Kicking ass and taking names: SHWI do self-defence

Another fantastic meeting with the Seven Hills ladies in March, this time with added kick!

I actually mean that quite literally as we had the wonderful Radek Kalas who came to see us and teach some pretty punchy self defense in the style of Krav Maga. Long gone, it would seem, are the days of handing over your purse and being nice about it, its all kicking ass and taking names these days.
The meeting kicked off with our annual vote for our charity of the year. Judy Kelso from SAYiT, our previous charity of the year was there to explain how they would be using the money we've raised. It was great to hear how we have made a difference to this small charity and she even brought along some of the young people who will benefit from the funds raised.

Treasurer Vicky with Judy and some of the young people from SAYiT

Then we heard a bit about the charities our members had nominated to become this year's charity of the year. All of them were worthwhile causes and it's a shame we can't support them all but we feel like it's important to have a concentrated effort each year for one charity.

After counting all the votes, it was announced that our charity of the year for 2016-17 will be Sheffield Light. Sheffield Light is a small local charity run by volunteers providing support across Sheffield to families affected by perinatal mental heath illnesses, including post natal depression and anxiety. We can't wait to get cracking and help support this worthy cause. 

Then we moved onto our activity - self defence!

Members with instructor Radek

Anyone who happened to be walking past might have been forgiven for being a little nervy -after hearing some of the shouts and seeing a lot of the punches and kicks going on in there I was a little nervy myself! I wouldn’t have wanted to get on the wrong side of most of the ladies that night after hearing rowdy agreements to the instructor suggesting you put your thumbs in the attackers eyes and ‘touch brain’. How splendid. I’m not sure the uninitiated would believe the WI could be quite so rambunctious. Tea, cakes and elbows to the crotch!

On a lighter note, everyone seemed to have a fantastic time - nothing like a good workout and pad pummeling to get the endorphins flowing. Plus, everyone is settling really well to the new venue, feels like we’ve been there a lot longer than a few months. Thanks for another great meeting. Same time again next month everyone?

Jodie Winters
Committee member

President's blog: Thoughts on 2015

It’s been another fantastic year for Seven Hills WI. We’re still at maximum capacity for members and we’ve had a brilliant programme to keep us entertained. Personal highlights for me include Cheerleading and Dr Nate Adams. 

Cheerleading in 2015

Fundraising has become such a huge part of our group and I’m happy to say we’ve continued to raise massive amounts of money for our charity of the year, Sayit. Our total this year is £1055.69 so well done to everyone who baked for Sheffield Food Festival or came along to our Centenary event. Next year I would like to organise an extra fundraising event or challenge for our charity so if anyone has any ideas, please let me know. 

Sheffield Food Festival 2015

One of my personal goals as President is to make members feel welcome and more included in the group. It can be hard when we have such a large group and when I’m personally very busy trying to get things ready at the start and end of meetings. I think we have got better at making members feel more included. We’ve had more and more newbies get involved, join spin-off groups and even feel like they want to join the committee after one year. I’d like to thank Lucy and Kat for organising a record number of meals out for SHWI Eats. Events like these really help people get to know each other and I think we’ve had much more than the usual faces come to events other than meetings. There is more to do and I hope we can build on this next year. 

Spin-off SHWI eats event at Bhaji Shop

On to the committee. We’ve had a few people stand down this year so I’d like to thank them for their hard work. Caryl Carson, Chella Quint, Leanne Sunter and Carly Sunter - thank you for everything you have done for SHWI and I hope you to see you at meetings in the future.

Our committee for 2016 is:

President - Kirsty Bowen

Secretary - Laura Bainbridge

Treasurer - Vicky Porteous-Medley

Vice President & Programme Co-ordinator - Jennifer Marsden

Assistant Secretary - Grace Tebbutt

Assistant Treasurer - Bex Lissaman

Meeting Attendance Secretary - Jodie Winters

Newsletter Editor - Sam Foster

Programme Co-ordinator - Rachel White

Meeting Co-ordinator - Liz Needes

SHWI Ambassadors - Anna Pilson, Alice Bullas, Sarah Willougby, Karin Safwenberg-Barnes, Chelle Cook

Next year we have a fantastic programme of events - more details to be announced soon!

Finally I’d like to say it’s been an honour to be President in the Centenary year. I’ve been lucky enough to have some fantastic opportunities and represent you in this year including appearing on the Great British Menu. 

BBC/Optomen Television Ltd/Andrew Hayes-Watkin

I will be stepping down at our AM in 2016 and I hope then, I will be able to look back at another successful year where the WI has enriched our lives and helped people where we can. 

The WI has been a force for good and for change for 100 years. I’d like to finish with a saying inspired by our WI friend, Joanne Croxford’s own motto - "Deeds not Words":

‘Fine words butter no parsnips’

I hope to our WI can continue to make positive change for our lives and our wider community in 2016. 

Kirsty Bowen
President

We raised £1024 at Sheffield Food Festival 2015

Anna, Jen, Kirsty, Grace and Chelle help on the stall

We're very happy to say that our stall at this year's Sheffield Food Festival raised an amazing £1024 for our charity of the year. Our members worked really hard to bake some delicious treats and volunteer on the stall all weekend. Committee member Sam made two beautiful rainbow pinata cakes for us to raffle on both days. Thank you to everyone who helped, bought a cake or raffle ticket from us!

All the money we raised will go to SAYiT Sheffield. They provide support for young people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) or who are affected by HIV.
 

One of Sam's incredible pinata cakes

Sheffield Food Festival this weekend

Last year's volunteers on our stall

It's Sheffield Food Festival this weekend (Saturday 23rd and Sunday 24th May) and once again, Seven Hills WI will be peddling our wares! We have a stall in the Peace Gardens (close to Browns Restaurant) selling homemade cakes and baked goods from 10am - 5pm on Saturday and 11am - 5pm Sunday. All the money raised goes to our charity of the year, SAYit.

The Sheena Amos Youth Trust (SAYiT) is an independent charity which has been running in Sheffield since 1999. A sexual health charity, they work with young people up to the age of 25, particularly those who are most vulnerable or marginalised including LGBT people or those affected by HIV.

Please come down and help support our charity of the year!

We choose SAYiT as our charity of the year

At our February meeting, Seven Hills WI members voted SAYiT as our charity for 2015. A local independent organisation, SAYiT (Sheena Amos Youth Trust) supports young people who are LGBT or who are affected by HIV.

Fundraising events planned include Seven Hills WI’s annual baking stall at Sheffield Food Festival. Last year, we raised £1170 over two days by selling cakes and organising a best in show competition.

Sally Carr, Strategic Manager of SAYiT said “In the on-going quest to address homophobia, biphobia and transphobia in our society we know that we still have a long way to go, and the support of the WI will help to address this outdated and hurtful prejudice. We will use the money raised to continue our educational and awareness raising work which aims to make society a better place for everybody.”

Kirsty Bowen, President of Seven Hills WI said “I am very pleased that we have chosen SAYiT to be our charity in 2015, the WI’s centenary year. The WI has never shied away from important issues and we hope that we can make a real difference to young people affected in our local area.”

For more information on Seven Hills WI and our fundraising, email us at sevenhillswi@live.co.uk

Charity and Cake

February 2015 brought a visit by one of our own - Claire Kemp and voting for our 2015 charity. As always we started the night with this month's WI business. We really are busy ladies with more activities than ever - we have nearly every base covered: You can gorge on tasty food with SHWI Eats, then burn off the calories with SHWI Runners and the SHWI Slimming group, whilst keeping busy with SHWI Mad Skills, SHWI Crafts, SHWI Cine-Club, SHWI at Night and SHWI Mummies! And now, with a SHWI night out in the diary, we can even get our groove on. Anyway, back to business … 

Our wonderful Fundraising and Campaigns Officer, Sarah Willoughby, introduced the charity voting process. We had 5 truly deserving charities to choose from this year put forward by  our members. But the winner was The Sheena Amos Youth Trust (SAYiT), an independent young people’s charity based in Sheffield that provide support, information and opportunities for young people aged up to 25 who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) or who are affected by HIV. Now onto the cake… 

Claire kicked off the evening by explaining how she became a cake queen. Originally from an architecture and design background, Claire created her cake empire to combine her passion for baking with her professional design skills and artistic flair. 

She launched Claire Kemp Cake Studio, in 2011, with a 1:100 scale cake of The University of Sheffield's Arts Tower building that was almost 80cm high. Her bakes are extraordinary, not only are they very pretty but they are mini feats of engineering. 
 

Claire gave us a demo of her exquisitely smooth icing skills – divulging a few secrets along the way. So what did we learn? Claires’ top tips included:
· Use icing sugar to roll out icing, but only on the underside. DO NOT flip over the icing (like one would with dough).
· Avoid wooden rolling pins.
· Always roll forward (rolling backwards creates air bubbles).
· Grey icing is surprising gorgeous!

I was really impressed with Claire’s cakes and will definitely be trying out her tips - I hope everyone else found it just as informative as I did! Next month we have jewellery-making with another one of our wonderful members – Lauren from Bobbins & Buttons (extra materials charge of £2 per member, and the start of our fundraising for SAYiT … see you there!


Alice Bullas 
Commitee member 

P.S A big thank you to The Broadfield for donating voucher for a pie & a pint for our raffle.