Daffodil Tea

To celebrate the arrival of Spring, a Daffodil Tea was held in the Hall in the run up to Easter – although it was touch and go as to whether the local daffodils would open in time.

Happily, they obliged, and we were able to decorate the hall with bunches of cheerful yellow flowers. There was a great spread of food, thanks to the efforts of a number of bakers.

The event was well attended with over 40 people, locals and quite a few from further afield, coming to enjoy a chance to socialise and catch up with friends and neighbours.

Our Daffodil Tea happened to coincide with Endometriosis Awareness Month and Pat Menzies, who is the Scottish Development Coordinator for Endometriosis UK, had a stand in the hall and distributed information about the condition and the support available. Approximately 1 in 10 women suffer from the condition which can cause debilitating pain and impact sufferers for life.  There is more information on  www.endometriosis-uk.org .

Pat was very ably assisted by Maggie and Enya who, among other things, helped fund raise for Endometriosis by selling tablet.

Join us again later this month, when the Pop-Up Coffee Shop returns to the hall on Tuesday 25th April at 10.30 am.

Fearnan Carpet Bowls

Lesley writes:

Another very enjoyable Bowls season drew to a close with the advent of lighter evenings and the start of the lambing season for some of the key players.

Although our Bowls League is no more with the closing of Acharn Bowls, we enjoyed friendly, competitive matches with Camserney, Home and Away. Camserney also hosted the very popular Round Robin competitions with delicious food to keep up our stamina!  

Our annual Singles Trophy was won by our President Alastair Kininmonth. Doubles winners were Jardine Robertson and Alastair Kininmonth. 

Our next season commences on Mon 2nd Oct 7.30-9.30, and we would warmly welcome anyone who would like to come and have a go.  

FVA Annual General Meeting

The FVA’s AGM was held on Saturday 1^st April and the Minutes will be circulated to members in due course.

Two topics were brought up by members under AOCB – noise from some short term lets and speeding through the village.  Whilst most short term lets are well managed and cause little disruption to residents, living next to some of the larger lets can be akin to living next to a Party House with a level of noise and disruption that is somewhat incompatible with a quiet rural village.

Both noise and speeding are issue that come under the Community Council’s remit, but there is an information page on this website (Useful Contact Numbers) that offers advice and guidance to those who are affected by noise and speeding. It includes information on reporting Anti-Social Problems, Traffic Offences, Driving Safety Issues, and Police Non-Emergency Reporting. There is also information on how to download the PKC Noise App which offers a quick and straight forward way to report anti-social noise.

You can find the Useful Contact Numbers Page in the menu for the FVA website – on a computer or tablet it is listed in the black strip just under the header photo.  On a smart phone, the drop down menu appears at the top left of the home screen, in blue.

Fearnan Book Club

Linda writes:

Our latest book club session, at which we reviewed The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams, was due to be held on International Women’s Day.

The book seemed an appropriate choice as it covered the period when the women’s suffrage movement was at its height and our main character was a young woman of the time.

Set in the late 19th/early 20th century, the book follows the life not only of Esme Nicoll but also of the Oxford English Dictionary. Esme’s father is working in a group compiling the dictionary and she questions words that are not included in the dictionary and also collects her own words often used by the lower classes and particularly by women. 

This book was generally considered to be well written, well researched and informative. It was a good choice for discussion and was enjoyed by most of the group. Some found it initially slow moving and repetitive, lacking twists and turns. We liked the intertwining of historical fact and fiction and were intrigued by how words for the Oxford English Dictionary were chosen and by whom. The decades of laborious compilation, editing of proofs, the printing and binding and the pride and dedication of these involved are well described.

The interesting and unusual subject, characters and settings were well portrayed and easily imagined. Esme’s father was very modern and forward thinking in his parenting style. The group particularly liked Lizzy, the loving maid, and supportive Ditte.

We welcomed the inclusion of suffrage and the exploration of how far some people would go in pursuit of their ideals including imprisonment, alongside the derision of the lack of militancy in more conservative women. It was good to read about the range of differing views held by both men and women on women’s rights. 

The impact of WW1 on life of ordinary people was well illustrated including the death of Esme’s husband Gareth. Issues such as unmarried Esme’s pregnancy, adoption of her child and subsequent depression was dealt with sensitively.

We welcomed the appearance at the end of Megan, Esme’s daughter, who learned about her mother’s life, interest in words and contribution to the dictionary. A fitting ending. 

 If you are fascinated by the etymology of words and the evolution of language, you will enjoy this book. It was also informative to read the timelines described at the end. 

The book chosen for our next read is The Bookseller of Inverness by Shona McLean, described as “a gripping historical thriller set in Inverness in the wake of the 1746 battle of Culloden by the award-winning author S. G. MacLean.”