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15/5/2021 0 Comments May 15th, 2021 lockdown newsWell its been a a while since we have posted anything but now we hope to be onward and upward. Although its been a long lockdown, time seems to have passed quickly. Even though lockdown was an unwanted experience for most of us we have to take some positives, one of which was the need to learn new skills like zoom, this enabled us to stay in contact and as we got better enabled us to have zoom meetings . So here are some of the things we have done in lockdown In February we celebrated our 15th Birthday via zoom , we had Bingo and a quiz and we also sent our members a Birthday card. For climate awareness we We also sent out sunflower seeds. we are having a competition to grow the largest, each member was sent the same seeds, and the same compost with a pot to start them off so that they all had the same starting chance
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27/2/2019 0 Comments A Change of PresidencyIt's our 13th birthday!! Elections night! And the Judge is in the house! After six years, Brenda handed over the baton tonight to Elizabeth. All of BVWI are extremely grateful to Brenda for her dedication and passion during her presidency, which has seen us get up to all sorts of mischief, achieve our name in print, and for her to finally get up the Winding House!! Well done to Elizabeth and we're all ready to support you and see what you have up your sleeve! After elections, the annual statement and a brew, we welcomed Bob Gow, retired magistrate, who had us playing the parts in a courtroom drama! There were roles for the judges, solicitors, complainants and defendants with the remaining members as the jury, and it was a great insight as well as humorous, thanks to some hammy acting (Claire, we're looking at you!) The new programme will be available at the next meeting, and we'll be having a quiz night and social time, where our new president Elizabeth will guide us all into another year of BVWI fun. 23/1/2019 0 Comments New Year, Welcome!Happy New Year to all! Our first meeting of the year was a nice catch up and chance to plan our year ahead, including the programme, the inevitable changes and what we'd like to achieve.
After a number of years at the helm, Brenda will be stepping down as President from next month when we have our birthday and elections. She's been a driving force for events around the Community, activities and speakers for our WI and keeping things ticking along but whoever fills her shoes, she'll be there to offer her support and guidance on the Committee. Decisions going forward for everyone to consider include how to handle hostessing, recruiting new Committee members, and whether we decide to sing Jerusalem. Lots of WI's do this at every meeting; some only at certain events such as their general meeting, and until now BVWI has not done either. We had a go at singing it and it's up to members to have a think now about whether you'd like it to be regular. If you're not sure how it goes, or want to brush up on the tune, take a look at this video by Papplewick's Lapwings WI who recorded a version last year. It's also Subs month so cheques or cash for £42 to Debbie please if you didn't bring to the meeting! We had fabulous feedback from our party guests, including Hucknall, Sherwood and Gedling, who sent some lovely correspondence praising us for our hospitality. We do aim to please and are thrilled to know everyone enjoyed themselves! After the success of our entertainer, Brenda wasted no time in suggesting rebooking him for this year too. First Coffee Club this year will be Saturday 9 February, at which we'll be taking down the poppies, then back to second Saturday of the month. Join us at 1.30pm at Dynamo House. Craft Club will start again on the 4 February, then every first Monday of the month. We'll be planning for our craft projects for the year ahead, exhibits for WI competitions, and discussing any new skills we want to learn and who can teach us. We'll also only be having one Fundraiser this year, on 20 October, and will focus on making this a bigger event. Two per year is a lot of planning and work and after review, the Spring is not always as successful as Autumn. Of course we'll have stands and games at Community events around the village, so our presence is still known! Finally we'll take this chance to thank Brenda, taking her last meeting as President, for her commitment to BVWI and her championing us and the WI at County events, village get togethers and rounding us all up every month. Hopefully she'll have more time on her hands for the exciting adventures she wants to get up to! Thank you Brenda, you've been fabulous. Here's to the President! 12/12/2018 0 Comments Happy Christmas!Warm wishes for a very merry Christmas and happy New Year from Bestwood Village WI! Thanks to our Committee who work tirelessly for us all year, we enjoyed a fantastic party at the Community Centre, welcoming guests from Arnold, Sherwood, Netherfield and Arnold. Our entertainment was Tom Whitehurst who entertained us with some jazz classics while we ate, and cranked it up with a disco afterwards for us all to bop away all the sausage rolls we consumed. Every guest received a WI mug favour filled with sweet treats and the evening was a great chance for us all to enjoy putting our glad rags on, having a good old natter and sharing lots of laughs and stories. All the pictures are in the Gallery and if you're thinking of coming along to see what mischief we make, join us for our first meeting of 2019 on 23 January in the Community Centre. 27/9/2018 0 Comments Weave It Out!As if us crafty folk here at BVWI need another new hobby to try, Chris Baxter joined us to tell us about her fantastic traditional willow woven baskets and it's safe to say we all fancy having a go now! One a booming trade in Nottinghamshire - in fact, quite the epicentre of willow weaving with over 7000 makers in the county alone! - it died out mid 20th century and there are very few makers left at all. Chris herself trained over in Norfolk as there are so few teachers remaining and it's a skill that takes a lot of time to master. Willow was so popular in Nottinghamshire due to its abundance of growth along the Trent, particularly in the Sutton on Trent region, where the largest supply originally came from. There are around 5 types of willow, all of which require soaking and stripping to make them malleable enough to weave, and to develop the beautiful colours we see. The typical brown willow and white willow are naturally coloured, and white willow can also be dyed a variety of colours. The popular and most recognisable buff, or golden, willow came about through accidental discovery. The willow, left to stand in willow pits after soaking, turned a golden colour due to the cheeky men of the time piddling on it! It turns out that boiling the willow produces the same effect, as it releases tannins from the bark which develops the colour. Luckily, buff willow nowadays is produced with water only... Fresh cut willow is also fine to use for projects, but ideally should be used within six weeks or it will lose the flexibility. This is ideal for Christmas wreaths and fresh decorations that are typically for a seasonal event and not made to last more than a few weeks. The scope for making willow woven items is limited only to imagination, as Chris has discovered. Everything from bird feeders, to trivets, to Christmas decorations and classic obelisks are artfully woven, as well as a range of traditional baskets for every purposes. Classic log baskets, storage and food display, and even as our members suggested, yarn storage! Chris runs workshops and classes around Nottingham and sells a range of items via her website www.chrisbaxtersbaskets.co.uk if you are tempted to have a go. With the season nearly upon us, perhaps a festive item is up your street? Following on from our discussion on winter venue last meeting, a vote decided that the community centre is our preferred location, so from November this year to March, we will meet there and this will include the Christmas party. Our Knit and Knatter sessions and committee meetings already take place there and it was our original home back in the early days of BVWI. The Poppy project is steaming along very well, with some 'acquired' netting being used to string up the plastic poppies, of which there are around 700 so far. The count on knit and crochet poppies is quite staggering, so far 1420 red, 560 white and 300 lilac made and more hot off the needles every day! To this end there will be two more craft sessions to bring these together, with the aim to display them around Dynamo on the weekend of 13/14th August so we have plenty of time to appreciate all the work and let the village see what we've been up to! If you can spare an hour or two to help out with the display, let one of the committee know, menfolk are also welcomed if you want to keep your other half out of trouble for a while! The fundraiser on 28 October will be at a new time of 12-4pm to allow set up in the morning and volunteers are always welcome if you fancy baking, serving, manning a stall or dragging - sorry, welcoming - the punters in! 23/8/2018 0 Comments Talking Rubbish!Quite literally, Lesley Taylor from Veolia joined us to talk rubbish at our August meeting! With recycling high on our agenda and a constant source of news, we got a behind the scenes introduction to the Notts County Council recycling schemes and even the most eco-savvy of us found out a few surprising facts. Most of us are probably aware that some things, like paper, can be recycled over and over again. In fact paper will be recycled four or five times before it then becomes cardboard. Steel and aluminium have the same principle, and it's actually 95% faster to recycle tins than make them from new. They are infinitely recyclable and lose nothing of their structure in the process. Plastic is the largest issue facing us all, not just to recycle but the message that responsible disposal is absolutely key to cleaning up our oceans and maintain healthy wildlife and resources. As much as 800 plastic bottles were found per square mile on a recent beach clean. That's a LOT of littering! The general rule of thumb is that a quarter of the content of a bottle was used in oil to create it. Imagine a one litre bottle - 250ml of oil was used to produce it. But to recycle it uses no oil at all. It seems a no-brainer, right? There is still a lot of confusion around which plastics can be recycled, and manufacturers confuse matters further by adding a 'recycle' logo to a lot of plastic trays and punnets which is misleading, as they cannot be recycled, These 'hard plastics' are actually at the end of their recycling life, so while your hand soap bottle is fine to recycle, the pump action lid isn't. The milk bottle is fine, but the top can't be recycled. This rule applies to quite a few items, even margarine tubs. Oddly the lid is made from a harder plastic than the tub! The opposite end of the scale is also a confusion. Plastic bags - low grade plastics - can be recycled, but sadly, no one wants them. Reprocessing outlets find no value and unless located directly next door to a waste management company, these are never made use of. When they are used, they can be formed into backing for carpet underlay. Resourceful and crafty folk have also recently started weaving, knitting or crocheting with plastic bags to make sleeping mats for the homeless, which is a far better use for them. Plastic coated items are the biggest strain - they cannot be recycled in any way, so Pringles tubes and TetraPaks are huge offenders and find their way frequently into recycling bins. Due to design trends, around 80% of wrapping paper - for any occasion - is also no longer recyclable, due to plastic coatings, glitter and other such additions. A lot of sorting is done by machines to remove contamination but a large amount is done by hand, to weed out those items which machines can't pick up, especially black plastics which are invisible to a machine using laser light. Bear that thought in mind and help them out by rinsing your recycling - imagine the whiff off sour milk as you work and it may make you think twice! But what about everything we shove into the general waste bin? Doesn't it all go to landfill? Not so! Currently in Nottinghamshire, only 10% of general waste actually goes to landfill - the rest is burned for electricity and produces only steam residue, so there's no harmful toxins and smoke filling up the air. The biggest shocker to us all was that shredded paper can NOT be recycled. Why is this? Because it causes chaos in the machinery. Any dampness and it becomes papier mache, spreads all over the floor and jams up the machines. Bag it and bin it instead! In other news, as the winter season comes around and we prepare for our move to the winter venue, discussion and funding this year has led to the decision to vote on a return to the Community Centre rather than the Church. Costs are much lower, parking is better and lighting is safer, and due to our work around the community and supporting the work at the centre, it's been offered to us at a cut price. We'll be voting next meeting so think about your preference and we'll go with the majority. The poppies project is coming along well but we always need more, Brenda will be drumming up support and more craft sessions are planned so keep your ears open for the dates! 29/6/2018 0 Comments Unsung HeroesThe word 'hero' gets thrown around a lot, but we really mean it. Our June meeting visitor Alex Davidson - Chairman of the Nottingham Blood Bikes - opened our eyes to a vital service supporting our NHS. The Blood Bikes, which started circa 1962 in London and remains relatively unchanged, are a 24/7/365 charity service which runs emergency transport covering 80% of the country to deliver and collect whole blood, cells, samples, urgent tools and files and even frozen breast milk. With no government funding, the service is run entirely by unpaid volunteers, and is completely free of charge to the NHS. 32 groups cover the country with around 3500 volunteers, and in 2014 charity status was finally achieved to give recognition and support to these amazing riders and coordinators. The Nottingham branch has approx. 100 volunteers, of which 89 are riders; 49 of those with advanced riding qualifications and the remainder undertaking the advanced training. A contract is in place with Notts Healthcare Trust and the bikes undertake runs to and between City, QMC and Kingsmill hospital as well as other medical outlets under the Trust, responding to 2640 clinical requests since the contract started and saving over £30,000 to the NHS. Quite rightly, Alex is proud to state the Nottingham Blood Bikes have never had to turn down a request, and the majority of calls are responded to within 25mins, well ahead of their own SLA of 35mins. Impressive work, although as Alex reminds us, traffic is a lot less busy at 3am when the team are usually out on the road! Very little has changed since the inauguration of the BB's, except shared bikes are now used rather than personal vehicles, and the requests increase year on year. Fundraising is an essential part of the Blood Bikes, with no secured funding, and the bikers will often be seen at fayres, fetes, rallies, group meets, giving talks, on toy runs and community drives. Whether it's breast milk for a preemie, whole blood for an urgent transfusion, or samples for emergency testing, the Blood Bikes are on hand, free of charge, and quite literally saving lives every day. Their incredible work deserves recognition and to the NHS they are a vital resource. Thank you to all those riding for others' lives! Do you know a biker with some time to spare? Want to volunteer or fundraise for the Blood Bikes? Find out more at nottinghamshirebloodbikes.org/ and make sure to give them a like or follow on social media. 28/5/2018 0 Comments Show Me How You Burlesque!We're never shy to learn about new things here at BVWI and our May meeting was our sauciest yet! Nottingham burlesque performer Foxie La Roque joined us for the evening with an array of costumes, wigs, feather fans, headpieces and - yes, nipple tassels! We learned a brief history of the origins of burlesque, the types of burlesque and some classic showgirl moves then got chance to try out all the props and costume pieces while we enjoyed some jazzy vintage tunes. Some of us even had a go at twirling tassels, and Janet especially (pictured left) seemed to get the hang of it pretty quickly! The more we laughed and enjoyed it, the more an idea formed... we may have some budding starlets in our midst, stay tuned to find out where this new skill may take us! Along with pleasure comes the business, and May is our time of year to discuss and vote on the resolutions. Typically there are more than one but this year the overwhelming lead is for Mental Health Matters, mainly campaigning for better support and resources. As a WI we all agreed that this is an area severely lacking in awareness and at WI level we can all get on board with making small adjustments ourselves to change perception and stigma around mental illnesses. Creating opportunities to talk, without judgement, or offering open drop-in support locally in the area are great starts and likewise, those of us with MH issues can share our experiences and show others that there is no 'face' to mental health and we are not 'weird' or 'scary' and not all mental illnesses are comparable. Overall we voted For as a majority and this will be taken forward to the Annual Meeting in Cardiff in July for a final vote. Our Fundraiser last week raised a handsome £190 and local mobile pizza aficionado's Zenzorro came along with their van which certainly helped draw a crowd, and even gave us a lovely donation. We'll be sure to have them join us again at the next event! At the Newark Show we also celebrated winning 2nd place in two of the competitions, for our recycled cushion and display which just about everyone had a small hand in pulling together. We used everything from brick dust to Tassimo wrappers and with our 'Votes For Women' theme it really was eco-girl-power all round. We're also still working on our crochet/knitted poppy collections, we'll need a whopping 1569 all together, so at meetings, coffee club and craft nights you can guarantee that's what we'll be up to. We have spare yarn and eager teachers, so if you want to be a part of it all and learn a new skill, join us! See more photos of our Burlesque fun in the gallery! |
AuthorOur WI members adventures, news and gossip! Archives
May 2021
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