Our activities during 2020 - 2022
Anniversary events 2022 can be found as a separate sub page on the News page.
Thank you Lunch for Group Leaders and Helpers
Lancaster & Morecambe u3a Committee showed their appreciation of all the hard work which is put in by members of our u3a by holding a Thank You Lunch in October 2022. It was not just for the Group Leaders but also for all the many people behind the scenes who help to make our meetings run smoothly.
Margaret Hemming, Groups Coordinator
Ashton-in Makerfield U3A had their first re-opening day on Friday 2nd July 2021. Numbers where limited because of the restrictions.
Our "Chair" Mary Davies was waiting outside to give the members a warm welcome back.
The room had been decorated in Yellow and Blue and the beautiful table decorations had been made by some of our members.
A notice board of Past and Present photographs gave a lot of reminiscence for some members.
All safety measures were adhered to and everyone was happy to see their friends and have a good catch up.
Members are looking forward to getting back to their usual meeting and all the activities that they enjoy
In June 2021, Mawdesley and District u3a celebrated their 15 years in style.
Lymm & Thelwall u3a Climate and Environment Interest Group took part in the LEAF event next to Lymm Library in June 2021
Groups around the region have been sharing their ideas for keeping engaged and happy during lockdown. Would you like to share yours? If so use the contact page above to get in touch
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Halton u3a uses ZOOM to keep in touch with its members as well as sending monthly Newsletters. u3a is the University of the Third Age but it is not directly connected with universities. It is a learning organisation for people who are retired or semi-retired and wish to use some of their time to learn new skills and help others do the same. No qualifications are needed, none are given and there are no exams. It is run entirely by volunteers.
On Monday (March 8th) Bob Roach continued his series of talks on the development of the chemical industry in Widnes and Runcorn. He talked about the personalities. Bob showed how they had not only developed the chemical industry but added to the social development of the towns. John Hutchinson had decided that Widnes was the place to build his chemical works in 1847. John Brunner came to work for John Hutchinson in 1861 and rose to the position of general manager. He met Ludwig Mond and in 1873 formed Brunner Mond & Company and this built a large chemical works near Northwich. It became part of ICI in1926. Sir John Brunner continued his interest in Widnes and gave money (£2.8m in today's money) for the Transporter Bridge which he opened in 1905. There are plaques in West Bank recording this and its subsequent re-opening.
Several Gossages have been involved in Widnes over many years. The first, William Gossage, came to Widnes in 1850 and started soap manufacture in the mid-1850s. He retired in the 1860s leaving the soap business to his sons, Alfred and Frederick. The latter became the first mayor of Widnes in 1892. There is a plaque in West Bank with four Gossages named as they paid for the promenade gardens. Also they paid for a hospital there and for a maternity hospital in Highfield Road. The offices occupied by the Gossages in West Bank is now the Catalyst Science Discovery Centre.
We were particularly pleased to welcome direct descendants of the above to our ZOOM meeting, Sir Hugo Brunner and Peter Gossage, both of whom live in the south of England. They have recently taken a great interest in Widnes and where their ancestors worked.
Halton u3a has a website which includes the interest groups: https://u3asites.org.uk/halton/welcome
The Heswall Ukulele Group has turned the whole Covid 19 situation into an opportunity! Ever
since the first Lock down we have been busy creating an online community so as to continue
playing, stretching ourselves and meeting up each week.
Instead of going down the Zoom route (which is notoriously problematic especially for music) we
created our very own TV channel called Hugukuleletv123. We use Twitch for viewing our stream
and I broadcast this at a high quality of sound and picture. Anyone can view us playing along and it
would be lovely if other U3a members joined in with us. Definitely no requirement to play ukulele
to do so. (Details for how to join us can be found at the end of the article).
Every week without fail at 10.30am on a Friday we have been meeting up on line and playing
along to an ever growing list of songs. Some of us have videoed ourselves playing and then others
join in. To make it easy for people to join in we are able to also put the words and music on the
screen to help viewers play along and sing to as we play songs. In between songs we chat to each
other. We have recently introduced a fun way of selecting the songs we will sing by spinning a
wheel with all of the song titles on it, wherever it stops we play that song!
Members have kept themselves busy writing original songs, poems and making videos. Not
forgetting learning new ukulele skills. We have created videos to accompany the original songs.
Also we try to mark significant dates with a themed live stream. For instance we held a VE Day
celebration of war time songs and for Halloween played some spooky songs!
As well as Fridays we also have an on line Social Club on a Tuesday night at 7.00pm, we call this
Hug Social and it has things like quizzes and new features for us to sample. On Tuesday night we
also go through a new song that we want to learn and add to our growing list. It is very much our
chance to catch up with each other.
The emphasis for us has been to retain a sense of community and embrace new skills but of course
have fun doing so, it is an absolute pleasure to be involved with such a bunch of talented and
dedicated people who willingly throw themselves in to whatever I ask them to do.
We didn’t stop there though, as we now have our own Youtube Channel as well where all of our
videoed contributions can be viewed. Our Youtube Channel is called HUGUKULELE
Leading up to Christmas our time was taken up preparing for the Christmas Concert we were asked
to perform for Heswall U3a Members It was no mean feat given we are not able to physically meet
up. We have all learned new skills of combining playing along whilst not actually being together
and on top of that videoing the results! I have been busy learning to edit videos! The Christmas
Concert is now available on our Youtube Channel to be viewed.
So the Hugukuleltv123 Channel goes from strength to strength and the only thing missing is more
U3a members tuning in to our channel, you definitely do not need to be able to play ukulele to
watch us or sing along but other ukulele groups would be very welcome to get involved and provide
material for the stream. I would be happy to talk through with any other groups who feel they could
make a contribution to our Live Streams and not just confined to Ukulele.
We also have our very own website where you can find out more about us. - www.thewus.co.uk
Most importantly the very first page of the website has very easy instructions of how to view our
Live streams and how to actually join our growing On line Community on our Channel
Hugukuleletv123 , it is very easy to do!
We hope others will take a look and consider joining us and have fun as we do whilst embracing
all of the U3a principles Learn, Laugh, Live!
Dave Jones
Heswall Ukulele Group Leader
Up Holland art Group 2: 50 shades of green
From, Anne, group leader
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Hello everyone
I attach a picture of some tulips for you to do You can have some fun with this see how many
different shades of green you can paint for the leaves I have attached the bookmark we did
last year as a reminder of how to mix the different greens. If you haven’t got any special greens mix yellow and blue. Add more blue for a darker green and more yellow for a lighter green.
For the background wet it , then drop in some colour yellows, oranges, greens, burnt sienna.
For the tulips start with a light wash of yellows. Let it dry then add another thin amount of colour and build it up. Light greens against dark greens will make the leaves stand out.
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Bury U3A Watercolour group are receiving a fortnightly bulletin, 'Splash!'
From Watercolour group leaders Diane and Alison:
"Continuing with April’s theme of flowers, the workshop on 23rdApril saw some members having a go at a sixty minute challenge. This was to paint a picture of flowers in a vase in just an hour, based on the photo below. The rules are that you can take as long as you like to draw, mask and prepare paints, but the clock starts as soon as the first drop of paint hits the paper.It’s a great way to focus on painting quickly without getting hung up on detail. The results are very different from each other and all are glorious!"
An example of their bulletin can be seen here splash bulletin3
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Macclesfield U3A
The summer bulletin is a rewarding read, especially for any U3A looking for examples of how to keep in touch and keep personally active macclesfield summer 2020
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