Welcome to Long Eaton WI 2019.
Our final meeting of 2019 "A Taste of Christmas" was held at Springfield Hall in Sandiacre on Tuesday 3rd December. . It was a lovely venue and a perfect setting for our taste tests of mince pies, after dinner mints and crisps and a Christmas themed quiz. And the winners were: Aldi's mince pies beat Marks and Spencer and Lyons Poundland's After Dinner Mints beat After 8 and Marks and Spencer Marks and Spencer Crisps beat Aldi and Kettle Chips There was a great raffle with lots of prizes, a huge load of selection boxes and other goods donated for the Food Bank, birthday celebrations and a chance to sign up for the next pub quiz. We'll be back at The May Hall for our meetings in 2020, starting on Tuesday 7th January with Don't Fear the Smear. Doors will open at 7.30 pm for a 7.45 pm start. All welcome! Hope to see you there. In the meantime very best wishes for a Happy Christmas and New Year.
Tuesday 5th November was our Craft Dabble evening with a brilliant selection of crafts to try. Felt flowers, beaded snowflakes, a fabric wreath, paper flowers, Christmas tree brooches and decorations, poppies for the LEWI Remembrance wreath, mindfulness colouring, silk card painting and making natural Christmas tree decorations were all on offer so there really was something for everyone to have a go at. The May Hall was a hive of activity as LEWI members and visitors crafted, chatted and had a great evening. We were delighted to welcome the Mayor of Erewash, Sue Beardsley and her consort to the meeting and we hope they both enjoyed the crafts and the company. Sandra, Heather, Madeline and Alison were our November/December birthday ladies - many happy returns to them. The WI is full of amazing women and LEWI is no exception. At our meeting on Tuesday 1st October we heard from four of our members in LEWI Life and what a fascinating and fantastic evening it was. Madeline's cross channel swim; Zoe's trip to India to train teachers and take story sacks for the children; Jackie's skydive for the Freedom from Torture charity; and Norma's career as a tailor, sewing teacher and maker of nun's habits while working at a convent - all so different and such interesting and well told experiences. Thanks to all the ladies who took part - what incredible and inspirational stories. On Tuesday 3rd September we heard about Garden Mishaps and Disasters from Graham and Judy White of Woodleighton Grove Gardens.
In an interesting, amusing and well illustrated talk Graham highlighted some of the many risks and dangers gardeners can encounter. Beware the top hazard - lawnmowers and strimmers, and mind out for garden canes and sticks which also feature in the top 10 hazards! Their garden, in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, has been open to the public as part of the National Garden Scheme for 11 years and Graham and Judy also give a range of talks to raise funds for charity. In 2020 the garden will be open (tickets only) on Saturday 28th June and group visits are also available by arrangement throughout June and July. There was a collection for the Long Eaton Food Bank and donations of urgently needed items such as tinned fruit, tinned tomatoes, long life fruit juice, dried potatoes, chocolate, crisps and snacks and coffee were received. The Derbyshire Young Carers Christmas Gifts Appeal was also well supported. There was no formal meeting on Tuesday 6th August but we held our Summer Social followed by a picnic outside. Great to see everyone, and it was just about warm enough! At our meeting on Tuesday 2nd July ‘Disaster Detective’ Richard Venables gave a fascinating talk about his work in disaster victim identification. Richard is a retired Detective Inspector from South Yorkshire Police and has trained over 8000 officers nationally in victim recovery to gather evidence to identify people. He outlined how he had worked on a wide range of disaster including the Thailand Tsumani, the Selby rail crash and the Morecambe Bay cockle pickers. Richard's book "A life in death" won the People's Book Prize in 2017 and highlights many of the disasters he worked on during his career - a role he describes as "working with the deceased on behalf of the living". Richard was awarded the Queen's Police Medal for his work. A collection of jewellery for the Heart Research UK appeal was well supported and will be continued to be collected until the Autumn Federation meeting in October. Jenny noted that the Carnival Cake Stall had been very successful and had raised £180 for the Long Eaton Community Garden. Local photographer, Andy Markwell was the speaker at our meeting on Tuesday 4th June. Andy's talk was incredibly informative as he talked about his life long passion for photography and explained how to get the best pictures from your camera or mobile device. With many of his own superb photographs to illustrate the techniques he described, we passed the quick test Andy set us with flying colours and showed just how much we'd learnt from his talk. Andy regularly runs workshops at local venues and his images can be seen on Facebook and Twitter. We posed for our annual group photograph, kindly taken by Andy; celebrated our June birthday ladies; enjoyed delicious cake; swapped magazines and books and as always provided an amazing amount of donated items for the Food Bank collection. Tuesday 7th May was our Annual Meeting and 6th birthday!
We paid tribute to our outgoing President, Jo Bartram, welcomed in Zoe Higgins as our new President and took part in Avril's fiendish quiz. A new committee for the coming year has also been appointed . We said goodbye to Cindy, Avril and Jane and welcomed Laura, Lynn G and Madeline. You can Meet the Committee here. At our meeting on Tuesday 2nd April 2019 we had a lively discussion and voted on the two Resolutions to be considered at the national conference in June. "A call against the decline in local bus services" and "Don't fear the smear". Briefing notes for both Resolutions can be found below. a-call-against-the-decline-in-local-buses-briefing-notes.pdf dont-fear-the-smear-briefing-notes.pdf Thanks to all members who voted on the two proposed resolutions. Our delegate at the NFWI Confrence will be asked to vote for both resolutions. We celebrated April birthdays for Jane, Janette, Avril, Zoe, Anita, Alison, Jean and Margaret; noted that the next book swap would be held at the May meeting; and Emma outlined a number of events to be held in April. Nominations are now welcomed for a new President, Secretary and Committee members to be appointed at the forthcoming Annual General Meeting on Tuesday 7th May. Please let Cindy know if you would like to stand. Good Golly Miss Molly! - we sure had a ball on Tuesday 5th March when we were joined by Pete Cockram for a lesson in jive dancing. Karen, Alison and their partners showed us how it should be done and we had an absolutely fantastic time trying out the steps to the barn dance, jive and cha cha cha. A really fun evening which everyone enjoyed. The collection of Easter Eggs for the Food Bank and other urgently needed items was, as always, very well supported and the table was piled high with donations (68.6kg), all of which will be very gratefully received. What an amazing evening we had on Tuesday 5th February when we made green hearts from felt and card for the "Show the Love" climate change awareness campaign.
Out of the chaos of fabric, embroidery silks, sequins and other decorations available our ladies made a beautiful array of green hearts which are now on display in the foyer at Long Eaton Tesco. We celebrated several birthdays this month but only Maggie was there to receive her card, however good wishes to everyone with a February birthday. Ann thanked everyone for the contributions for the food bank during 2018. We provided a whopping 227 kg of goods over the year. The next collection for the food bank will be at the LEWI meeting on Tuesday March 5th. Cindy will pass on the donations of deodorants and mouthwashes to the Canaan Trust. Thanks to everyone who contributed. Our first meeting of the year was held on Tuesday 8th January and we were joined by Lesley Padley who gave an immensely interesting and valuable talk about Mental Health Awareness. Lesley is a fully qualified humanistic integrative counsellor offering support with anxiety, depression, low moods, sadness, life changes, loss, relationship issues and family issues. Lesley is based at the New Dawn Counselling Centre in Beeston. Claire, Gwen, Jackie and Karen were our birthday girls this month. Zoe thanked members for the fabric drawstring book bags they have made for her forthcoming teaching trip to India and promised lots of Facebook pictures of her visit. Jenny highlighted the Canaan Trust Community Lunch which was attended by over 80 people who enjoyed the meal prepared and served by LEWI members. Very grateful thanks to all who helped on the day and those who couldn't be there but supplied puddings which were very well received. |