News

CAROL’S COLUMN: LAUGHTER, TEARS AND JOY

Yesterday was our Autumn Federation Meeting and what a joy-filled day it was.
Who would have thought that a programme of Forest School antics, the ‘Walk the Walk’ Moonwalk Charity challenge, the Burlesque Bombshells Troupe, a Yeoman Warder and Surrey Serenaders could have filled the hall with so much emotion and laughter, even to the point of tears?
Whether or not you were aware of it, there was a message that underpinned the whole day: that if you accept a challenge, follow a dream, find your hand in the air, the world will offer you rewards and opportunities that will not only change your life but may have a significant and beneficial butterfly effect touching many. My mantra has always been to accept any opportunity that is offered to me for it is likely only to be made once in life. This has stood me in very good stead, so far.
What was it about yesterday that made it such an enjoyable day? For me it was seeing a room of women laughing together — infectious waves of laughter! If a member of your WI comes along to your next WI meeting with her coat buttoned up to her neck, be prepared for a surprise.
One member who had attended many meetings said that this was the best meeting she had ever been to, whilst another said that after two-and-a-half years of restrictions she “felt alive once more!” It really did feel like a party, a true celebration and seemed to anticipate the season we are approaching, of festivals and family, of food shared and traditions celebrated.
What will you do with your WI to celebrate the festive season? How will you celebrate with your family and friends? Are there any traditions that make your celebrations special or unique? We would love to hear.
My family celebrate Christmas. It lasts a day longer than most as my birthday is on Christmas Eve, hence my name — Carol. I wonder though, with the accession of King Charles III and our entry into the Carolean period, if Carol will become a popular name.
Mum was a little frustrated that, because I had kept her waiting for three weeks, my arrival meant that she was not allowed a Christmas lunch. How times have changed. Today she would be home and probably cooking it.
Traditions
Our Christmas is never without Great Grandma’s George VI sixpences being slipped into the Christmas pudding, supposedly unseen, but it never happens quite like that. And the matchstick-style Father Christmas who sat astride Mum’s Christmas tree at rather a jaunty angle. He now travels to wherever the family Christmas is, and we take turns to hide him for the children to find. My biggest challenge is finding him from one year to the next and doing the running repairs!
We as WI members must share many common traditions. Do you make your Christmas pudding and cake on ‘Stir-up Sunday’ with family members, stirring the mixture and making a wish? We do, but it’s always prompted by The Archers. I use the NFWI’s Centenary Fruit Cake recipe, it’s brilliant!*
Items that have also become a crucial part of my Christmas preparations are Betty Dominy’s tomato and red pepper chutney and Beryl Havers’ folded fabric stars. Both were learnt at Surrey Federation workshops and will grace anyone’s Christmas.
Do you decorate your house? I do but I had never really thought about the significance of bringing greenery into the house other than it looks lovely and smells wonderful.
The Druids, Celts and Romans believed that the ability of evergreen trees to keep their leaves was magical and held the promise that spring would return. Holly was subsequently adopted as a Christian symbol, with the berries representing Christ’s blood and the evergreen leaves as a metaphor for life after death.
The significance of mistletoe, although having similar pagan origins, has very different connotations. Revered by the Romans as a symbol of peace, love and understanding, the berries were believed also to be a symbol of fertility. Men were required to kiss the one they loved under the mistletoe to cement their relationship. In doing this it also protected them from witches and demons. Be careful who you kiss under the mistletoe!
This year I will have to cast my search more widely for greenery as the local forest that I have harvested my holly and ivy from for years has been felled to make way for new housing, whilst the brownfield site next to it is being flattened and planted with trees. Such appears to be the wisdom of the planners.
As you enjoy your celebrations this year, take a little time to think why we celebrate our festivals, beyond the razzamatazz. It is ultimately a time for family and friends to come together, something we missed desperately during Covid, and it’s never too late to create memories and instigate a new family tradition. Whatever festival you celebrate this year, do it with joy, something that has been in such short supply. Make it a season to remember for all that are important to you. Happy Christmas.

Carol A. Gartrell
Federation Chairman

*For the recipe go https://www.thewi.org.uk and put “Centenary Fruit Cake” in the search box.

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EDENBRIDGE & OXTED SHOW – REPORT, RESULTS AND PICTURES OF CLASS WINNERS

To find out more, please go to PAGE 12 of November’s SWIN

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NFWI’S COST OF LIVING HUB OFFERS HELP TO MEMBERS

• THE WI has created a cost of living hub to help members who are worried about the cost of keeping warm this winter.
• It can be accessed at: My WI | Cost of living hub (thewi.org.uk) and will be regularly updated with help and advice.*

The WI has also joined the Warm this Winter campaign, a cross-sector campaign combining poverty and environment groups to add our voice to the calls for emergency and longer-term measures to tackle the cost of living crisis.
NFWI chairman Ann Jones said: “The huge leap in the rise of the energy price cap will cause sleepless nights for the millions of people who face being unable to pay their energy bills this winter.
“We need urgent action from the government to stop the cost of living crisis from becoming a catastrophe this winter.
“We would urge the Government to work quickly to lead us away from the UK’s broken energy system towards cleaner, greener and cheaper forms of energy.”

*Perhaps online members could relay important points from the hub to those without internet access, so that they don’t miss out on information that may be of use to them. The Citizens Advice Bureau has a handy calculator to work out the cost of running electrical appliances — search for this topic at https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk

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SHOP EARLY FOR CHRISTMAS!

CATERHAM Hill are again holding a Christmas Fair to raise money for charity and give families a good day out.
The date is November 19, the venue de Stafford School Hall, Burntwood Lane, Caterham, CR2 5YX.

There will be stalls including a WI craft stall and others selling festive items and gifts, free activities for children, a WI Christmas cafe and free parking. Admission is £1, under 16s free.

The fair is open from 11.30am-3.30pm and funds raised will be for Abbie’s Army, a children’s brain tumour research charity.

On the subject of crafts, don’t forget that Denman at Home is also the place to go. Sue Pearl is running two needle felting courses: on Wednesday, November 23, from 12 noon-2pm she will show you how to make a delightful penguin and on Wednesday, November 30 she will make a Christmas robin and feathered friends. See the Denman at Home website.

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WHAT’S NEW FROM HQ

AT THE end of August/early September we sent a mailing to WI secretaries which included:

* Delegate and observer order forms for tickets to the 2023 NFWI Annual Meeting at St Davids Hall, Cardiff, together with a copy of the WI Linking List. Please complete and return your application for tickets to the federation office as soon as possible.
* WI Annual Meeting Forms: Can you please ensure all forms are completed accurately and clearly and returned to the Federation office as soon after your Annual Meeting as possible? We use this information to send out magazines, tickets etc. so when house numbers or email addresses are incorrect these do not reach their desired destination. Thank you very much for your help with this.

If your secretary has not received this information please contact the office as soon as possible.
Please also check the website (www.surreyfedwi.org.uk) for downloadable documents as well as news and information.

Karen Whitehead
Federation Secretary

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BE A DELEGATE – IT’S FUN AND A PRIVILEGE says WI Adviser ANNE HEWARD

THE Federation is asking WIs to send one delegate to represent eight WIs at the NFWI Annual Meeting in Cardiff on May 25, 2023.
Delegates’ coach travel and hotel accommodation are paid by the Federation. You may have heard of the “pooling of fares” which all WIs pay to their Federation; this is to help towards travel costs.
Recently we have had a shortage of volunteers, probably because of uncertainties about Covid.
How are delegates chosen?
Every year each WI is sent a schedule of the WIs to be represented at the Annual Meeting. The schedule is divided into columns and the WI in column 1 is asked for someone from its membership to volunteer to attend as a delegate.
If no-one is willing to go then the Secretary of that WI must contact the WI in column 2. If no one from that WI is willing to go then the request goes to the WI in column 3 and so on. This is very important because a lot of time is wasted chasing non-replies and having to find delegates from elsewhere in the county.
What does a delegate do?
We encourage delegates to come to the Annual Meeting in person to experience and enjoy being part of a big organisation with the opportunity to meet members from all over the country.
The Federation runs a resolution briefing meeting each year (in person and virtual) to help delegates understand the role and answer any questions.
We have over 150 WIs in Surrey so we need about 20 delegates. Each delegate collects the number of votes “for” or “against” that year’s resolution from each of the WIs she is representing, by visiting or by email.
There will be interesting speakers to hear, the Annual Meeting business and the debate on the chosen resolution. Your WIs will have given you their decisions on the resolution and you will probably have been given discretion in case there is an amendment (without discretion you can’t vote if there is a change to the wording of the resolution).
When you arrive, you will be given eight coloured cards with “For” written on them and another eight with “Against” (one for each of your WIs). When the time for voting comes you will be asked to pass the relevant cards along the row where you are sitting — one for each WI. The votes are then taken away to be counted. Those taking part virtually will have been given instructions regarding voting online.
At lunchtime there is time to browse the NFWI information stalls and often there are things to buy as well. When the meeting is over you either return to your hotel or head for home.
Afterwards your only requirement is to send a report of what you thought of the meeting to your representative WIs as soon as you get home, or you can arrange to visit and give a verbal report.
So, if your WI is lucky enough to be asked to send a delegate, do take the opportunity to volunteer and come in person. You can bring a friend as an observer, but she will have to pay her hotel, coach and entrance expenses — but if the Federation is short of delegates she could volunteer to become a delegate as well.

Anne Heward

WI Adviser

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A FELLOW WI MEMBER’S REFLECTION

On the evening of September 8, 2022, a radio announcement stunned the world by reporting the sudden death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. Whether one is in favour of the monarchy or not, this was a moment of history.
Surrey Federation marked the passing of Her Majesty with a simple but heartfelt statement that read: “It is with deepest sadness that the Surrey Federation of WIs acknowledges the death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. Her lifelong commitment, loyalty, wisdom and dedication to her peoples has been truly inspirational, particularly to fellow members of the WI. Our condolences go to the Royal family. Rest in peace Your Majesty.”
Members of the Royal Family, political leaders, sovereigns and journalists shared words of condolence and admiration for a life lived well in the service of her country and the Commonwealth. Over the following days it felt that the whole world had much of significance to say, to which I could add little.
Her Majesty was a lifetime member of the WI, as were the Queen Mother and Queen Mary before her, and many other senior female royals, including the Countess of Wessex, a member of my own WI, Bagshot.
On reflection, the institution of the monarchy, and the WI, two seemingly disparate organisations, share much in common because during her reign, Her Majesty exemplified the ideals of service, loyalty and commitment and was truly inspirational, characteristics highly valued by we WI members. Perhaps we recognised that, despite the Queen’s seemingly detached world of luxury and entitlement, on the day that she sat alone at the funeral of her husband, HRH Prince Philip, the love of her life, she became one of us?
Throughout her 70-year reign she had been a voice of women, speaking out on behalf of all women. A universally respected woman, she always supported the WI. Many of us recall her surprise address at the NFWI Centenary at the Royal Albert Hall, alongside the jovial moment of the cutting of the cake, when the knife she wielded failed to penetrate the icing and Princess Anne and the Countess of Wessex stepped in to help. A magical moment for very many members as we all shared in their laughter!
It is a remarkable statistic that 85% of the current UK population has lived their whole life with Queen Elizabeth II as their reigning monarch. I hear some of you saying that the monarchy is outdated and has lost its relevance in 21st Century global living. But what do we know about our past monarch?
For the vast majority of us, engagement with the Queen will have been through entertainment, for example the wonderful series The Crown or through press coverage.
Some of you will have spotted in the book recommendations in WI Life’s summer edition — Mrs Simpson by Wendy Holden. You may have been motivated to read her other recent novel, The Governess, a fictional account (though thoroughly researched) of the life of Miss Crawford — Crawfie — governess to the Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret, the former a little girl not born to be Queen but who took on the mantle of heir to the throne as a child.
The book tells how Crawfie battled to ensure that their education acquainted them with the lives of ordinary people. Perhaps one measure of her success might be the Queen’s lifelong commitment to the WI as a loyal and dedicated member. Both novels are a super read, but I digress.
Of all that has been reported about the Queen in the last few weeks, what has struck me most are her own words, that give us food for thought in these difficult and troubled times in an everchanging world, and seem most apt today: “We may hold different points of view, but it is in times of stress and difficulty that we most need to remember that we have much more in common than there is dividing us.” (1974).
The realisation of this sentiment was echoed in the sermon given by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, when we were reminded that “the pattern for many leaders is to be exalted in life and forgotten after death… People of loving service are rare in any walk of life… But in all cases those who serve will be loved and remembered when those who cling to power and privileges are long forgotten.”
What has been acclaimed as the biggest gathering of world leaders and politicians in living memory brought together nations, faiths, beliefs and politics. Does this foreshadow a wind of change, I wonder?
Of the many significant features integrated into the ceremonial commemorating the Queen’s death, all meticulously designed by her, has been the increasing role that women, particularly the female royals, have played. The poignant Vigil of the Princes, which included Princess Anne, the first time that a woman has taken part in this historic ceremony, and the stark and moving Vigil of the grandchildren, punctuated only by their seemingly muted footsteps, united in grief.
With the succession of His Majesty King Charles III we are likely to move into a time of continuity and also change. The immediate everyday changes that we will see will be the King’s head on our postage stamps, facing in the opposite direction to that of his mother, and the cypher on post boxes. Our rather rare George VI village post box was stolen recently; I trust that the one marked E II R will not suffer a similar fate.
And what of our passports and royal warrants on many of the products we buy? They too will change. When visiting a 1,000-year-old Benedictine monastery, Pannonhalma, in Hungary, I was honoured to be invited to lunch with the monks in their stunning Baroque refectory, a strikingly ornate room with frescoes and countless ancient religious triptychs decorated in gold leaf. We sat together around a table laid with silver and crystal. Evenly spaced along the centre of the table were bottles of a well known brand of tomato ketchup bearing our Queen’s Royal Warrant!
The last two-and-a half years have been marked for us all by a series of challenges that we could not have predicted and could never have been prepared for. The list continues to grow with the war in the Ukraine; rising gas, electricity, food and petrol prices — all everyday essentials — will have significant implications for ourselves, our families and for the WI. In contributing to the discussions around and the solutions to these problems, we could recall other wise words of our past Queen: “None of us have the monopoly of wisdom and we must always be ready to listen and respect other points of view.” (1991).
Thank you for your legacy to us, Your Majesty. Rest in peace.
God Save the King.

Carol A. Gartrell
Federation Chairman

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November’s Surrey WI News is now available for you to read online.  It is available to view on your phone, tablet or computer via Flipsnack@ November’s Surrey WI News.

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SFWI’s croquet day – report, pictures

To discover more, please go to PAGE 11 of October’s SWIN

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