President, June Lloyd, welcomed members and a guest to our July meeting and following the singing of Jerusalem introduced the speaker for the evening, Catherine Clarke, who after we had gone through the business section of the evening was to give us a talk on hats. Last month’s Open Meeting, a fashion show, had been a great success and although chaotic had been a great success. One of our long standing members, Hilda Bashford, is leaving us to move north with her husband to be nearer family and will be sorely missed by all.

Catherine had brought a wide selection of hats, fascinators and hatinators most of which she modelled and then encouraged members to do likewise. She wore a black and white outfit which co-ordinated perfectly with all the “head gear” she had brought. The colours ranged from cyclamen, pink, yellow and multi coloured. One member commented that all the hats suited Catherine and she admitted that she had made sure of this when selecting them! She showed how to wear the hats etc to maximum effect and told us some of her secrets for making sure they stayed in place (Alice bands, elastic etc). She advised that a hat worn at a tilt was called a Kissing Hat as it enabled the wearer to be kissed on the cheek without having to bend her head. She also suggested it was a bad idea to wear a hat the same colour as your hair as it could make you look as if you had had a bad hair day! Finally she brought out a container with an assortment of hats dating from the 1940s some of which were designed by famous designers such as Christian Dior. These brought back memories of the hats our mothers/grandmothers used to wear and in some cases we wore ourselves. Catherine explained the correct way to store a hat is upside down with tissue paper around it to preserve the shape. Barnardos Charity Shop collects the no longer required hats twice a year to sell in their various shops.

Following Catherine’s excellent talk we enjoyed our usual lovely supper prepared by members and were then reminded to check the various activity boards as this will be our last chance to put our names down for events until September. The next meeting is an informal American Supper to be held in a member’s garden (weather permitting) with an assortment of games including jenga, boules, coites and any other games which members choose to bring. Marlene Addy and Hazel Hunter both won gift tokens for gaining one hundred points in our monthly competitions. The competition this month was won by Amanda Bostock with a cleverly decorated top hat containing everything but the kitchen sink!

Guests and new members are welcome. For further information contact June Lloyd on 01386 830844. See also www.littletonswi.moonfruit.com

Margaret Dalton