Bank Holiday weekends are always a bit bonkers at the Oxford Mutual Aid food bank. After a busy and confusing Saturday shift last week we were crossing our fingers that today might be calmer, and it was...but only a little!

The produce was stacked high all over the hall and kitchen as there won't be any more food restocks until Tuesday, so there needed to be enough in to meet demand until then. The OMA whatsapp had been pinging away all morning, so we had an inkling that we were going to need to switch from a cleaning shift to a parcel packing team, and indeed that was the case. The morning team had been rushed off their feet preparing food parcels, and we took over with a dozen still to do. Unfazed, we set to work packing, adding a generous scatter of Easter eggs and hot cross buns as treats.

After an hour all the parcels were packed so Katie and Trev switched to restocking the shelves with tins, pasta, porridge and sauces, and Zoe tackled the bread and butter mountains in the kitchen. We counted 15 crates of bread, 4 sacks of pastries, and too much Utterly Butterly to keep a tally. Oxford residents will be carb-loading this weekend for sure!

No time for cleaning this week, but by the time we left everything was in fridges that needed to be, the hall shelves were replenished, food parcels were ready for the van, and the bins emptied.