Our February meeting was a miserable, cold and wet night, several Committee members were ill, but it was the night we discovered our church has some sort of underfloor heating system. It was like winning the lottery, warm parquet is a actual thing.
We opened our doors and were greeted by our ladies laden with cakes and full of chatter; I can only comment on Karin’s incredible kladd kaka (like chocolate brownie) with orange and cayenne pepper – wow!! Our meeting for this month was made brighter by our friends from Girl Gang Sheffield who led our meeting on positivity and self celebration.
Before we got down to positivity and feeling great, Grace ran through some SHWI business, passing on thanks from Light Sheffield for our fundraising efforts in 2016 and informing us of her successful negotiations in securing a stall for Sheffield Food Festival.
In February we traditionally vote for our charity of the year, this year we had 7 amazing nominations; Ashiana Sheffield, Golddigger Trust, Haven House, Memories from Isla, MHAGS Sheffield, Snowdrop Project and Whirlow Hall Farm Trust. Following a wholly democratic sticky dot led voting process (watch out Electoral Reform Commission) I was delighted to announce that our support for 2017 will be MHAGS Sheffield. Watch out for our fundraising ideas over the coming months – one definite already in the diary is the Food Fest in May, so get your bake on!
After a swift break, Vanhessa, Ellie and Charly from Girl Gang Sheffield introduced their manifesto to our group and shared the reasons why they set up Girl Gang – their focus being to shine a light on women in Sheffield and support and promote the work they are doing.
Girl Gang started by a core group of like minded women in Sheffield and has now expanded to Leeds and Manchester where their events centre around creativity, artistry, music and talent, and have a feminist undercurrent to encourage us all to value ourselves more. The Girl Gang website states that a girl gang can be whatever you want it to be – encouraging skills sharing, self love and the power of female friendships – all of which I get from our fantastic SHWI girl gang.
Our activity for the evening was poster making focusing on making a positive statement to ourselves, taking back the negative perceptions and opinions we have about ourselves; the little voice in your head which can appear to be shouting you down and making you feel crappy. What followed was an hour of positive reinforcement, shared experiences and laughter; and what resulted was a whole array of amazing posters, many adorned with a vast repertoire of swear words.
When I joined SHWI in November 2015 it was because I was missing nights like this. I was existing in a city I had called home for over 10 years with friends living 40 miles away becoming more and more remote, what I craved was the company of like-minded people, women supporting women, sharing experiences and offering advice. We all lead such busy professional and social lives, living in a digital era where the restorative power of an actual conversation can often be forgotten. Thank you Girl Gang for your support in delivering such an inspirational and uplifting evening!
Rachel White
Vice-President