The gods were smiling on Donabate on Saturday 14th March with blue skies and warm sun in time for the St Patricks Festival Parade, the first one in living memory I’m told. Active Age for All were delighted to take part and came equipped with a banner, placards and much enthusiasm. There was a great buzz in the village and the mood of both walkers and watchers was happy and excited to be part of a community coming together to have fun and celebrate our fabled saint.

The Active Age committee have been busy of late with some more activities to add to our programme in response to suggestions from the membership. These are:

*Give the Gym a Go: an 8 week course being held in the DPCC gym on Friday mornings from 11 to 12 with Gym instructor Ross. It is geared towards instructing participants on how to use the gym equipment safely and effectively.

*Intergenerational project, a 4 week pilot scheme with AAfA and the Transition Year students from Donabate Community School. A full report on this will be in the next issue.

*Cards, games, crafts & chat is an informal, relaxed session every Thursday from 2 to 4pm in the Portacabin in the community centre where members can play a variety of games, such as, cards, scrabble or chess while the crafters sew, knit and crochet, all whilst enjoying a tea/ coffee, biscuits and a chat.

*Computer course: a laptop housekeeping course which will be coming on stream in the near future, more news on this at a later date.