Greetings.
Our AGM took place in September and the new Management Committee is hard at work.  I am enjoying the role of President and would like to acknowledge the outgoing Committee for their great work & contributions to the development of CWS.  
We will ensure CWS continues to provide opportunities for Connection through Recreation for our members.  Much work is undertaken behind the scenes, which may go unnoticed but is vitally important to maintain & develop CWS into a strong & vibrant community-based organisation.  I look forward to meeting more members and working with you all to ensure we share & learn new skills, try new activities, make friends and above all, have fun.!!
Deilia Murray.
 
Activities, meetups and workshops (scheduled booked):  reminder to always book on Hello Club and that we endeavour to run these activities with 2 volunteer coordinators to support and supervise the activity (we aim for 3).  This is a safety measure that forms part of our risk management process.  If you are interested in becoming an activity volunteer coordinator please contact Deilia.

Band:  (chat platform for each of our groups) when you become a member you can then access Band after you receive an invite to that group.   Remember to check the FEED as well as the CHATS for general CWS updates and information.

Brainiacs:  1pm Saturday cards/games group continues to attract new members and we have just started another group on Thursdays at 1.00pm.  Come along, have fun and test your skills.

Book Clubs:  Library Book Packs – a reminder if you are a member of any CWS Book Clubs, please remember to pay your fee by adding it from the extra’s menu in the booking system – $12.50 per year.  The book pack service costs CWS over $100 a year per club.

Walking group:  every Tuesday a group of very keen women enjoy the varied walks.  The coffee is always a treat at the end.  The November Away Walk will be held on Tues 8 Nov, further information will be posted on Hello Club Walk Group.
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Sketchy gals:  drawing meetup; interested getting started in drawing or specific techniques?  Beginners welcome to this self-paced group, each meeting will have a basic topic.  You can bring your own project or suggest tutorials or activities.  BYO materials.

Donation:  recently we received a donation of $605 from a Sunshine Coast Council Senior Engineer.  He raises funds for community groups and Not for Profits, during September it was Womens Health Week, so he chose Coolum Women’s Shed.  We were delighted to receive this unexpected and generous donation.
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Tool Shed:  what a great job Sheddies are doing - handmade name installed above roller door, repurposed rolling cabinets for power tools work benches, stand for outside sink, repair kitchen cupboard door and the mosaic letterbox is almost complete.  Sessions currently: - A meetup is an informal session that can be self-directed or you can join in with projects we are working on.  You can use equipment and scraps for small projects but for larger ones you need to source your own materials.  Please do not use any equipment alone and without familiarising yourself with the safety instructions and the manual (all kept in the folder at the shed).  As we progress, a record of Inductions and Tool competencies will be developed.

CWS furniture: we have acquired another Poang chair and now have a spare couch to give away, the one in the main hall of the Community Centre.  If you are interested, please chat to a Management Committee member.

Coolum Men’s Shed:  Saturday 29 Oct 9.30am, celebrations for their 10-year anniversary.  Along with a dedication of a Memorial Garden for past members, there will be a garage sale and morning tea.  CWS have been invited to this whole day event.

First Fridays Social Meetup:  on hold until next year.  Even though this is a social gathering we need 2 volunteers to organise, check the CWS bookings and lead the evening get-togethers.  If you are interested in taking on this role, please let one of the management committee know

Xmas celebration:  Yes Xmas is coming and we will be organising an activity/celebration for our members, possibly early December, details to come.
Thankyou
Deilia M.

Just as we were about to write this update, the Queensland Government has announced a further relaxation in restrictions. This is good news for many of you that want to come back to Research Street and get back into our in person activities. Whilst we don't have the resources to open tomorrow (!) we have been planning a slow return to in person activities. There will be some changes to allow us to manage risks to our members and volunteers including:

• Activities must be pre-booked online from now on. This helps us ensure that we do not breach limits on numbers, allows us to capture contact tracing  information and avoid the need to handle cash. 
• We are looking at ways to move classes and activities outdoors where possible.
• We will only be operating with smaller groups, another reason to book ahead.
• Where possible, we will continue to offer classes via zoom. Some classes may stay on Zoom only, depending on the facilitator. This means that you can still 'attend online' if you have any sniffles/ symptoms.
• There will be strict guidelines about attending the shed and wiping down surfaces and equipment.

If you want one to one help with the booking system or zoom, please email [email protected] and we will arrange a time to help you.

As restrictions have gradually lifted we have been offering the chance to meet up in a informal way with a smaller number of members- people have suggested walks, and  we have organised a sewing bee via our community forum.  The community forum is a way to connect with other members and make plans about activities. It's a bit like Facebook but we prefer it because it has better privacy and is restricted to members only.  If you aren't interested in joining the conversation there, we will still post things on Facebook and our website. 

You should also get an email soon with your membership number, and some more information about the different systems. Read more here if you haven't received it yet: https://www.thewomensshed.org/new-members-guide.html

As for this weeks activities we have :

• Pilates with Narelle (Monday 9am)
• Meditation with Simone (Monday 6.30pm)
• Gentle yoga with Simone (Thursday 9am)
• Vocal group with Ali and Erica (Thursday 7pm)
• Vinyasa yoga with Holly (Saturday 8am)

All the activities are bookable here and will remain online only. We will let you know when we are back at the shed :-)

Our main focus for the next few months will be preparing for our open day in August.
Coming up we have a macrame basics meetup on 13th June and are planning a sewing bee, fabric dyeing meetup and ceramic hand building meetup.   We are also hoping to have more talks from Martine (financial planning) and Sara (nutritionist).
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Did you know that Anna Jarvis created Mother’s Day as a memorial to her mother Ann Reeves Jarvis?
The first mother’s day as we know it was in 1908 in Grafton, West Virginia.  Anna organised it in recognition of the work her mother, Ann Reeves Jarvis, had done to support and bring together women.   Ann Reeves Jarvis had 11 children and only 4 of them made it to adulthood. In the late 1850s she created Mothers’ Day Work Clubs as a way to address issues with child health, to share information and support each other.
For many years the Mother’s Clubs supported the community and each other, refusing to take sides in the American Civil War and offering assistance to wounded soldiers from either side.  Ann remembered her mother praying that the work of mothers would one day be formally recognised by all. This was around the same time as the very earliest beginnings of the women’s suffrage movement, and it’s easy to see common themes in the need to recognise and support the contribution of women to society.  

Ann Reeves Jarvis died in 1905, with the first ‘Mother’s Day’ memorial  held in May 1908. Ann and her friends established letter writing campaigns to establish a national holiday. Virginia adopted  Mother’s Day as a state holiday on 10th May 1910.  It took 6 years for the national holiday to be established, with Anna having to justify why there was a need for such celebration – the US congress initially rejected the idea in 1908, joking that they would have to create a ‘mother-in-laws’ day too.  However, many people adopted the idea and the celebration spread until in 1914 it was recognised as a national day by President Woodrow Wilson and the US Congress.
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Anna rejected the commercialisation of Mother’s Day and went to great lengths to try and keep the celebration in line with her own mother’s values. She encouraged people to write letters to their mother’s telling them why they appreciated them and to make hand made gifts, or give white carnations (her mother’s favourite flower).

Anna herself never had children and was buried next to her mother when she died in 1948, and this is important – Mother’s day was about celebrating and recognising the contribution that our mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers have made to our community and lives. Now we also have International Women’s Day – and sometimes Mother’s Day seems like just an opportunity to appreciate your mother – and there is nothing wrong with that! But Mother’s day began as a celebration of the achievements and values of one woman at a time when most women were expected to become mothers - it was a recognition of everything that women did for their family and community.

STOP PRESS we have some exciting news about Thursday's Art Therapy with Helen Bradshaw - we have been able to drop the price to $30 for members. We had hoped that we would be back at the shed for this workshop, but as we now know that's not possible. Helen has provided a list of materials that you should be able to find at home or fairly easily, and reduced the price so that more people can try this activity. If you have already booked, we will refund you the difference :-). Book online here

It's been another busy week for us at the virtual shed, including a great talk from Sara from The Skin Solution which covered some of the popular diets and how we can boost our immunity. She has sent us some more information on one of her favourites, the Mediterranean diet, download it here:

There was a bit of confusion this week when the facilitator for Drawing for Beginners (yours truly) was 20 minutes late, people were in the Zoom waiting room and nothing was happening- it all came back together in the end and we started some upside down drawing exercises. If you missed it, the class outline is available in our members only part of the website. 

We are also keeping recordings of our vocal group in the members section, so if you want to practice or catch up, just go to our members area on the menu above.

​This week on Tuesday, the fabric dyeing group are having a catch up to see if there are any projects we can do at home. Join us from 1pm on Tuesday.

We had a few people drop in for a virtual cuppa this week, going forward we will run this at 10.15 on Mondays and Thursdays, either drop in or stay on from Pilates or Thursday yoga :-). 

Our regular Pilates, yoga and meditation offerings are on at their normal times this week. It's also week 3 of the 4 week combined yoga and yoga nidra (meditation) class on Wednesday at 6.30pm. It was so lovely to see one of our early members back in class - she relocated to Sydney and has been missing Simone's classes - so there is an upside to online yoga :-). Of course all of our classes are suitable and welcoming to beginners, you can let teachers know about any medical issues on the booking form and our teachers. Usually there are modifications to each class for those people that need to take it easier or want more of a challenge - plus our teachers can see you and give feedback, just like in our classes at the shed.

Everything can be booked right here on our website :-)

Shed Operations

A while ago, we gave notice of our intention to streamline our Facebook presence, and this process will start to happen over the next few weeks. Some groups will be closed completely. All groups will be limited to members only. 

Member renewals will start going out this week, the management committee have agreed that despite this being a difficult time financially for some of our members, we do have a responsibility to roll out renewals. If you cannot afford to maintain your membership at this time, and you aren't  interested in joining us online, we will send a follow up reminder in 3 months. You will be able to rejoin when it suits you.

Plants Fundraiser
We still hope to run our open day on the 8th August and are asking people to start propagating plants for a plant stall. We have had quite a bit of plant show and tell in our virtual cuppa sessions. One of our members sent in this photo of the plants she is propagating for us. It seems that everyone has something at home they can raise, either in soil or in water - the only problem is whether you can let your green babies go  after raising them !  Here are some possibilities :​

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Talking of sweet - how is your diet going these days? 

 I've actually found somewhere to hide the chocolate from the kids - in the vegetable drawer! Although, that does mean more chocolate for me, and we aren't really getting out and about as much.  This is hopefully offset by the 400 kg of cucumbers that seem to have sprouted from my hubby's new gardening obsession.... That being said, it's great timing that Sara from The Skin Solution is going to go ahead with her talk on the different types of diets.  Whether you are thinking about Keto, Paleo, Plant based, Vegan or Fasting, Sara will be going through these eating plans from a nutritionists perspective, and talking about boosting your immunity with the right foods as well. There will be time for discussion and questions at the end.  Join Sara this Thursday from 1pm, at our virtual shed (i.e. Zoom).

Another new activity this week is the 'Drop in Cuppa' on Monday morning at 10.30. This is a chance for you to grab a coffee and just drop in for a chat - especially good if you feel like you haven't had a chance to catch up with anyone :-) . 

There isn't much time to tell you more except the following is happening this week - click on any item to book :-). Or create an account to make booking easier and to keep your payment details stored, from our bookings page. Prices are for members, non-members pay a $5 surcharge or can join when they book.

Monday 7am - Pilates with Narelle (nb earlier start time this week) -$10 
Monday 10am - Drop in cuppa (make your own coffee and join us to say hello) - Free for members
Monday 6.30pm - Meditation with Simone $10
Tuesday 10am - Drawing for beginners -  Free for members
Wednesday 6.30pm - Yoga & meditation with Simone $10
Thursday 9am - Gentle Yoga with Simone $10
Thursday 10.30am - President drop in /Zoom training
Thursday 6.30pm  - Vocal Group with Ali & Erica, Free for members

Plenty happening for all - hope to see you soon!

Hi ladies, 

It's been a different week for us at the shed. We had to make the decision to close down our face to face activities, along with many other people in our community it has been a time of stress for a lot of our volunteers and members. 

In order to keep some sense of community and to look after our wellbeing we decided to trial running our activities online. I'm pretty sure most of us had fairly low expectations of going online, but these sessions have really been the highlight of my week.  We have managed to run pilates, meditation, yoga and the vocal group and we will be continuing to offer activities online where we can. 

On Saturday at 7.30 you can attend Abbey's moving meditation class -using the Nishino method for free. We are also still running the 'Path to Self Love' class with Hannah Hempenstall from 9am. 

I really want to thank the volunteers, facilitators and members that have accommodated this change in our delivery - we have all gained skills in online socialising that will come in useful over the next few months. We may even be able to offer more classes!

If you are concerned about your IT skills we have also been running 'have a go ' training sessions with our preferred software - it's a chance to try it out without the pressure of a class starting. 

Please keep checking our weekly roster page or bookings page to see what you can join us for. 

Stay safe and well,
 Nell

 

Hi all, At the time of writing many events and activities have been cancelled. Many people are being asked to work from home.  This update is a response to the changing requirements around social distancing. that were announced today.

We have spoken to some members and coordinators who are happy to continue activities at the shed, and therefore we are implementing the following guidelines:

• Anyone with any symptoms of viral illness - cough/sore throat/sneezing/aches/headaches/fever is asked to stay away from the shed until they are recovered. Reported symptoms vary therefore we need to just stay away for the sake of other members and their families.
  
• Be flexible as coordinators may also need to stay away for their own sake or due to family commitments, which will lead to cancellations or rescheduling. 
• Book online to let us know who is coming so we can decide whether to run an activity. We will be cancelling activities if there are not enough people booked in and we need to limit class sizes to ensure the space is not crowded. If you are booked online, you will not need to sign the register reducing the use of a shared pen. Booking online also reduces the need to handle cash.*
• If we have to cancel at the last minute, booking online means we can let you know straight away. 
• On arrival at the shed please wash your hands.
• The coordinators will wipe down all commonly touched surfaces with disinfectant wipe prior to opening up the shed.
• Difficult to clean items including yoga mats, straps, bolsters and eye pillows will not be available to borrow. Please bring your own.
• Minimise physical contact and proximity with other members. 
• We will keep doors and windows open wherever possible
• We recommend that you wash your hands before leaving.

The management committee will continue to review the situation and keep you updated via the News section on this website. For the latest, always check the website.  Direct email will depend on volunteer capacity.

Whatever the next few months throw at us, we know that we are lucky to have come so far and we will find a way to sustain our  community :-) 
xxx


*We know that not everyone loves our booking system, and this is under review. However we can assure you that all online payments are taken via a third party accredited secure payment processor with the appropriate security in place.

Hello sheddies! We have had another great week at the shed. Did you join us for any of the fun? 

On Tuesday we had a really great start to our 'Talking Money' group with Martine.  It started with a discussion on the markets in the wake of what has been happening, and moved through discussions of balanced funds, super, pensions, wills. Rather than a formal presentation, Martine did a great job giving her insights and answering the questions that came up. We got some great tips from other members about what we need to think about. It was interesting talking to women at different lifestages and getting advice from other members who had already been through it. All in all, very thought provoking and we are looking forward to our next meetup in a month or so. 

Tuesday evening saw the first meetup of our new singing group. I have to say I was shocked to turn up, running late as usual (!) and find so many women waiting to come in - usually the rain keeps our members away, but not this time! (PS sorry for being late!!) (PPS sorry for all the exclamation marks !!!!!). After a cuppa and introducing ourselves, Erica took us though some vocal exercises and then we belted out some tunes  including  Rockin Robin, Chiquitita and Lean on Me. It turns out that a lot of us don't know Chiquitita except for the chorus, and it's v e r y   s l o w in parts which made for some very interesting muscial arrangements ;-). I can't tell you if we were any good but at least Erica didn't run away crying!  Another member, Ali has volunteered to help coordinate the group with Erica - thank you ladies, can't wait to see you next time! The vocal group runs fortnightly on a Tuesday evening.

Hi everyone, we just wanted to let you know how we stand under the current circumstances. As a place where people gather we do not currently feel the need to cancel  classes or workshops, and as we feel part of our role is to improve the health and wellbeing of our members, it would be a shame to cancel before it is necessary to do so. That being said we are asking you to observe the following guidance in relations to the coronavirus (and any other virus)

1) Please do not attend activities at the shed if you feel unwell - this is particularly important if you are have a fever or are coughing and/or sneezing because of the increased likelihood of contaminating the community center or infecting others. We will always refund you any activity fees that you may have paid in advance, so you will not lose out financially if you have to cancel.

2) If you come to the shed, please make time on arrival to wash your hands in case you have inadvertently touched something infectious on your way to the shed.

3) If you fall sick and are told to self isolate or are told you may have the coronovirus please let us know if you have attended something at the shed so that we can tell others that may have come into contact with you, or been at the shed the same day that you were there. We will not disclose your identity - but we can let the people know if they are at risk.

Thank you for your help in keeping everyone safe x

Last week we had another sausage sizzle and we really want to thank those of you that turned up to help - it was a lot of work but we had fun and it was a good chance to meet some other members. We also had a lot of interest from our customers about the Shed. 

Other activities in January included more walks organised by our member Marie, our first outing as a quiz team and a trip to the movies. We also started our art drop in, a gardening group at Veggie village and had the first goddess gathering of the year.

This Monday we have two new classes to try - Pilates with Narelle at 9am and Meditation with Simone at 6.30pm, as well as our regular walk meeting at Tickle Park at 8.15am. Please book in via our bookings page as this gives our instructor an idea of how many people are coming, and really speeds in the check in process.

Then, on Tuesday we have the first of our sold out Eco Dye Workshops run by Margaret Moon (please note art drop in won't be running this week).

It's also the first Tuesday of the month and that means that our quiz team are meeting from 6pm at Coolum Surf Club - all welcome :-)

On Thursday from 9am we have gentle yoga with Simone, followed by coffee and the President's 'Drop In' 10-11am.

Finally this week, Marie is organising another walk this Sunday at Maroochy Botanic Gardens from 7am. You can let her know you are going on our Facebook group - Women's Shed Social
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Well, that's all we have planned for this week - remember if there is something you would like to organise, please feel free to suggest it in one of our Facebook groups, or contact us. 

​See you Soon :-)