THE FLOWER LADIES
One of the many delights at St Giles’ is the sight and smell of beautiful flowers on display each week, (except, as is the custom, during Lent). It’s Gill Roker, Jean Wilson and their valiant team of a dozen helpers to whom we should be grateful for this ever-changing display.
Gill has been arranging flowers since she was a young girl, encouraged at first by her mum who was a well-known flower arranger. Jean came along a bit later, and they make an accomplished pair – as evidenced by the many awards they have gained in shows and competitions over the years.
Preparing displays for weddings is especially joyful, and the ladies incorporate the bride’s preferences for colour and flower type in their designs. And each week’s regular displays are usually sponsored by individuals in the congregation who want to celebrate a special event or remember someone dear to them.
“One of the delights of doing flowers throughout the year is how we can express the changing of the seasons”, said Jean. “We will have lilies at Easter, red flowers at Christmas and yellow and orange for harvest-time.” Most of the flowers come from Lloyd in Uxbridge Market, while the foliage is from various sources, including a flowerbed in the churchyard, tended by Jean and her husband Ian.
Special occasions call for special efforts. At the St Giles’ Christmas Market (on Sat 8th December this year) the floral arrangements on sale are always popular. And during the Ickenham Festival, the arrangers join forces with the local Flower Club to lay on especially memorable displays, usually based on a religious theme.
Most of the weekly routine preparation takes place on Friday mornings, but it’s not all hard work. The team look forward to their annual social gathering - a Bring-and-Share lunch at Jean’s house. If you’d like to get involved just drop in on a Friday, see what goes on, and admire the handiwork. As St Matthew so elegantly put it, “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin. And yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these”.
AFN
A MESSAGE FROM ABBEYFIELD ICKENHAM SOCIETY
We offer supportive en-suite accommodation for elderly people in our comfortable premises in Court House, Court Road, Ickenham. Two fresh meals a day are provided and we charge a reasonable, all-in rent.
There are currently vacancies for permanent living or for respite care. Please call our housekeeper on 01895 632486 between 9am and 2pm on weekdays, for further details or to arrange a visit. We welcome your enquiries.
SUPPER WITH THE WEA
The WEA’s popular annual Supper Evening will take place on Saturday 17th November in Ickenham Village Hall starting at 6pm. Tickets are £10 each. The guest speaker this year will be Philip Littlejohn, who will be giving an illustrated lecture on ‘The Titanic Past and Present’.
Philip will tell the story of his grandfather Alexander James Littlejohn, a steward on the Titanic who survived the sinking. In addition he will be recounting his own experiences of making a recent dive to the Titanic wreck site. As this year is the 100th anniversary of this famous maritime tragedy, the lecture topic seems especially appropriate and should provide a fascinating evening.
For more details or to purchase a ticket, contact Caroline Field (01923 824922), Jean Gibbons (01895 859644) or Sheila Johnson (01895 639815). Everybody is welcome!
HARVESTING THE FACTS
Although we are not quite so directly dependent on our own local crops nowadays, Harvest Festival on October 7th provided an opportunity to assemble in God’s House and give thanks for the food and other boundless gifts that we often take for granted.
Did you know...
- The word ‘harvest’ comes from the Anglo Saxon ‘haerfest’, meaning Autumn
- Harvest Festival was originally celebrated at the start of Harvest (August 1st) when loaves of bread called Lammas (meaning ‘loaf mass’) were made from the first gatherings of corn, to be used as Communion bread at special harvest services
- We now celebrate at the end of the Harvest, when ‘all is safely gathered in’
- Corn dollies, made from the last sheaves of the season, were originally much larger figures that were carried aloft around village communities as part of the celebrationn 1843, the Revd Robert Hawker of Cornwall started the tradition of holding Harvest Festival services in church
- The Victorians developed this custom, by decorating churches with home grown produce as we do today
