Like Christmas, the Fearnan Winter Pudding Night comes but once a year.  Much thought goes into staging the event, but one thing we didn’t take into account in our planning was the possibility of a power cut 75 minutes before the Pudding Night was due to kick off.  So when this actually happened, there was a collective gasp of dismay from bakers throughout the village.

This is the point at which most of the puddings go into the oven.  Dismay quickly turned to panic when we realised that the cut was going to last for some time (2 hours, the electricity company said).  It was too late to cancel, and some 40 to 50 pudding-hungry people would be arriving shortly – how many cold or pre-cooked sweets could we muster?  Would there be enough?  Who had gas ovens? What about torches? Portable gas heaters ……………..?

Happily, the Guardian Angel of Puddings and All Things Sweet must have been watching over us.  The power came back on just in the nick of time, and although we were about half an hour late in starting, we managed a full spread.

A lovely mix of people attended, aged from about 3 upwards, and included not only regulars, but also some new faces. Live music was provided by Audrey and Andrew, and Andrew’s daughter Bea (above right, in the pale blue jumper) took to the stage and played for us, coaxing some delightful music out of the old piano.

It’s not every year that we get a Pudding Champ, but we did this year – 11 year old Alice from Glenlyon managed to sample everything on the menu!  Good work!

We managed to get a copy of Alice’s paperwork, complete with 5-bar gates to keep count and time intervals marked – which just goes to prove that to succeed at anything, even eating pudding, a planned approach works best!

Well done, Alice.  Hope you come back next year to defend your title!

Many, many thanks to all those who baked or made such a wonderful selection of puddings and desserts for the evening, and special thanks to everyone who came and helped eat it all.

FVA Events Diary

The first Coffee Morning of the year will be on Tuesday 6th March at 10.30 am in the Hall.

The FVA’s AGM is on Saturday 17th March, 4 – 5pm in the Hall.

Book Club Update

At the February meeting, the group discussed The Passenger by Lisa Lutz. Unusually, there was almost total agreement in terms of the lack of enthusiasm about this book, and for a range of reasons. Too much unnecessary violence, the style of writing and implausible events and outcomes. The reason for the title was cleverly revealed towards the end of the book, but it was thumbs down for The Passenger.

The choice for discussion in March is a popular book suggested by several members. Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is a debut novel by Gail Honeyman, who lives in Glasgow and is a graduate of Glasgow and Oxford Universities. It was the Costa First Novel Book Award Winner in 2017 and is about to be made into a film, produced by Reece Witherspoon.

The novel is set in Glasgow. The heroine, Eleanor Oliphant, leads a simple life. She wears the same clothes to work every day, eats the same meal deal for lunch every day and buys two bottles of vodka to drink every weekend. Eleanor Oliphant is happy. Nothing is missing from her carefully timetabled life. Except, sometimes, everything.

One simple act of kindness is about to shatter the walls Eleanor has built around herself. Now she must learn how to navigate the world that everyone else seems to take for granted – while searching for the courage to face the dark corners she’s avoided all her life.

Yoga Workshop at the Big Shed