For our February meeting we had arranged a talk on Recycling in Nottinghamshire given by
the Veolia waste management company. Unfortunately, the speaker in question is retiring at
the end of January and so was unable to join us. The good news is that (thanks to our fabulous programme planning team!) we brought forward Paul Wilkins, a speaker we had booked for next year to talk to us about the
women who worked in the First World War munitions factories.

This topic is of great local interest as there was a National Shell Filling Factory close by in Chilwell!

It was really interesting to learn about their vital contribution to the war effort, the dangers they faced and how they came to be known as the Canary Girls.

Paul provided us with the following link which gives us a lot of additional information about the munitions
factory at Chilwell specifically with clear photographs:

Following the talk we had an email from Paul. Paul really enjoyed the visit and to quote
from his e mail he said ‘what a great group of ladies at your WI ‘ (we definitely agree!)

The January meeting was another evening full of fun and laughter! Members and visitors played Kurling in teams – although only a few “stones” made it onto the target it certainly was entertaining to play and watch!!

The 8 teams also enjoyed completing quizzes between rounds and there was lots of time for tea, cake and a good chat.

The request for food and toiletries to go to the food bank, operated by the Russell Trust at the Hope centre, generated a great response from members (check out our picture below!). We were joined at the meeting by Helen Voce from Hope who thanked everyone and explained how important these donations are for those referred to the centre (we also convinced her to stay for some Kurling & quiz fun which we hope she enjoyed!).

There was a book stall which raised £8 towards Hive funds.

Our December meeting saw us in festive spirits. The non alcoholic mulled wine went down a treat as did the mince pies, stollen and yule log. Christmas jumpers, sparkly tops, Santa hats and the like were much in evidence, and we enjoyed an interesting, well researched and entertaining talk by our speaker Dave Mooney. He traced the origins of Father Christmas right back to medieval times through to nineteenth and twentieth century poetry and storytelling. Along the way he enlightened us as to the significance of his pet goat and how the reindeer came into the picture and tracked the rise of his American rival Santa Claus.

We also raised £45 (by guessing the number of baubles in a vase) for Knitted Knockers UK (our fabulous October speaker!

At our November meeting we welcomed Clare O’Donnell who gave an interesting and entertaining talk all about the history of Melton Mowbray and its famous pork pie. From humble origins as the food of labourers it became popular with the aristocratic hunting fraternity. This included the Regency ‘King of theDandies’ Beau Brummell and his pals whose visits to the area made it a fashionable resort. Clare concluded with a pie raising demonstration after which we very much enjoyed tasting some genuine Melton pies.

In November the craft group also met one Saturday afternoon for our first Crafternoon where we enjoyed making rag wreaths for Christmas, The room was a ‘hive’ of activity and ‘buzzing’ with chatter. We hope to run more Crafternoons (in addition to our regular monthly Craft Group meet-ups) over the coming year! I’m personally quite impressed with how they all turned out…

We had an unfortunately very last minute change to our programme for October but we were honoured to be joined by the wonderful Margaret who spoke to us about the charity Knitted knockers UK and her work knitting knockers (i.e. breast prostheses) for women who have undergone a mastectomy or lumpectomy. Her talk was engaging and funny and you could really feel her passion for this wonderful charity.

Check out the charity at the following link: https://knittedknockersuk.com/

We also ran a raffle to raise money for Maggie’s (as we do every October), in honour of Breast Cancer Awareness month and in memory our beautiful friend Sarah.

We have also had to change out November meeting from our scheduled Christmas cookies but we have decided to keep to the ‘food theme’ by arranging a talk about Melton Mowbray Pies (with samples!)