The Ladies In Waiting Clue #2

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WISH
Women’s Institute Scavenger Hunt
CLUE TWO STORY

For this second WISH activity the "Ladies in Waiting" team aimed to focus on imagination and creativity, releasing a bit of our free spirits.
Using LEGO certainly encouraged us to follow those aims as well as Laughing Everyday, Grasping Opportunities. Yeah LEGO (LOL)!!
The final result represents our WI motto "For Home and Country" and so much more. The structure represents our home, our safe place, open to the winds of change and challenges of adaptation. The open spaces represent the opportunity to allow for extra ventilation during Covid.
We realize that not everyone on our planet, even in our own country, has a snug, secure home, even a bed.
Through the years, our Princess Elizabeth WI branch has supported the Dryden Project "Sleeping Children Around the World" to help where we can as well as reminding us how fortunate we are to live in Canada.
WI has given members a focus for creativity in many ways, in the home and farther afield. The words to this version of the WI Song set to Auld Lang Syne come to mind with references to home and country (using the words households and Canada). Unfortunately, there is no name or date attached to this bit of creativity.
Sing along, if you wish.....

A golden chain of kindred minds
Extends from sea to sea
And links the thousands, each to each
In Canada, the free.
In union there is strength, 'tis said,
Divided we are weak;
So wife and mother, daughter, maid,
Each other's welfare seek.

From household worries, cares and toils
As sisters now we meet
To strengthen, hearten and assist
With mutual counsel sweet.
For common weal our hands are joined
We work with might and main.
Let each for all, and all for each
Our watchword will remain.

Isn't that a wonderful golden oldie?

This report is also a tribute to Adelaide Hunter Hoodless. Our Addie was the epitome of a woman with great imagination, a true free spirit, aiming to improve the lives of women in many creative ways, in their households and beyond.
In our LEGO creation we have included a sunny yellow hat as a nod to Adelaide's lifetime when women wore a hat to all official functions. When she attended the Farmer's Institute meeting at the home of Erland Lee
to propose the idea of an Institute for Women, no doubt she arrived wearing a hat on her head and gloves on her hands. When she promoted the creation of the Council of Canadians, worked to help promote the Victorian Order of Nurses and served as the second President of the Hamilton YWCA, a hat and gloves would have been part of her outfits.
Does anyone remember making a hat during a WI Short Course?
Look closely at our construction and you may see two red roses in the midst of other details: one represents the rose developed in 1975 by Dr. Henry Heard Marshall to honour our beloved Adelaide; the second flower represents the ROSE programs, near and dear to our hearts. These educational events, open to the public, often encourage creativity and imagination and are always meant to be fun! (True to the spirit of WI!)
There is another tribute implied by the name of our branch, formed when Elizabeth Winsdor was a Princess. Now, all these years later, we celebrate her 70 years on the throne, as our Queen in 2022.
Where does a Princess live? In a castle perhaps? Use your imagination: could this be what we have created? Do you see the waving pennants on the top pillars? They are included as a salute to Canada, to this WISH project and 125 years of WI. Most appropriate and creative, eh?
Is your home a castle? For Queen Elizabeth, Windsor Castle is one of her homes.
How proud are we that our Monarch is a member of the WI in the UK?
Imagine Elizabeth, through the years, being escorted to her limo to be driven to a WI meeting. I can visualize her, always wearing a hat and gloves.
Our "Ladies in Waiting" are free spirits in one way or another. Each was keen to participate in this scavenger hunt. Did you notice there is a bit of blue and gold, WI colours? The signs speak for themselves.
In the photo, two women are sporting hats, grabbing the opportunity to enjoy a sunny day and sharing a laugh or two.
One woman is smiling as she decided she would officially join our branch as our newest member. Perhaps she is recalling a WI event when she was a youngster, accompanying her mother on a tour of the CKCO TV Station in Kitchener in the late 1950's. For that tour everyone wore their Sunday best, including a hat.
The fourth member looks the part of a free spirit, with unruly hair, planning to schedule a haircut, as time allows away from her sewing machine, where creativity and imagination mesh.
So, going back to the beginning of this report, the question is: "Did we succeed?"
We are holding our breath, waiting for an answer.

Yours in WI,
"The Ladies in Waiting", representing Princess Elizabeth WI

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