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| Phoenix Trading with Estelle Cotton - e: estelle.lawrence@virgin.net |
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| My beautiful and generously given rose bud headdress xxx |
They promised rain, lots of it, even suggesting that the weekend would be a total wash-out. A huge collective sigh emanated from Adderbury and beyond, with matters well in hand for the festival.
PIP Control had everything well in hand, Adderbury WI were fixing last minute matters and collecting props and other necessities for their stall and I was about to begin making cakes for our stall. It was all systems go and all players for Saturday's great annual festival were finalising their To Do List and counting down the hours.
We woke up to sunshine and breathed out gently. "We might be OK! was the circulating thought as fingers were tightly crossed. Props, tables, boxes and all the accumulated paraphernalia essential for the day ahead was driven and walked to the Lucy Placket Playing Field then unloaded and covered up against the possibility of oncoming black clouds. We were even having doubts as to the sufficiency of collected cakes! Would there really be enough to keep our everyone happy? It was Christmas Eve season and we just had to hope there would be cake for all our guests.
We finally arrived at our WI stall area in the lightest drizzling of rain, began organising our area, assembling our gazebo, putting up tables and chairs, finding table cloths, aprons, bunting, price list posters and our WI Teapot sign. The cakes were gathered together from boxes and carrier bags, smaller boxes were piled on top of each other in larger carrier bags and then more arrived by hand and foot and suddenly we were in business and all systems-go!
But one little difficulty remained; we were without hot water. The generator was not doing its thing. It needed fixing and eventually clever electricians sorted out the problem. Our boiler became hot, then hotter and finally hot enough for making tea and coffee and life was good!
Our guests had been entirely empathetic and patient, eating and enjoying our cake and coming back for their tea and coffee and even yet more cake.
While all this had been going on the rain clouds had been gathering apace, until a thick black pall hung menacingly overhead after which we had rain, on and off during the afternoon. Sometimes heavy downpours, sometimes light patterings with various shades in between. It was warm and pleasant, we were enjoying ourselves and visitors were pouring onto the site, prepared for an evening of music and entertainment, a picnic and convivial chatter.
We closed down at 6pm with most of our stock happily sold and eaten, with a few more sales later on in the evening. We'd had a good day, met some really lovely people, chatted with friends and listened to good musicians and their bands.
The stallholders were game. presenting their wares and goods and keeping cheerful, all the while the rain fell and spirits hovered....
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| Face Painting by Vizard Face & Body Art........... |
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| Medina Clothing e: MedinaClothing@outlook.com working with WYCE and bringing help to the people of Madina Salem, Gambia..... |
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| the lovely folk of The Orders of St. John Care Trust at Lake House, Adderbury |
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Hespera Glass by Lisa and work of Kat Onions each with their own colourful art work
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And the rain. It came, it fell and all of us got wet dodging the showers and the downpour and it was warm. Just before we came away the sun came out, shining down brightly on the field and the gathering. It was hot, the sky was bright blue and we'd had a good day. All good things come to an end and so had our good day.
But hey, it was cool dodging those showers, that downpour and the intermittent light patterings we had all endured and enjoyed throughout our lovely day.
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and my friend Pat of Katharine House Hospice, Adderbury
And the rain - well, it wouldn't be summer without a drop of rain, would it now????
And finally, I must record my deep thanks to one of our lovely visitors who kindly gave me this delicious rose bud festival headdress when I admired the flowers she wore abouot her person.....See my photo above.
I do hope my photo's offend no-one and apologise for my forgetfulness if I failed to ask prior permission before posting this Blog xxx
Daisy
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