Stone Soup Kitchen Ministries

  Good morning to all of you! What a perfect weekend it was...a couple of those bonus days we get after the calendar ticks past official summer. I hope you all had a chance to get outside and enjoy it. Work on our entrance, damaged in the fire, is supposed to begin today. I've been told that it will be 2 weeks to finish it. In the meantime, we're still doing our workarounds on Fridays, and particularly on Saturdays. It will be good to have our entrance back and be able to put this behind us! In the meantime, work goes on! We received another delivery of homemade cookies from our wonderful bakers. Thank you to Laurie S, who organizes that every couple of weeks. I wish each of you who bake could be with us on a Saturday to see how much it means to people to receive such a symbol of love in their bread bags. If you are interested in baking occasionally, please email me back and I'll get you in touch with Laurie. We have other volunteer opportunities this fall...

  PLEASE NOTE: the only entrance to dinner tonight will be through the lower door on Washington Street. Please park in the Newton Street lot and walk up to the first blue door. Stone Soup Kitchen opens at 4 pm on Friday evenings, located in Shepherd of the Valley Church on Washington Street in Ayer. Dinner is open to ANYone who wants a good hot meal and some company...no need to bring anything but yourself unless you want to! From 4 to 5, we are open for those who want to get together and socialize in the dining room. The potluck dinner is available from 5 to 5:30 followed by dessert and our open support group, which runs from 5:30 to 6, if you'd like to stay for it after dinner. This week, the potluck will feature chicken parmesan, thanks to the Ayer Senior Center/COA, various sides, dessert, juice, coffee, and some extra snacks to take home for the weekend. Our food pantry is open every Saturday morning from 10 to noon, same location. Come to the parking lot on Cam...

  Good morning friends! Tonight starts Rosh Hashanah (literally the “head of the year”). It begins the period of the High Holy Days, which is a time of self-reflection and prayer, culminating in Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. It's traditional to eat things that are round and sweet for Rosh Hashanah, like apples with honey, figs, dates, and roasted chicken :-) Alright, chicken isn't exactly round, but with a honey glaze, it's found on our table each year! Before I can start to cook today, I have so many things to tell you about. I'll start with the wonderful Harmony + Hope Concert that our friends Margaret Phillips and Rebecca Strauss performed for us yesterday afternoon. It was an amazing event, with Margaret and Rebecca sharing stories about their instruments, the music, and themselves, encouraging everyone to ask questions and to interact with what they were playing. We can't thank them enough for giving us so much of their time and talents! There ar...

  PLEASE NOTE: the only entrance to dinner tonight will be through the lower door on Washington Street. Please park in the Newton Street lot and walk up to the first blue door. Stone Soup Kitchen opens at 4 pm on Friday evenings, located at Shepherd of the Valley Church on Washington Street in Ayer. Please park in the Newton Street lot and walk up to the first blue door on Washington Street. Dinner is open to ANYone who wants a good hot meal and some company...no need to bring anything but yourself unless you want to! From 4 to 5, we are open for those who want to get together and socialize in the dining room. The potluck dinner is available from 5 to 5:30 followed by dessert and our open support group, which runs from 5:30 to 6, if you'd like to stay for it after dinner. This week, the potluck will feature roast chicken with gravy, various sides, dessert, juice, coffee, and some extra snacks to take home for the weekend. Our food pantry is open every Saturday m...

  Good morning friends! What a beautiful weekend it was, and what an equally nice stretch of weather seems to be before us this week. Slowly but surely, things are getting set to rights in the kitchen and the pantry. We lost some more food and supplies last week during the professional cleanup, which was very unfortunate, but we're back to full operations now. Accessibility for the pantry is still a challenge right now, but as soon as our entrance and hallway are rebuilt or restored, things will be much better. It would be nice if everything could be finished yesterday, right? :-) I want to remind you about the concert coming up this Sunday, September 21 at 4:00 in the beautiful Shepherd of the Valley sanctuary (21 Washington Street, Ayer). This is a benefit for Stone Soup Kitchen, being performed by two professional Berklee Conservatory musicians. I have heard them, and they are, in a word...GREAT! Come enjoy an hour of wonderful music followed by some light refreshmen...

We are thrilled to be able to offer this free concert to our community! Harmony & Hope: Feeding Our Neighbors with Music Sunday, September 21 at 4:00 Shepherd of the Valley Lutheran Church 21 Washington Street, Ayer Please park in the lot off of Newton Street, and walk up Washington Street to the second blue door. The concert is free, but if you are able to make a donation to help support our dinners and pantry, we would be grateful.  

  PLEASE NOTE: the only entrance to dinner tonight will be through the lower door on Washington Street. Please park in the Newton Street lot and walk up to the first blue door. Stone Soup Kitchen opens at 4 pm on Friday evenings, located at Shepherd of the Valley Church on Washington Street in Ayer. Please park in the Newton Street lot and walk up to the first blue door on Washington Street. Dinner is open to ANYone who wants a good hot meal and some company...no need to bring anything but yourself unless you want to! From 4 to 5, we are open for those who want to get together and socialize in the dining room. The potluck dinner is available from 5 to 5:30 followed by dessert and our open support group, which runs from 5:30 to 6, if you'd like to stay for it after dinner. This week, the potluck will feature salisbury steak, various sides, dessert, juice, coffee, and some extra snacks to take home for the weekend. Our food pantry is open every Saturday morning from 10 to...

  Good morning! First an update about the fire: We were able to have dinner on Friday evening for our friends in the community, but we had to serve it out of electric pans and crock pots because the kitchen had not been cleaned up yet. On Saturday, we were able to have an open pantry session inside, but in the dining room because the big hall had not been cleaned up and was full of equipment. The smell of smoke is still pretty strong in some areas, but it's getting better. The entrance that we use is going to have to be rebuilt. We are anxious to have all of this mess be just a memory, but we're also aware that everything could have been so much worse. The Riverview Chamber Players are coming to perform a concert to support our dinner and pantry! A flyer is attached with all of the details, but basically, my friend Margaret Phillips, along with Rebecca Strauss, professional musicians at Berklee, will be performing duets of beautiful music in the sanctuary of Shep...

  ***PLEASE NOTE: due to fire damage, the only entrance to dinner tonight will be through the lower door on Washington Street. Please park in the Newton Street lot and walk up to the first blue door.*** Stone Soup Kitchen opens at 4 pm on Friday evenings, located at Shepherd of the Valley Church on Washington Street in Ayer. Dinner is open to ANYone who wants a good hot meal and some company...no need to bring anything but yourself unless you want to! From 4 to 5, we are open for those who want to get together and socialize in the dining room. The potluck dinner is available from 5 to 5:30 followed by dessert and our open support group, which runs from 5:30 to 6, if you'd like to stay for it after dinner. This week, the potluck will feature ham, mac 'n cheese, various sides, dessert, juice, coffee, and some extra snacks to take home for the weekend. Our food pantry is open every Saturday morning from 10 to noon, same location. Come to the parking lot on Cambridge Str...

  To all of you who worked, work, or will work hard to keep our nation running, Happy Labor Day! I just wanted to show you what we did on Saturday as a workaround for our fire damage, thanks to the beautiful weather! This week, we will be back inside, although some of our procedures will be different. I love you all!