Adderbury & District WI

Adderbury & District WI The Adderbury & District Women's Institute - a modern thinking WI that serves to inspire and inform

Adderbury and District Women's Institute was formed in November 2010. We meet in The Institute, Adderbury, on the first Thursday of every month at 7.30pm. We met by Zoom during Lockdown but now, since September 2021, we are meeting again at The Institute at 7.30pm on
1st Thursday of every month. Activities over the past four years have included guest speakers on a wide variety of subjects includi

ng local history, Dogs for the Disabled, beekeeping, the Mystery of Agatha Christie, English Cut Flowers, Costumes in the theatre and the history and memories of Whitney blanket making. We have had demonstrations of how to make ourselves look more glamporous and make the best of our wardrobes, how to cook Japanese and now our latest demo on cooking family meals without meat or fish (October 2014), and trips out to Denman College, Lord Leycester Hospital, Ditchley Park and Broughton Grange garden. In May 2011, we were privaleged to have Pru Leith come and give us a very entertaining evening, recalling her life experiences and some of the amazing things she has achieved. Not only do we meet once a month but we also have various activities going on throughout the month for those who are interested including a knitting group, which has now become our revisioned "needlecrafters" group, aa reading group with a wide-ranging book list and our walking group which, in the summer of 2014, visited a Medicinal Herbalists garden for a talk on the use of such herbs and their home application plus a tour of this very lovely garden. You are most welcome to come along to any of these "extra activity" groups. They are usually held in a member's house, so please keep an eye on our notice board at The Institute, or on our website for venue details. All ideas are very welcome, whether that is suggestions for our monthly meetings, trips, speakers or for our extra monthly activities. So if you have a skill or wlould like to learn something new, please do let us know and we will try to accommodate. Many members come to our meetings in order to meet and make new friends, We all live very full and busy lives but if you would like to come along to one of our meetings you will be assured of a warm welcome and we will ensure that you will not be left along if you do no know anyone. Each year we like to support a charity and to date we have supported GAGA - Goodwill & Growth for Africa UK(GAGA) - looks at working, funding and forging relationships with organisations which aim to alleviate the effects of poverty, disease (HIV/AIDS) and violence on African children and the greater communities that they live in; BYHP - Banbury Young Homeless Project - BYHP exists to support and assist Young People in finding and maintaining a safe home from which they may be assisted to determine their own opportunities in life. We currently maintain a donation box for suitable food items at our monthly meetings. The current year's charity is the Frank Wise School - a community school for children with Special Needs, between the ages of 2 to 19, described by Ofsted as "Outstanding and Inspirational". Beginning at Wood Green

House with 30 pupils, the school has now been running for 50 years, currently catering for 107 children and young people.

Forthcoming WI events for all members.Craft Group - Monday 28 July at 2.00pm at Janet's house - 53 St. Mary's Road. Post...
25/07/2025

Forthcoming WI events for all members.

Craft Group - Monday 28 July at 2.00pm at Janet's house - 53 St. Mary's Road. Postcode OX17 3HA. For ongoing crafting and thoughts and ideas for our 2025 Christmas Tree event at St. Mary's, Adderbury.

Meriel's Book Group for Tuesday 29 July at Cindy's home to discuss our latest read - Hamnet.

Our August Members' Meeting social event to be held in Janet's garden at 53 St. Mary's Road, Adderbury - 2.30pm to 4.30pm. Please bring a plate of finger food and a portable chair where possible.

Founder's Day and Climate Ambassador Sue Smith event for Friday 19 September at Adderbury's Rugby club. Further details to be sent out and free tickets for the event may be booked now via Delia ###

Our Artists Book event, when Meg Richardson helped members begin their journey towards the creation of their own books w...
15/07/2025

Our Artists Book event, when Meg Richardson helped members begin their journey towards the creation of their own books with samples of her own work to inspire and encourage ###

Photos for our Artists Books event last Wednesday 9 July 2025 at The Institute, which was absolutely fascinating and ext...
13/07/2025

Photos for our Artists Books event last Wednesday 9 July 2025 at The Institute, which was absolutely fascinating and extremely interesting ###

Our flower farm visit and more photos to view.  We were all impressed by Tif's presentation and tour and hope we may vis...
13/07/2025

Our flower farm visit and more photos to view. We were all impressed by Tif's presentation and tour and hope we may visit again, sometime. Perhaps for the Christmas Fair ag the end of November ###

10/07/2025

Our much-anticipated Artistes Book event with Meg Richardson on Wednesday, 9 July, last night, at The Institute, which was resoundingly successful and very much enjoyed by all attending members.

Meg had brought along a marvellous display of her books including some for sale, which were most welcomed, even giving each of us a little book as a keepsake.

All necessary equipment was kindly provided - scalpels, cutting boards, paper, grey & coloured card, glue and brushes, newspaper, printed covering paper, ribbon, and all needed tools including a hammer, long and short rulers and hole-making tool.

Meg gave excellent instructions and demonstrations for making our first artist book and was extremely helpful in all matters, as we took our first tentative steps towards a new & aspirational craft goal.

A altogether brilliant afternoon and here a few photos for you to view ###

ps I was so keen to do my write up and quite forgetful of needing to upload my photos, which had escaped my attention. I will post now and do a photo post this afternoon. My apologies ###

Call now to connect with business.

Just a few more flower views from Monday 7 July at Chippy Flower Farm ###
10/07/2025

Just a few more flower views from Monday 7 July at Chippy Flower Farm ###

A most fascinating and interesting visit to Chippy Flower Farm on Monday 7 July, on a beautiful, hot and windy summer's ...
10/07/2025

A most fascinating and interesting visit to Chippy Flower Farm on Monday 7 July, on a beautiful, hot and windy summer's evening. The farm is perched atop a high hill and the wind's action drove us into Tif's display-sales area for her talk about her farm, which has been in existence for the last 4 1/2 years We all delighted in the bunches of drying flowers hanging from the ceiling & particularly the dried seedheads of Nigella (aka Love-in-a-mist), the books, hand creams, flower vases and pottery containers made by Tif's sister. Tif is the farm's owner-manager, working full-time with 6 volunteer helpers to manage the site, grow and care for the flowers, prepare wedding flowers, their PYO areas and provide learning courses.

Pathways between the different growing areas allowed closer inspections of the great variety of grown flowers, such as, Monarda (aka Beebalm, Bergamot, Oswego tea, made by native American Indians), Delphiniums, Alchemilla mollis (aka Ladies mantle), Mallow, Dahlia, lavender, Bladder campion, Cerinthe (aka Honeyworts), roses, poppies, Nigella and calendula everywhere.

The site has no running water so they must harvest rain water in deep troughs adjacent to the polytunnels, which are replenished by run-offs via channels on the sides of these tunnels. They take flasks of hot water with them to help with flower stem conditioning and are often on site at 4am to make flowers ready for collection, their PYO flower area, wedding and memorial flowers.

A Christmas Fair is definitely an event to look forward to and here are a few flower photos to view ###

Three more photos from our Members' Meeting last Thursday for you to see.  A very good meeting and we all enjoyed hearin...
10/07/2025

Three more photos from our Members' Meeting last Thursday for you to see. A very good meeting and we all enjoyed hearing from Analiza Jones ###

Our Members' Meeting on 3 July 2025, when our guest speaker, Analiza Jones, presented her collection of handmade bags cr...
09/07/2025

Our Members' Meeting on 3 July 2025, when our guest speaker, Analiza Jones, presented her collection of handmade bags created out of locally sourced indigenous materials of the Philippines, giving a brief but enthusiastic history of the working practices of her home island. Working with tree bark, strands of fibres, coconut shells, palm leaves, Abaca - also known as Manila h**p and a species of banana, and of great economic importance for its extracted fibre harvest - and even animal dung, to give a living wage of £5. per day was spoken of matter-of-factly, as was the custom for local residents. And Analiza described how younger people are now going overseas to work in the same manner. Her presentation was lively, enthusiastic and extremely interesting.

Refreshments and a great deal of socialising, followed by a very short business session, was complemented by game of play-the-letter A, with members vying with each other to produce something striking, beginning with the letter A. We had - A-duck, an apron, an Alstromeria plant, a fascinating book and many other items ###

03/07/2025

Our read for Meriel's Book Group - Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell - and its going down a treat ###

Tonight, Thursday 3 July, we gather for our Members' Meeting for July and our guest speaker Analiza, will be talking about hand made bags in the Philippines, with some for display and for sale.

Delicious refreshments will be available and members have been asked to bring 'Something Beginning with A' to put on their table. And tables will be dressed with tablecloths and flowers ###

This week's visit to FarmEd near Chipping Norton on Thursday 19 June, to take a good look at this new centre for farming...
21/06/2025

This week's visit to FarmEd near Chipping Norton on Thursday 19 June, to take a good look at this new centre for farming - regenerative style and food education. They gave a presentation to members last summer which was very lively and engaging. A visit for coffee and shopping or their guided tour and lunch was very definitely on the calendar for this summer and all who attended this event had a most enjoyable visit. A few members stayed on for lunch too. Of course, the weather was lovely for June if, perhaps, just a little too hot for comfort but, nonetheless, a highly enjoyable day for all concerned.

Those members who could not attend will doubtless wish to make their own way to FarmEd as soon as possible this summer. Here are photos from our visit ###

Still thinking about our visit to Grounds Farm on 12 June 2025, when this tractor and trailer were photographed.  Farm m...
21/06/2025

Still thinking about our visit to Grounds Farm on 12 June 2025, when this tractor and trailer were photographed. Farm machinery is so interesting and especially tractors. Yet, this one photo shot simply would not load up to the laptop from my 'phone when it was needed.

So here it is now, in all its glory - Grounds Farm tractor and trailer ###

And while here, here is our Meriel's Book Group read for June - The Mermaid of Black Conch by Monique Roffey. I simply could not put it down, reading this fairly slim book within a week of last month's meet. It was also another photo that simply would not load up to my laptop ###

Address

Banbury

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm
Saturday 9am - 4pm

Telephone

+447800721432

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