October 2023 Main Meeting – Members’ Evening

We returned to our tradition of letting our Committee take a well earned break and a group of members took over for our October meeting. Names were drawn in June and the team of 10 people did a fantastic job in running the meeting and providing a very memorable evening.

Entertainment took the form of a Morris Dancing evening, with singing and dancing by the ‘Earl of Stamford’ Group.

Our members did not need a great deal of encouragement to join them for the last 2 dances, waving our handkerchiefs and banging our sticks like experts!

Helen H took on the role of President and Ann O’B was secretary. The team provided us with delicious refreshments and we had a lovely welcome from the the team, who also organised the raffle.

The competition for ‘a handkerchief’ was won by Janet Paterson.

As ever we were reminded about the many events planned for the next few months, further details are in the October newsletter

September sub-group meetings

After our August break, it was good to be back enjoying our sub-group meetings, though the Walking group took its break during September rather than August.

The Book Club had a complete change and discussed poetry and individual’s favourite poems. The Scrabble group enjoyed a game and a chat and the Craft group met in Susan’s garage rather than the Village Hall as they were working on their November poppy display, which involved rather a lot of red paint! Ann C showed the Art Group how to use the ‘grid’ method to reproduce a picture.

Baking Beauties took a break and went to Pesto at Cabbage Hall for a delicious Afternoon Tea. Click on subgroup name above to see more information, pictures and dates of next meetings.

September 2023 Main Meeting – Chester uncovered

The speaker at our September meeting was Stephen Shakeshaft – a Blue Badge guide to Chester. He gave us a very informative talk about the city – particularly interesting as Whitley WI had a visit to Chester for our May outing this year.

Many of us know about the well published features of our local historic city, but Stephen gave us an insight into some of the lesser known areas. From rare ‘sedan porches’, 700 year old architectural features on the Cathedral grounds, and the hidden half of the largest Roman amphitheatre in Britain, he opened our eyes to the massive importance of Chester to our national heritage. He certainly encouraged me to look out for some of these lesser known features next time I visit. Janet P won our competition – ‘A Souvenir of Chester’ with an old photograph of the suspension bridge across the river Dee.

Annette and Jonty showed us some of the blankets they have recently made for ‘Project Linus’, which gives a blanket’ to  to provide love, a sense of security, warmth and comfort to children, who are sick, disabled, disadvantaged or distressed.

Our regular activities are restarting after our summer break, with lots to look forward to locally at Whitley, within our ‘Village’ group of WIs and a number of County events, as you can see if you explore our website.

Summer Garden Party

20 members gathered for our summer garden party – many thanks to Ann Cookson for her hospitality. The weather was kind to us and we had a lovely sociable afternoon, with a delicious ‘shared table’ buffet. Thanks to members for donations of raffle prizes, the money raised from this went to cancer charities.