Our Singapore Roses have been very much on our collective mind this month as, on November 17, the club celebrated its 75th birthday. What an incredible milestone and while the current Covid climate dictated that the milestone be marked virtually, it did mean that our club president Vera Farmilo and fellow committee member Carol Metcalfe could accept the club’s kind invitation to attend. Below is the poster pic we sent to IWC Singapore bearing best wishes from our club. We really liked and appreciated the sentiment in this quote, right, from our Singapore friends as it endorses that we all have something special and unique to offer our clubs and communities. While their activities – like those of most of us around the world – have been impacted by Covid, the club is a firm believer in Participation over Perfection.

Sharing some highlights from the newsletter.

MOTUEKA

Over the past months the club has been collecting a wide variety of good quality household goods for the Nelson Red Cross Refugee program which has sponsored families from Columbia and Myanmar.

At a recent club meeting, Annette Sirak spoke about her experience as a volunteer for the Refugee resettlement program. Annette and her group, organise a rental, set up the house and meet the family at the airport. The family has three weeks orientation and help with English lessons, setting up bank account, registering with Work & Income and the local health center as well as enrolling children at the local school. The families are also encouraged to have community involvement with families already settled. The local newspaper recently did a feature on a couple from Bhutan who arrived in Nelson ten years ago unable to speak any English and now run a successful fish and chip shop.

AVONHEAD

The I W Club of Avonhead commenced the year with a speaker from PIPS (Pregnancy, Infancy, Parenting, Support) formerly Pregnancy Help Canterbury Canty. The August and September meetings were cancelled due to the Covid. In October we had the pleasure of District Chairman Barbara join us and we held our AGM. 

In July Jillian Crossen put out a request for second hand uniform/winter clothing and knitted beanies for students at Burnside Primary School. The response was wonderful and certainly most appreciated by the school.

Val Morgan continues to knit Teddy Bears for the Christchurch Hospital and with contributions from other members we have donated a total of 900 Teddy Bears since we commenced this project nine years ago.

RANGIORA

One of our main charities is the Cholmondeley Centre at Governors Bay. Two of our members had made toilet bags, pencil cases and swimming bags and in June we got together and filled these bags with toiletries and pencils etc. Often children who go to Cholmondeley don’t own these personal items so they are given their very own bag to keep. In October Robyn Wallace, manager of the Chomondeley Centre came and spoke to us and told us about the work at the center, so it was nice to be able to give her a good supply of bags for the children. 

Spoke and Felloe's report from Inner Wheel New Zealand District NZ297 is now available and can be found here:

Charity fundraising by Inner wheel Club of Christchurch West. This beautiful Kaffe Fassett Fabric Patchwork Quilt has been listed on TradeMe with a buy now price of $500.00

The NZ294 November E-Magazine has all sorts of goodies for you to share with your members. These include novel ideas from Clubs, two yummy recipes, some creative work from members, profiles of the who's who, some laughs of course (lookout for "The computer's Gobbled Grandma"), stress management, and much more!

In short, I can promise you a jolly good read and a laugh or two. So I suggest you settle down in your favorite chair with a lovely cup of tea and the magazine and go for it! Enjoy!

You can find it here

Carole’s Stitching

Another lockdown productive activity worth sharing. At the end of August Carol did a 2-day embroidery class embroidering and learning how to construct the resulting Christmas cubes. There were 8 cubes with each side using a different embroidery technique. This involved 48 squares of embroidery and none of us expected them to be finished this year. However, with the lockdown and having activities curtailed, quite a few people have finished their cubes which is quite extraordinary considering the work involved. These cubes are put together in such a way that they can be manipulated/turned into different patterns. It is a bit difficult to explain but she has taken a photo of the “NOEL” side to give you an idea. The other two are different techniques.

The Inner Wheel Club of Plimmerton received several boxes of knitted squares to be sewn up into blankets for the Neonatal Unit.

The Craft group spent a morning sorting out colours and sizes to make up these blankets which will be delivered to the Neonatal Uni for the families of premature babies.

The Inner Wheel Club of Plimmerton recently held their annual Pink Ribbon Lunch and last week members helped with the Pink Ribbon Annual Appeal.

With all the disruptions caused be COVID this year, it was wonderful to be able to support Pink Ribbon, as this organization relies on the funds raised to provide services to women in our community.   

 

Dianne, Colleen and Diana held the first of our fundraising Garage Sales a few weeks back. It was very successful. They presold approximately 100 strawberry plants and a few other donated items, and we had a great response from the public who bought up large. They had further donations after the Sale, so they decided to have a further one. They this last weekend of October 2021, a week earlier than planned as they thought the uncertainty around the South Island Covid cases could mean another lockdown. They had another great response and items not sold were then donated to the South Alive program for a charity event they are holding. The silky pillow evening at Beth’s was a great success, with heaps of pillows being delivered to the Cancer Society. The new labels look great on them. 

What amazing ladies you are with all the lovely preserves, cookies, fruit & veges, knitting, sewing, weaving, reading, and beauty jewelry you contributed to make our Days for Girls project such a success! Velma has gathered up the remaining bits and pieces, which we will take to the District Meeting on 27 November. The table raised $280.60 so thank you ladies for all your contributions.