Fundraising shouldn’t be seen as a burden – the word ‘fundraising’ after all starts with FUN.   Enjoy, and do please fundraise as you feel naturally gifted.  Whether you want to host a coffee morning, run a quiz night, a raffle of promises, arrange a swimathon, or indeed climb a mountain or two (Scotland works well, Tanzania is great if you happen to like volcanoes) – but have fun.  For children it might be keeping quiet for minutes at a time which the adults might enjoy more than the children…!

Jumble sales can be time consuming but very profitable, table top sales are certainly much easier, and anything not wanted can often be collected by one of the growing teams of collectors who are looking to purchase rags for re-cycling.

Personally, I love writing multi-media quiz nights – invariably I start with subjects which really interest me from steam trains to 60’s music, from science fiction to classic TV humour. There are lots of books which can help, and the world-wide-web is full of good and daft ideas.  Don’t forget to include some local history questions, and always consider whose coming – ensuring you have enough questions that everyone can answer so people leave feeling they did alright on the night.   Teams can also mark each other which makes scoring nice and easy too.