Congratulations to the winners of our recent 200+ Club draw for June 2022
1st prize – £35
Linda Frise, Hampton Tudor Rose
2nd prize – £20
Lorraine Reed, Ruislip Evening
3rd prize – £15
Mary Jeffery, Stanwell
MFWI News
Happy Birthday – June 2022
Happy birthday to WIs in Middlesex celebrating birthdays this month:
Southbourne
03 June 1953
Greenford
11 June 1985
Hayes Town
17 June 1993
Stanmore
18 June 2018
Finchley
13 May 2009
Stanwell
15 May 1919
Ladies Of The Lock
26 May 2016
200+ Club Winners – April & May 2022
Congratulations to the winners of our recent 200+ Club daws.
April 2022
1st prize – £35
Elizabeth Owen, West Drayton
2nd prize – £20
Margaret Smith, Iver
3rd prize – £15
E Hutton, Manor Farm
May 2022
1st prize – £35
Linda Frise, Hampton Tudor Rose
2nd prize – £20
Lorraine Reed, Ruislip Evening
3rd prize – £15
Mary Jeffery, Stanwell
Chair’s Chat – June 2022
Hello all,
I hope you are well – and doesn’t a bit of sunshine just make you feel better?
Let’s hope we have a proper summer this year.
In May, the Board of Trustees held its Committee meeting in the Office for the first time since lockdown began. However, in the spirit of the times, it was a hybrid meeting, with a Zoom connection available for those who couldn’t get there in person. We had a few teething problems with this set-up but hope to improve next month!
I am so pleased that we are able to do this; it’s great to see the office open again, for business as well as craft sessions and so on, and we hope to be doing more there in the future.
As I mentioned in my last mailing, we are hoping to set up some training sessions soon, so please have a think if it is something you could help us with. Members can be wary of taking on a role on their WI Committee, not knowing what it might entail, so some information and guidance would be a great help. The office is available for face to face meetings, or Zoom if it is easier. Please get in touch if you would like more information.
By the time this reaches you it will nearly be time for our National Federation Annual Meeting in Liverpool. I am really looking forward to seeing some of you there—please come and have a chat if you can, as it would be good to put some names to faces.
It seems like such a long time since we gathered in Bournemouth in 2019 and I am sure we will have a great time—I just can’t wait to hear several hundred members singing Jerusalem; it always sends a shiver down my spine! It promises to be a successful day: the speakers look very interesting, and of course we will be discussing and voting on this year’s Resolution.
This is a very timely selection, there have been several mentions in the press recently about ASD/ADHD and it seems that they are only just beginning to realise how the condition is going undiagnosed in girls. It promises to be a thought-provoking debate.
So, what have I been doing this month?
I was pleased to recently attend the Spelthorne Group Meeting. It was good to be with so many fellow members and it really brought home how much we have missed these events over the past two years. We had an excellent evening.. After the business was dealt with, our refreshments were provided by Surplus to Supper.
We had all been asked to take our own mug/cup/glass; it was good to feel we were doing our small bit for the environment! Our entertainment was provided by a very funny magician, who had us all joining in. I hope to be able to attend more of these events in the future. A full report and photos are on page 10
My own WI, Stanwell, celebrated its 103rd Birthday in May, with a birthday party at our Village Hall. As usual, a good time was had by all! Earlier in the month, several of us attended a VE Day celebration dinner at a local college.
The food was prepared and served by students of the catering department and we were pleased to meet a group from a WI in Surrey—it seems we all know where to find a good meal—and it was good to support the next generation of chefs and restaurateurs!
I have just realised how many social events involve food…
Have a great month
Angela
Middlesex News – June 2022
Here we are in late spring, and our WIs are back in full swing again with meetings, outings and special events. So much so we have a bumper ten-page Middlesex News this month!
Click here or on the image to read it.
Protecting our Rivers
We know our rivers are polluted—the WI has been running the End Plastic Soup campaign to protect them from microplastic fibres and many groups have been campaigning about agricultural pollution and untreated sewage.
But there is another cause of pollution that doesn’t get mentioned so much: surface water run-off from roads, towns and cities. This contributes nearly a fifth of pollutants.
Surface water drains are intended to take clean rainwater, and in many cases end up in water courses with no treatment. But the rainwater picks up dust, microplastics from tyres and brake pads, detergents from washing cars, oils from the road and a whole range of other chemicals, damaging biodiversity and the health of rivers. When there are periods of heavy rainfall, the drainage systems can be overwhelmed, and we end up with flash flooding; water treatment companies have greater volumes of water going in than they can treat, as surface water combines with foul water – one of the causes of sewage overflows.
However, there are ways of capturing much of this water before it reaches the drainage system: adding sustainable urban drainage systems in urban areas and beside roads. Features such as rain gardens, swales, reed beds and green roofs collect water and slow the flow, allowing it time to soak into the ground, and the right planting cleans it.
As climate change drives more periods of heavy rain, this is important. Such schemes can make the streets look nicer, too, with attractive areas of greenery. This video explains it all in just over 3 minutes: https://youtu.be/LMq6FYiF1mo. Asking your local councils to bring in or support such schemes can make a big difference.
If you have a garden, as well as using water butts to collect water you can build your own rain garden to catch the excess—a surprising amount of water comes down from the roof after heavy rainfall and rain gardens can soak up 30% more water than a lawn.
These links show you how to make two different kinds: https://www.rhs.org.uk/garden-features/rain-gardens and https://permaculture.co.uk/videos/how-build-rain-garden.
Green roofs also slow down water flows, and can be added to sheds and garages if you want to leave the house roof clear for solar panels.
Even simple steps, such as avoiding paving over large areas of garden with impermeable surfaces, make a big difference to flood protection. If you have a driveway, areas of low-growing plants or even gravel will slow down rainwater run-off.
Some of the surface water contamination comes from misconnections—when washing machines, sinks and other domestic water outlets that should be connected to the sewer system have been connected to the surface water system by mistake. This happens surprisingly often, so it’s also a good idea to check where your pipes go.
Trustees farewell outgoing Chair Lorraine Reed
In April 2022, the Board of Trustees said our own thank you to Lorraine Reed who stepped down from her role as Federation Chair in March. Lorraine did a brilliant job steering the Federation through the difficult Covid period, even staying on for an extra year in the hope of sharing our Centenary celebrations.
Unfortunately, this was not to be, but we all just wanted to show our gratitude to Lorraine—so we treated her to a lovely lunch on the South Bank.
It was good to get together face to face, as the majority of our meetings are still via Zoom, and while Zoom is very convenient it’s not the same as actually meeting up. The meal was delicious (and so was the wine!) and a good time was had by all.
Thank you to all of my colleagues for a lovely meet-up—and especially to Sarah Endersby for making the arrangements.
Chair’s Chat – May 2022
Hello all,
I hope you are well.
Can I first of all thank everyone who has sent their best wishes to me following my appointment as Chair. Your kind thoughts mean a lot and I am sure will inspire me going forward.
By the time this reaches you, Easter will have come and gone, and do I hope you had a pleasant time. Did you do anything to mark the occasion? Maybe an Easter Coffee morning, or an Easter Bonnet competition? Do let us know—and send some photos!
You will remember that in the last issue I suggested a Federation-wide Tea Party to celebrate our Centenary—and anything else, really! Well, I am pleased to say that a few WIs are already planning something. Please let us know if you are too – and if we can do anything to help.
I know some of us are still anxious about meeting up, so please don’t do anything you are uncomfortable with. Hopefully, as the weather improves, we will all start to feel a bit more confident, especially outdoors.
Have you seen the mailing from NFWI Wales regarding their 2022 Not in my Name competition? The competition is to ‘Design and Make a Scarf’ depicting the Not in my Name campaign to end violence against women. Full details can be found on My WI.
As you probably know, the National Annual Meeting is being held on 11th June, in Liverpool. I am really looking forward to attending—especially after missing out for the last two years—and I am looking forward to meeting some of you there.
Finally, the National Federation raffle tickets for this year are now on sale through your Secretaries. Tickets cost £1 and the first prize is £10,000. Good luck!
Angela
Middlesex News – May 2022
As our WIs get back into the swing of in-person meetings and events, there’s so much more to read about in our monthly newsletter. Click here, or the image, to take a look.
A Buckinghamshire Science Day Out
On a bright spring day in March I drove to Aylesbury for a day of Investigation and Discovery put on by Buckinghamshire Federation Science and Society team. What a marvellous day! There were four speakers, all experts in their own fields. I was swamped with very interesting information—I just lapped it up! (Unfortunately, I haven’t retained all of it—should’ve taken notes!).
Carbon capture was about sending hydrogen from oil fields, and converting it into the national grid, and taking the carbon emissions back to be stored underground safely. The aim is that by 2050, we will all be using hydrogen to replace gas, though we will have to continue using fossil fuels until we have enough bio-fuels to build the manufacturing plants. I was interested to learn that although great Britain is good at reducing carbon release, aeroplanes release the most carbon, over the oceans, and this is a global problem.
A Life in Astrophysics was presented by Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell, an astrophysicist who, as a post-graduate student, discovered the first radio pulsars in 1967. This discovery eventually earned the Nobel Prize in physics in 1974; however, she was not one of the recipients of the prize. She was the only woman studying a degree in Physics at Glasgow University and had to fight for recognition throughout her student career.
Robotics and artificial Intelligence was about automated and autonomous robotic development. Automated robots are widely used for manufacture and surgery among other things, but autonomous robots such as driverless cars are only in the early stages of development. All robots are only as good as their programs, and this development is ongoing.
Rebel Cell: Aspects of Cancer was all about the rebel cells in our bodies. The cells mutate very early on in our lives to become rebels (they re-configure to escape our immune systems) and cause cancers. Research has led to discovery that some rebel cells can be controlled, and unfortunately they soon learn to re-invent themselves and continue to cause trouble.
I learned that though we can make choices to reduce the risks, life is really a lottery—some healthy people get cancer, and some unhealthy people don’t.
The speakers were excellent at presenting their topics in a lively way, particularly the ladies, who spoke slowly and clearly. They had all been heard on Radio 4, were contacted by the team and ‘interviewed’ to make sure that they could present their topics in a way that we would understand.
As Science Representative, I will try to organise something smilar for us in Middlesex. So watch this space!