November update

  

It was lovely to see so many ladies at our November Meeting despite the damp and blustery weather. 

We all enjoyed an enlightening evening with a talk from Luke Simon, CEO of the charity “School in A Bag”. Back in 2004, he and his brother Piers had the misfortune of being on the Island of Koh Phi Phi during the Indian Ocean Tsunami in Thailand. Sadly Piers lost his life in the tragedy but Luke channelled his grief after seeing such devastation, by setting up an appeal in Piers’s name. That appeal has grown into “School in A Bag” which provides disadvantaged children from all around the world their own personal school equipment in rucksack. With our donations we hope we have helped to give hope of a better education for some of these children in the future.

 

Our support of The Frome Food Bank this year instead of a Secret Santa, provided a large table overflowing with Christmas food goodies brought in. These were gratefully received by the FOod Bank so thankyou everyone.

 

 

Some of our ladies our busy planning our tree entry to The Village Christmas Tree Festival on 9/10th December. ‘Birds of a Feather’ is our theme so expect lots of brightly coloured bird decorations. Any loaned decorations welcomed. 

 

We are looking forward to our Christmas meal at The Bell Inn, with 30 expected it should be a grand celebration. 

 

Next month’s meeting sees us holding a Christmas Food tasting evening, where we shall compare a few selected items of choice. A fun evening planned. Don’t eat too big a meal beforehand! 

 

We are a friendly bunch of ladies of all ages and welcome visitors so please do come along and join us. We meet the second Monday evening of every month, in the Memorial Hall at 7.30pm. 

 

Just turn up or contact Caroline on 01373 812889 for further information. 

 

 

A warm welcome to Rachel and Lucy who have just joined our group. Thanks to Roxy for setting up a new Leigh WI Facebook page and we also keep in contact via our WI WhatsApp and Blog account.

Instead of a speaker for this month’s meeting we were treated to an entertaining powerpoint show ‘Wish You Were Here’ cleverly put together by Caroline using animation and sound effects. Members had been asked to provide photos of their favourite holiday destinations both at home and abroad. We were transported to the Channel Islands, Majorca, Italy, Crete, Egypt, India, Bhutan, Vietnam, Canada, Devon, Norfolk and East Sussex with an interesting story about each destination. 

 

Final donations towards Christmas Shoe Boxes for local YMCAs or other groups were collected and a total of 14 full boxes were added to the County total and were delivered to the Annual Meeting at the Bath & West Showground which a record 8 LOM members attended.

It was decided to support the Frome Food Bank with Christmas food items instead of a Secret Santa this year. Carrying on with the Christmas theme our annual Christmas meal has been booked at The Bell in Leigh and we will be entering the Christmas Tree festival in St. Giles Church over the weekend of 9th and 10th December.  

Our speaker in our November meeting will be explaining to us about ‘School in a Bag’ and the work this charity undertakes.

We are a friendly bunch of ladies of all ages and welcome visitors so please do come along and join us. We meet the second Monday evening of every month, in the Memorial Hall at 7.30pm.

 

Just turn up or contact Caroline on 01373 812889 for further information.

 

Caroline welcomed all our existing members and especially our new ladies Kate Drinkwater and Mary Witts to our September meeting.  It was lovely also to see visitors – including some mums from Leigh on Mendip School.

Some of our members had attended the Kilmersdon Summer Party.  A superb buffet was provided with lots of choice and yummy desserts.  We watched a demonstration of baskets made from weaving card strips and were able to purchase some of the lovely items.  It was also a chance to talk to other Institutes and compare notes.  Would certainly recommend for next year!

A small group went on an outing to Frome to visit the Guild of Weavers.  They have both large and smaller table looms – a very friendly group who help each other and give advice.

It was decided to suspend our Walking group for the time being and review again in the Spring.  Our other clubs are proving very popular and enjoyed by those who go.  Six ladies came to the monthly lunch at The Bell.

The Sales table proved popular.  Lots of lovely donations and £22 was raised to support Dorothy House.

Our speaker was Ursula Franklin with her unique story of ‘Mission Penguin’.  Ursula has combined her love of nature – particularly penguins with her passion for photography. Following the death of her husband in 2012, Ursula decided she needed a healing journey and so the idea of ‘Mission Penguin’ was born. 

She found out that there are 18 species of penguins in the world living in the southern hemisphere. So, she set herself a goal of seeing and photographing all 18 in their natural habitat. This meant researching and organising ways of travelling to the Antarctic and Antarctica Islands, the Galapagos Islands, the Falkland Islands, South Georgia, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, and South America. Ursula had a lot of journeys by different planes, ships and boats and even though she suffers badly from sea sickness, this did not put her off. 

She achieved her goal and now has published two books about the penguins she saw, and she told us that her healing journey is now complete, a most fascinating story.  She was enjoyed by all and many bought her book and cards.

At our October Meeting on Monday 9^th we are organising a "Wish You Were Here" event with photos from members' holidays or local outings.

The Rec Field are holding a Quiz on Friday 3 November.  Teams of 4.  So far 6 members are interested.  Please let one of the Committee know if you would like to take part.  A lot of fun – and after the success of our team at the County Quiz maybe even a winning team!

Looking even further ahead our Christmas meal will be at The Bell on Monday 4 December in the evening.  Menus will be available shortly.  We would like to take part in The Christmas Tree Festival again which is being held on 9/10 December.  Members were asked for suggestions for the theme.  More discussion at our October meeting.  This meeting will also be your last opportunity to donate small gifts for the Shoebox Appeal – otherwise please take your donations to Mary's house.  She will be packaging them up to be taken to the County AGM being held this year at the Bath & West Showground (very local!) on Sunday 15 October.  A lovely opportunity to meet with WI ladies from around Somerset and listen to some interesting speakers.

If you would like to know more about us contact Caroline on 01373 812889.  It would be great to see you at one of our meetings.  Come a few times before making any decision about joining.