Thursday 26 April 2012

Teatails!

It's Thursday, the new Friday apparently. And in honour of this I thought I'd share a little idea with you that's all the rage in that there London these days, and tickles my fancy quite a lot... I'd like to set up a cafe serving these, or, perhaps we can persuade one of our local venues to serve TeaTails!

Teatails! by Pic_Nick_
Teatails!, a photo by Pic_Nick_ on Flickr.
You can always make your own, I love the idea of serving them in fine, mismatched bone china teapots, cups and saucers.

It's not all about ladies who lunch these days you know, and, a pot of Sailor Jerry cocktail at 3pm sounds rather civilised. Not to mention with it being in a teapot, and tea coloured and all, no-one would know you were sneaking in a crafty afternoon drink ;-)

Happy Thursday!

Tuesday 24 April 2012

May meeting details

Hello! Our May meeting will take place on the 17th May, 7-9pm. Venue tbc at the moment as we're looking for a bigger room...

As we're approaching the diamond Jubilee, which will be officially celebrated on the 5th June 2011, our May meeting will be (loosely) Jubilee themed.

We give props (as the youth would say) to a woman who has held the same position for the last 60 years. The only other monarch to have had a diamond jubilee was also a woman (Queen Victoria).

Check out the rainbow queen picture from Vogue magazine for a bit of queenie joy.

The activity/speaker for the meeting will be Millie Moon.

Millie Moon's is a fabric and haberdashery shop on Catherine Hill that also run workshops in various sewing techniques. If you have never been go and have a look at all the lovely rainbow colours.

We will have a corsage making session using simple sewing techniques (so please don't be scared if you aren't a regular sewist).

And there will also be a demonstration of some different sewing techniques.

The meeting is free to members and £3.00 for non members. If you join up on the night then you don't need to pay the £3.00.

We will set up a Facebook event for the meeting. If you are not on Facebook then we will email you the week before (if you haven't given us your email address please let us know: WI.frome@gmail.com).

Millie Moon's will be making up corsage packs specially for us, so we need to know numbers in advance. Therefore please could you rsvp either via Facebook or email if you'd like to attend?

Friday 20 April 2012

First meeting - done and dusted!

On Thursday 19th April 2012 the first meeting of the new branch of the Frome WI took place at the Round Tower. Over 70 women attended the first meeting and we somehow managed to fit in the building!



Storm Fagan (Frome WI) gave a brief introduction to the meeting. The aim of the evening was to introduce everyone to the Women's Institute, find out more about what everyone hoped to achieve with the branch and eat some cake.

Margaret Bigg (Somerset WI advisor) spoke about the National Federation of Women's Institutes organisation from a wider perspective, explained how to join (£31.50 per year or £3.00 per visit with a maximum of 3 visits per year) and spoke about some of the recent campaigns (including the call for more midwivesplight of the honeybee and the relationship with the ACWW, specifically the Women Walk the World campaign).  

During the rest of the meeting we rotated between:

Subscriptions desk
The subscriptions desk will be available at all meetings should you wish to either join up or find more information about joining the Frome WI.


Cakes and drinks
There was the most amazing array of cakes and bakes that were brought along. If there is a recipe you'd particularly like then please post in the comments and hopefully the baker will come along and share. 



Origami
An origami folding session took place on the upper floor learning how to create the crane which is traditionally the symbol of good luck. If you'd like to try and fold the crane then here are some easy to follow instructions. And if you fold one thousand of them, you can make a wish...



Questionnaire
A questionnaire was available for people to fill in. It is very short! And with the aim of ascertaining how involved people would like to be and what topics the group should cover in future meetings. If you missed the meeting but would like to give us your thoughts then please email us at: wi.frome@gmail.com

Thanks to everyone who came along and made sure this meeting was a fantastic start to our shiny new WI. We'll post some photos in the Facebook group

Future meetings
The next meeting will take place on Thursday 17th May 2012. We'll upload a separate post about this meeting and set up a Facebook event with details. If you are not on Facebook and would like the information then please let us know via email. 





Monday 16 April 2012

First and last

Four days til our first meeting...first and last WI branches.

The first WI branch was set up in Llanfairpwllgwyngyll in 1915 by Mrs Alfred Watt with support from a Col Stapleton Cotton.

Col Cotton was initially sceptical:

he had himself been one of the many who doubted the capacity of women to conduct even their ordinary business with success,

Happily the ladies proved him wrong and the branch is still going today meeting on the third Tuesday of the month at 2pm.

Source: afwi.org



Credit: Wikipedia

And the newest WI branch? That might be ours what with not having had our first meeting yet!

Sunday 15 April 2012

Countdown to our first meeting










Five days til our first WI meeting...and five things you didn't know about the WI.

1. The WI is an educational charity.

The Women’s Institute (WI) was formed in 1915 to revitalise rural communities and to encourage women to become more involved in producing food during the First World War. Since then the organisation’s aims have broadened and the WI is now the largest voluntary women’s organisation in the UK. The WI will celebrate its centenary in 2015 and currently has over 210,000 members in around 6,600 WIs.

The WI plays a unique role in providing women with educational opportunities and the chance to build new skills, to take part in a wide variety of activities and to campaign on issues that matter to them and their communities.

Source: thewi.org

2. The WI kicks buttock when it comes to campaigning.

The first WI campaign was in 1926 for improved school dinners. Since then the campaigns have been many and varied including equal pay for women, free breast screening for every woman, HIV and AIDS awareness, the plight of the bumble bee, saving libraries and inappropriate imprisonment of the mentally ill among many other campaigns.

3. The WI has its own college - Denman College in Oxfordshire.

WI members can sign up for courses from Maki sushi Japanese home cookery, via weaving your own willow coffin and crochet for beginners to Pilates and Photoshop.

http://www.denmancollege.org.uk/

4. The stereotype isn't quite right.

There are WI branches who specialise in flower arranging and jam making (not that there is anything wrong with either of those activities). But equally there are WI groups who get their knickers off (see calendar girls for more info) and who make giant fanjo patchworks.

5. Jerusalem

In the early days the WI chose Jerusalem as 'their' song because of its association with women's suffrage. In 1916 Sir Hubert Parry composed the hymn for a meeting of suffragettes for the Fight for the Right movement. Many WI groups sing Jerusalem at their monthly meetings and at the national AGM the WI fills the Albert Hall with a giant group singalong.

Sunday 8 April 2012

Egg based excitement

Happy Easter y'all. Hope the bunny has been and you're tucking into some nutritious and delicious chocolates.

There's an egg rolling race in Mells which is my local eggvent, no doubt one of many egg based activities today.

Are you egging it up today? Want your egg to stand out from the crowd?

1. Fancy flowery eggs

Credit: Posie gets cozy


2. Eggcellent egg bag

Credit: Purl Bee

3. Silk dyed eggs

Credit: our best bites