Celebrating the Centenary

At our Recent AGM we suggested members might like to dress in a style from one of the decades of the last 100 years!

The next event will be on Thursday 4 June with a live streaming from London of the National AGM.  This will be in our Village Hall  from 10.30-5pm, when we are hoping members from our Institute and other local ones will come along for all of the day or pop in to watch part of the proceedings.  We are hoping to see Mary on screen!

May 2015 Meeting & AGM

In May we had our AGM and also discussed the Resolution led by Jan Pattison. The latter item caused some confusion as the detail seemed to be mainly about ensuring that “Continuing Care” was fairly accessed across the country, which was dependent on quite specific and limited types of health care needs. However the Resolution itself veered away from this and sought to ask that the destinction between personal and nursing care be removed for everyone. Partly due to this apparent contradiction and a general lack of clarity in the document we voted to leave the decision on whether to support it or not to our National AGM delegate Mary, once she has heard the arguments and obtained further information.

Lists were sent round for people to sign up to provide cakes for various events including the fete and it was pointed out by Caroline that at our recent Food Hygiene course we learnt that, by law, we now have to declare various ingredients if we use them in our cakes. The list includes many basic items such as eggs so we need to let anyone selling them know what our cakes include so that this information can be put on a label. It would be decided by the next meeting exactly how this would work.

Finally we had our AGM with an interesting review of the year prepared and read by Jan and a set of certified accounts given out. All current members of the committee agreed to stand again and we voted for the new President. Barbara very kindly agreed to take this post as without a President the group would have had to close. We then enjoyed some lovely refreshments prepared by the committee.

Our next meeting will be on Monday 8^th June at 7.30 when we will have a talk about the RNLI

Women Walk The World (and a few men!)

On Sunday 26th April, we joined 70 other countries to take part in the ACWW "Women Walk The World".  11 walkers, including 3 visitors from Buckland Dinham WI, left the memorial Hall for a walk around the quarry bund.

Were they waiting for the ladies, or couldn't keep up?

This was followed by welcome tea and a selection of cakes back at Mary's, where it even stayed bright enough to stay outside.

April Meeting

Rotas and Roulade - Institute Meeting Monday 13th April

Margaret Loten chaired the meeting for us in April when once again there was a lot of business to get through including several appeals for help. These included requests for cakes for the Women Walk the World event on Sun 26^th April, for a WI stall at Glastonbury and of course for our own stall at the Leigh Fete in June, see minutes online for other events members can help with. 

The meeting on the 11^th May is our AGM and discussion of the resolution. Mary would be e-mailing details of this and the committee asked for 2 volunteers to speak for and against the motion. It was suggested we come along in the costume of our favourite decade and we were reminded that the committee provide both the refreshments and entertainment at the AGM.

The first Friday lunch in April at the Waggon and Horses only had a small turnout but was much enjoyed by those who came. Margaret suggested alternating different venues with the Bell and would email us nearer the date of the next one.

Our speaker, Rachel Middleton, told us how she started and developed her Pudding Kitchen business and made a meringue roulade which we all enjoyed tasting.

As mentioned above the next meeting will be our AGM on Monday 11^th May at 7.30pm.

Litter Pick - Saturday 14 March

Thank you to everyone in the Village who turned out to help clear litter from the roads and lanes of Leigh on Mendip.  Many hands make light work!  Hopefully, when others see the area looking so good they will think twice before throwing rubbish out of car windows.

Thank you also to the ladies who provided tea and cakes on our return to the Hall.  Delicious!

Meeting on 9 March 2015

March was Barbara’s turn to chair the meeting, with quite a lot of news about events members had attended and occasions to come. Sue Rodford had information about a meadow project run in conjunction with Somerset Wildlife Trust where she had learnt all about planting areas with wild flowers and also told us about an upcoming non WI outing, a garden festival at the Bishop’s Palace in Wells which will run from 20^th to 24^th June, more info online.

The first Friday lunch in March at the Waggon and Horses had not taken place as it was thought very few were free. However this turned out not to be the case so can we all be sure to reply to Margaret’s e mail one way or the other in future so she knows at least approximate numbers, it does usually have to be booked up. We are going to try again with the Waggon and Horses in April on Friday 10^th (first one being Good Friday).

Jan told us about a walking tour on Fri 24^th July round a farm which specialises in rearing chickens starting around 10.30 and including lunch, you should have received an e mail on this.

Unfortunately our speaker from Happy Landings Animal Shelter was taken ill earlier in the day and had to cancel. Margaret had stepped into the breach with a quiz based on numbers and letters standing for “well known” phrases and facts. There were 80 questions and it’s easy to judge how hard it was from the fact the winning team only scored 38. Strangely though most of us found it really absorbing and thoroughly enjoyed the challenge. If time hadn’t been called I think one or two may still be there determined to solve it all!

The next meeting will be on Monday 13^th April at 7.30pm, the talk being titled “Pudding Kitchen”, hope we get some tasters!