound was reported into Site Office, we investigated and took remedial action to stop the continual flush. Our water bill thanks them for their outside detective work in the face of what sounded like someone having a very long mid-morning shower!

Our curtain experts were back, removing more curtains in Foxlease House ready for washing and prepping the curtains for The Barn so that they are ready to be hung next week when the paint in the Main Hall has dried. They went on their own curtain/housekeeping-related scavenger hunt (we love an impromptu scavenger hunt at Foxlease Park) and were succcessful in acquiring the various things they were looking for - a double duvet for some marketing photos and more curtains!

Our paperwork hunt continued in the office too as we've got some very specific things it would be useful to know and the paper box of treasures included the lovely excerpt photographed of where the name "Foxlease" derives from.

It felt like an awful lot more happened then we've listed but it might just be that lots of it happened all at once!

Painting, paving and perhaps more scavenger hunts tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 77 - It was a dark and starry night over Foxlease Park (or survey results day)

Tue, 04 Feb 2025 23:09:59 GMT

Day 77 - It was a dark and starry night over Foxlease Park (or survey results day)

It's a dark and starry night over Foxlease Park this evening - apologies for the terrible quality phone photos but the stars are truly spectacular as always and a reason in themselves to winter camp at the site! (P.s. if we have any experts in astronomy or astrophotography, we'd love to hear from you!)

We've a lack of new photos today as we've simply been too busy with jobs and contractors and then an evening Trustee Meeting, so please enjoy an unrelated photo of Foxie's Friend, Robin, who frequents the wall of the Sundial Garden and is friends with our skip rummaging squirrels, Sasha and Sam. It wasn't taken today but earlier this week.

We had one group of volunteers on paint duty in The Barn and the back rooms are nearly finished now, along with some of the doors and the hatch in The Barn being refitted. We also had hard work happening in The Lodge, stripping back the floors before they are resealed and also with touching up the blue paint on some of the doors in there as one of the finishing off jobs.

Also on site today we had volunteers with the New Forest National Park service who were mapping Rhododendron for us in advance of a further project to help us cut some of it back to stop it from taking over and stilfling its neighbour plants on site - we're really excited about our future volunteering partnership with that team.

Contractor-wise, we had final works in The Barn to the showers and vent cleaning in the kitchens in The Lodge and The Barn ready for their future guests. We also had some of our various survey assessments back from our asbestos surveys across the site and we're delighted to share that we're asbestos-free in our residential accommodation buildings (which are the commissioning reports we've had back so far) which is another tick off the compliance jobs list. We're expecting to hear back with reports from our External Fire Risk Assessor soon following his visit earlier in the week but we're expecting all good things based on our post-inspection chat.

Lots more visitors expected on site tomorrow for more commissioning sign offs, Love Foxie x

(P.p.s. please forgive any typos at a higher than usual quantity; Emma took her lenses out before realising her glasses are in the Site Office...not ideal for typing.)

Day 76 - Delivery Day (or when the barrier was pretending to be a yo-yo)

Mon, 03 Feb 2025 22:34:10 GMT

Day 76 - Delivery Day (or when the barrier was pretending to be a yo-yo)

The barrier was doing its best imitation of a yo-yo today - it was up and down with so many different visitors! We had our fire risk assessor doing inspections, our volunteer plumber stopping by, arrivals from far-flung volunteers coming to spend some time with us, some third party potential partners coming to help us out with some exciting things around the site and some fantastic surprise delivery arrivals. What we thought were some small radiator parts we ordered, actually turned out to be the arrival of some of our new tentage ordered in the winter sales. We weren't expecting them to arrive just yet and so we were momentarily confused when the nice delivery man explained he had 12 large boxes for us, not one tiny one.

In other delivery news, it looks like Foxie's Fairy Godparents' generosity may finally have defeated the local Amazon Delivery Man, who this morning, instead of unloading parcels at Paul's, presented him with his vey own Amazon Logistics Bag of delivery parcels - we'll be working through opening them tomorrow to grow the Amazon Mountain Range and the adjacent Mt. Cardboard further!

Our volunteers today were sugar-soaping walls in The Barn - finishing off the clearance of the basketball court and more magic erasing of stains. The drawing pins have been removed from the notice boards in The Barn ready for brown paper/re-covering. Our wonderful volunteer plumber tackled some shower drips for us and also turned his hand to realigning the kitchen cupboard doors in The Barn and fixing up one of the loose panels in the Prep Room in The Lodge.

Paul and Volunteers Andy and Ian have been tackling fencing and the replacement of paving stones around the external areas up at The Lodge (photos soon when work is complete).

More yo-yo-ing tomorrow, with lots of commissioning works contractors expected, Love Foxie x

Day 75 - Step this way...(or another visit from the Paint Fairy!)

Sun, 02 Feb 2025 22:10:18 GMT

Day 75 - Step this way...(or another visit from the Paint Fairy!)

Day 75! Three quarters of the way through our first 100 days blog already and where did that time go???

We're now just under two weeks away from our first on site booking and just under three weeks until our first over night stays in The Lodge and The Barn, the first of the buildings on site to open and we are working hard to get through the to-do list to make sure things start strong at the standard which we want them to. As of this week, Foxlease Park is officially on the Girlguiding Adventure Map following the inspections at The Lodge and we're lining up The Barn to follow the same path over the next week or so.

We had flooring contractors in today from Compass Projects, who did us a HUGE favour by getting the guys to come out on a Sunday to fit us in in time for our planned opening - the showers in The Lodge have never looked so nicely finished! They'll be back for the final bits later this week. We've also got some very small bits in there to finish off now that the Amazon Mountain Range has stocked up with Mt. DIY in the last few weeks - the door escutcheons and finger plates really are the final touches in The Lodge ready to go, along with a few token foxes, of course, and the clocks that have een purchased.

Our volunteer team this morning picked up where yesterday's team left off and successfully rediscovered the missing second set of steps from the car park, which prior to the team starting work, were mostly identifiable only by the handrail. As it turns out the steps are actually pretty wide and were just hiding really well in the overgrown grass and so they are now much safer to use again and a great way to avoid some of the mud on the way out of the car park. They finished so quickly too that they were done with the steps and adjacent edge tidying by lunchtime and then moved on to restocking The Lodge Kitchens for us from Mt. Kitchenware (currently residing in the Delivery Store, next to Mt. Cardboard and also to helping us to prep The Barn for further painting tomorrow by removing some errant cobwebs. They also set to work with some magic sponges from the Laundry Store which really do do wonders for removing all sorts of marks from the walls and avoiding the need to repaint in some places.

We had a critical assessment of the progress in The Barn to plan the coming week in order to ensure that we get everything done to the current timeline and then we had another unexpected visit from The Paint Fairy (known in her daily life as Janine) who has very kindly given us a further stock of paint from her Wickes Store's community donations - more lovely indoor paint which we'll be using straight away in The Barn and also some exciting colours of outdoor paint too which we'll be thinking of some plans for when we get past our immediate critical path.

We also took a quick walk up the drive to video The Snowdrop Road which is coming in nicely this year and the video is available to see on Foxie's YouTube Page now - it really does look very special at the moment.

Looking forward to the coming week's progress, Love Foxie x

Day 74 - Little by Little; Step by Step (or when Foxie tackled flood prevention and trip switches)

Sat, 01 Feb 2025 22:03:01 GMT

Day 74 - Little by Little; Step by Step (or when Foxie tackled flood prevention and trip switches)

Our group of volunteers on site today braved the damp and chilly weather to help us make the arrival from the car park look much more welcoming by rediscovering the steps for us and cutting back the edges all round them and along the side of Foxlease House. They also tackled cleaning the telephone box for us, inside and out, to start the process of bringing it back to its formerly smart glory. Judging by the size and scale of the cobwebs inside it before they started work, during the period whilst the site was closed, no one has been taking or making calls in there except some very busy spiders.

We spent some time sorting further inherited paperwork to help us get to grips with some bits of the site where we think action is needed and some schematics would help and thanks to Volunteer Wendy we found some of what we were looking for! We also found some lovely plans to add to our collection and we'll be thinking of the ways we can use them in the future.

Emma and Wendy spent some time dominating the on-site radio waves as they tried to identify which trip switch on our 14 or more distribution boards was the right one to turn off the misbehaving light up in the North Wing of the House (although they only knew about 5 of them when they started) and thankfully, it was a much speedier job than they thought and they hit the jackpot after two and a half boards worth of switches! Riding high on the waves of their success, they used the extra time to go and install a second flood barrier at the back door of The Barn. There are plans for it to be replaced soon which will resolve the issue entirely but in the meantime flood prevention is key to avoid having to clean the back hall and kitchen again.

Activity tomorrow depends upon the weather but we're expecting the driveway to be in its snowdrop road phase as it was nearly there today; we'll let you know, Love Foxie x

Day 73 - When the volunteers cleaned too hard for Foxie (or when The Barn got more coats of paint)

Fri, 31 Jan 2025 23:16:09 GMT

Day 73 - When the volunteers cleaned too hard for Foxie (or when The Barn got more coats of paint)

We had three different volunteer groups on site today and the site phone did not stop ringing all day with bookings enquiries, some big and some small, but every one another one on our list! We're now up to about 140 bookings for the year, which is fantastic given the time that we've been open to receive them and they still seem to be steadily coming in - we've had some enquiries for Team Building Days too, which is great, as it's another string on the Foxlease Park bow which we're really keen to promote for midweek bookings.

In terms of volunteer activity, we had the wonderful Harris family volunteering a group today, having travelled over from the Isle of Wight to be with us for the day and they made spectacular work, accompanied by Foxie of course (see photos) finishing preparations of the small bunk room and the day room in The Barn for painting and then painting everything a bright magnolia colour (paint courtesy of our paint fairy's previous donations to us). Whilst I'm disappointed the walls aren't fox-coloured, as almost every volunteer using it to paint so far has commented, it's a very consistent colour and it stays clean longer than white so the smaller rooms in The Barn are very much having the magnolia experience and are looking much brighter for it already.

Our second group in The Barn were also on paint patrol today and they were on round two and coats, 6, 7, 8 and 9 (in some places) of the stain blocker paint on the old water marks on the ceiling in the lobby and side hall (courtesy of the previously leaky, and now replaced, pipework) and the ceiling now looks mostly white again in the side hall and fully white again in the main lobby! It's no easy task painting upwards, even with the paint fairy's extendable paint rollers, so we're very grateful to them for doing that tricky area for us. The Barn might be behind The Lodge on its makeover but it's certainly catching up fast with the progress our volunteers are making!

Our third group were set to task cleaning and moving for us some of the older furniture that we plan to eventually use in our reception and as a shop cabinet and that is now spick and span and ready to stock soon in advance of our first visitors to site. Having done some careful removals down the Main Stairs, our third team moved onto cleaning some very special rooms for us in Foxlease House to ensure that they are not suffering too much from being empty and it took them some considerable time to clean the room and bathroom, known to many of you by the balcony out the back of the House which it opens onto. All was going well, and then came the point that our volunteers in Foxlease House got too keen and enthused in their task for me to handle when they accidentally (we are assured) sucked me mostly up the tube of one of the hoover regiment in action (see photos) - so much so that the day could have been called "When Henry nearly ate Foxie" but Emma thought that might be too shocking of a headline for an unprepared late night or early morning blog reader! We're pleased to report that the volunteers noticed quickly and I was removed safely in the nick of time, avoiding the ultimate peril of the hoover bag! They got back on track soon after and careful deep cleaning resumed - everyone, volunteers and Foxie's alike, returned to base in the Site Office at the end of the day.

More painting expected tomorrow (and a rest in the Site Office for me, just to be safe!) Love Foxie x

Day 72 - When Foxie met our youngest volunteer yet, donations arrived and the flooring in The Gatehouse was done (or when the first snowdrops flowered)

Thu, 30 Jan 2025 22:37:50 GMT

Day 72 - When Foxie met our youngest volunteer yet, donations arrived and the flooring in The Gatehouse was done (or when the first snowdrops flowered)

Such a busy day on site today - we had visitors coming to look at some of our campsites as prospective bookers for D of E group stays and we hope they'll be back for a booking later in the year. We then had a series of wonderful, planned visits to site to deliver us lots of wonderful things to fundraise with, to use on site and also a bag of fabulous treats to fuel our volunteers - some of our donors had travelled far to make their deliveries and we are very grateful for their kind donations and support. We've arranged a number of partnership meetings and discussions and we're excited to progress those over the coming weeks.

In terms of our volunteers on site today, we had limited numbers doing very important things for us. We had stain blocking paint applied (coat one of more) to some of the marks in The Barn from previous water damage to make it all look nice and bright again, coat two to follow tomorrow. We had lots of part finished jobs completed, with new kick plates and finger plates installed on a couple of doors in The Lodge and the kitchen cupboards adjusted. In The Barn, we had the excess foam from yesterday's hole filling removed, ready for the next step in the coming days. We had the last of the proud screws in the bunkbed frames sealed off and sanded back to finish off those jobs and make the surfaces smooth and we are awaiting a number of things from the wishlist which Foxie's Fairy Godparents have kindly purchased, to enable us to finish the restock of the building.

Our fantastic volunteers also installed pillows and protectors (from Mt. Bedlinen and Mt. Pillow of the Amazon Mountain Range) on all the beds in The Lodge, ready for its first guests arriving soon and they look comfy cosy already! The Singing Machine, which had had a rest for a week or so got a few turns too, to freshen up some of the older things on site ready for reuse. Our Volunteer Sandy also has great plans to repurpose some of the older pillows on site which would otherwise be being disposed of due to their lack of appropraite fluffiness (amongst other criteria which they don't meet).

We also had our youngest volunteer so far on site today, accompanying his mum who is helping us work through some of our activities equipment, prepare our safety logs and checks and set us up for our further discussions with our insurers about our led activity offering for the year, in conjunction with some of the team. We're making great progress and we hope to be able to confirm our offering very soon, along with the self-led activity options which our team and some of our volunteers are working hard on. As you can see from the photos, our youngest volunteer worked very hard checking helmets (heavily supervised, of course) and had a number of adventures rescuing some of the paw-puppet foxies from around the office before putting on his "work shirt" (for which, read "high vis") so that he could explore outside too, testing out some of our forest walks for us (again, under supervision). By the end of the day his career with the team had reached its pinnacle and he was keeping the office in line as our temporary site manager - we didnt let him loose with the emails but he's got "future ropes instructor" written all over him so we'll report back in about 15 years or so on that....

In The Gatehouse, Volunteer Iain, made further spectacular progress on the new flooring, for which we are very grateful, and it now looks showhome-worthy so we hope that our future volunteers will enjoy their time there - our next cohort of visitors arrive in their next week.

To help us with assessing our options for led activities, if you hold an independent accreditation in any of the activities previously offered on site, for example archery, climbing, ropes or watersports, and you might be prepared to assist us with delivery of our activities in the future if we need you to, then we'd love to hear from you to volunteers@foxlease.uk - contacting us doesn't mean that we'll definitely need to call on you as we don't quite know that yet, but it would really help us in our appraisal of our options.

In other admin/web development news, we've also got our Spring Raffle live through the Foxie's Shop website or through in person ticket sales (running until 20th April) and we've now got a new Events Page on the main website so that you can see and book our upcoming events and workshops in one place!

Lastly, the first snowdrops we've spotted on site are flowering nicely and we expect to see more soon!

More action tomorrow, and perhaps more flowers, Love Foxie x

Day 71 - When Foxie finished lots of things and started lots of others (or PATrick's adventure off site!)

Wed, 29 Jan 2025 23:21:05 GMT

Day 71 - When Foxie finished lots of things and started lots of others (or PATrick's adventure off site!)

So many things going on on site today! We started the day early with our fire alarm engineer arriving at 8am to start work on installing the equipment in The Lodge, The Barn and The Coach House to make them remotely monitored alarm systems the same as Foxlease House already is - Foxie supervised, of course!

We had some outside work going on clearing more of the weeds and overgrowth at the back of Foxlease House outside of the Dining Room windows and the before and after areas look much better and under control again, thanks to Volunteer Karen.

We had lots of activity in The Barn, with holes in the floor from the old heating system pipework being filled in with expanding foam, ready for filing down and levelling off once it's set - it looks a bit like Foxie is sitting on a scoop of ice cream but that's definitely not the case! We had more work going on in The Barn alongside that to prepare the day room and small bunk room off of the main hall for painting - scrubbing with sugar scrub, filling holes and taping up ready for sanding and painting action soon and then that little area will be ready to go, along with the main hall itself - halfway there!

The oven in the downstairs kitchen in The Lodge is now sparkling clean, thanks to three days of intensive cleaning and we're so grateful to everyone who has made a donation of some kind to fund our purchase of the new ovens needed in The Barn and upstairs in The Lodge. We're making great progress, with more fundraising to do, and we've been discussing the options with our electrician to make sure that we've got the right one coming soon, ready for a swift fitting and action for our first guests.

Off site PATrick the new PAT Testing equipment, purchased with a very kind donation, was on its second day out as we've had a couple of the Team trained up to learn how to work it to help us get through the hundreds and hundreds of different small electrical items which will need testing in order to make Foxlease Park run as it should when the site is open. PATrick will be safely returning to site tomorrow ready for testing action soon.

Weather permitting, more outside areas tomorrow, alongside some painting in The Barn x

Day 70 - When Lodge Corner was cleared (or when Foxie shook and vac'd in The Barn)

Tue, 28 Jan 2025 22:17:33 GMT

Day 70 - When Lodge Corner was cleared (or when Foxie shook and vac'd in The Barn)

A busy day on site today again as we had TV filming going on for South Today and the politics segment this morning so our volunteers on site had a bit of a chat about what they were doing and why they think the project is important alongside doing their tasks.

We then had one group of volunteers moving the curtains carefully from The Gold Room to avoid any damp and a second marking up door frames and gloss work for painting touch ups in The Lodge and testing taps as they went round the building. They then followed those tasks up with more cleaning of The Lodge oven (phase 2 of 3 - see Foxie looking pleased), for group one, and, in the case of the second group, sanding down the areas to be repainted and repainting of the glosswork where needed to remove any dings and nicks. Group one then moved onto further tasks in The Barn, clearing the wet lobby at the back (#3rd time lucky...or it might be #4th time now, but who's counting!) ready for tiles to be laid and a further clean of the kitchen. They then cleaned the Day Room and small bunk room off of the Main Hall and liberally applied the shake n' vac to improve the state of the carpet...which is now looking, and smelling, beautifully clean thanks to their work.

We had a third group who spent the day in the upstairs kitchen in The Lodge, carefully washing all the kitchen equipment before stowing it away following yesterday's inventory and deep cleaning the last of the cupboards up there - save for the new oven arriving, the upstairs kitchen is looking ready for action and nice and clean again - it just needs the floor resealed to protect it once that arrives from the wishlist courtesy of one of Foxie's Fairy Godparents soon!

Our final group on site today were outside all day despite the occasional weather and they've worked miracles on the area which we've now called Lodge Corner - we don't have may before photos which do the fantastic work Volunteer Sue and Gill today justice as they don't really show the scale of the task - but if you think of the muddiest, sludgey-ish, leafiest piles of mulch causing the torrential rain yesterday to run all kinds of places it shouldn't around the front of the building and path resulting in blocked drains and very large puddles...that would give you a good starting point. As the rain eased off this morning and a couple of gulleys had been reinstated yesterday the giant puddles had mostly disappeared, leaving only the leaves and promise and threat of a puddle-y return behind them. Our Volunteers shoveled, cleared leaves, cut back the muddy edges and shifted away the mud and silt (so enthustiastically at one point that we understand the sign behind them had a minor inadvertent mudbath...) and the end result is a crisp and clean looking area in front of The Lodge which is looking so good it derserves a name of it's own so it has been newly christened as "Lodge Corner" (coming to a signpost near you soon...). We couldn't do it justice with a before and after due to the lack of appropriate photographs, so we took a little video to show you instead.

Tomorrow's focus in on The Barn, Love Foxie x

Day 69 - Water, water everywhere! (or Foxie's deep clean and the big count)

Mon, 27 Jan 2025 20:47:37 GMT

Day 69 - Water, water everywhere! (or Foxie's deep clean and the big count)

It's been a very wet day at Foxlease Park today and there is, quite accurately, water everywhere! Some of it inside where it shouldn't be, which has helped us to identify where perhaps new seals or draft excluders are needed but mostly outside and in most cases it's doing an excellent job of showing us where drains and gulleys which previously existed need to be re-dug and/or cleared so that the mini rivers across the site return to their intended flow. It's certainly been a blustery day for Foxie and the volunteers moving around the site - horizontal rain is no one's friend but the plants! We've had great progress with clearing the soakaway at the back of The Barn to take away all the water doing a reverse Kate Bush and running down that hill! We've also removed all the sharp screw points from the wooden bedframes and sealed in the screwheads sticking out of the bunk beds in the various buildings to be certain there are no possible scratches occuring.

We had volunteers Anna and Dott, who travelled a long way to be with us, professionally deep cleaning the oven downstairs in The Lodge and checking all the signage on the doors in The Lodge is free of paint smudges, sticky bits and looks super smart ready for our guests in a few weeks. Volunteer Corinne spent the morning taking the laminate flooring to task with some industrial degreaser and the upstairs kitchen is looking like a while different, fresher colour again. A general mop and then some protective sealer to go and then rinse and repeat in the other vinyl flooring rooms - we've added some serious cleaner stock to Foxie's Wishlist this evening to prepare us for the task!

In other news, we had some visitors to look around site who are considering booking with us and Foxie, Emma and Hazel have spent the evening checking what other wishes we need to add to the list to ensure the kitchens are fully inventoried and stocked across the site. We've also, this evening launched our first set of craft workshops to take place in March, with limited places, and more to follow soon!

We hope that Hilary's Simply Marquetry and Hard-backed Bookbinding will appeal to some as a way to pass a Tuesday or Thursday morning in March - details of all of our exciting upcoming events are available via Ticketsource: https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/foxies-future

Hoping that we don't get blown away this evening in the strong winds on site, Love Foxie x

Day 68 - When Foxie went off site to make some new friends!

Sun, 26 Jan 2025 17:32:17 GMT

Day 68 - When Foxie went off site to make some new friends!

Low volunteer numbers on site today as some of the team were off site at the New Forest National Park Volunteering Fair in Brockenhurst. Teresa and Deborah who attended for us spoke to so many prospective local partners, potential volunteers and people who stopped by to ask a bit more about Foxlease Park and what our plans are. A great day to be spreading the word in the local communities and we're very grateful to the New Forest National Park Service for extending the application deadline to allow us to attend this year as otherwise we'd have missed it due to the timing of completion of the purchase.

We did have some activity on site today too, with careful inspection of the painting in the Main Hall of The Barn to check that we're there with that and the great news is that we are! This meant that the taped up dust sheets needed to removed in advance of the next stage of work in there and so Foxie (care of Volunteer Philippa) learned that unless your aim is to play parachute games with them, it's nearly impossible to fold up dust sheets whilst the new heating system in The Barn is on as the fans don't cooperate! We understand that she prevailed in the end though and so The Barn is ready for our next phase of works tomorrow now that the contractor's works in there are finished.

The other steps taken today, as well as lots of catch-up paperwork and emails, were to prepare the rear lobby in The Barn for re-tiling and to review our action list for the next steps needed to get The Barn ready for its first bookings.

Hoping for better weather than the forecast tomorrow so that we can keep progressing outside things, Love Foxie x

Day 67 - When time was spent 90% in The Barn (or when long handled brooms were useful).

Sat, 25 Jan 2025 22:40:45 GMT

Day 67 - When time was spent 90% in The Barn (or when long handled brooms were useful).

Today was 90% focussed on The Barn for our volunteers following the completion of the hot water works yesterday.

Our larger group of volunteers worked extremely hard deep cleaning The Barn kitchen and removing so much dust and grime build up that shelves and light fixings we thought were brown actually turned out to be white! The hatch has been under repair offsite thanks to one of our volunteers, to make sure that it opens and closes freely and that all is as it should be - it's being sanded down to better fit the hatch space and we expect its return to site for reinstallation soon!

Meanwhile, the final windows in the Barn needing application of safety film were completed by Volunteer Philippa on her third or fourth weekend of that pane-staking project and it's another tick off the to-do list!

We had volunteers working hard to prep the tiled area out the back by the kitchen in The Barn for the laying of the replacement tiles in there so that the floor is nice and even and smooth again with no damaged tiles.

As The Lodge is nearly complete now, save for a few final tasks and some third party commissioning works, there was only a small amount of time spent in there today (maybe 5%). Some of the new shower curtains were hung in the ensuite rooms - we've gone with a nice grey, mould resistant style - and our magician electrician worked his magic in the building too to replace on emergency light which wasn't working as it should.

The other 5% of time was spent dry brushing the ceiling of the Foxlease House porch to remove the layer of cobwebs and spiders' nests ready for further cleaning soon and scoping out some of the further works neede elsewhere on site so that we can prioritise.

Our magician electrician also helped with preparations for our upcoming quiz event but PAT testing the AV Cupboard equipment for us so that we're ready to rock and roll!

We're looking forward to being at the NFNPA Volunteering Fair tomorrow in Brockenhurst and we got the pile of bits for that ready to go for the morning. We'll have a small amount happening on site and lots of admin catch up!

We ended the day with beautiful evening skies (see photos).

A day of meeting new people tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 66 - When Foxie inspected the hot water supply in The Barn (or the day the drains were cleared)

Fri, 24 Jan 2025 23:11:43 GMT

Day 66 - When Foxie inspected the hot water supply in The Barn (or the day the drains were cleared)

A cause for celebration in The Barn today, as the plumbing wizards from Normans all but finished the installation of the new hot water tanks and system in The Barn and doesn't the new tank insulation look shiny! They've been working hard for us to upgrade and replace everything that wasn't working or wasn't as efficient as we'd like. In our longer-term plans we'll need to look at adding insulation in the roof of The Barn to make sure that we're as energy efficient as we can be but we'll be planning that in. For now, we're enjoying the hot water on demand and the heating system which was installed just prior to the December break. We'll be letting volunteers loose in The Barn again from tomorrow to catch that up with The Lodge in terms of the cleaning and re-decorating tasks in there.

The Lodge is looking good with only minor things to go and some more of those were ticked off today, some replacement sealant, removal of outdated fittings like the hand sanitiser units and some further deep cleaning, including removal of some rather icky drain build up in the showers for which the PPE mountain's products were put to good use! We also relabelled the fire signage and ran another set of emergency lighting checks to ensure everything is as it should be and to make sure that we have a number of people on our volunteer team who know how to check and record the necessary weekly checks.

Elsewhere, we had lots going on in the office with preparation of flyers for upcoming events, advertisements for Foxie's Barn Dance and Raffles, responses to bookings emails, financial reconciliations and risk assessment reviews. Setting things up involves a LOT of paperwork and we're so grateful to everyone behind the scenes helping with that, particularly our Committee Members who have been working exceptionally hard for us to produce what's needed in record time.

We're pleased to report that the named storm passed Foxlease Park by, although it was a bit blustery at times, and in other progress, the previously difficuly to lift old carpet from The Gatehouse was removed to make more space for our volunteers when they come to visit.

Setting to again in The Barn tomorrow - look out for transformations coming your way in there soon! Love Foxie x

Day 65 - Three good things, two parcels and one really bad thing (or the day Foxie started planning more fundraising)

Thu, 23 Jan 2025 22:27:54 GMT

Day 65 - Three good things, two parcels and one really bad thing (or the day Foxie started planning more fundraising)

They say bad things come in threes. We'll start with the one really bad thing today, which is actually a bit more like three things, so hopefully that's our three done for a while. This morning, we had our gas servicing engineer arrive to service the calor gas cookers in The Barn and The Lodge for us ready for commissioning and that was nothing but three bits of bad news really, or perhaps more like two and a half as he shared with us that the downstairs kitchen cooker in The Lodge needs some parts (that's the half bad news) so we've booked that repair in for next week - annoying but resolvable and hopefully not too expensive - unfortunately, the other two really bad news bits of the bad news is that in addition to the cooker in The Coach House (which we knew about), we also now need to replace both the upstairs cooker in The Lodge and also the cooker in The Barn as, although functional, they are non-compliant for use in a commercial setting and so cannot be certified for us. This means that we're now needing to fund two and a half additional cookers compared to what we were expecting since acquisition, in a very short space of time before our first bookings. We can do that, and will, but it will mean using money that was destined for something different and we really do need to fundraise for them as unplanned expenditure is to be avoided at all costs.

But as wallowing gets us nowhere, on to the good news - firstly, our insurance inspection is complete. The inspector loved the site (but, come on, who doesn't love Foxlease Park and its magic??). We'll have to wait for his report and the insurers' response to that but it's good news for us that we've done all we can do and now have to wait and see whether we receive any queries or challenges. Secondly, we've be informed that one of our wonderful supporters who has been doing a sponsored mile-a-day walk in January following a knee operation has raised nearly enough for the new cooker for The Coach House (so the above set back isn't ideal, but that's definitely something to celebrate!) and, thirdly, the bookings are still rolling in and the hot water works in The Barn are nearly complete and the showers in The Lodge have been reinstalled! Woohoo! That might be more than three but you can never have too many good things!

And as to the two parcels, exciting things arrived (as pictured), our new PAT Testing Kit, funded by a donation from a wonderful supporter, has arrived and we shall call it PAT-rick. We'll be putting it to work very soon! The second parcel was our new pull up banner ready for the New Forest Volunteering Fair in Brockenhurst on Sunday.

In terms of on site doing, our unending thanks to our small number of volunteers doing important finishing tasks in The Lodge today and insurance preparations ahead of this afternoon's meeting and site tour. They lifted, shifted and fixed things despite the rain this afternoon and we wouldn't have been ready without them. We don't have any photos from today's work as we were a bit too busy but we did enjoy the stars coming out this evening - if you look closely in the photo, it looks a bit like Orion's celebrating over The Coach House - our dark skies on site really are something rather special to enjoy and we can't wait to have our winter campers back on site for some stargazing.

More finishing works in The Lodge tomorrow and sourcing appropriate new cookers to purchase, Love Foxie x

Day 64 - When the team worked until there were starry skies (or when Foxies were dressed)

Wed, 22 Jan 2025 22:23:16 GMT

Day 64 - When the team worked until there were starry skies (or when Foxies were dressed)

The first snowdrops are coming and lots of other bulbs are preparing to flower and we've officially now been here long enough to have to weed things which we planted (but only just!).

We had a deliberately low numbers day on site today as we are deep in final preparations for our insurance visit tomorrow (attempt #2 for the meeting to go ahead, let's hope illness stays away this time!) and preparing for lots of commissioning works to The Lodge and The Barn over the next ten days or so - exciting times ahead but lots of hard work and paperwork to get there.

The volunteers we did have worked so hard for us today - we had our Master Draper and Assistant Draper back on site (Volunteers Jean and Jan) this time finishing off The Lodge and appraising where we're at with The Barn ready for hanging in the Main Hall next week - the curtains look amazing! Clean, fresh and expertly hung to John Lewis' standards!

Volunteers Mary and Christine have spent some of the last few days, in addition to inventories for us, making neckers for our donated sft fox toys. There's a larger number still to reach us from near Bristol soon (50 or so) but the Foxie army on site is looking very dapper and ready for action in their handmade fox patterned neckers with an "I support" badge and each one tied in a friendship knot by our onsite expert, Alison (also an expert in printers, activities, bookings and much more) who honed her skills in her days wearing a Foxlease necker as a house assistant under the site's previous ownership. They are going to look great in our on site mini-shop when we're back open. They've got a large number more still to make but the ones they've completed look great.

In terms of practical jobs, no photos as they were too busy, but we had Volunteer Pete Pete (as opposed to Plumber Pete) working with Volunteer Rosie to finishing making the decking safe after the removal yesterday and removing the nails and screws so that we can reuse some of the wood on site for fencing repairs. They then moved on to repairing the special balcony at the back of Foxlease House (one of the bits of wood needed reinstating and fixing in place) and repairing some of the windows along that corridor which wouldn't close fully and so were contributing to our ongoing damp/moisture problem, with success! They also removed large quantities of dead flies residing on the window ledges in those rooms so that is all a bit more pleasant. As if that wasn't enough, they then fenced off the decking for us ahead of tomorrow's visit and also cleared the remaining wood in the former Operations Office in the House so that that is now all cleared for use following removal of the partition.

We've ended the day with more fire alarm testing (an unfortunately loud activity, but at least we know they all work!) and with a critical assessment of The Lodge's current status following yesterday's interrupted works to see what we have left to go which has resulted in lots more wishes being added to Foxie's list.

We had the office busy all day too responding to bookings, partnership enquiries and generally preparing paperwork. The prize for the most patient person in the office today was definitely won by Alison who reconfigured no less then 4 computers to make the printer work, multiple times each...(Hazel and Emma were ready to throw laptops and printers out of the window...Deborah less so...but Alison's IT expertise was very welcome!).

Wish us luck and dry weather for tomorrow to help us stay on track, Love Foxie x

Day 63 - Foxie's First Power Cut! (or when everyone moved outside)

Tue, 21 Jan 2025 21:50:51 GMT

Day 63 - Foxie's First Power Cut! (or when everyone moved outside)

Another first for us today at Foxlease Park with Foxie's First Power Cut! The day started well with the team on site based up at The Lodge and working hard to finish any remaining snagging on the ground floor and to complete finishing works on the first floor and good progress was made. We had sewing machines at work downstairs in the Main Hall, cutting and preparing patterns for our donated foxie toys to wear when they are added to the Foxie's Shop. We had deep cleaning of the cupboards in the upstairs kitchen, silicone sealant being applied in all kitchen rooms, window catches were fixed, holes were filled and skirting boards were scrubbed clean; radiators were dismantled and cleaned (before and afters coming tomorrow). We also had a great number of lists being made to make sure we know what needs to be stocked into The Lodge from elsewhere. Volunteer Plumber Pete was back hard at work completing repairs to the leak in one of the downstairs toilet (day 2...). We had Volunteers Mary and Gwen moving kitchen items identified as needed yesterday up to The Lodge.

We also had the contracted plumbers back on site working on the hot water fittings in The Barn. All was going well and most of the team stopped for a lunch break when Volunteer Pete (today known as Pete Pete, rather than Plumber Pete, due to the number on site) came down to check whether we had power in Foxlease House...yes, we said...ah, he said...and then explained that The Lodge was without. We initially assumed something had tripped it, found the right keys, got up to The Lodge and checked it out and all was in the right place but...no power....we checked the other buildings...all fine...we dialed our magician electrician remotely to ask if there was something we were missing and he gave us some suggestions to check...all was fine. We concluded we were out of things to check and then Deborah in the office announced that she had had some success as Emery Down had reported an unexpected power outage....which was only affecting The Lodge! All of which happened in the space of 20 minutes or so.

With no immediate crisis and nothing to be done to change things until things came back online our volunteers pivoted in their tasks for the day and the majority relocated outside, with Foxie necker production moving to the Site Office where we had both lighting and power. Plumber Pete managed to finish day 2 of fixing the troublesome toilet regardless of the power failure (which lasted several hours). Meanwhile, we had volunteers clearing more of the weeds and overgrowth from the Rose Garden, the Sundial Garden and also what we think (due to the abundance of sage) may once have been the herb garden at the back of Foxlease House and all of those areas look so much more loved due to their few hours of unexpected attention this afternoon and they did a wonderful job. The also re-discovered the beautifully messaged stone bird bath and we think the inscription is lovely: "Bird song at morning, star shine at night".

Day 2 of the pergola/wooden structure levelling also proceeded and Volunteers Pete and Gordon had great success (see photo) with the added benefit that it also gives us some wood to reuse on some fencing repairs elsewhere on site - we just have a pile of it to clear over the next couple of days.

Once power was back, Volunteers Steph and Karen ventured back up to The Lodge to finish painting (in Steph's case - she was also responsible for repainting the white post in the Sundial Garden, which looks great) and deep cleaning the Main Hall radiators (in Karen's case). More to do in The Lodge tomorrow than expected due to the unexpected lost time today but at least we know our emergency lighting in The Lodge works in a real life scenario and not just when we're testing it!

Cleaning up the big piles of wooden things on site tomorrow and getting things tidy again, Love Foxie x

Day 62 - When Foxie put things up and when Foxie took them down.

Mon, 20 Jan 2025 23:05:40 GMT

Day 62 - When Foxie put things up and when Foxie took them down.

The volunteers on site today more than made up for our office day yesterday with what they achieved and some of it was really exciting visible progress.

Paul and volunteers Ian and Pete repaired and refitted the porch roof to the rear (or side...depending on which way you're looking at the building...) of The Lodge. They used our newly acquired scaffold tower (as yet unnamed but maybe "Scaffold Pike Mountain"....we'll work on it...) and removed and reshaped and replaced the buckled lead, they relaid and reinstalled the roofing panels and used lots of wonderful things from Foxie's Fairy Godparents generous donations from the Amazon Wishlist to properly seal and refix the job with the end result being a shelter fit to sit out undercover on a rainy day to stop and smell the rain in the great outdoors (or petrichor for those of you who love a fancy word or two!).

We had our Volunteer Plumber Pete (not the same Pete, but a different one) who worked really hard all day for us repairing a few bits in the shower and one of the leaking toilets in The Lodge so that they are in ful working order and we're so grateful to him because it was such a big job that he's coming back again tomorrow to finish it off - he's part of the Lyndhurst Men's Shed and he's given us hours and hours of his time, for which we are SO grateful.

Meanwhile, we had Volunteers Helen and Joan working their way around assessing and inventorying in The Barn and The Lodge kitchens to see what we have in there and what we need and what might need to be sourced from elsewhere (three part kitchens make two whole ones...we hope) and that kept them busy counting and checking for most of the day. Then Volunteer Chris, having applied protective film to the sparklingly clean carpet in The Lodge to save us from cleaning it again 200,000 times between now and our first guests, was then dispatched on a scavenger hunt of many things to stock The Lodge from elsewhere and did 100's of steps back and forth with a trolley for us.

Volunteer Claire spent the day cleaning bedside cabinets for us in The Lodge and assessing finishing works needed, such as the filing of some sharp screws in a couple of places and she was so speedy that she had time to go on a dehumidifier emptying mission for us, including an introduction to Derek, who currently resides in The Coach House (please see previous blogs for an introduction to Derek if you are unfamiliar).

Volunteer Sue spent the day doing further, successful, battle with the surface of the court in front of The Barn (see photos) and she's definitely winning - she found lots more edges and it's much less green where it shouldn't be!

Volunteers Clare and Angela had possibly the best job of all, or at least the most satisfying, as after they spent the first part of the day clearing drains and gulleys for us (none of the leaves want to leave you see) they were then tasked with starting the deconstruction and removal of the much-debated wooden structure out the back of Foxlease House. They donned hard hats and appropriate tools for the job and removed the whole top layer and most of the second. We can't remove it completely as it's too expensive to resurface underneath at the moment, so the plan is to level it and repurpose it into less of an eyesore (sorry to anyone who loved it but we've not met you yet if you exist...) and to make it into a nice, flat, unobtrusive wooden platform which might be nice for a spot of tea in the Summer and which might serve as an accessible viewing platform for future events out the back of Foxlease House. They did a splendid job and we can't wait to move on to phase 2 of making that area lovely and useable!

Volunteers Mary and Christine arrived and talked fabrics and projects and delivered some new donations for the Foxie's Shop, including these wonderful little foxie finger puppets (or paw puppets in Foxie's case) - coming to an online shop near you soon.

Probably less call for hard hats tomorrow but we'll see! Love Foxie x

Day 61 - When Foxie's plans were afoot!

Sun, 19 Jan 2025 22:21:46 GMT

Day 61 - When Foxie's plans were afoot!

No site photos today as all our focus was on paperwork and planning (with Derek and a few other dehumidifiers emptied along the way!) but a little video of some of our on site wildlife of the Deer variety.

Planning-wise, we've ordered the tickets for our ongoing teddy raffle (it's one of the limited guiding centenary bears and electronic tickets are on sale now on the www.foxiesshopping.co.uk website). We've also set up and ordered tickets for our Spring Raffle which will go live this coming week and which we'll be selling at upcoming events, on site and online too - it's got some amazing prizes and we can't wait to announce it.

We've got some of our marketing materials together to start telling people that we want their bookings. We've launched them on Facebook this evening, but if you've got a publication that we could put a short article or some wording in then please do get in touch. We want to let everyone know that Foxlease Park is open for bookings from mid-February onwards for camping, residentials, events spaces or meeting spaces and we've got some more publications and pricing brochures in the works too.

We're planning upcoming events and getting ready for the Quiz which is happening in February, our Barn Dance in March and we've got some workshops and other events which we hope to announce soon once they're at the right point...think coffee mornings, craft workshops (thanks to some fabulous volunteer offers) and open air theatre experiences...coming to a Foxlease Park near you soon!

We've been preparing for our further insurance visit later this week and for some of our compliance checks - lots of paperwork but the team are working hard to make sure we're where we need to be. Some of the team who were involved in the 24-Hour Sing have been having a well-deserved rest and the funds raised from that so far are incredible - an event that spanned 17 time zones, had over 180 participants, 7 countries and which raised over £5,000 and still counting! Fundraising for us is absolutely vital to ensure that we can do everything that we want to and pay our overheads whilst the site is closed or in its initial bookings period. It's very expensive to run (not least because our insurance bill alone is £17,000 a month....) and so every penny really does make a difference.

Look out for more news soon, Love Foxie x

Day 60 - The day prep for the camping season began (or when Foxie joined the 24-Hour Sing!)

Sat, 18 Jan 2025 23:17:04 GMT

Day 60 - The day prep for the camping season began (or when Foxie joined the 24-Hour Sing!)

An early start to the day for some of our volunteers today, but nowhere near as early as our fundraising champions the 24-Hour Singers and their support crew. Our volunteer coordinators today stopped in to listen first thing before the volunteers arrived and it was fab.

First to arrive of the volunteers was our magician electrician and his canine electrician's mate, Bella, who was exceptionally well-behaved during her time on site. We can't typically manage canine volunteers but it meant our volunteer electrician could give us his time so we made an exception. He PAT tested all day for us and got lots more ticked off of our list in the main buildings, for which we are very grateful.

We had Volunteer Jean, our expert draper, on site pressing the curtains for The Barn all day for us ready to be re-hung when The Barn is ready for that and we understand there's only two to go, meaning we can start laundering more from elsewhere when the next batch of pressed curtains are moved out of the upstairs room soon.

Our other two teams of Volunteers today achieved great things for us in different areas of the site. Volunteers Fiona, Immi, Alison and Emma managed to lift all remaining glued carpet in The Gatehouse - through serious determination, arm strength and elbow grease - in just the morning's work. We asked them to progress as a much as they could without overdoing it but when they came to report back we weren't expecting them to tell us they'd managed it ALL! It's absolutely amazing progress which set us up for more flooring to be laid next week. To try to give them an easier afternoon, after they had had a break for lunch and a stop in to see our on site singers for a while, they assessed the state of the changing rooms for us and inventoried the work yet to be done and then moved on to assessing and starting very preliminary cleaning to a couple of our camp site huts.

Our other team on site, Volunteers Becky, Gill and Geoff, spent the day working hard to assess and start repairs to the campsite huts on Oaks and North Meadows and they made great progress with the guttering cleared and necessary repairs to it identified; moss removal on the roofs, cleaning of the hard standing around the huts, with all edges cut back. The huts were swept out and all areas checked and inventoried to let us make the necessary additions to Foxie's Wishlist, which we'll be doing over the next few days. Our campsite huts still need work but it's a fantastic start to getting the first of them up together for us and ready for our early campsite bookings and they did an amazing job.

Once the day volunteers had left and our deliveries arrived, those of us in the Site Office paused paperwork (which we could keep doing forever) and went up to sit in with our fantastic fundraisers for their last hour of their 24-hour marathon (Foxie spent considerably more time up there today and made a number of friends - see photos of Foxie meeting Cadi and enjoying a waltz). Finishing with "To Foxlease we'll always come home" was such an enthusiastic end to the fantastic first event on site and great to have the feedback from those who stayed on the current state of The Lodge! We hope they'll now treat themselves to a well-deserved rest.

Paperwork and grant applications all round tomorrow and planning for next week, Love Foxie x

Day 59 - When Foxie was on a timescale (or our first event!)

Fri, 17 Jan 2025 20:03:46 GMT

Day 59 - When Foxie was on a timescale (or our first event!)

We're so excited to say that this blog is being written from The Main Hall in The Lodge at Foxlease Park as our first event is taking place - the Raise the Rafters 24-Hour Sing being organised for us by a group of our wonderful supporters to fundraise for us and it's been SO amazing for us to welcome back the special group of people who fundraised so hard for us and those who have come along for the first two hours (we're 1.5 hours in so far) of this fundraising event.

We'll do the usual update on daily activity on site shortly (and oh my goodness the team on site today did SO much that it's difficult to express in words just how much without the capital letters!) but before that we've got to try to explain the way that seeing everyone come back and love the progress we've made makes us feel - again, one of those things that's difficult to put into words, but we'll try briefly - WE MADE IT!! We hoped we'd get here when we started fundraising all that time ago (that feels forever but really wasn't so long ago) but we didn't really imagine how much relief, and happiness, and personal satisfaction we'd feel knowing that we've really, really done it and Foxlease Park is safe and being loved - it probably won't still feel properly real for a long time, and we've still got so much more to do but, on a personal note, putting the finishing touches up in The Lodge today and seeing the new sign up on the wall and people's joy at being back is something really pretty special and a big milestone for us! The ups and downs on site are different from those we had when we didn't know if we'd manage the enormous thing which we were trying to do and without being too emotional about it (although it's quite an emotional day for the Team in some ways) some of the songs being sung at the fundraiser today are amongst those that helped remind us why we were doing what we were doing even when it was hard and its lovely to hear them again in different circumstances ("Somewhere there's a forest" being one for Emma personally).

So, on to progress today....our volunteers started early and worked solidly for the first 3-5 hours of the day without pause to make sure that the ground floor of The Lodge was ready to welcome the 24-Hour Sing and to host the team staying overnight and as you all now know, we managed it! It started with Hazel cleaning the kitchen again at 8am whilst Emma ran around doing the weekly fire call point tests (running up and down the stairs is no joke!) which was a bit loud for a while but we couldn't spare a second person to stand in the lobby to push the buttons as there was too much to do! They were soon joined by volunteers who worked SO hard for hours preparing all the crockery for this evening's event, hoovering (so much hoovering), painting some last minute walls that didn't look quite right, scrubbing and so much spot cleaning throughout. We moved things that shouldn't be in The Lodge out, we moved things that should be in. We updated fire exit signage, applied new stickers and we dread to think how may steps the team did before 12pm today! Huge thanks to Volunteers Clare, Claire, Tracy, Steph, April and Carole and to Zoe and Alison who ran around fitting mattress covers, checking things and updating signage, all alongside the office tasks which they were trying to complete with Viv and Teresa in the office.

As usual, as if that weren't enough, the same volunteer team went even further for us and cut back the pathways for our evening guiests to use and lifted and shifted and shovelled and moved enough stone to fill the holes up the drive all the way to the barrier, which made for a lovely mooth exit and arrival for those who have used the driveway since. We know the volunteers will feel it tomorrow and we're so grateful to them for their hard work.

Alongside all of that we had Volunteers Alison and Sandra finishing off an exhausting week of cleaning the dining room and the serving room in Foxlease House and they then went even further for us before they had to end their week's stay of hard work and cleaned the corridors outside that area too. We are truly grateful for the magical transformation they achieved this week and we can't wait to welcome them back soon (Foxie did let them leave on the condition that they return).

The final excitement, which you can see photographed, was that Volunteer Pete dropped by to show us his progress on the Golden Clock - it's still ongoing but it looks great so far! AND Mr D. Hugh Midifier AKA Derek, arrived and was installed in The Coach House!

We'll update on the singing and progress on site again tomorrow afternoon as usual, Love Foxie x

Day 58 - When Foxie built more mountains! (or the great de-greasing!)

Thu, 16 Jan 2025 19:28:38 GMT

Day 58 - When Foxie built more mountains! (or the great de-greasing!)

It was a misty start to they day on site today and we had bigger numbers of volunteers again as we count down the final hours until we welcome our first event guests on site tomorrow for the 24-Hour Sing fundraising event!

We're pleased to say that the new padlock played nicely, so everyone was in and out without difficulty. We had Volunteers Gill and Peter carefully cleaning all of the lighting covers in The Lodge after we looked up and realised we had more spiders to evict before we welcome our first guests. Volunteers Rachel and Alex were identifying drains for us on the scavenger hunt assigned to them for the day and then assisting with cleaning up following the painting in The Lodge. The cupboard doors for the kitchen were inspected following their final varnishing ready to be reinstalled!

We had our fire alarm provider on site this morning and our security engineer for various different jobs - a busy day in the office - and Alison and Viv were reconciling bookings payments this afternoon. We're pleased to see bookings are still coming in daily but we'll be releasing some advertising soon for our supporters to help us with telling everyone what we have to offer. Offsite, we've got people planning our next fundraisers and onsite events, the next of which is our Barn Dance in The Barn in March (tickets available now!).

We had a great team (see photographs) in Foxlease House today and they worked hard to clean the room many of you will know as Wiltshire and prepare it to allow them to build a new mountain range out of the soft furnishings from some of the Foxlease House Rooms so that we can assess them, prepare them for washing and rehanging at the appropriate time. For now, removing them will help us reduce and avoid any damp in those rooms to mean our dehumidifiers at work are effective, and they will also help us avoid mould and the prospect of damage to soft furnishings with any decorating or repair works. A successful day's work for us and they really have moved mountains! They also found some ladybirds who have taken up occupation during the site's closure who have been carefully evicted (see photo).

Elsewhere in Foxlease House, Volunteers Alison and Sandra, on Day 4 of their battle with the dining room and service area this week, were on to serious de-greasing and deep cleaning in there. Alison temporarily re-located to the hot water supply in the Site Office to make the task easier and as you can see, but the time she was finished Foxie could slide off any surface!

In other exciting, and yet to be revealed news, our friends at Sign-It did us a rush order job on a new sign for inside The Lodge and came to instal it - we're looking forward to sharing that tomorrow.

Finishing touches to The Lodge tomorrow morning before our first guests in the evening, Love Foxie x

Day 57 - When it was all about the gate!

Wed, 15 Jan 2025 21:27:07 GMT

Day 57 - When it was all about the gate!

Another busy day with lots of comings and goings - a great visit from some of the New Forest National Park Authority Team this morning for a walking meeting around the site and exciting discussions of future possibilities for partnership delivery! We're grateful for their time and the support which they are giving us to make sure that our future visitors are well informed about all things New Forest! We're on their list to get an Information Point on site, along with lots of other great things to make the most of our wonderful location.

We had dramatic excitement early afternoon when our local Elliots delivery man arrived with his HGV and loading crane to deliver some sacks of shingle and stone to improve various areas of the site and the site decided momentarily it didn't want to let him in, or our volunteers on site out....as the padlock on the barrier stopped working. Despite assistance both on site and remote to try to resolve the padlock situation and allow the nice delivery man access, it took several runs up and down the drive and trips for tools over 30 minutes or so before we could get the barrier up! We're very grateful for his patience and helpful assistance in the process and he kindly delivered the bags all over the site for us to where they needed to be, despite the delivery delay. We've given the barrier a talking to and expelled the offending padlock (a repeat offender at this point) from the ranks and its been replaced with a nice new one so hopefully a repeat can be avoided.

Meanwhile, our temporarily trapped volunteers continued to work hard, with curtains being re-hung downstairs in The Lodge, ready for our 24-Hour Sing visitors on Friday (we're getting excited now!). More painting and varnishing thanks to our Volunteer Charley who stopped by to help us get our painting done in time for Friday and we managed to get the barrier open in time for her to leave when she needed to, and in time for one of our contractors to stop by.

Volunteers Alison and Sandra continued their hard work in the service area end of the dining room in Foxlease House and as the photos show, they are definitely winning their ongoing battle to make it fresh and clean again - the fireplace in there looks so much better and the smell continues to be amazing. We asked how many buckets of water they are up to now and they've used so many they've lost count. The Singing Washing Machine will get some activity washing their cloths tomorrow to restock the supply for the next round of cleaning and the curtains are now on the list to be washed when we've next got space to dry them.

Our Volunteer Plumber Pete returned and fixed our split pipe (see previous blogs for excitement when that was discovered) and has added a new isolation valve to one of the showers to make it easier to access in the event of an emergency. We've also consulted with him about the options for adding some outdoor washing up sinks to our planned family camping area, as the first phase of our campsite improvements and we'll be looking to source a couple of appropriately sized stainless steel sinks for that purpose soon.

Volunteer Iain stopped by this afternoon and managed a speedy job for us laying some matting to fix the quagmire around the front barrier to save our visitors' shoes from the mud and the work had the dual effect of smartening up the area around the barrier too! The barrier is high on our list (or at least Emma's) to think about replacing after today; we were planning to see whether we could fund something with both an intercom and an access button to avoid the current challenges with providing access remotely and the site deciding it wants to be extra-secure (due to misbehaving padlocks) unexpectedly - we'll be looking into that over the coming weeks!

Hopefully less drama, but no less progress tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 56 - When Foxie met the brokers and the paint party continued! (or when the dining room was the cleanest it's been for 40 years).

Tue, 14 Jan 2025 21:27:53 GMT

Day 56 - When Foxie met the brokers and the paint party continued! (or when the dining room was the cleanest it's been for 40 years).

Our brokers came to site today to discuss all things insurance, and very kindly bought us some of our wishlist to help out the project. They're working with us to try to make sure we can deliver all the things on site that we want to and we're excited to move forwards with the next phase of our plans.

In practical terms, our volunteers worked hard on their various tasks. For the majority it was Lodge, Lodge, Lodge all the way. Volunteer Lyndsey took on the next phase of the kitchen for us, cutting out old sealant, painting and applying final filler. Volunteer Chris got acquainted with one of the hoover regiment for us cleaning some of the rooms on the ground floor ready for the 24-Hour Sing on Friday and then spent the afternoon carefully applying a further layer of varnish to the cupboard doors which are laid out in the Main Hall (final coat tomorrow). Volunteer Gordon has fixed some more of The Lodge snagging list, using inspection hatches purchased by Foxie's Fairy Godparents from our wishlist and also completing repairs to a window in The Lodge that hasn't been in a state to be opened for some time - the view over North Meadows and beyond is now once again available to those who brush their teeth in the upstairs shower room.

Voluteers Janet and Jane sugar soaped and painted the prep room for us and finished off the hallway painting ready for our shiny new signage to arrive...watch this space. Our friends at Sign-It are working hard for us to get it to us hopefully in time for our first visitors to The Lodge on Friday so fingers crossed it's wish us and in place by then. Everything is looking so much fresher and Volunteer Jacqueline attacked the patio windows with gusto for us after a bit of sanding and they're becoming more sparkly with every wash. We bid a (temporary) farewell to our Volunteer double-act from Devon today who have been with us for nearly a week and done stirling work - we're very grateful for all their efforts during their stay!

We've had a bit of a special project going on in Foxlease House this week with Volunteers Alison and Sandra who have, so far, spent two days and countless buckets of water, cleaning the dining room for us (on hands and knees no less!) and it is sparkling and smells lovely and clean! They've cleaned every chair and table, the high chairs are a shade of white we're not sure they've ever been previously, the floor is the colour it should be and the great Foxlease House spider/spider web relocation has continued (as you can see from the photos). Tomorrow they're continuing with the food service end of the room but we're excited by the potential to start looking at ways to use the dining room space in the coming months now that we know it's back to a foodsafe and (mostly) spider-free state.

Great progess and we're tackling more of The Lodge tomorrow ready for Friday, Love Foxie x

Day 55 - When Foxie met James, who arrived to join the regiment (or when the Paint Fairy came to visit).

Mon, 13 Jan 2025 21:28:43 GMT

Day 55 - When Foxie met James, who arrived to join the regiment (or when the Paint Fairy came to visit).

Well, where to begin today, so many good things to share - it was a day of small successes and minor dramas (which we'll take over the major ones any day!) and peaks and troughs in so many ways!

So we started the morning with clear tasks for our wonderful volunteers. Alison headed down to The Lodge to varnish the cupboard doors set out yesterday evening; Volunteer Sue commenced her battle to clear the basketball court surface for us; Volunteer Eleanor faced down the bucket of random keys we found in the cupboard to try to find at least 3 specific keys we needed (one for a door lock we'd like to use, the keys to the grandfather clock, and a couple of others). Mid-morning Volunteers Alison and Sandra started planning their attack to battle the dining room in Foxlease House into submission; Expert and Apprentice Drapers (Volunteers Jean and Jan, respectively) continued their curtain preparation; our Twin Volunteers who we'll miss when they leave their occupancy in The Gatehouse continued snagging works in The Lodge; Volunteers Gordon, Ian and Paul started on their respective repairs list; and Volunteer April started work refreshing the benches and the steps in front of The Barn.

It was all going well all morning, Eleanor was three key successes in (Foxlease Park magic and some determination at work - see photos), Sue and April were winning, everything else where was going well and then Alison looked out the window in The Lodge mid-varnishing and spotted an unexpected water feature and for some of us on site the minor chaos whirlwind began there....Alison radioed (cue immediate panic that we had a leak in The Lodge from a burst pipe)....she clarified (less panic)...it was outside and a burst pipe, (she thought)...Emma went via the tool store, Paul and Gordon headed in the direction described (Alison clarified location)...Alison and leak were found....water gushing and clearly had been for at least a while (very soggy grass)...Alison sensibly went to retrieve a waterproof to dive into the fountain....Emma, Paul and Gordon decided they were waterproof and got stuck in with a crowbar...with the housing around the tap removed and Gordon's hand covering the split pipe, preliminary investigations were made....Emma and Paul went in search of a pipe map and followed Alison's example...meanwhile Gordon sacrificed the dryness of his outfit (particularly his trousers) and stepped face first into the spray to investigate further - fully drenched and committed at this point his sacrifice was for the greater good...he called out sucess - he found the off switch - Emma, Paul and waterproof Alison returned (it was at this point Emma noticed a stone in her hiking boot...or so she thought)....pipe isolated and drama averted...all was calm.

Emma returned to the office and reported back to Eleanor (who had been manning the radio) and volunteers who were in the Site Office (and therefore missed the excitement) that The Lodge wasn't in peril, all was well. She then took off her boot to remove offending stone and discovered it was a rather large nail that had (thankfully) missed her foot...at which point one of our suppliers arrived and was greeted by part of the team covered in water, Emma hopping around in one boot and everyone else rather more calm (he took it in his stride we're pleased to report). Minor challenges resolved (pliers to remove the nail; dry clothing for all in need) the day continued apace.

April finished The Barn steps (and don't they look fab! - see photos); Alison finished the first layers of varnish; curtains were prepped and hung; progress was made in the dining room - more keys were found!); Sue found the edge of the basketball court (no mean feat and one we weren't sure she'd achieve when she started due to the enormity of the task ahead - see photos); Angie and Helen resolved the snags; Ian fixed things (that's kind of his thing) and then, our very own paint fairy (also known as the wonderful Janine) arrived with another delivery! (see photo of the fraction which she delivered, there were many more pots of paint too!)

AND THEN....as if that wasn't enough, the Amazon man (in a confusing turn of events, as he usually delivers to Paul's house...) arrived to deliver JAMES! Please meet the newest (still boxed currently) addition to the regiment, kindly purchased for us by Volunteer Janet and her husband - THANK YOU!

And around all of that, we got through the to-do list, had a number of meetings on and off site with great progress and one of the boiler wizards dropped in to finish the Foxlease House part of the boiler repairs.

Phew! What a day. Time for a lie down before we do it all again tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 54 - When Foxie fixed the snags.

Sun, 12 Jan 2025 15:35:34 GMT

Day 54 - When Foxie fixed the snags.

Snagging works on site today in The Lodge, and more safety film to the windows in The Barn - one more stint and that will be nearly there!

Our volunteers worked hard in The Lodge downstairs kitchen and prep room, clearing the cupboards ready for painting in both rooms. They deep cleaned both rooms again and then sugar soaped the walls in the kitchen and taped, ready for painting tomorrow. In the prep room, we applied wall finishing skim to the areas it needed, taped ready for painting and Volunteer Sallyann won our prize of the day for her removal of the old sealant from the bottom edges of the tiles - it was a hard fought battle, with what was later discovered to be possibly the bluntest stanley knife blade of all time, but she won! (and tomorrow we'll find a sharper one for the removal in the kitchen.

We had other volunteers fixing bits of carpet, drains and light fittings elsewhere in The Lodge to get it ready for its dry-run occupants at the 24-Hour Sing next weekend and not much to go now!

We drew the winners of our Golden Ticket Raffle draw, congratulations to winners Caroline and Angela!

And we finished up the day by prepping the kitchen cupboard doors for varnishing, ready for those volunteers arriving for that task in the Main Hall of The Lodge tomorrow.

Time for a rest now before a new week, Love Foxie x

Day 53 - When Foxie cleared the decks (or when preparation was key).

Sat, 11 Jan 2025 22:19:55 GMT

Day 53 - When Foxie cleared the decks (or when preparation was key).

We took advantage of the brighter weather today and had volunteers working outside clearing the footpaths around The Lodge and the gravel areas at the rear of Foxlease House. Although it was bright outside it was definitely frosty-freezy in temperature - as evidenced by the exceptionally thick ice leaning on Volunteer Ruth's boot, found round the back of Foxlease House (which we should perhaps call the 'Ice Palace' until warmer weather!).

We also had our Volunteer fencing expert, Kester, pop by to help us scope out how to get the fencing up the start of the driveway, safe, repaired and looking lovely soon. He is also kindly helping us with some of our machinery on site, for which we are grateful!

We had more painting, snagging works and final cleaning in The Lodge, ahead of the 24-Hour Sing next week and we're preparing raffle tickets for the 'Golden Ticket' draw tomorrow.

We had more safety film from the Mt. Repairs element of the Amazon Mountain Range (thank you Foxie's Fairy Godparents) being applied to the doors in The Barn to make them safe and that work is nearly complete thanks to our dedicated Volunteer Philippa's efforts.

We had policy writing and paper newsletter mailings being prepared for posting in the Site Office, for those who don't email, and our expert Volunteer Draper Team continuing preparations to the curtains for The Barn, ready for them to be re-hung when decorations in there are complete.

Paws crossed for more sunshine on site tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 52 - When Foxie plotted (or when the clock struck....4...and then 5....)

Fri, 10 Jan 2025 21:59:54 GMT

Day 52 - When Foxie plotted (or when the clock struck....4...and then 5....)

We've had a great day on site today under the chilly, but sunny skies at Foxlease Park. We've had lots of different things going on. We had lots of office-based things, responding to booking enquiries...we're pushing close to 100 bookings and a couple of enquiries coming in each day....preparing some copy for articles and local press - if you've got a local magazine that might want to include an update for us, thenplease let us know - and also plotting out our current bookings to see when we start to get people back on site and to fit in some other things. We've had a great response to our request last week for people who might be able to deliver workshops for us so watch this space as Foxie's Team are plotting in all forms!

In other practical news, thanks to our wonderful Volunteer Peter we now have many less dripping taps and toilets than we did since his first visit and a lovely new outdoor tap (indoors, so as not to ruin our aesthetics) in The Laundry which is ideal for bucket-filling and hose-connecting. We'll take a photo soon to share. We're also delighted to share that as Pete is part of our local Men's Shed, he's rather handy with things other than plumbing and he's taken a look at some very special clocks in our Gold Room in Foxlease House. The mantle clock has taken a little holiday with him for some careful restoration to see if we can restore it to its former working glory and we've got big plans for the restoration of our lovely Grandfather Clock too. It's a short recording, but we thought you might like to hear our lovely clock chime 4 today (it wasn't 4pm...it was more like 2pm...but the clock didn't know that and we can forgive it for the confusion and please ignore Emma's terrible excited laugh when the chime worked). Our lovely clock is not quite back to fighting fit yet, but what a wonderful sound! Truly proof that a little bit of love and Foxlease Park community magic goes a long way!

We've had more hard work inside both The Lodge and The Barn, painting party continuing in both with great pace thanks to our excellent volunteer team working hard again today, and on the outside of The Lodge, Volunteer Sandy has made great progress with getting some of the ivy under control, which was badly needed!

Elsewhere, we had Volunteer Ian working hard convincing (with the aid of some power tools) some doors to open and also some others (in The Coach House) to close, so that we can close off the holey floor in the storage area which was caused by the, now formerly, holey roof in there until its safely repaired, with plans for that soon.

Getting excited for the year to come now, Love Foxie x

Day 51 - When the Wizard returned (or when the painting party continued)

Thu, 09 Jan 2025 19:34:06 GMT

Day 51 - When the Wizard returned (or when the painting party continued)

Some of you may recall from the blog so far that Foxlease Park has been frequented to-date by various magicians and wizards, by the names of Graham, James and David, depending upon the day, and today was the trimphant return and success of one of the Boiler Wizards, also known as James, who has completed the grand achievement of repairing the heating in The Coach House! This is truly cause for big celebrations as this means that we have not one, not two, not three, but three and a bit (four and bit if you count The Gatehouse) working heating systems on site, from a starting position of one and a half (if you counted The Gatehouse on a good day) at best! Our thanks to the wizards at Normans and volunteer Andy. We still have a couple of parts expected for them to finish off the hot water in The Coach House (to make sure it can be turned off...reverse problems now to previously) and to repair the partial heating in Foxlease House. Cosy times all round!

In other wizardly/magical news, we must add Volunteer Iain to the magical ranks (although given he was until very recently also our entire IT Team and is the most patient man alive when people keep forgetting passwords we may have to nominate him as Foxie's Superman instead) for his amazing progress, on the flooring in The Gatehouse. There's more to do but the kitchen looks spectacular now and we're very grateful. Also huge thanks to the volunteers who have so far spent hours scraping up the most super-glued carpet ever in The Gatehouse as it's extremely back-breaking (and in at least one case, blister-inducing) work. We're very keen to limit that to only a little stint at a time but we'll keep chipping (or scraping) away at that over the next week or so.

We also did a bit of grit spreading to remove our own inadvertent pathway ice-rink in front of The Barn and to keep our volunteers safe.

The paint party in The Lodge continued (and it's looking fabulous!!) and so did the paint party in The Barn (also looking fabulous!!) and more curtains were ironed to progress them ready for re-hanging (don't worry Jean, we haven't muddled them up, we promise!).

More painting (maybe less partying as people are a bit tired) and tracking down the elusive DHL delivery person with the soon-to-be-named dehumudifier tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 50 - Whooah! Foxie's halfway there........

Wed, 08 Jan 2025 20:24:02 GMT

Day 50 - Whooah! Foxie's halfway there........

....and living on caffeine and generously given volunteer time!

Lots more progress today and innovation in The Lodge in particular (dusting those high walls in the main hall in there is no joke!) - the paint job in there is starting to look AMAZING and people who haven't been on site for a few days are able to see the difference. We're looking forward to being at the point where we can do a video walk through to show the world but we can safely say the hours of time our wonderful volunteer team have put into scrubbing, buffing, repairing and renovating in are paying off! We've picked up more paint today to keep our painters going and to get them to the finish post as The Lodge is so nearly there.

Meanwhile, in The Barn, great progress too. No photos to share yet, but the filler has been smoothed and we're on to painting in there too and with the shiny new heating system puffing away, both buildings are shaping up nicely! Again, full credit to our wonderful volunteers. We've measured the glass for the replacement panels in the various doors in The Barn today and the replacement floor tiles for those which are broken have arrived and we'll be looking to install those in the coming weeks.

All our fire extinguishers in The Lodge and Barn have been checked and are up to date or have been replaced with up to date ones. We've also had continuing work on our COSHH register. We've also had contractors on site to quote us for duct cleaning in the kitchen areas of both buildings.

More curtain action too, with our expert and apprentice drapers working hard to prepare the curtains in both buildings for re-hanging once painting is complete, hopefully next week.

We've also had hard work going on in The Gatehouse as the flooring needed to be relaid. Volunteers Gordon and Iain were ready to tackle the task to lay nice new flooring throughout and to remove some of the older carpet but they had a bit of a challenge as the carpet in there appeared to have been glued with the most super duper sticky glue there ever was! They persevered but the ungluing was a bit more of a challenge than expected!

The De-humidifier (yet to be named) is due to arrive tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 49 - When Firefighter Foxie met the Lyndhurst Fire Station (or when great heights were reached!)

Tue, 07 Jan 2025 20:55:50 GMT

Day 49 - When Firefighter Foxie met the Lyndhurst Fire Station (or when great heights were reached!)

Lots of detailed work going on on site today by our volunteers and we had tree surgeons on site first thing cutting back around the Walled Garden Marquee - lots of other tree works planned, but those were the first to get us going on the maintenance side of things.

We then had teams of volunteers working hard in both The Barn and The Lodge for us doing all sorts of tasks to tick things off the to do list and The Lodge feels like we're now within touching distance of it being ready for its first occupants. With lots of gloss cleaning and painting taking place in there today, we think we'll hopefully be in a place where there are only very minor things left by the end of this week - fingers and paws crossed! We took a trip today to try to colour match the paint to finish it off and we had a special visit this evening (see below).

In The Barn we also had further activity, cleaning up some of the recent flood (which thankfully was nowhere near as bad as it could have been) lifting some broken tiles, ready for refitting when the new ones arrive (scheduled delivery was today so we'll be unboxing tomorrow) and sugar scrubbing some surfaces, along with lots of other important things ticked off the list.

We had further cleaning and clearing and some post-Christmas removal going on in front of Foxlease House thanks to some of our volunteers and this evening we've taken delivery of a number of wooden sleepers today which we hope to make use of in our Campfire Circle, a bargain find on GumTree, thanks to eagle-eyed Volunteer Gordon.

This evening we had a very special pre-arranged visit to Foxlease Park by Lyndhurst Fire Station who kindly agreed to bring their very big ladders and expertise working at height to help us remove the very high up curtains in the Main Hall of the Lodge and to clean waht reportedly seemed like 22 years' worth of dust and dead flies for us whilst they were up there. As you'll see from the photos, Firefighter Foxie also joined the fun. We're very grateful to them for giving their time to help us with a problem to high for us to handle and also for their advice on some practical fire safety matters for the site, which their attendance gave us a chance to discuss.

Delivery arrivals expected tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 48 - The day Foxie took two steps back (or the great flood in The Barn).

Mon, 06 Jan 2025 19:09:53 GMT

Day 48 - The day Foxie took two steps back (or the great flood in The Barn)

A bit of a frustrating day on site today thanks to the rain this weekend as, in the absence of the new doors for the back of The Barn (which we thought were on track but now appear not to be) the rainy weather over the weekend came into the back of The Barn and undid some of the hard work and time spent cleaning that area by some of our previous volunteers. We're better shored up for the weather now with a temporary fix until we manage to fund and solve the doors issue but frustrating nonetheless.

In other areas, good progress continues to be made. The roof on The Coach House seems to have withstood the nasty weather so that is a massive plus and we can start the follow on internal repairs to the interior of the roof soon. Unfortunately the hole in the roof up to now, which had clearly been the case for some time, has meant that more works are needed to the boiler in The Coach House, so we're getting a quote for that now too.

More sanding down in various places and painting happened in The Lodge today. We're making steady progress in there towards being ready for reopening and our first bookings and The Lodge is generally looking great and should be ready for the 24-Sing in a couple of weeks.

We updated our ladder register today - a task more challenging than one might think when they're in use around the site. We've invested in a large-scale dehumifier to resolve some of the damp issues in various places - it's arriving Wednesday/Thursday and yet to be named, which of course it will have to be on arrival so suggestions welcome. It's an expensive investment for us but will more than earn its keep in helping us to dry out some of the damp areas before re-opening.

The camp huts have all been opened up so works can start on checking and repairing those over the coming weeks. It's exciting to start work on another part of the site in conjunction with the other ongoing activity.

Our volunteer plumber made it back to site this afternoon for some of our small fixes needed and he'll be back later this week for more.

We also had window checks finished off in The Lodge, WD40 and safety catches checked and fitted, following the majority of that task completed yesterday.

A busy time and lots more wishes on our wishlist to stock us up for the next phase of works, Love Foxie x

Day 47 - When Foxie met some Tech friends (or when descaling was the name of the game).

Sun, 05 Jan 2025 19:59:05 GMT

Day 47 - When Foxie met some Tech friends (or when descaling was the name of the game).

A very soggy day on site today with torrential rain - we're very pleased that The Coach House roof hole was successfully medium-term repaired yesterday by our fantastic roofers as that meant one less bucket to empty today. The wet weather does mean that drying things out, particularly carpets, is proving problematic, so we'll be having to invest in a few more industrial de-humidifiers to help us with that.

Blinds were fitted in The Gatehouse, moving it ever closer to volunteer-accommodation perfection and our IT experts, volunteers Jim and Sandra, finished of their hardwiring and other tech things of our internet so that Foxie can be truly online in more of the Main House - they also brought their mascots Tech Duck and Tech Squirrel to meet Foxie (see photo).

All the holes in The Barn have now been filled following the recently completed heating works, ready for painting and touch-ups and that building is drying out nicely. We still have some repairs to do at the back of The Barn to make sure that it's water-tight but those actions are in progress too and we hope to have that resolved soon.

We also had some seriously industrial cleaning activity happening in The Lodge today with our fab team of volunteers in there doing further descaling of the showers which despite the previous works in there remains a pretty heavy duty task. Armed with brushes and limescale remover the Team working in there spent the day scrubbing from top to bottom and removing gunk and grime with satisfying progress and results.

More cleaning tomorrow, and all being well some minor plumbing fixes too, Love Foxie x

Day 46 - The Day Foxie raised the roof (or the paint party in The Lodge).

Sat, 04 Jan 2025 14:23:36 GMT

Day 46 - The Day Foxie raised the roof (or the paint party in The Lodge).

It was a crunchy leaf day on site today with the frost, immensely satisfying noises but a bit chilly - lots done regardless.

We had roofers in to help with the significant hole and damage to the roof of The Coach House today and whilst they've discovered that it's a much bigger job long-term as unfortunately the tiles on the right side of the roof need to be removed so that the felt can be replaced, they've done an incredible job to replacing the felt over the hole, re-battening the roof and replacing the tiles - in a moment of Foxlease Park Magic the tiles they had sourced from their store before coming to site for us were a perfect match for the existing tiles. The medium term fix today allows us the time to plan for the full felt replacement and to fundraise appropriately for that.

Alongside that we had Volunteers Nick and Michelle who moved mattresses for us into The Accessible Suite and who moved on to Polyfilla in The Barn and remove some of the wall coverings for re-painting, along with some other fixings. Separately from that, we had Volunteers Steph and Wendy who were working in The Lodge today smoothing the previous Polyfilla and having their own touch-up paint party to do the first cover over some of the portions on the walls which need painting to match their surroundings. It's exciting to see things coming together.

We also had our technical experts Volunteers Jim and Sandra on site to install our IT hardware and to expand Foxie's internet reach within Foxlease House and we are very grateful for their time and travels to assist us.

More touch-ups tomorrow to prep The Lodge and The Barn for action, Love Foxie x

Day 45 - The Day Foxie made plans (or when the tiles were lifted).

Fri, 03 Jan 2025 22:49:43 GMT

Day 45 - The Day Foxie made plans (or when the tiles were lifted).

So many plans - old plans, new plans and making plans! We've had fantastic progress today and yesterday with visiting Volunteer Corrie who kindly gave us her time and expertise to assist with assessing prospective locations for certain future projects, like accessible campsites, and supporting us with photographs, advice and plans for our future grant applications for funding. She's also compiling a range of old plans of the site for us which we hope we can put to use as part of our plans to participate in Heritage Open Week later this year.

This morning we bid adieu to The Original Baby Skip and a short while later welcomed Baby Skip #2 to site to take its predecessor's place - we've made great progress with getting rid of the various forms of waste on site and Baby Skip #2 will be an integral part of that continuing vital work. We thank Original Baby Skip for its service.

On the volunteer side, our dedicated group today were smoothing and checking the filled holes in The Lodge, identifying paint colours for us to match up fo touch ups (more challenging than it sounds) and Volunteers Jennie and Nat spent the day working hard for us measuring, cutting and replacing damaged, stained and sub-standard ceiling tiles for us in The Lodge so that all those future top-bunk guests in there will have nice clean ceilings to stare at when they can't sleep rather than unidentified stains or holey tiles. Cleaning in The Lodge also continued with a vengance and we've managed to make special arrangements for assistance with the very tall ceiling and the curtains in there - more on that next week.

We had a volunteer with plumbing expertise come and check on some of our leaks and identify the parts needed to replace them and we're grateful that Volunteer Pete, who came to us via our links with Lyndhurst Men's Shed, is returning next week to hopefully finish the jobs and make sure the water remains where it should be.

Frosty and sunny on site today and our indoor team managed to progress some of our event planning and fundraising projects. We're on the hunt for anyone with skills in a particular craft or hobby who might be happy to give us their time to run a workshop for us at some point in the coming year - if that might be you, please get in touch to volunteers@foxlease.uk and we can discuss our ideas further.

Investigating other new projects tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 44 -An alarmingly loud day for Foxie and the volunteers! (or when Foxie met Colin).

Thu, 02 Jan 2025 21:21:16 GMT

Day 44 - An alarmingly loud day for Foxie and the volunteers! (or when Foxie met Colin).

It was a big numbers day on site today and we had a family group volunteering together to celebrate Volunteer Alison's special birthday - we were privileged that she chose to spend her special day working hard for us at Foxlease Park and her family team managed lots of outside jobs for us - moving piles of garden waste around, tidying up the main roadway up to the lodge and cutting in some more drainage, as well as making a visit to scope out the work needed to our Main Campfire Circle. They also took this beautiful photo of it this afternoon with the sun (first time we've seen it on site in a while) peeking through the trees. The good news is there isn't too much generally to be done to make the Campfire Circle useable, the bad news is that what is to be done is substantial in that it requires works to reinstate and/or replace the seating there. It's on the list as a special project as unfortunately it's likely to be expensive to make it properly safe and shored up to use anything above ground level but, s'mores are high on our list of 2025 targets, as are campfires, and so we'll be thinking about how we might be able to fund that soon.

Alongside the birthday celebrations, during which Foxie met both Alison and Colin (the caterpillar cake) we had lots of other volunteers on site today too. We had groups working hard checking the status of ceiling tiles and polyfila repairs in The Lodge and continuing the pressure washing progress outside, as well as tackling the second deep clean of the kitchens in The Lodge.

We had our team of curtain experts working upstairs above the Site Office in Foxlease House today to repair and re-hook a number of sets of curtains and to play the curtain matching game with us to try to ensure we know what goes with what and where - despite careful labelling, we seem to have ended up with some extras...we're not entirely sure how.

The alarming part of the day was the significant fire alarm call point testing which Emma and Alison started this morning. Up until now our regular testing has been completed by expert volunteers Peter and Gill but, as they weren't there today, it was time for some others to take up the baton and the results were initially very good and then....noisy....and noisier....as the second type of call point (as no two things at Foxlease Park can ever be the same) was a little more challenging and the key instructions were...invisible. The excellent concluding news to share being that the call points all work fine and YouTube has some exceptionally useful "how-to" videos, for which Emma and Alison (and also Paul who was drafted in to add a third brain to the mix after ten minutes of silencing the alarm and one phone call to Peter and Gill) were very grateful. All three are now pro's and will be exercising their new skills regularly to keep us up to date.

We had another group of volunteers who sorted out The Laundry for us and removed some of the things which were causing offence to the Singing Washing Machine (it likes its space uninterrupted) to alternative storage locations. They also topped up the magic potions (refillable cleaning products) for us. Then they went on a hunt around the site to try to update our ladder register, which was a little less successful as the Foxlease Park ladders have a mind of their own and it's hard to check things when people are trying to use them and keep moving them to other places on site. They achieved the labelling and recording of half of them and more to go tomorrow. They did take a fabulous, updated set of photographs on one of their breaks of Mt. Duvet and Mt. Pillow, climbed by the expert Foxie's crew (for scale) as they felt the original photographs last week didn't really capture the altitude correctly.

They also relocated four better mattresses to be installed in The Accessible Suite tomorrow which are currently lining the corridor ready for installation, for which our volunteers' spines will be grateful. In other news we've booked in Baby Skip's exit and replacement for tomorrow too.

Moving mountains and mattresses tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 43 - Foxlease Park's first New Year's Day and some resolutions for a Foxie 2025.

Wed, 01 Jan 2025 21:41:18 GMT

Day 43 - Foxlease Park's first New Year's Day and some resolutions for a Foxie 2025.

A quiet New Year's Day on site today, with some finishing-off jobs being done. More windows in The Barn carefully prepped for safety filming when the new rolls of film from the Amazon wishlist arrive shortly, some sink sealant in The Accessible Suite being finished off and the Singing Washing Machine belting out another couple of solos in The Laundry. Lots of lists being made ready for large numbers of volunteers on site again and our insurance inspection tomorrow - cross everything for us that they agree to keep covering us and allowing us to pay the extortionate, but very necessary annual insurance premium!

As today was quieter on site, we thought we'd come up with a bit of a (very) brief numerical round-up of Foxie's year and some Foxie resolutions (or more accurately, aspirations) for the coming year. So, without further ado:-

Foxie's New Year Round-up:-

1 x successful acquisition of Foxlease Park and 1 x celebratory glass of bubbles;

2 x Foxlease Park Newsletter Editions sent and 2 x new Singing Appliances in The Laundry;

3 x doors broken into/coded padlocks hacked on site and 3 x properties on the market;

4 x jars of coffee consumed and 4 x Christmas fundraising fairs/events attended;

5 x grant applications or requests for funding granted and 5 x leaks discovered to varying degrees;

6 x mountains in the Amazon Mountain Range and 6 x coded padlocks reset by Iain and Paul;

7 x bottles of mould remover used and 7 x drop offs of wonderful donated materials;

8 x late night trips to reset alarms on site and 8 x prospective partnership meetings;

9 x members of the Foxie's crew and 9 x impromptu scavenger hunts (each week);

10 x loads of curtains washed and 10 x trips back to the Site Office for forgotten keys;

75 x bookings;

Approximate on site volunteer hours given in 2024: 2,940;

Most steps walked on site by one person in a single day since acquisition = 25,600;

and so many more metrics we could use!

Foxie's Resolutions/Aspirations:-

1 x month with no late night alarm call outs;

1 x weekend with more booking requests than we can cope with;

1 x day with over 1,000 paying visitors on site;

1 x weekend fully booked;

1 x successful Heritage Open Week with more than 300 attendees;

1 x new oven for the The Coach House;

100 + New Foxie's Family Members;

10 x kayaks on the lake by midsummer;

50+ campfire's burning;

500 x s'mores consumed on site (Emma's started already to help the count - current tally this week = 1);

100 x Forest Bathers;

5 x Guided Bat Walks;

5 x Star Gazing Evenings;

24 x Organised Fundraising Events;

60 x Quizzical chilli eaters;

24 Hours of Foxie's Singing;

300+ volunteers signed up;

1000's of Happy Campers;

10,000+ New visitors to site; and

Countless moments of Foxlease Park Magic yet to come (we hope)!

Happy New Year to all, Love Foxie x

Day 42 - The end of another Foxie's year.

Tue, 31 Dec 2024 12:48:08 GMT

Day 42 - The end of another Foxie's year.

A bit of a re-group on site today as it's the end of the calendar year but we've still got a solid number of volunteers on site working away. We've got a part-day blog post today due to website maintenance but we didn't want to leave you without a final Foxie site update for the year.

Work today is continuing on with some bits around the site from yesterday in The Gatehouse, to finish that off ready for volunteers, and with some of the other part-finished tasks from this week. Mt. First Aid is nearly fully restocked as the last of the items have been arriving from the Amazon Wishlist this week so we're ready for all eventualities although, obviously, no need to use them would be preferable!

We've had some wonderful further offers of things we need which have come in today too, more practical bits for re-decorating and some offers of some of the specific support which we called out for previously. We really can't express how wonderful it is to have people's support with our project to love Foxlease Park back to life and we see that support in so many different ways each day.

Photos today are actually a bit of a round-up of some of the progress so far in The Gold Room in Foxlease House, with thanks to Volunteers Wendy and Charly for their careful deep cleaning and removal of what looked like 100 dead spiders and (so far) 1 live slug. Foxlease House has a long way to go to get back to its truly majestic state but the deep cleaning is the start and even with its curtains down and a lot more cleaning to do, it still looked pretty special yesterday evening.

Into the New Year tomorrow and what exciting things that may bring, Love Foxie x

Day 41 - When Foxie could have fed 41 pandas (or Teams day)!

Mon, 30 Dec 2024 19:44:57 GMT

Day 41 - When Foxie could have fed 41 pandas (or Teams day)!

We had a whole host of dream teams of volunteers on site today, with 30+ people on site in total throughout the day.

We had two deliveries of donated items collected from Wickes, which was fortunate as it meant we had sufficient step ladders to accommodate all of our volunteers.

We had Team Barn Exterior working as a large group to clean and clear the outside of the Barn, cutting back, digging up and clearing to try and make sure its outsides match its shiny, clean insides following the recent internal progress.

Team Steam and Clean managed incredible progress as a party of four to put The Rug Doctor to work; first in The Barn, with a significant stain removed from the carpet in the rooms off of the Main Hall and then, after an exciting trolley ride to new environs in The Lodge, The Doctor was set to work cleaning further carpets in there too. Alongside that, the Team also managed to utilise the fantastic steam cleaner donated to us previously to clean the upholstered chairs in The Lodge Main Hall. A clean sweep (or steam) of successes all round - you can see them taking a short break at the end of the day in one of the photos!

Team Curtains were hard at work in the Site Office with our make shift ironing room, sorting, ironing and checking the curtains from various places and then rehanging those where it is now safe (by which we mean appropriately clean) to do so - The Accessible Suite was the first to benefit with its curtain poles reaffixed securely and clean curtains now in place to complement the new nets installed previously.

Team Tree-mendous were back as a dynamic duo, not for trees this time but for the clearance of the greenery and tonnes of bamboo which were taking over the roof and the side of The Coach House - the bamboo plants were enormous (see photo from this evening with Volunteer Gordon for scale) and had to be removed and cut back in order to prevent damage and further damp to the wall and further roof which they were overtaking. Foxie took a climb to inspect progress and have a little slide down the roof and was then appropriately extracted by Volunteer Kester back to grounded safety. We can't show you the after photograph as it was dark when they had finished work today but we'll take a daylight photo for comparison soon too.

Team Kitchen were a further duo working hard to start tackling the kitchen in the Main House to dispose of anything which should have been long gone and which might start/continue eminating bad smells. Although we don't plan to use it soon, the Main House kitchen is now in a much improved, and better smelling, state!

Team Gold Room did amazing work in The Gold Room, continuing the careful cleaning started previously and removing mould, cobwebs, layers of dust and in on instance a live slug! to bring it back to its shining glory. It's a slow-moving task, but excellent progress is being made and they've started to remove the curtains for a proper clean - we'll just need to check them and then we'll need to see if we can identify a friendly dry-cleaner who might be able to show them some love for us.

Team Gatehouse tackled the oven in The Gate House, installed some window blinds and lampshades and did significant work clearing the outside area around the building and pressure washing the driveway.

Team Sundial Garden made stunning further progress on clearing the, so far, untamed areas of the garden and removing some of the rotten store which was unfortunately causing damp to Foxlease House - their hard work means it looks so much more tamed now but the real difference will be when things start to bloom and flourish next year.

We had other volunteers completing important other tasks on site too (with less jazzy Team Names) and our Magician Electrician returned for another day and completed a number of very important tasks for us, installing a new PIR light at the side of the Main House to replace one which was broken (thank you Amazon Mountain) and a number of other electrical tasks.

SO many photos; so little blog space. We've shared some today and we'll share more soon but it's a great sign we can't manage to document everything as it means there is so much progress being made!

Precision tasks tomorrow and a chance to regroup before our insurance inspection on Thursday, Love Foxie x

Day 40 - The day Foxie ironed whilst the iron was hot!

Sun, 29 Dec 2024 21:52:19 GMT

Day 40 - The day Foxie ironed whilst the iron was hot!

Another Barn-focussed day on site today and another busy day for The Singing Washing Machine who is making short and tuneful work continuing to wash the curtains for The Barn ready for ironing and re-hanging early next year. Precision application of the safety film on the single-glazed windows continued - it's pane-stakingly slow but important progress and we've added more of the film to the Amazon Wish List so that we can finish off that job when that is hopefully purchased for us and arrived.

Foxie visited the Amazon Mountain Range to extract one of the new ironing boards and irons, and started work on ironing some of the curtains to be rehung in The Gatehouse. After those, we've still got lots more ironing left for some of our ironing-loving volunteers arriving in the next couple of weeks to volunteer. The curtain tracks have been cleaned in the various buildings as the curtains have been taken down and so once Foxie's Big Ironing Event is complete we should be in a good place to rehang them.

The Rug Doctor was also back at work after its December break and busy in The Barn, removing more layers of grime from the carpets in there as part of the first deep clean. The Barn really is benefitting from the attention it has had over the December period and the difference in there compared to its state before the December volunteers got to work is spectacular. We're loving seeing it taking shape as the list of repair and improvement jobs is underway.

We also had notification from our volunteer Gordon that he successfully collected the first of our Wickes Community Scheme donations today for us from the Southampton branch. If you're near Fareham, Hedge End or another branch of Wickes and can ask whether they have Community Scheme budget left to use by 31st December then please do so on our behalf and we can let you know what's on our wishlist of bigger things.

An army of volunteers due on site tomorrow, the most so far, Love Foxie x

Day 39 - A pane-staking day 2 of Twixmas at Foxlease Park.

Sat, 28 Dec 2024 17:27:48 GMT

Day 39 - A pane-staking day 2 of Twixmas at Foxlease Park.

It was Day two of Twixmas at Foxlease Park but there's nothing in-between or betwixt about the progress our volunteers are making on site.

Mainly indoor tasks on the agenda today - more careful cleaning in The Gold Room in Foxlease House - no progress to update on that yet, but it is being cared for.

The first deep clean of the The Barn continued following the amazing work yesterday. For most buildings we're on at least a three phase cleaning process but the first is the worst in every case! To add to the progress in the Main Hall of The Barn yesterday and the exhaustion of our supply of mould remover on site (more en route) we had volunteers attempting to exhaust the supply of descaler by cleaning and descaling in the shower rooms in The Barn. Hard water is a challenge as it builds up and so descaling is a process, and will be an ongoing hot spot for future cleaning too in order to keep things shiny. No photos of the showers, but you can see the fire place in the photographs and the Main Hall generally looking much cleaner and brighter for our fututre guests.

We also had volunteer Philippa completing a pane-staking but hugely important precision task for us to make the single glazed door panes in The Barn safe for future visitors by applying safety film. She spent considerable time measuring, cutting and applying safety film to each of the panes for us, using film which was kindly supplied via our wishlist and which has been patiently awaiting application in the Amazon Mountain Range until today. The relevant panes now sparkle like diamonds (other cleaning brands are available) and are safety-strong!

Outside, we had drains and gullies checked to make sure we're keeping water on site where it should be and not hoarding it where we shouldn't.

More safety foxie action on the cards for tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 38 - Twixmas at Foxlease Park (or Foxie's Barn Revival)

Fri, 27 Dec 2024 22:39:21 GMT

Day 38 - Twixmas at Foxlease Park (or Foxie's Barn Revival)

Twixmas began at Foxlease Park today (for the uninitiated, "twixmas" is the period between Boxing Day (Foxing Day) and the end of the year) and we had 25 volunteers working hard on site to help us making good progress before our insurance inspection at the start of the year and the start of our phased opening in mid-February.

We had tonnes of activity going on all over the site - too much to document today in photo form due to upload limits on the blog so we'll share some of it tomorrow and focus on The Barn's Revival going on today. As you can see from the photos, the kitchen in The Barn was in a bad way, with the floor carpeted with a significant layer of mud; mould and heavy dust everywhere, so much so that it resembled its namesake building far more than we'd have liked! But, after an intense day's scrubbing and mould removal from our amazing volunteers on site, that is no longer the case and it is shining so much it probably deserves a rename - The Cleanest Barn There Ever Was! - but it's probably a bit long as names go, so we'll just stick with The Barn. Nonetheless, a fantastic first deep clean for us to build on in the coming weeks before opening.

The kitchen at The Barn was far from the only hive of activity, with all of the curtains removed in The Barn to and the main hall given a good clean (photos tomorrow), Mt. Barn Curtains is a temporary institution in the Foxlease Park Mountain Range whilst The Singing Washing Machine does its thing and it's been tuneful on site today, with more songs to come tomorrow as it washes away the dirt and freshens up the curtains.

We had more serious cleaning going on on site with drain clearance and descaling at The Lodge - no photos yet, but it's starting to sparkle. We also had a tree-mendous group of skilled volunteers helping us with resolving some long-fallen trees on the site to enable us to remove them and to repair the fences which are damaged due to tree interference and we're so grateful to them for giving up their time today and helping us out.

And as if all that wasn't enough, we've also had further rubbish clearance going on to help us clear more of the site.

Sourcing more mould cleaner tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 37 - When Foxie was in planning mode and the great Foxing Day litter pick.

Thu, 26 Dec 2024 23:59:29 GMT

Day 37 - When Foxie was in planning mode and the great Foxing Day litter pick.

Another low numbers day on site but lots of important admin going on in different places to keep us on track for the New Year, to keep bookings moving and to keep booking volunteers in and a superb effort by those who were on site to complete a Foxing Day litter pick for us around The Link Cottage, The Gatehouse and the site generally.

We've also got our fab volunteers deep in organisational mode for a number of fundraising events, the first of which is the on site element of the 24-hour sing taking place in January!

Lots of plans afoot, Love Foxie x

Day 36 - Foxlease Park's First Christmas Day.

Wed, 25 Dec 2024 12:17:51 GMT

Day 36 - Foxlease Park's First Christmas Day.

A quiet day on site today but Foxlease House is resplendent (on the outside) thanks to our volunteer's efforts decorating the pillars for us and the two wreaths made at a recent fundraising workshop by two of our Trustees.

A big "Thank You" to all of the volunteers, supporters and our foxie's family members who have helped us to acquire Foxlease Park and who continue to support us in various ways, from the Amazon Mountain Range to clearing drains on site - that sense of community really is part of Foxlease Park's magic.

We also thought you might like to see one of our onsite visitors today, enjoying the grounds whilst it is still quiet.

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate, Love Foxie x

Day 35 - When Foxie made the gold sparkle!

Tue, 24 Dec 2024 21:20:17 GMT

Day 35 - When Foxie made the gold sparkle!

We had a dedicated team on site today and they had some special donated treats to enjoy when they had a lunch break as it was Christmas Eve.

As it was a low volunteer day, it meant we could continue our special task of cleaning The Gold Room, our shining glory in Foxlease House. We also (a few weeks ago) had a special limited edition Tatty Teddy delivered for us to use for fundraising and he played us a tune on the piano in there!

We also had cleaning at the front of Foxlease House and in The Gatehouse and it's all starting to look so much better.

We've also launched our raffle and auction for in person attendance at the Foxie's 24-hour sing in January, which is exciting and we hope will be a good fundraiser for us and we've been sorting through all of our first aid resources and has lots more arrivals for the Amazon mountain range!

Christmas tomorrow and 36 days in, we wish all of our supporters and volunteers a restful holiday and our thanks for their support, Love Foxie x

Day 34 - Bonfire's Burning, Bonfire's Burning...please do not draw nearer but keep a health and safety compliant and foxie appropriate distance...

Mon, 23 Dec 2024 19:54:04 GMT

Day 34 - Bonfire's Burning, Bonfire's Burning...please do not draw nearer but keep a health and safety compliant and foxie appropriate distance...

Things have been heating up on site today at Foxlease Park as we had an enormous (but carefully managed by our expert volunteers) bonfire to dispose of a large quantities of waste wood on site - it certainly helped to save us the cost of another skip for now as Baby Skip is currently full and ready to exit stage left in the New Year.

Whilst we had some volunteers on site lifting and shifting to make the bonfire happen in the time available, we had a number of other things going on too. We had a volunteer ecologist stop by to give us his time and expertise on some aspects of the site and we are grateful to him for sharing his knowledge. We also had the electrician stop by to quote us for some of the works needed for sign offs in various buildings in the New Year and for some further planned works we need. Again, we are grateful to him for sharing his expertise to help us ensure that we approach things in the most cost effective way to achieve our aims in the timescales available. We do know that we need to replace the oven in The Coach House before we can open it for use next year and so we've spent some time researching that now we know what we need and it does mean more fundraising needed (more on that below) as the cost of a replacement (electric-only) is going to be between £1,500 and £3,000, but it'll be worth it to make the kitchen safe, compliant and ready for action.

We didn't have a third wise man turn up to share knowledge, but we did have a gift of a wonderful paint donation delivered yesterday, from a support who travelled far to bring it to us! It was obtained as part of the Wickes Community Scheme which we understand is closing at the end of the year with budgets to be used by 31st December - so if you have a local Wickes store that you can ask if they have any Community budget left that they might donate to us with then let us know and we can let you know what's on our wishlist!

We had other supporters working to sort the kitchen items from The Coach House and also cleaning part of our wonderful Gold Room in Foxlease House, a very special job indeed!

In other exciting news, we're also so pleased to announce the launch of our first fundraiser at Foxlease Park next year which is for 30 in person tickets to attend the first few hours of the 24-Hour Sing virtual event taking place in January. We'll be auctioning off 28 to the highest bidders and raffling off 2 via a Golden Ticket Draw, which you can buy tickets for via the Foxie's Shopping website.

A quieter day tomorrow, but planning for big numbers on site on 27th so lots to be done, Love Foxie x

Day 33 - When Foxie's Team moved mountains!

Sun, 22 Dec 2024 21:47:25 GMT

Day 33 - When Foxie's Team moved mountains!

We had two external volunteers on site today but they did the work of many more!

Despite the bitter wind, one of our volunteers spent the day advancing along the border outside The Sundial Garden to pick up where our last gardening volunteers left off and to remove the brambles and other weeds which had taken over. She also did some much needed pruning and cutting back of the plants which we do want to flourish in the border so that they can hopefully start to thrive again next year.

Our other volunteer collected and removed all of the bedding from The Coach House for us to the Bar in Foxlease House for now and started a new mountain range...we take this opportunity to introduce you to Mt. Duvet and its smaller neighbour, Mt. Pillow Pile. The recepticle of choice for transporting between the buildings grew in size as the day continued and over the many, many, many steps and stairs climbed to collate and remove. We can now spend some time assessing quality, repairs and cleaning needed and it means that the new mountain range is also safely out of the way of any decorating needed in The Coach House.

As if all that wasn't enough, we also made further progress in The Gatehouse, which will welcome its first volunteers for a test run soon and also in some further mould removal in Foxlease House (white and fluffy this time, rather than black, for anyone wondering).

Rubbish disposal plans progressing on site tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 32 - The day Foxie could have had a mud bath in The Barn but no longer!

Sat, 21 Dec 2024 21:35:06 GMT

Day 32 - The day Foxie could have had a mud bath but no longer!

With the heating works in The Barn completed (which we're so pleased about that we'll be talking about them for a while!) we're finally able to start work in earnest in there to start catching up with our progress elsewhere on site.

We've already had The Barn inventoried and the kitchen contents cleaned and washed, courtesy of some of our previous volunteers, but due to the significant nature of the heating works which were ongoing in there, we've been largely unable to do any cleaning and/or repair works in there up to now. Unfortunately, for various reasons parts of The Barn are in a terrible state, for example the rear hall entrance hall where there was almost more mud inside than outside, which is saying something give how wet and muddy it has been at Foxlease Park recently.

Our volunteers today did an absolutely exceptional job removing the not-so-therapeutic mud spa from The Barn, as well as completing the first clean and descale of all the rooms and bathrooms in The Barn (except the main hall) and the difference is staggering! Foxie was kept away from The Barn for fear a trip round The Singing Washing Machine might be needed after a short visit, but tomorrow will be a different story entirely given the much cleaner state of things!

We've also had more fantastic deliveries arriving to grow the Amazon Mountain Range from our supporters' wonderful generosity. Those purchases are keeping us stocked up and out outgoings to a minimum in this time before we are open for bookings. We're pleased to say that our bookings for the buildings so far are more or less on track with our estimations and we hope that those will continue to grow into the New Year and beyond when we do some advertising. Our camping bookings are currently low against what we expected but, again, we're hoping that will increase in the New Year with some advertising.

Review of progress and more cleaning on the cards for tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 31 - It's more curtains for Foxie (but in a good way!)

Fri, 20 Dec 2024 23:43:16 GMT

Day 31 - It's more curtains for Foxie (but in a good way!)

More hard work clearing cupboards in The Gatehouse and in The Sundial Garden today for our volunteers and also clearing some of the various garden areas around the site. We now have all of our equipment (we think) more or less where we want it in our various stores.

Other volunteers were cleaning, cleaning, cleaning! There's so much to be done and so little time it's sleeves up and first and second cleans across the site. We also surveyed and reviewed some of the further works and tasks still to be done, taking stock of the days that we have left before our first visitors on site next year. We've got lots of wonderful volunteers signed up over the coming weeks and more offers of volunteering still to contact - we're working our way through getting back to everyone and hope to have been in touch with all our offers soon.

The Singing Washing Machine was also busy with the curtains from The Coach House which are coming up a treat and drying nicely with the heating on in the site office - they smell SO much better and the office smells nice and fresh too which is a great byproduct!

The other fantastic news today is that the boiler works in The Barn are officially complete and instructions and handover happened today! It's warming up nicely in there and with the recent guttering fixes and the new heating system operational the building is becoming the level of cosy which we'd like it to be and which we want to shout about given its previous issues and the fixes and new installation are also helping us to avoid any damp issues in that building. The boiler/heating works being complete means that our next tranche of volunteers over the December/New Year period can now start work in earnest in bringing The Barn up to our cleaning and repair standards so that we are all ready for our earliest bookings next year and our planned fundraising events.

It looks like limescale removal is on the cards tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 30 - The day Foxlease Park was well-hydrated!

Thu, 19 Dec 2024 21:37:02 GMT

Day 30 - The day Foxlease Park was well-hydrated!

We were expecting a lull in activity today at Foxlease Park as it was a low-volunteer day but due to the local water supply shortage in much of the area around Foxlease Park yesterday we put out a shout-out for volunteers to help us open the site for anyone who needed to come to fill their water containers up and the response from our supporters was amazing!

By 11.30am we were set up to manage traffic if people needed to attend, we'd managed to work 2 out of 3 outside hose points and we'd moved the barrier car park - we also took the opportunity to use the bags of gravel kindly donated to us yesterday to fill the worst of the holds up the drive temporarily. Thankfully, we had very low up take on the water filling front, which was good news as it meant that the local community supply had been largely reinstated, but we were ready!

Our volunteers who'd turned out for us were raring to do something useful as they were there and so we had further border clearance, cleaning around the front porch and the front of Foxlease House and some further removal of temporary wall in the internal office space, along with some checks on work done so far in some of our buildings where work has already started. We also had electricians on site doing works towards the heating works in The Barn and the Lodge so good progress there too.

Massive thanks again to all of those who answered our short-notice call to water and to those who offered to help.

Back to normal service on site tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 29 - "We can see clearly now the mould has gone" (or when Foxie's crew were very busy!)

Wed, 18 Dec 2024 23:15:59 GMT

Day 29 - "We can see clearly now the mould has gone" (or when Foxie's crew were very busy!)

Another successful day for Foxie's on site crew; large numbers on site again and lots of activity. We had a large number working hard in The Coach House finishing the first deep clean of the kitchen, the shared space and the bathroom areas and then some action from the Rug Doctor, starting on the carpets upstairs. All of the removed curtains so far had a proper assessment for any repairs needed from our expert volunteers and lots are ready to be washed and ironed when we have our designated volunteers with us in the New Year.

We then had a fab team of two working their way round with the Polyfilla, repairing all the small holes in The Lodge and The Coach House ready for sanding and preparation for painting in the New Year. They then managed great progress in cleaning up some of The Coach House courtyard in the afternoon.

We also had another team of two kitting out The Gatehouse from our on site kitchen supplies to make sure it has enough crockery for when our volunteers from further afield come to stay and we ticked off a whole load of the minor repairs and deep cleaning jobs still outstanding there - we've also had The Gatehouse's boiler inspected and cleared and so we now know that we'll soon be ready in the New Year to start occupation! We've still got lots of volunteer offers to contact and we are working through those as quickly as we can.

In addition to the mould removed in parts of The Coach House and The Gatehouse, we also had yet another fab duo working on cleaning the mould off of the ceiling in the boot room/vestibule to the side entrance to Foxlease House and it actually looks nearly white again! They then had to clean the whole room again to get rid of all the residue and mould flakes and Mt. PPE of the Amazon Mountain Range definitely came into its own today but the end result looks great and we can't wait to start using the space more actively.

We also had a little wander to take a couple of photos whilst we were emptying dehumidifiers around the building (see above).

More excitement tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 28 - The day of the most people on site so far and the successes of the boiler wizard!

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 22:32:44 GMT

Day 28 - The day of the most people on site so far and the successes of the boiler wizard!

We started the day with 18 day volunteers on site plus 3 contractors working on The Barn and then more people arrived, more plumbers and boiler repairmen, more special project volunteers and more visitors to discuss future partnerships. By the end of the day we had about 30 people on site, the most Foxlease Park has seen in some time and it was a hive of activity all day!

The first success of the day for the boiler wizard was the plumes of steam happily puffing away from the top of The Barn because the new boiler is WORKING!! (see photos). More work to do for a few more weeks, but great progress being made.

We had significant cleaning works and inventorying going on inside The Coach House with a number of our volunteers giving it its first deep clean and also two volunteers clearing around the right hand side of the building and the fire escape, which looks so much better. The pile of things weeded and cleared grew into a hill of its own thanks to two more of our volunteers working hard on the border along the outside of The Sundial Garden along to The Coach House courtyard, removing weeds, brambles and overgrowth - there's still more to be done but the difference is already amazing to see!

We had more pressure washing outside of the vestibule/boot room to the side of Foxlease House and now more of the path is the right colour again. We also had dry-brushing of the windowsills, doors and frames around the outside of Foxlease House to prepare for further cleaning and to remove the layer of cobwebs on them, and that paved the way for another of our volunteers to carefully clean the windowsills and pillars to the front of Foxlease House - it's starting to look clean and white in places again rather than grey.

We had first aid boxes being sorted and topped up, with more items needed added to the Amazon Wishlist, and thanks to the hard work of volunteer Jim over the past couple of weeks the sliding doors in The Coach House courtyard now actually slide! and are secure!

Three more of our volunteers spent the day fixing the guttering and drainage around The Barn - it's not perfect as it's a bit mismatched, but it's so much better than it was and will do a much better job of keeping the water where it should be and away from where it shouldn't until we get to the stage where the guttering can be replaced further down the line.

And with all that going on, then we had more boilermen and plumbers arrive to start work on the heating in The Lodge, and they made great progress there too, which we expect to continue over the next few days. Foxlease Park will all be nice and toasty again soon!

AND, even more excitingly, the boiler wizard (also known as James) managed to sort the heating in part of Foxlease House for us so the site office is warm! A grand day of successes all round for the boiler wizard and we are very grateful to the Normans team for the work they are doing all over the site for us.

More big numbers on site tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 27 - A Foxie to light your way (or the day of the big weeding).

Mon, 16 Dec 2024 20:24:27 GMT

Day 27 - A Foxie to light your way (or the day of the big weeding).

Big numbers of day volunteers on site today (even more due tomorrow) and they were busy, busy, busy!

The weather was fine for most of the day at Foxlease Park and the sun was shining down on our volunteers outside as they worked hard to lift, shift and clear various places around the site. We had most volunteers working in teams of two to weed, clear and clean certain outside areas to take advantage of the fair weather and the front borders of Foxlease House and the outside area around The Coach House are looking much clearer, with unwanted growth, dead things and moss removed as appropriate.

We also had a fab team of volunteers working inside The Coach House for a further round of cleaning and leaf removal (putting the outside back outside) and another team moving things around the site to where they needed to be e.g. furniture to be disposed of, rubbish to be added to the Baby Skip and things to be removed from site. One of our volunteers took a lovely picture of the robin she befriended on site who followed her around during her weeding (see photos).

We had lots of visitors to site today too, using our new office meeting space, with more to come later this week. We're hoping to acquire some paint to repaint the space over the next few days too as our first on-site painting project so far.

We've used a number of our kindly donated vouchers donated through the Amazon Mountain project to replace the defunct (and very mouldy) plastic lanterns from the front of Foxlease House with some beautiful new metal and glass lanterns. We've gone for a non-integrated battery-powered candle option so those can be added and removed to avoid further degradation in bad weather but they'll be shining brightly on a porch near you shortly. We've added a separate photo montage of the assembly project and we promise no Foxies were harmed in the making - they were in the lanterns for a very short period for effect (Emma thought it would look cute for a photo, but as Paul pointed out it looks a bit like they're in tiny Foxie jail and put there to warn the other Foxies not to misbehave....we might stick to candles in the future....).

More well-behaved Foxies and volunteers tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 26 - When Foxie met the Polyfilla and the regiment assembled.

Sun, 15 Dec 2024 20:47:57 GMT

Day 26 - When Foxie met the Pollyfilla and the regiment assembled.

Our Magician Electrician PAT Tested lots of things yesterday in between helping us try to stop a leak in Foxlease House and reception now looks very regimented - with the Henrys, Hetties and Henrietta assembled and in working order - with Foxie leading and commanding the charge, of course! Henrietta made her way up to The Lodge with our volunteers today who were finishing our first clean downstairs for us. They also then helped Hazel to replant some of the planters in front of The Barn ready for some colour to appear in the New Year!

Alison and Hazel set to to clear lots of things still needing PAT Testing into our designated "to be tested" room in Foxlease House and boy is that pile growing, but it is helping us make sure that we know was is needed, what works and what doesn't and its keeping our volunteers safe and future visitors safe and compliant.

Meanwhile Emma (and Foxie) went on a mission to remove all the abandoned screws and raw plugs they could find in the rooms we're currently using in Foxlease House and then we donned gloves and armed with Polyfilla and a spatula from the Amazon Mountain we went on a second mission to fill the holes, particularly those in the office which we intend to use as a meeting room for now, whilst the Site Office is in use. It's not quite in its final form yet, but it's certainly a start and we'll continue with that project at some point next week. We've also moved some of the furniture around and put up our lovely site safety posters so that our volunteers can brush up on best practice as part of their induction. We're still not focussing on Foxlease House yet due to our other priorities but we are making sure it feels loved and trying to fix and shine up what we can when we have a spare minute or less volunteers on site.

We had other volunteers on site this afternoon progressing our special project - more on that soon.

Henrys, Hetties and Henrietta ready for more volunteers tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 25 - The day Foxie joined the Magician Electrician (or when we were 1/4 of the way to opening).

Sat, 14 Dec 2024 19:08:08 GMT

Day 25 - The day Foxie joined the Magician Electrician (or when we were 1/4 of the way to opening).

We're 1/4 of the way to the start of our phased opening next year and we've got so much more to do between now and then. We've got lists upon lists and plans upon plans to help us get there and more volunteers and donations coming forwards all the time. We've used today to take stock of where we are and regroup - we're making good progress and we're on track but at this point continuous reviewing and replanning is necessary to ensure that we're moving as effectively as possible to deliver in line with our aims.

We've got over 60 bookings in now and more enquiries coming in all the time - early booking really is one of the best ways to support us as it helps our cashflow, which is really needed in this period before we're open. We've also launched today the announcement regarding the 24-Hour Sing Fundraiser taking place in support of us in January next year - it's a virtual event so we're really hoping that those further afield, including our wonderful international supporters will be able to attend.

We had our Magician Electrician back on site starting our (rather endless) list of PAT Testing for us, which was amazing! As you can see, Foxie got involved too! We're also tracking some areas of damp and leaks in various buildings, some more expected than others, to try and ensure that we're on top of these and can call out for support of trades and skilled volunteers to help us resolve any issues and keep Foxlease Park lovely.

Onsite for an exciting project tomorrow which we'll share soon, Love Foxie x

Day 24 - The day Foxie explored the sluice gate and the NFNPA Volunteering Team came to visit.

Fri, 13 Dec 2024 19:17:02 GMT

Day 24 - The day Foxie explored the sluice gate and the NFNPA Volunteering Team came to visit.

Foxie had great adventures outdoors on site today , exploring around the Lake and investigating when and how the sluice gate works. We're pleased to say that the mission was successful!

We also had lots of office-based things going on, collating the inventories completed by our hardworking volunteers to tell us what state our buildings are in. We had some repairs going on to fencing on some of the site and to some safety elements like the handrail on the stairs in The Lodge which used to spin, and now it doesn't.

The most exciting part of our day was meeting James and Katie from New Forest National Park Authority to take them around the site and see what projects we can get their volunteers involved in in the New Year. It turns out there are soooo many different things in the grounds which their volunteers might be able to help with, from ensure that we know what flora we have, helping us remove anything that shouldn't be there and encourage anything that should be to thrive. We're also hoping that they might be able to help us out with some new fencing and giving some love to some of the natural hedgerows and fencing which have been let go a bit - they've got such a great knowledge bank to help us out and we're really excited to see where the project goes in the future.

We're doing our best to schedule in our willing volunteers to help us get things done and we're looking forwards to getting started on outside works soon too, as we've mostly had to be focussing on indoor tasks for the first few weeks.

In other news, Little Skip is also 2/3rds full!

On site with our volunteer Magician Electrician tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 23 - The Foxlease Park magic strikes again!

Thu, 12 Dec 2024 20:55:00 GMT

Day 23 - The Foxlease Park magic strikes again!

The Foxlease Park magic strikes again as we discovered today that THE TUMBLE DRYER SINGS TOO!! We're not sure if it always knew, or if The Singing Washing Machine's been teaching it, but either way our very busy Laundry is now delightfully tuneful!

We have to share our particular thanks to our volunteers Steph and Carole today who we pounced on to jump to work as they literally drove up the drive due to an urgent need to finish cleaning one area of the site before some contractors arrived, when they had just arrived about four hours earlier than we were hoping. They cleaned for us like absolute champions and full credit to them and to all of the wonderful volunteers who have helped us meet our deadline over the last week and a bit. Time stops for no foxie!

Shredder the shredder, newly arrived from the Amazon has been hard at work all day in the office keeping us on top of our confidential waste and nice and GDPR compliant. We've also had lots of meetings about exciting future opportunities and booking queries which we're working our way through.

Volunteer Gordon has renamed The Barn "ivy point" at the moment due to the challenge of clearing the highest peak of the roof but that'll only be temporary. Otherwise, he's cleared everything within reach single-handedly and the difference around the whole building is immense! We were also lucky he was on site today for round 2 of the lock negotiations from yesterday; as it turned out being more forceful was the answer and there was a true "ta-da!" moment as he burst out of the door having got it to move.

Back tomorrow for another verse (we might ask The Singing Tumble Dryer if it knows any carols), Love Foxie x

Day 22 - The day Foxie trailed all over site and Henrietta got a workout.

Wed, 11 Dec 2024 22:38:51 GMT

Day 22 - The day Foxie trailed all over site and Henrietta got a workout.

No alarms this morning, which was excellent news, but an exceptionally busy day for our onsite team.

Lots of office-based progress in the morning, responding to bookings enquiries, administrative applications and "claiming" ownership of various sites...watch this space for a wholly new trip advisor site page in the New Year and alongside that we had two hardworking volunteers putting Henrietta the hoover to work (you might think we mean Hetty, but you'd be wrong as Foxlease Park's Hetty is a mashup of a Hetty with a Henry hat and is affectionately now known as Henrietta to their friends - possibly Lady Henrietta in formal settings but we've not asked).

Our on site Foxie's IT Team defeated the stubborn printer which was masquerading as a photocopier only up to now as it didn't want to connect to print anything and after much effort and negotiation, and a bit of time for it to consider its position whilst Iain went and sealed the Laundry Room sink for us, the printer graciously agreed to print things (Iain - 1; stubborn printer - 0) - fingers crossed it's still in the mood to print things tomorrow.

We've shared some before and after pictures of the vestibule/boot room/entry lobby to the side of Foxlease House which looks 1000 times better already and it's only had a first pass at floor level and a good tidy up! We've got some mould and damp treatment still to do and some further deep cleaning but we're pleased to say the boots are now on the rack, the chairs look ready to be sat on and the outside is back outside where it belongs, rather than inside! We've also shared an after picture of the amazing progress in one of the offices, which also gave Henrietta a work out, along with some grime-removal and elbow grease to get it looking nice and clean again as a usable space for us.

Some of our new barriers arrived courtesy of volunteer Tony, who very kindly also looked at a lock problem we were having to help us out and work out what was needed.

We spent a few hours this afternoon walking the site with our tree advisor and identifying more management that will be needed so that we can get those things in before the start of our phased opening next year. Darragh had done a bit more damage around the edges of the site than just the big tree on Apple Trees pictured yesterday, but we have the start of a plan to resolve it and may just need to call on some of our volunteers who previously offered fencing as being in their skill set (not the kind with swords, obviously). The really lovely thing to see, aside from the deer criss-crossing the site every so often to find a space we weren't, was how clearly you can see the trails which they have been following regularly if you look (see photo of one of them). To the untrained (or tired) eye they look a bit like lines of mud in the grass but when you look closer (after your forest expert points it out) you can see lots of little hoof prints where they have been playing follow-the-leader around the site.

More trails tomorrow, or certainly more mud, Love Foxie x

Day 21 - An alarmingly tree-mendous day for Foxie.

Tue, 10 Dec 2024 21:15:12 GMT

Day 21 - An alarmingly tree-mendous day for Foxie.

We started the day with an activation to our fire alarm panel in Foxlease House, which resulted in consistent and persistent pre-alarm warning beeps. The nice engineer was called and checked everything over and gave us the all-clear but apparently the sensors don't like being chilly, dusty or damp (a bit like Foxie) and so sometimes get a bit temperamental - it's a good thing that sorting the heating was already on our to do list as soon as possible!

With that resolved, our wonderful cohort of volunteers arrived and helped us with some exterior and interior cleaning and landscaping at the top of the site and the difference a day of hard work from a great team makes is amazing! With morning tasks completed, some of the team then moved on to cleaning in the ground floor of The Lodge and in some minor fixing details in The Accessible Suite - the blind in the front room is now the right way around, which is excellent.

The other highlight of this morning was seeing the departure of Big Skip, which was so well filled from the work last week it lifted the lorry's front tyres off the floor to about knee level (depending on how tall you are) when it was loaded!. Thankfully, the skip man in his festive santa hat seemed unconcerned and Big Skip exited the site, leaving only Baby Skip (now half-full) behind.

The Rug Doctor got a further work out and made excellent progress with another set of carpets looking beautifully clean - then further persistent beeping arrived, but this time from a flat battery in a carbon monoxide detector with a glued in irreplaceable battery and after it annoyed everyone for a bit, our volunteers Gill and Peter made it their mission to silence it, which they achieved effectively we are pleased to say.

Since the weekend we've also identified a tree that needs to be removed next to our Apple Trees campsite (thanks Darragh) and the first of our tree advisers came to site to take a look for us so that we can schedule the removal of the fallen tree, currently safely taped off, before we welcome campers to the site next year when we open. Apple Trees hasn't seen a spike in bookings popularity yet, but we're expecting it might at some point as it is one of our lovely enclosed campsites.

The tree-mendous (excuse the pun) part of the day, aside from the tree shenanigans above, was seeing that our google listing has updated so Foxie will now always be able to find his way home (using Google Maps...other providers are available) as we are officially labelled Foxlease Park!

We wrapped up the day with our first on site Trustee meeting this evening in our new, if still a little bit chilly, home, turning our Site Office into a Board Room for the evening.

Final checks on some of the buildings tomorrow and fingers (paws) crossed that The Lodge is nearly at the next stage, Love Foxie x

Day 20 - When Foxie peeled back the layers (of mud!).

Mon, 09 Dec 2024 21:35:26 GMT

Day 20 - When Foxie peeled back the layers (of mud!).

We had another larger cohort of volunteers on site today, some returners and some new, and some volunteering as a family! As ever, all were kitted out and sent to tasks from today's list after a stop by Mt. PPE for some high vis and other bits, and Mt. Cleaning for supplies.

We had amazing work going on at both ends of the site - the boiler works in The Barn continue, the site was a hive of cleaning and clearing, as we attempt to fill Baby Skip too (which, oddly, is taking longer than it did to fill Big Skip!), The Gatehouse had a further scrubbing and oh my goodness, the comparison photos of the front door to The Gatehouse show how much "peeling back the layers" really isn't an understatement - it's gleaming white again, thanks to our fantastic team working there today!

We also have to mention the workout one of our volunteers gave The Rug Doctor on the carpets in The Gatehouse too, which smell SO much better already! She cleaned so many for us that we suspect The Rug Doctor might complain of overwork tomorrow.

We had the office going full steam ahead too, with bookings, volunteer coordination and also a bit of laundry action - as one of the warmer rooms in Foxlease House at the moment, the Site Office is also the main drying space for some of the clean curtains and cushions (we don't let Foxie recline for long though - too much to do!). The Laundry Room activity kept the Singing Washing Machine very busy as we move on to the next building-worth of curtains, ready for drying, ironing and mending over the coming weeks from some of our other volunteers.

Another busy day and good progress so far - we've got good prospects on the horizon for a friendly roofer to fix our problem in The Coach House and for the replacement window glass we needed. We've also started to look at further grant applications to try to fund some of the bigger things we have on the agenda, although in the short-term the focus is on getting bookings in to support the site's running costs.

More cleaning and clearing tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 19 - Foxlease Park (foliage) on tour (or when Foxie went wreath-making).

Sun, 08 Dec 2024 19:49:48 GMT

Day 19 - Foxlease Park (foliage) on tour (or when Foxie went wreath-making).

It was still very windy on site today, but thankfully a volunteer-light day so no plans were interrupted. A site check suggests that Storm Darragh may have done some minor tree damage to a couples of the smaller trees on site but nothing unmanageable based on current checks. We'll be able to do a proper site check when Darragh has left (hopefully soon!).

All quiet on the laundry room front, but we've warned the Singing Washing Machine to prepare itself for more loads of curtains next week and more arrivals due to add to the Amazon Mountain - we're expecting lots of volunteers on site tomorrow so we're hoping to be back to busy business as usual from then. We spent a small part of today installing our wonderful new microwaves and toasters into their new homes and logging them in our testing register.

This afternoon was the last of the wreath-making workshops run to fundraise for us by one of our fabulous volunteers and it was great! Foxie got stuck in along with a room full of supporters who came away with the own Christmas wreath. It wasn't on site, unfortunately, but the wreaths were made using genuine Foxlease Park foliage, the real deal, collected by April despite the disgusting rainy weather this week!

We can't wait to start planning workshop days and afternoons on site next year when the relevant spaces are open again. We've got some plans of our own, but if there are things you think would be good to see and which might interest the wider community to book on to in order to help us raise some much needed funds, then Foxie would love to hear your suggestions in the comments.

Ready to wave goodbye to the (probably now waterlogged) Big Skip tomorrow, love Foxie x

Day 18 - The day when Foxie nearly blew away (or when Storm Darragh arrived).

Sat, 07 Dec 2024 22:05:48 GMT

Day 18 - The day when Foxie nearly blew away (or when Storm Darragh arrived).

Storm Darragh kept some of our volunteers away today as it was very blustery on site but a couple of our volunteers soldiered through the weather and spent the day on further cleaning and putting The Rug Doctor to work in The Gatehouse to make it lovely and fresh and dust/dirt free for our overnight volunteers.

We spent the morning contacting more of our volunteer enquiries to start getting people scheduled in for January and over the December period - we've got so much to do before the start of our phased opening in February we don't have any time to lose!

The Foxie Team tried hard not to get too blown away as they moved around the site (see photos) - we didn't have any tree issues identified whilst we were on site but we'll need to do a further site walk after the storm to check for any problems. The great news is that we've had a number of offers from professionals in the tree surgery and tree advisory profession who we'll be able to call on to assist us with management of the wonderful trees on site.

We've had lots of preparations for the second wreath workshop tomorrow being run by one of our volunteers going on today and we've also announced the dates for the second Foxie's 24-Hour Sing fundraiser event, taking place in January, run by more of our volunteers.

We've got lots of volunteers scheduled in for Monday and Tuesday so we hope that The Gatehouse and the Lodge might be nearly ready, save for decoration and repairs, by the end of next week.

More planning tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 17 - Oh crumbs! (or when Foxie let them eat biscuits!)

Fri, 06 Dec 2024 18:46:50 GMT

Day 17 - Oh crumbs! (or when Foxie let them eat biscuits!)

Our volunteers on site today were mostly office-based and fuelled by the first packet of lovely biscuits donated to us for our volunteers, along with some other key supplies, by the Rotary Club of Southampton Magna - they were gratefully received and, based on the size of the box, will keep our wonderful volunteers fuelled for some time!

Our Foxie's IT Team had a number of wins today - we've got wi-fi outside of the cellar and a printer which also allows for remote printing. We've also had some wonderful offers of support for the Foxie's IT Team and look like we'll be in a good place to get our final office arrangements set up in the New Year.

We had lots of admin going on on site to catch up and to make sure we've told everyone that Foxlease Park is now Foxlease Park! We've also got lots of booking queries coming in by email which we're hoping will convert soon into bookings in our calendar.

The boiler works are continuing in The Barn with great progress towards cozy-town being made!

In other parts of the site there was great progress being made on sorting and shifting - so much so that the big skip (which only arrived yesterday) is already full and being collected again next week thanks to great work by our hard-working team.

More action from The Rug Doctor tomorrow now that its had a few days of rest, Love Foxie x

Day 16 - Foxie's big skip into being corporate, voluntarily.

Thu, 05 Dec 2024 19:42:01 GMT

Day 16 - Foxie's big skip into being corporate, voluntarily.

It was so nice to see The Accessible Suite back in occupation with glowing lights in the early morning on site - it has some final bits to finish off and a window to replace but then it should be back to fighting fitness. Today one of our volunteers who has been working hard on the project for us donated and fitted replacement net curtains and they look amazing - we'll take a photo soon.

After an early start on site to wait for the internet installer and the arrival of the big skip, and we mean BIG, typically, everything happened all at once and the skip arrived shortly before the installer and our large group of volunteers, which was a bit frantic. We now have a connection to broadband on site....but you can only use it if you sit in the cellar at the moment until we sort the further kit needed to spread the signal further - the cellar's a great place for hide and seek, but not so good as an office space in its current form so we'll be managing without the wifi for now until we get that finalised.

We had a number of returner volunteers on site today, who have assisted us previously and it is lovely to have people coming back again and again - we're very grateful. More pressure washer action at the side of Foxlease House and you can see the light colour returning and the sludge receding in the progress photograph.

We also had a wonderful group from Aviva who were our first corporate volunteers site, using some of their company volunteering hours to help us out and they were AMAZING! High Vis on and a quick stop by Mt. Cleaning and Mt. PPE to get kitted out and the big skip got some serious action, they scrubbed and cleaned from top to bottom for us all day, with only a very short pause for lunch. We managed to give them a short walk round some of Foxlease House before it got fully dark, even though it's a bit closed up and not at full levels of shiny at the moment, and showed them The Gold Room and the South Africa balcony, with time for a little photo after they'd admired the beautiful view. We've had a few more corporate volunteering offers which we'll be booking in as soon as we can, along with all of our non-corporate volunteering offers. We're trying to schedule people in between now and the New Year at the moment as a priority to get boots on site and in action and we'll then turn to the New Year offers.

We've decreased Mt. Bedlinen (current remainder in photos) but only because we've started to use some of the bedding which has arrived in The Accessible Suite and it is lovely and soft! We think the singing washing machine's plumbing has been fixed and probably will be an improvement to the damp problem in that set of rooms as we think the previous washing machine had been leaking into the the wall for a while so, fingers (and paws) crossed, the dehumidifiers will be able to do their thing successfully!

Hoping for drier times tomorrow for more outdoor progress, Love Foxie x

Day 15 - When Foxie labelled everything (including Foxie).

Wed, 04 Dec 2024 21:10:32 GMT

Day 15 - When Foxie labelled everything (including Foxie).

Less volunteers on site today, but no less work taking place!

We had a big clear out of some of the former office spaces to restore order and labelled lots of shelves (and Foxie!) to help us develop storage systems which work for our current needs. The bookings system is still going strong and we've hit over 50 bookings in our first week, which is amazing! We hope there are lots more to come.

One of our volunteers has been clearing drains and cutting back associated overgrowth behind The Barn, which is really needed to preserve the integrity of the building and to ensure drainage flow for the winter months is good to avoid any damage. The before and after progress so far is in the photos, with more to come soon.

With assistance from our volunteers, we have removed the cardboard from the Amazon Mountain to be recycled, other than what we've recycled ourselves by using it for our own shop orders. It's much smaller for now but we suspect based on the purchase history of the Wishlist that more is on its way soon!

The leaky laundry room sink has been repaired, with just sealant to dry, and fingers crossed that it will be back in full action soon with some shiny new tiles. It did cause our volunteer a tricky time when what looked like 2 tiles to be replaced turned into 5 when the others popped off as he started work, but Foxlease House has always had a mind of its own! All re-grouted now and in place drying ready for more sealant later this week. The Rug Doctor was in better spirits and we gave it a rest but the singing washing machine also needs a minor plumbing repair on the outflow pipe, so perhaps we are working both too hard!

Our volunteers also started work pressure washing at the side of Foxlease House and the layers of mud which that removed were immensely satisfying to see - with the ground underneath an entirely different colour (see photos)! More progress on that tomorrow.

Our Accessible Suite has been measured for new net curtains, arriving soon and when showing round some contractors this morning we took a little pit stop on a special balcony which most of you will know well to take a photo of the view.

We also received our second parcel which precedes our broadband installer's arrival tomorrow so that we can get Foxie's Team online on site, allowing some of our processes to go digital.

Big skip and broadband both expected in the morning, Love Foxie x

Day 14 - The day Foxie reached new heights (and depths of cleaning) and when Mt. Bedlinen arrived.

Tue, 03 Dec 2024 22:21:01 GMT

Day 14 - The day Foxie reached new heights (and depths of cleaning) and when Mt. Bedlinen arrived.

We're officially two weeks in and just under 11 weeks to go until we re-open....Aaaaah! in all the ways!

Terrifyingly close to our next step on one level, with time whizzing by fast, and on the other, SO exciting that we've come so far in the last 10 weeks. Our Teams on site are making great progress; the contractors (with no further grass issues from today's delivery) are still working hard to get The Barn to the toasty warm state we want it to be in when we re-open and are due to be on site for at least the next few weeks.

We started the day thinking we'd overworked the singing washing machine as it was sat in a puddle, which turned out to be The Rug Doctor having a bit of a leaky moment (perhaps also due to overwork!) but that is hopefully now resolved. We had lots of fantastic offers of support today in lots of different ways to help us with some of the practical issues we've encountered. - we've had a very kind offer of glass donation for the cracked window in The Accessible Suite (Ali Mac) and we've found a volunteer to fit it. We've had other offers to assist with discounted rates on things like some of our waste removal and if we call out with a problem our fabulous supporters are there with suggestions and connections to try to help us out - it's just amazing and we're so grateful for our Foxie's Family!

Mt. Bedlinen joined the Amazon Mountain Range this week, as did Mt. Microwave, with two nice and new for The Lodge and The Accessible Suite and others still on the list to replace our other needs. Our fantastic volunteers did a further deep clean of The Accessible Suite and replaced the shower fittings and donned gloves for some serious descaling action in the Suite's bathroom - shiny results awaited tomorrow....

Foxie and the Team reached new heights inside The Lodge, where another six of our volunteers worked hard to deep clean the top floor of the building, right down to cleaning every hole in the bannisters! We just need to move The Rug Doctor in to the house (The Lodge), when it's in a better mood, and it should be sparkling clean, leaving us 11 weeks to complete any repairs and redecoration needed. We still need to source some new white goods for some of the kitchen spaces but the progress in that building, inside and out, is looking great. The floor was clean enough outside following yesterday's cleaning for Foxie to sit on without a speck (see photo) and we haven't really hit the outside hard yet, that's still to come.

We've got a giant skip arriving on Thursday to clear away some of the rubbish in storage on site and in various buildings and we're hoping that the groups later this week will help us clear what we need to and will either finish the deep clean of The Lodge and/or the first clean of The Coach House. We're also on the hunt now to find a friendly roofer who can assist us with repairing some tiles on the roof of The Coach House so that we can get that repaired before the winter really hits and/or more rain arrives as it's a bit leaky at the moment and we have to remember to empty the bucket when it rains - we're doing ok so far, but it would be good to have one less thing to remember on the list!

We'll let you know if The Rug Doctor is in a better mood tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 13 - Contractor Chaos and Foxie-sized high visibility clothing.

Mon, 02 Dec 2024 21:00:29 GMT

Day 13 - Contractor Chaos and Foxie-sized high visibility clothing.

It was a very busy day on site today with our highest number of volunteers in one day yet and, in a very exciting turn of events, the contractors arrived on site to start work on the heating and plumbing in The Barn - we can't wait for them to be done so that it is nice and cosy again!

Despite the best laid scheduling plans, everyone arrived at once on site, which would have been fine save for the contractor's third party delivery supplier deciding his van couldn't possibly drive through a puddle and instead getting it stuck on the grass in front of The Barn....(RIP grass for now). He was then stuck there for some time as Foxie wasn't in a position to be extracting him and the contractors weren't either, having many hours of heating works to do, and so he had to phone a friend for help. We're pleased to report he is now, presumably, ruining someone else's grass somewhere else following his departure, but at least he delivered the parts needed.

Alongside that minor chaos, we also had an arranged pest control visit to help us ensure that any unwanted little friends on site stay where they should be and not where they shouldn't and the estate agents looking to quote for our three properties arrived too - truly the most people on site Foxlease Park has seen so far since our ownership, and the most vehicles!

In practical progress news (although The Barn's heating is both important and a significant piece of work) Foxie donned high vis along with our fantastic on site volunteers today and they spent a morning working hard clearing the leaves and debris from around The Lodge and pressure-washing the path to ensure that it safe and that the access is clear and the progress looks amazing compared to the previously slime-covered path which was slippery enough in grippy hiking boots that it may as well have been an ice rink!

The contents of The Barn kitchen have been washed by our volunteer twins and returned shiny and clean and ready to be put back in cupboards once they are also cleaned following the current contractor works.

On the administrative side, the team have also been busy making lots of calls to obtain quotes for some of the other things needed soon, including waste disposal and, my goodness, is it expensive! We think we've found a solution to help us out with some local partners for general waste clearance but the cost of disposing of old mattresses and upholstery due to the current legislation is huge so unfortunately a rather large cost for us to manage.

As ever, the weather on site today was interesting and we had Foxie's First Rainbow! (see photo)

No further update on the Amazon Mountain range but we think Mt. Microwave will be arriving soon!

More busy times tomorrow, but hopefully less contractor chaos, Love Foxie x

Day 12 - Foxie's Winter Fair and lanterns to light the way.

Sun, 01 Dec 2024 18:36:17 GMT

Day 12 - Foxie's Winter Fair and lanterns to light the way. 

We had less volunteers on site today as the majority were committed to either assiting at or attending our Foxie's Winter Fair - so we took the time to restore some order ready for the busy week to come, both in terms of paperwork and everything else!

We're starting to get some good systems in place for our volunteer processes, which have been tested by our week 1 volunteers, and the Amazon Mountain Range now has a wonderful supply of the things we need for them to get to work (Mt. Cleaning and Mt. PPE in particular).

We've also got to grips (we think) with what lives where in our many, many key cabinets so we're hoping next week might involve a few less accidental extra steps.

We're expecting our first Corporate Volunteering Group later next week so we'll let you know how that goes and we're planning a project for them to work on for us during their day at site.

Although Foxlease House is lower down our list for reopening due to the long list we have to work through, we're working hard to make sure it has the love it needs to keep it safe over the winter as it gets colder. We're making use of the ground floor shutters for a number of reasons and they will be the focus of some careful attention in the coming weeks to restore them back to good working order (and to relocate the vast number of little spiders who've been living in them to happier homes).

We've also taken down the lanterns from the front of the house to give them a good clean and refresh and to restore them to working order over the next few weeks (more spiders to relocate from there too!).

We then dashed off to the Foxie's Winter Fair at the Community Centre where our supporters turned out in droves for us to buy, donate, sign up and support us.

Ever grateful, more on site tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 11 - When Foxie saw double and the return of the magician electrician!

Sat, 30 Nov 2024 23:44:50 GMT

Day 11 - When Foxie saw double and the return of the magician electrician!

Our plans for more work outdoors were quashed by the weather today, which was a damp and humid day at Foxlease Park.

We had twins volunteering on site all day and they did a spectacular job helping us inventory the works needed to The Barn and the furniture and then clearing The Barn kitchen this afternoon ready for the work to the boiler in there to start over the next couple of weeks. We're looking forward to The Barn being cosy again soon ready for visitors next year!

The singing washing machine churned through some more curtains from The Lodge and we had our friendly local carpenter/joiner on site to help us with securing some parts of the site.

Our magician electrician also returned to site for a full day and did an amazing job for us capping off the old reading lamps in the Accessible Suite, replacing one of our external lights that wasn't working, fixing some lighting circuits and working on a very special repair job for us which we can't wait to share soon when it's complete!

This evening Foxie was on the streets of Lyndhurst with some of our wonderful Trustees and Volunteers for the Christmas Lights Switch on and enjoyed the fireworks, whilst others finalised preparations for our Foxie's Winter Fair tomorrow - we're grateful to the wonderful twins for giving us their time at both ends of the day.

Looking forwards to Winter Fair Fun tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 10 - When the path became clearer and the great planter round-up!

Fri, 29 Nov 2024 19:07:50 GMT

Day 10 - When the path became clearer and the great planter round-up!

We took advantage of the sun today to dry some of the curtains in the sun outside during the time it was out and Andy our volunteer boiler expert returned for further investigations (we're getting there)!

We had less external volunteers on site but more trustees and committee members working hard to finish some of the jobs started this week. The fraying carpet in the Accessible Suite had a haircut with scissors to tidy it up and The Rug Doctor made a return visit for part 2 of the carpet cleaning needed to finish that. We've added new sheets to the Amazon Wishlist to make sure the Accessible Suite is fully kitted out to welcome more overnight volunteers when we reach that point. The singing washing machine continues to work hard.

We took a walk round the outside of Foxlease House to check on some window fixings today too and identified a small broken pane for repair, which we'll try to arrange soon - it was a good chance to take pictures from the back of the house though. Other action was mostly outside today, with a further cut of The Walled Garden space which smelled lovely (sadly we can't bottle it for you!) and also efforts to corral the planters and pots from around the site so that we can give them some TLC and clear out the dead plants to make them nice and fresh again. There was also considerable effort made to cut back, cut out and clear the pathway round the side of Foxlease House to The Sundial Garden and the rear entrance to The Accessible Suite, more photos tomorrow when we finish that off! No photos of the foxie crew today unfortunately - it wouldn't have been safe for them to ride along with the outdoor action.

Two of our supporters who are running a wreath-making workshop on Sunday came by this afternoon to collect some genuine Foxlease Park foliage to use during the workshop - it doesn't get more authentic than that and it's the second best thing to being here! We hope that next year we'll be able to offer similar workshops on site but for now we understand that there are still some spaces on the 1st December AM workshop and that the workshop the following week on 8th December is very nearly full, which is amazing!

Weather permitting, more outdoor progress tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 9 - Oh deer! (or the day of 100,000 steps).

Thu, 28 Nov 2024 21:02:23 GMT

Day 9 - Oh deer! (or the day of 100,000 steps).

It was a frosty morning today at Foxlease Park and we started the day talking a walk to remove the spare signage and the chair at the main gate to make things a bit tidier. Foxie stopped by an icy puddle on the drive, briefly considered ice skating, and decided against it, and then paused to wave at the deer relaxing in the neighbour's field (see photos).

The day stayed sunny, although very chilly, which meant the team were able to pull everything out of the laundry and give it a good clean - the Amazon mountain range, Mt. cleaning in particular, was stowed safely on the shelves, and we only discovered one leaking pipe during the clean up process, with plans in place to resolve that soon and a temporary fix (including a well-placed bowl) in the meantime.

Today's winning item on the daily scavenger hunt was lightbulbs (they're in the cellar, in case we ask in the future!) and some of the team spent a large portion of the day doing a few thousand steps more than were strictly necessary across the site due to key-related confusion, either taking the wrong key or not taking the right one...which, although they sound the similar, are not the same mistake.

The volunteer team were sustained in their hard work and many steps by a delicious banana and chocolate chip loaf cake, with more left for tomorrow (our thanks to Jocelyn's star baker at home!). There was also lots of computer-based activity and administrative sorting going on in the Site Office, with one of our volunteers sorting through our inherited paperwork to ensure that we know what we have and to tell us what we don't know we don't know.

By the end of the day we'd identified some more jobs for the list, finished cleaning the stairs near the site office with The Rug Doctor and finished cleaning and sorting the Accessible Suite. We found the shorter cycle on the singing washing machine and have a large number of curtains from The Lodge drying on frames in the Site Office - we've managed to convince the foxie crew not to make a blanket/curtain fort so far, but no promises for tomorrow!

More order restored tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 8 - Foxie's First Post, as one door closes another one opens and shiny new toilet seats!

Wed, 27 Nov 2024 21:47:28 GMT

Day 8 - Foxie's First Post, as one door closes another one opens and shiny new toilet seats!

We checked the post box this morning and it was so exciting to find that we'd received our first post at Foxlease Park - and it wasn't a bill! It was a parcel from some of our supporters on the Island to keep our volunteers going. We're still carefully managing where our deliveries go, and taking donations to several different locations, but it was lovely to see post addressed to us in our new home.

We had some unexpected jobs on site this morning when one of the wooden doors decided that the damp didn't agree with it and was stuck closed....and remained that way despite all attempts to open it ranging from Emma asking it nicely to Iain giving it a solid kick. In the end we had to go a bit heavy duty on the situation and remove one of the panelled up walls over a pre-existing door to give us another entrance to the room, which then allowed us to open the stuck door and resolve the issue. The panel removed was in the longer term plan to come out in any case, just not quite yet! So, although unexpected, it was nice to be making some of the changes planned to move the site towards how we want it to be when we start to re-open next year.

The singing washing machine had its first rodeo with the curtains from the Accessible Suite and while they did end up being lovely and clean, it took a little longer than Hazel and Foxie planned due to the washing machine's rather unexpectedly lengthy ECO setting. When they checked in to see progress, they realised there were still some hours to go. We'll be checking the settings before the next load to make sure that we're not still washing curtains for the first time next Christmas!

Our fantastic volunteers today cleaned The Gatehouse for us and made great progress. Andy the boiler expert returned to continue his systems appraisal and instructions and we're making progress (although one of the thermostats thinks its in the Caribbean at the moment, which isn't ideal). We also fitted the first of the shiny new toilet seats from the Amazon mountain range of deliveries and it looks lovely and white and bright.

In wildlife update terms, the paths are slippery from the rain and the path has turned into the River Foxie, the blackbirds were having a lovely bath in the giant puddle in front of The Barn.

More things to clean tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 7 - The curtains fall on another day for Foxie's Team.

Tue, 26 Nov 2024 20:47:18 GMT

Day 7 - The curtains fall on another day for Foxie's Team.

Another sunny day on site and our first day with a larger volunteer team. Once we'd managed to navigate site access to let them in.... (updated temporary signage now in place) our six volunteers arrived for the day and had their health and safety induction, signed their lives away in our Volunteer Agreements and donned High Visibility Jackets for the, slightly slippery, walk over to The Lodge. They made fantastic progress for us through the course of the day inventorying the contents of The Lodge, upstairs and downstairs, and logging for us things which need particular attention during the next phase of The Lodge's works, cleaning and repairing things.

The site is covered in lots of leaves at the moment, so they are on the list to clear when we next have an outside team on site and the mossy paths are to be cleaned when our pressure washer arrives, hopefully in the next couple of weeks.

Our Volunteer Coordinator Team has been very busy responding to offers of support, with a number of corporate Volunteering groups ready to come and help us out in the New Year, along with many wonderful individual supporters offering us their time.

No more mud buckets today but the recent wet weather made for some muddy boots on site and we spotted some lovely deer strolling about on Nightingale campsite (formerly Henry Knight) when we were locking up the store (see photo - you might need to zoom) - we'll have to break the news to them soon that their quiet days are about to becoming a lot louder from February as we're thrilled to say that bookings are climbing steadily!

Foxie ended the day having a little rest on The Lodge's curtains which are piled-up ready for washing in the new singing washing machine later this week - we'll let you know what tune it sings us this time...we suspect it doesn't know "Somewhere there's a forest", but perhaps the Foxlease Singing Circle can teach it when they are back next year....

More cleaning action tomorrow, some repairs and final preparations for our raffle draw and Lyndhurst event on Sunday, Love Foxie x

Day 6 - The end of the countdown, Foxie's first volunteer and the bucket of mud.

Mon, 25 Nov 2024 21:06:36 GMT

Day 6 - The end of the countdown, Foxie's first volunteer and the bucket of mud.

There was lots going on today at Foxlease Park. The Foxie Crew (and the Team in the background) were prepping final steps for the end of the bookings countdown launch this morning and the system went live as planned....or at the most a minute later than planned as the telephone rang as we needed to click the go live button. Our hugest thanks possible to Alison, Zoe and Iain who have moved the earth and spent more hours collectively than we want to think about counting over the last couple of weeks to ensure that our system was ready to go as planned for all of you lovely people wanting to book. We're really pleased with the steady number of bookings we've received on the first day of launch and we're hoping for lots more over the next few days and beyond now that we're live.

In the midst of the go-live launch our first non-trustee/committee member volunteer arrived and we're grateful for her patience as our volunteer guinea pig in advance of bigger numbers arriving tomorrow and ahead of the many more of you who we are in the process of scheduling in. Sue made friends with Henry (the hoover) and The Rug Doctor and between the three of them made very short work of cleaning what was the old staff lounge in the Main House - the photo evidence is in the slides (who knew that sofa was blue??!!). The furniture looks like you'd actually want to sit on it again, and the Foxie Crew did for the photograph - while The Rug Doctor has some more work to do on the carpets, the progress today is a huge tick off the list for that set of rooms.

Other cleaning progress was made elsewhere in the Main House (also by Sue, but a different one!) in the bar, where a thorough clean of the flooring produced a bucket of mud and a much lighter floor than we thought it was. We obviously knew all the floors would need cleaning but we suspect, based on today, that there might be some more mud-production/colour-change magic in our future when that occurs. As it turns out, the floor isn't lava at Foxlease Park, it's mostly mud!

In other news, sunny skies over the site all day, we still can't quite work the heating system (but lovely Andy the boiler expert dropped by this morning and is working on it for us) and the Amazon mountain range continues to grow!

More shiny surfaces expected tomorrow and more updates soon, Love Foxie x

Day 5 - An alarmingly windy weekend (or when Foxie met Bert).

Sun, 24 Nov 2024 20:31:45 GMT

Day 5 - An alarmingly windy weekend (or when Foxie met Bert).

For those of you who live far away from Hampshire, in hopefully drier places, Hampshire has been rather wet this weekend thanks to Storm Bert and rife with weather warnings for high winds and heavy rain all over the place. It's safe to say that Foxie and Team are not a big fan of Bert.

Much like the heating system (who'd believe we're only on day 5 of ownership; it already feels like forever that we've been waiting to learn how to adjust that!) our alarm system is also a new experience for us. It has an extensive zoning plan across Foxlease House and the other buildings with tonnes of sensors which, so far, are proving very sensitive...particularly to gusts of wind. The good news is that that means that Foxie's home is safe! The bad news...it means that between our three keyholding Trustees (and one wonderful locally-based committee member) they have all been conducting a bit of a juggling act for the last few days with responding to alerts on site in different buildings due to gusts at varying times of day and night - we're now excellent friends (on Foxie's behalf) with our alarm company, whose ability to sound chirpy and be helpful at 2am is nothing short of exceptional.

We've also had fun learning to agree walkie-talkie protocols. It seems obvious that if you've got a whole host of people using the same channel to communicate on a large site you'd have some kind of code to make it clear who you're trying to talk to but we didn't think of that until our toilet-fixing volunteer was interrupted at the crucial moment of the job with his head under the cistern for the second time when he thought a radio call was for him. and it wasn't.

We're looking forward to our first full week next week, with our first non-Trustee/Committee volunteer arriving onsite tomorrow to assist us, and a number more planned for later this week, with lots more to call.

We're looking forward to what this week's impromptu scavenger hunts for things might bring! It wasn't safe on site for little foxies today so we don't have an on site photo but the crew stayed warm and dry (see photo) and at least one of them will be back on site tomorrow to join our volunteers.

More soon, Love Foxie x

Day 4 - When Foxie climbed the Amazon Mountain.

Sat, 23 Nov 2024 18:58:37 GMT

Day 4 - When Foxie climbed the Amazon Mountain.

Today was a quieter day on site due to the weather outside and it being the first weekend - the theme of Foxie's first weather continued with Foxie's First Rainstorm.

Some of the Team braved the weather and spent time on site battening down the hatches to keep out the heavy rain and we're pleased to say the buildings are all warm and dry - partly because the lovely volunteer arriving to help us learn the heating panel controls isn't due on site until next week.

It did give us a good chance to sort out the absolutely amazing mountain of Amazon boxes which have been arriving daily to two of our Trustees - there were so many on Friday at one house that it looked a bit like an Amazon box barricade across the front door! The boxes aren't all on site just yet and we've added inventories and 'Thank you's!' to the to-do list for next week as there are so many to do, but seeing all the things we need start arriving so quickly from our wonderful supporters is just fantastic. The limescale remover spray in the Accessible Suite (Ali Mac) showers has been a godsend (we're likely to need alot more as we go as we've got lots of showers still to do!). We're also tracking some shiny new shower fittings which we can see are on their way to us at the moment.

Unfortunately fundraising today didn't go as planned as the weather and needs on site meant we were unable to attend Girlguiding Chandler's Ford's Christmas Event - we hope it went well without us and that they'll forgive us for not getting to this one.

Back to system testing and paperwork now so that we can let those who asked to know how they can book from Monday next week.

More soon, Love Foxie x

Day 3 - When Foxie met the magician electrician, The Rug Doctor and the measuring boots

Fri, 22 Nov 2024 21:10:36 GMT

Day 3 - When Foxie met the magician electrician, The Rug Doctor and the measuring boots

Our days at Foxlease Park so far have started with at least one volunteer going on a personal scavenger hunt (to which no one knows the answers) to try to find the thing we've realised we need and this morning was no different! The frozen snow melt from yesterday left us with lots of icy surfaces so we spent the start of the day hunting to see what grit supplies we had; the answer being....not enough...

Two of our Committee Members spent the majority of the day working hard to ensure that our interim booking system is ready for our go-live date on Monday next week. Although the site is very familiar to lots of us, there are so many details to be considered at every stage of every process and system we're putting in place from the ground up. The fire safety capacity of some of our spaces was the name of the game for part of the morning, which involved measuring different spaces around the site to calculate capacity - Foxie's newest unit of measurement is the size 5 measuring boot, each one in the pair a 30cm length from toe to heel, which proved handy when crunching around to measure the size of long spaces in the icy remains outside. We did also use the more standard tape measuring approach to doorway spaces, no two of which appear to be the same! Great progress was made and icy deer hoof prints discovered in the process, which was lovely.

Foxie also met The Rug Doctor, our newly assembled carpet cleaning marvel - we won't show you the colour of the water when the Doctor's work was done, as it wasn't pleasant, but it definitely made a visible difference to the test area of carpet cleaned in the Accessible Suite in the main house (known to many as Ali Mac). We're looking forward to more sparkling carpets appearing soon now that The Rug Doctor is ready for action!

Our afternoon ended with a different kind of Foxlease Park magic today when an initial call about his offer to volunteer with us to an electrician-skilled volunteer, who we're referring to as the electrician magician, resulted in him being available on site at EXACTLY the right time we were having an electrical issue we couldn't solve in one of the outbuildings - he appeared on site like an actual magician and very kindly gave us his time to help us resolve the issue. We definitely weren't going to manage that today without him as if he hadn't appeared we'd still be searching folders for the right schematic drawing to look at for clues.

Fundraising in Chandler's Ford tomorrow but more magic on site soon, Love Foxie x

Day 2 - Foxie's First Snow!

Thu, 21 Nov 2024 22:39:52 GMT

Day 2 - Foxie's First Snow!

We didn't expect to be announcing Foxie's First Snow so soon after Foxie's First Frost but today was the day and it was spectacular to see!

By the time the Day Team arrived on site the flurries were thick and starting to settle and by mid-morning the site had a beautiful white blanket of snow. The bonus to not having entirely figured out the complexities of our new heating system controls yet is that it was at least nice and warm (and in some smaller rooms perhaps a little too warm!). We made a few quick health and safety changes to Site Office first thing in view of the weather and updated the Amazon Wishlist with a some new things we identified we might need as a result and we were off for day 2 of Foxlease Park's revival.

The beautiful white blanket across the site meant that some of the outdoor things planned on our day list didn't happen, but we're nothing if not flexible at this point and our fantastic team rapidly turned to indoor tasks instead where possible. We particularly enjoyed the discovery that our new washing machine sang a rather long tune to us as it was setting itself up - it must be the Foxlease Park magic!

We made some new friends in the form of the very helpful contractors and service providers who stopped by to assist us with some set up and we've arranged more for the coming weeks....our fantastic Foxie's IT Team (which is mostly one amazing volunteer with endless patience) helped us to progress our migration to Microsoft and to negotiate with our new Broadband provider, all very necessary things.

In terms of our practical progress, we've managed to tick more of our initial cleaning off of our very long list and we're so excited that we've started progress towards cleaning and preparing some of the spaces in which we'll eventually be able to offer our volunteers from further afield a place to stay overnight.

And with all of that, Foxie still found time for a quick play in the snow before it started to disappear!

More tomorrow, Love Foxie x

Day 1 - Foxie's First Frost

Wed, 20 Nov 2024 21:49:59 GMT

Foxie's First Frost

Today marked the first full day of Foxie's Future's ownership of Foxlease Park and the sun was shining to welcome us back to our forest home!

A busy day of site set up for our hard working Trustees and Committee Team who were able to attend at short notice to help us clear our new "Site Office" and start working our way through the next set of our many lists charting our path to re-opening in February 2025.

The wildlife welcomed us back too, as always in the forest, with the deer who've been looking after things for us going on a few jaunts across the site across the main campsite fields, which were looking (and feeling!) crisp first thing this morning in the winter sun, and the robins and squirrels following us around as we began the great clear out and clean up of the first of the rooms.

After a busy first day, and lots of offers of volunteering pinging in through the day, the team on site were feeling positive as we called time on work for Day 1 - with a nice clean Site Office set up (including the all important kettle station) and working IT waiting for those arriving for Day 2 - we can't wait to see what Day 2 brings!

More soon, love Foxie x