this week

Our Queen Bee, 2009

It's our members' AGM tomorrow evening!  We'll be starting a little earlier at 7.45pm, as we have a lot to fit in - looking back at what we have done in the last year, formal reports and elections.  There'll be a short talk from Niki looking back at what EEWI has achieved over the last five years too.  Then we'll get on to celebrating our year with a wine tasting.  Even though we are on a budget this year, we've still got lots of lovely wine lined up - in my front room at the moment! - but it will be there waiting for you tomorrow night.  There will be some nibbles, but if you would like to bring some food along to share, do feel free to do so.  Usual location - St Margaret's House, Old Ford Road, E2.

Our Friday coffee morning is at Skylight Cafe, Commercial Street, E1 at 10.30am on Friday 18th.  If you are interested in joining us, we will be making our way to the Women's Library afterwards to see their latest exhibition All Work and Low Pay.  Guaranteed to inspire...

Finally, a big thank you to those who supported local charity U-Turn at their quiz night last Friday with your donations of prizes, baking, or simply by coming along and joining in.  And if you don't the answer to the question "What instrument does Lisa Simpson play?",  ask Jane.  She may be able to help you...


See you tomorrow.

aim and aspire

We want to do our bit to make sure that woman make their mark in the world and we are delighted that some of our entrepreneurial members have been kind enough to share their skills with us.  We thought that it might be a good idea for the New Year to invite a speaker to come along and talk to us about the challenges of setting up a new business and we are delighted that Lana will be visiting us in January.  More about that later.  In the meantime, Lana is running some workshops for people who are interested in setting up their own business and there is a 20% discount for EEWI members.  They cover topics ranging from writing a business plan to  marketing and customers .  If you are interested, take a look at what's going on here.  Might be a good time to get ready for those New Year resolutions now!

loving our library

What's this?  Cake in the library and not a shush within hearing?  It was our great coffee morning at Bethnal Green Library courtesy of librarian Richard and his people.  We had a tour round the library, a look at the lovely stained glass (Motherhood, Fatherhood and Peace!), a quick trip to see the magnificent tile work in the ladies and gents, and, ahem, cake of course.  Seems we were all thinking along autumnal lines and there were three different types of apple cake available to celebrate apple day.  At least Jackie had the forethought to bring along some cheese biscuits.  And Janet says that Bethnal Green has the best selection of talking books she's seen in the Borough.  Definitely worth a visit for the green location, historic ambience, and the books - of course.

Our thanks go to Clare for organising our outing and to Richard and everyone at the library for giving us such a warm welcome.

Don't forget - if you have not signed the NFWI petition to save our libraries (not everyone is as lucky as us) do please pop along to the online version here.

a round heeled woman

It seems to me that there is something rather indulgent about going to a matinee performance.  Perhaps that contributed to everyone's obvious enjoyment of Sharon Gless's performance in A Round Heeled Woman.  She was absolutely fabulous playing a sixty six year old woman who places an ad looking for, well, company let's say.  Funny, poignant, clever, and truthful.  What's more, we were lucky to participate after the performance in the Q&A session with both Sharon and Jane Juska, author of the book on which the play is based.  Why did she wait 30 years before placing her ad?  She was too busy of course.

Thanks to Niki for organising our outing, and to the lovely women who came along.

oh what a lovely night

What a lovely evening we had launching the Food Sharing Project with Sue and Corinne from Project Phakama.  Listening to everyone's food stories, recipes, memories of families and friends, and then sharing salads ...

and savouries ...

and sweet things...

and the recipes they would like to find.

It was an absolute pleasure.

We're very excited about working with Phakama, helping with growing and making and feasting.  We'll be hearing more in the New Year.  I'll be adding a link to Phakama's blog - as soon as I can find it.  In the meantime, see you at Bethnal Green Library tomorrow morning.

october meetings - bring a friend!

Seems like I forgot to remind you all about our October meeting.  Must have been all that cake making for the 75th Anniversary of the Battle of Cable Street.  Hope you saw us in East End Life with our cakes (my mum missed it and had to trawl back through her recycling!).  We'll still be on a food theme for our meeting tomorrow Tuesday 18th October when Phakama will be joining us to launch their food sharing project.  We'll be meeting at our usual time - 7.30 for 8pm, St Margaret's House, Old Ford Road, Bethnal Green, E2 9PL and this month we're inviting you to bring a friend for free (we normally suggest a £3 donation).  It would be lovely if you could join in with the event by bringing a favourite recipe/ story/ food to share.  Don't worry if you're not a cook - just bring yourself and a food story.  There's sure to be enough to go round.  

I'm thinking of apples at the moment as it's Apple Day on Friday 21st October.  Or I may save that for the cake I'm going to make for our Coffee Morning this Friday.  We're planning something a little different to support the NFWI's Love Your Libraries Campaign, so we will be meeting at Bethnal Green Library at 10.30am.   We'll be supplying the cakes ourselves, so if want to bake something, please do.  Everybody is welcome, so come and join us.

Love Your Libraries

Following huge support at the Annual Conference, the NFWI has launched its Love Your Libraries campaign.  Part of the campaign is a petition calling on the Government to honour its commitment to champion the library service.  We are hoping that there will 100,000 signatures and trigger a debate in Parliament.  You can sign the petition online via the Government's e-petition website.  And do remember to encourage others to sign the petition too!

We'll be doing our own bit to support our own public library service, kicking off with a coffee morning in October.  Watch this space for more info!

EDITED TO ADD:  Forgot to mention that you can get into see films at Rich Mix on Mondays and Tuesdays at a reduced rate if you show your Tower Hamlets Ideas Stores Card.  Wish I'd have remembered that before I paid full price this week to see Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy....