Celf yn y Caffi are creative arts sessions that bring people from the Aber Valley together with the aim of promoting the use of the Welsh language. It will be aimed at all levels and abilities, including those with no previous experience but interest and curiosity about the Welsh language.
Here's a bit about the project:
In the first session we made little booklets for people to add our ‘Gair y Dydd’ into each week or just use in their every day life. One of our participants Jackie who started learning Welsh years ago when working as a Primary School teacher has recently started learning again with ‘Dysgu Cymraeg’ and her ‘Llyfr Cymraeg’ is almost full of useful sentences and interesting words she has picked up along the way.
The Oasis Coffee Shop where we host Celf yn y Caffi is run by one member of paid staff and the rest are volunteers. Some with learning disabilities. One volunteer Ifan went through Welsh medium education and prefers talking in Welsh to English. He joins us each week at the end of his shift to get creative and sgwrs yn gymraeg gyda ni.
On our field trip to National Botanical Garden Wales we visited The Calico Dress which is a celebration of the Welsh identity, language and culture. I took a little embroidery task inspired by the Calico Dress to do on the day and the Lead Artist Menna Buss came over and introduced herself to us to see what we were doing. She loved the sound of the project and wants to keep in touch about getting involved in the next phase of her project which would be making collaborative quilts in small community settings.
