Pat Yourself on the Back!

By now those of you who've donated via the Just Giving link on this blog or the various charity auctions at Malvern Spring Show should have received your gift book or garden maintenance kit. Thanks to all of you who've donated to the NGS: we raised over £700 when Gift Aid is taken into account, which is fantastic. I mentioned this to Joe Swift when I saw him at Hampton Court Show back in July and he enthusiastically added his thanks to you all :)

This is the final post for Meet @ Malvern for this year. Not only did we meet in the spring, but I know all kinds of sponaneous get togethers have been going on throughout the summer. I hope this will continue - actually I know it will as 25 of us are due to visit Highgrove on Thursday. It's been organised by Helen via Twitter, so must count as the ultimate in Tweetups!

Don't forget there's also Malvern Autumn Show at the end of September. We won't be having a massive gathering like we did in the spring, but I know of a few people who are already planning to be there, so I suspect a more informal meeting will happen :)

Will we get together again next year? I don't know yet, though I suspect an informal gathering will happen at the very least. If Meet @ Malvern convenes in 2011, then how we go about arranging it will have to be very different whilst also taking your feedback into account. This blog will continue to be a useful resource for people planning to attend no matter what.

So all that remains is to wish you well for the rest of 2010 and to ask you to give yourselves a pat on the back for a job well done ;)

Thanks For All Your Help & Be Our Guest

The great thing about organising something like Meet @ Malvern is how everyone in the blogging community gets stuck in and helps to make an event so much better. Helen and I have been overwhelmed with your response so far, both on here and on Twitter. There's a real buzz of excitement about our first bloggers' get together here in the UK and so many more of you are interested in coming than we ever imagined.

You've been great already by posting about Meet @ Malvern on your blogs which is really helping to spread the word. It means our transatlantic cousins in particular are watching us with interest. I'm imagining them with their faces pressed against the 'windows' of their computers longing to join us. I'd love them to be able to come to Malvern and who knows? Someone just might. But if they can't be with us for real, then I'd like them to join us in a virtual way. Tweeting during the event will help them to do so, as will posting both during and after the show. I'm also trying to think of other ways: perhaps they could send in a greeting and photo and we set up a virtual visitor's 'wall' at Malvern in some way. What do you think? Perhaps you have other idea(s) for us to consider?

This week has also seen the start of a series of guest posts planned to take us all the way from now up to the start of Malvern. We've had two of them already this week, from Happy Mouffetard and Anna, so I've started a blog list in the sidebar as a little way of saying thank you. As others join them, they'll be added to the list too. All next week there'll be a marvellous series of posts from Deb chronicling how Lola, her show garden, went from the drawing board to best border at last year's show.

If you have an idea for a guest post which would be suitable for this blog, then do get in touch at malvernmeet at gmail dot com with an outline of your idea. For example, you might be coming to the show for the first time. What are your expectations? How do you feel about the show or meeting your virtual friends? What else would you like to know? Would you mind writing a short piece for us? It'll help us to ensure we provide exactly the kind of event you'd like - as will any comments and questions you care to leave here, on Twitter or via email - and give you all the information you need in one handy place. If you'd prefer to write your post for your blog then that's fine: we could either post on both blogs or I can link to you.

Michelle
xxx