Turning the town green to #sharethelove!

We've been thinking about the lives and places we love and want to protect from climate change. The Women's Institute is part of the Climate Coalition, along with other organisations like the National Trust, RSPB and Oxfam. On the 14th February each year thousands of WI members across the country create and share green hearts to show the love and get people thinking and talking about what we stand to lose to climate change and want to protect. We were a couple of days late, but Bake Natter and Roll wanted to join in!

A lovely postcard was sent out in this months WI Life magazine, and on the NFWI website we found instructions how to make green seeded paper hearts from recycled paper (we used old newspapers). A couple of us got together during half-term to make them with our children and had a great time blending up wet newspaper and adding food colouring and seeds. We chose flowers which attract bees and butterflies.

One of our completed postcards with recycled paper heart filled with seeds

At our monthly meeting on 15th February members wrote on the back of the postcard some of the people, places and life they wanted to protect from climate change - these included polar bears, turtles, garden birds, the rainforest, bees and butterflies. Altogether we filled in 25 postcards, including some home-made ones, and attached a seeded paper heart to each one.

And then came the fun part! We hid the postcards in popular places round the town so people could find them. Harder than you might think with the weather we've had recently as they needed to be protected from the elements. On the back of the postcard we'd added contact details so people who found them could contact us via social media and find this blog.

Only a few hours later our first postcard had been found! Staff at Alice Holt Forest were delighted by their discovery and tagged us on their Facebook Page. We left several postcards at the visitor centre and café at this very popular local Forestry Commission woodland.

"What a great find by our colleagues yesterday - some #showthelove seeds! The hearts we found were made by Bake, Natter and Roll - Farnham WI to show the love for marine life affected by plastic pollution. We're really looking forward to planting and nurturing our seeds. How do you show your love for the forest at Alice Holt?"

We're so excited some of our postcards have been found! There are still more to be claimed though, at places including a local Children's Centre, Farnham Library, Farnham Museum and the Maltings.

Comment below if you find one, or to let us know what you'd like to protect from climate change!

Bake, Natter and Roll - 2017 Programme

Hello there,

Welcome back to Bake, Natter and Roll - The Farnham WI Blog!

Well we've survived our first year as an official WI and we're excited to share with you our programme of monthly meetings for 2017. We still meet on the third Thursday of the month and we hope you like the look of the meetings we have planned for our second year.....

2017 Meetings

19th January – Crafting

Tonight we’ll be making ourselves name badges and decorating mugs to bring along to future meetings.

16th February – Wellbeing

We will be joined by various practitioners for demonstrations and talks aimed at promoting wellbeing.

16th March – Emergency First Aid

Jen Ballard will educate us in emergency first aid.

20th April – Quiz Night

Which team will triumph at the Bake Natter and Roll Quiz night?

18th May – Make a Resolution

We’ll be discussing the resolutions being tabled at the 2017 National Federation AGM and voting accordingly. we'll be joined by Farnham Foodbank and Surrey County Council for more info on how to support the current campaign to avoid food waste and address food poverty.

15th June – Murder Mystery Trail

Whodunnit! There has been a murder and this evening we’ll be out and about solving the clues and following the trail around Farnham to work out who the murderer is.

20th July – Cooking Demo

This evening we will be enjoying a demonstration of delicious Indian cooking by Malini from Curries at Home.

21st September – Pets as Therapy

Patricia Bland will join us with a couple of canine friends to learn more about the work of pets as therapy.

19th October – Weaving and Spinning

Learn more about spinning and weaving with the West Surrey Guild of Spinners, Weavers and Dyers.

16th November – AGM/Mummy Makes Fudge

After the business of our AGM we will be joined by Liz Usher to learn about how she started her own business, how it’s grown and what’s next for Mummy makes. We’ll have chance for sampling and buying too.

21st December – Christmas Floral Arrangement

Sue Pritchard from Lavender Hill Company will be joining us to demonstrate a beautiful seasonal floral arrangement.

I know the committee are especially looking forward to November and the opportunity to sample some scrummy fudge! 

We look forward to seeing our members at the next meeting!

Thank you for popping by today,

The Bake, Natter and Roll Committee

Our September Meeting - Healthy Eating into Winter

Hello there,

Welcome back to the Bake, Natter and Roll blog!

Last week was WI Sports Week and also our September monthly meeting. We were supposed to be having a meeting dedicated to jam and chutney making, but we couldn't get a speaker.....so instead we decided to tie the theme into Sports Week and generally being healthy.

Nuffield Health Farnham joined us again, this time providing a speaker for our healthy eating evening. Georgie Laverton, Operations Manager, joined us for an evening of practical tips and discussion about keeping healthy - what to eat and how to keep active when you have a busy life. Georgie has been in the fitness industry for over 18 years, training as a fitness professional and previously being a Health Mentor at Nuffield Health.

Georgie asked us lots of questions about healthy eating - what we wanted to achieve and what our biggest barriers are. It was great to discuss healthy eating with other people - we all know what we should eat, but equally we all face the same issues with staying on track! Georgie then gave us lots of advice about how to keep the sweet cravings at bay and how we can weave some activity into our everyday lives. Her advice was simple and straight forward - no faddy diets or strict regime!

She stressed the importance of eating regularly to maintain blood sugars levels and suggested we try snacking on nuts (especially walnuts). She also reminded us of the guidelines that we should try and exercise for ten minutes three times a day.

It was a really interesting meeting, with lots of sensible advice that we all felt we could follow!

Thank you for popping by today,

The Bake, Natter and Roll Committee

Our July Meeting .....Make Do and Mend

Hello there,

Welcome back to the Bake, Natter and Roll Farnham WI Blog!

This month Vice President Kate hosted the monthly meeting which included a talk and demonstration from Alice and Ginny and a clothes swish! The theme for the meeting was "make do and mend" and we enjoyed an informative evening, led by Alice and Ginny, which was followed by time clothes swapping...giving our unwanted clothes a new home!

Alice and Ginny is a collaboration of friends Alice Butcher and Ginny Farquhar, who provide fun, informative sewing workshops that focus on building good core sewing skills, enabling greater confidence for independent sewing. They offer sewing & craft classes for all ages in Hampshire & Surrey.

During the evening Alice and Ginny talked through the importance of the "make do and mend" movement and how we can all learn simple skills to prolong the life of our clothes or reuse them in an imaginative way.

We saw lots of tools of the trade during the talk and were given ideas and tips for upcycling clothes. Alice also showed us how much fabric you can gain from unpicking an old shirt!

We were also given some top tips for sewing on missing buttons....and we all got to have a go....

Once the talk had finished the clothes swap commenced. Each attending member was inviting to bring along good quality clothes that they no longer wanted, and then we swapped....

a fun way to share clothes, extending the life of unwanted items in your wardrobe!

Once again this was a very informative evening, which left our members feeling inspired to give their wardrobes a new lease of life!

We'd like to thank Alice and Ginny for joining us.

Thank you for popping by today,

The Bake, Natter and Roll Committee

Our June Meeting.....WI-NEY Night!

Hello there,

Welcome back to Bake, Natter and Roll, the Farnham WI blog! We're a little behind with our blog posts at the moment....sorry!

Way back in June (that's how behind we are with our posts - whoops!) Vice President Lydia hosted a fab WI-ney night where we were joined by Thomas Jack from Wine Rack in Farnham for a talk on wine!

VP Lydia overseeing the wine!

Thomas took us through a selection of old world and new world wines from around the world, telling us about the techniques used to make them.....and of course we got to sample the wines too....

Old world wine vs. new world wine - which will you chose?

We learnt that largely the difference between old world and new world wines is the methods used to make the wine. 

Old World wine countries wine making tends to be restricted, with guidelines all wineries must follow. Each country and region in the Old World has been making their wine the same way for centuries, and current winemakers are held to those traditional standards. The New World generally places less emphasis on making wine the same way it has been made previously, and more emphasis on making wine that takes advantage of modern advances.

We also learnt that everyone has their own preference when it comes to wine and it's good to explore the different wines available.

It was an educational, but fun evening which we all enjoyed. 

We'd like to thank Thomas for joining us for the evening!

Thank you for popping by today,

The Bake, Natter and Roll Committee

2016 Resolutions

Hello there,

Welcome back to Bake, Natter and Roll - the Farnham WI blog!

As you may know, the WI has a long history of campaigning on a wide range of issues. These campaigns are about changing things for the better and tackling the issues that matter to members.

Members are at the heart of the WI and they play a central role in bringing issues onto the WI's national agenda through our public affairs and campaigning. The WI has a resolutions and mandates process which means that every campaign starts within our membership and every year we vote on which resolutions to support.

Previous campagins and initiatives have included SOS for Honeybees, More Midwives and Time to Talk about Organ Donation.

As a newly formed WI group Bake Natter and Roll are not able to vote on the Resolutions in 2016, but that didn't stop us finding out more about them and having a discussion at our May meeting. At the meeting Gill Wright (joint Farnham and Hale member and Tresurer at Hale WI) gave us a presentation on the two resolutions have been selected to go forward to a final vote at the Annual Meeting in Brighton on 11th June:

Avoid food waste, address food poverty
'The WI calls on all supermarkets to sign up to a voluntary agreement to avoid food waste, thereby passing surplus food on to charities thus helping to address the issue of increasing food poverty in the UK.'

Appropriate care in hospitals for people with dementia
'We call upon HM Government and the NHS to provide facilities to enable carers to stay with people with Alzheimer's disease and dementia that have been admitted into hospital.'

Following Gill's presentation we had a group discussion about the two resolutions and look forward to hearing the outcome of the vote next month.

For more information visit the Women's Institute website.

Thank you for popping by today,

The Bake, Natter and Roll Committee

Our May Meeting - the tea-riffic world of social media!

Hello there,

Welcome back to Bake, Natter and Roll - the Farnham WI blog!

This month our monthly meeting was led by Vice President Rachel Wheeler who also runs some of the Social Media for Bake, Natter and Roll. As Rachel also writes a blog dedicated to Afternoon Tea we decided to dedicate this meeting to the world of Social Media and Rachel shared her blogging story with the members, giving them some tips on using social media and answering questions.

Rachel is a self-taught blogger whose afternoon tea blog is popular with tea and cake lovers around the world. Rachel attributes her love of social media (Twitter in particular) to her blogs popularity and she took the members through how she set up the blog and shared it with potential readers.

Since we were talking quite a bit about afternoon tea - Rachel and President Cat Hoare thought it would be a wonderful treat to enjoy a spot of afternoon tea during the discussion and each table had a tea-riffic afternoon tea stand to enjoy....

Topics discussed during this interactive meeting included setting up a blog, using Twitter, dedicated Facebook pages, Instagram and the use of hashtags in social media (remember to be careful what you write in your tags!). Rachel answered as many questions as she could during the evening and invited members to ask her other questions via the Bake, Natter and Roll Facebook page if they wanted.

The cucumber sandwiches, savoury tarts, scones, cakes and biscuits were enjoyed by everyone!

June's monthly meeting is called WI-NEY Night - where we will be enjoying (responsibility) a selection of wine and increasing our wine knowledge!

Thank you for popping by today,

The Bake, Natter and Roll Committee

Our Mindfulness Meeting - February 2016

Hello there,

Welcome back to Bake, Natter and Roll - the Farnham WI blog.

This week we had our second monthly meeting - with our first external meeting. I think the whole committee felt that this was our first real meeting as a WI and were looking forward to seeing all the members again.

In this meeting 51 members and 7 guests joined us for an introduction to mindfulness, led by Suzette Jones Health & Wellbeing Adviser The Diocese of Guildford.

Suzette took us through the basic principals of mindfulness, introducing us to the concept of paying attention to our experience in the present moment with an attitude of acceptance. She explained that anyone can practice mindfulness and took us through some simple exercises.

We practiced mindful smiling - a very simple exercise where we did nothing but smile and focus on our smiles for a full thirty seconds.....

Suzette encouraged us to smile more, especially when we have moments in life when we become irritated. Next time you're stuck in a traffic jam give it a go - smile and for a few deep slow breaths.

Evidence shows that mindfulness practice can boost our well-being and compassion for ourselves and others. Being in the moment and paying attention makes us more present and awake in life.

As well as mindful smiling, we also learnt about the three step breathing space meditation and mindful eating - really thinking about the food we are eating, where has it come from and who created it, before eating it.

Suzette encouraged us to continue practising mindfulness at home - there are many different ways to do this, from colouring books, to guided mindfulness meditation to simply taking time out each day to focus the mind on your breath. 

The meeting was enjoyed by all our members and we'd like to thank Suzette for joining us for the evening

Thank you for popping by today,

The Bake, Natter and Roll Committee

Don't forget to try mindful smiling next time you feel your irritation levels rise!