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Voting for the Women's Institute Icon 2008

Hello my name is Valerie. I live in Myddfai, a tiny village in The Brecon Beacons National Park, in rural Wales and I need your help!

Sky TV are looking for an 'Icon' for their new learning channel.

I am a member of the Women's Institute who are organising the competition. I entered this competition and now I am in the top ten!! There are only 2 finalists from Wales and if I won it would really help my village.

My company is, Grandma's Stories Ltd and I write fun educational books for children & adults who are learning Welsh. We will have a Welsh language site when resources allow. The Big Plus is that, with the 10,000 first prize, we could launch our new not for profit company 'Learn with Grandma' properly and set up a dedicated website.

Please vote for me and ask your friends to do so too!

This is vital. Myddfai is such a tiny community there is no way I could muster the sort of support someone from a large community could attract. Especially at such short notice.

HOW TO VOTE

Voting will be on the Daily Express website starting on Thursday 18 September until Sunday only. Click on the link to vote

So not much time to get those votes in! Please will you forward this to your friends too.

God BlessValerieGrandma's Stories

[A Scots brother passed along this snippet, but could not remember where he found it originally. It has a real feel of the Celt in it, and is no doubt part of a larger work of some importance, and I am hoping that some reader of it will recognize this piece and enlighten me further. In the meantime, enjoy! -- Brian y Tarw Llwyd]At the end of his seven years, one born to it will stand at the start of knowledge, and leaning a fond ear to the soul he may have parley with old folks of old affairs. Playing to the tune of the fairy harp, he can hear his forefolk, plaided in skins, towsy headed and terrible, grunting at the oars and snoring in the caves, where the white-haired sea-rovers are on the shore, and a stain's on the edge of the tide; or, he can stand by the cairn of kings, ken the colour of Fingal's hair, and see the moon-glint on the hook of the druids.

The Womens Institute in the UK have partnered with Sky TV to launch a competition to find the ultimate "W-Icon". "What's a W-Icon?", I hear you ask. Read more below:-"One WI member will be chosen from over 200,000 women to become the face of the WI on Sky Learning where she will use the skills the WI are famous for, by hosting a range of inspiring and useful How To guides to modern life. The guides will be hosted online and broadcast on Sky TV." ( quoted from the Women's Institute website )Amongst the finalists are two contestants from Wales including Valerie-Wood Gaiger, a member of this site. Valerie kindly provided us with some biographical details for inclusion in this post:-"Valerie Wood Gaiger MBEValerie has 7 grandchildren and became a great-grandmother in January 2007. Valerie researches and writes Grandmas Stories and is a co founder of Learn with Grandma. A not for profit company reg no. 05913133. The unique holistic educational programme which is incorporated in her work. The philosophy behind Learn with Grandma is to make learning memorable and fun. Without really intending it Valerie has become an expert on Intergenerational Learning!Valerie was awarded an MBE for her work with disabled people. She founded a Charity that helped recognize, throughout the U.K, the value of work for disabled people both financially and in fostering respect and self-respect. Since being made redundant from this work Valerie became aware how that work related to the separation of the generations and the problems that this was causing in society. She has, and is continually; seeking ways of fostering respect for older people and helping the younger and older parts of society learn from each other.Valerie Lives in a tiny village in The Brecon Beacons National Park in Wales. Her children, grandchildren & little great grandson live a long way away. This has lead to another interest - to exploring modern technology as a means of maintaining contact over great distances and as an educational tool. "We feel that Valerie would make an excellent icon for the Women's Institute and urge all eligible members to consider supporting her in the voting which will take place between Thursday and Sunday of this week. We will post further details and links as they become available.

From the BBC:- "Flags will be flown across Wales to commemorate the proclamation of Owain Glyndwr as Prince of Wales more than 600 years ago." Read the article HERE and HERE

Tim Roth appears in the BBC adaptationof the 1998 novel "Skellig" by David Almond An article in WalesOnline today underscores the fact that Wales is becoming an increasingly attractive location for film-makers following the dramatic success of the BBC "Torchwood" series:- Dramatic Wales proves a big attraction for movie makers New series being filmed in and around Cardiff include "Merlin" and "Skellig":- BBC Merlin BBC's "Merlin" to Air in US Tim Roth lands Skellig film role The fact that the "Merlin" mini-series will air stateside in 2009 is good news for fans of all thing mystical and Arthurian. The seres will be broadcast in the spring of next year and stars Richard Wilson as court physician Gaius andAnthony Head ( of Buffy fame ) as Uther Pendragon.

Our new Members map can be found in the right hand column just below chat:-

The Members map displays as a popup. Click "post" on the left of the menubar to enter your location and details. Enjoy!

From the Ning blog:-In this release, you'll notice two major improvements to the way you and your members communicate:* A New Message Center & Friend Request Interface Your Network Inbox and Friend Requests are moving out of the Ningbar and will now be integrated within your network. Members will now be able to send/receive messages and review pending friend requests on full pages on your network. Screenshots below.* New HTML Email Design An updated design will make your invitations and shared content look better than ever. Screenshots below:-NEW INBOX

MESSAGE DETAIL

COMPOSE MESSAGE

FRIENDS REQUEST

When I first began looking into my Celtic -- and specifically, my Welsh -- ancestry, I decided to look up information on Wales, a country of which I knew nothing. Of course it is impossible to read of Wales without reading about the castles. So I was taking a virtual journey, and looking at pictures of all the different castles in Wales. Some were more impressive than others; some more beautiful, some more foreboding.But the very first time I set eyes on Chepstow Castle, I experienced something I had not felt with any of the others. I was immediately overtaken by an overwhelming feeling of familiarity, and grief. My eyes and my head were telling me I had never been to this place, but my heart was saying something different.I told my dear friend, Brian y Tarw Llwyd, about my reaction. I told him that something very devastating had happened at this castle. His response was that something bad had happened at ALL the castles in Wales! And there were no doubt many grevious events at Chepstow alone. Of course this is all true, but none of the pictures of the other castles had had this effect on me.I didn't quite know what to make of this, and after finding some general facts about the place, including the fact that it lies where the River Wye flows into the Severn. I moved on to something else. Later, while researching my genealogy, I found that one of my ancestors, Ann Powell, was born in Glasbury-on-Wye. Is this a clue to the impact that Chepstow Castle had on me? I don't yet know.What I do know is that after quite some time of not thinking much about this, I decided to put a picture of Chepstow Castle on my Americymru page as a background. Once again, my reaction to seeing a picture of the castle -- which I had not viewed in close to two years, probably, was exactly the same, and the grief that welled up within me brought tears to my eyes once more.The mystery continues.

Through the inexhaustibly, inarguably arcane machinations of our Humor Group Judges, LINDA HALL! is hereby elected Americymru Clown! and receives this very fine prize, below.We know this will be an endless source of pride, hubris and arrogance, which she will be tiresomely trumpeting to her great-great-great grandchildren who will nod, "yes, nana" as they change her diapers, having heard this all a million times but still secretly proud enough to share it in school essay assignments, to the envy of all their little friends, whose nanas are much less cool and have not lived as long.Congratulations, Linda, you deserve every bit of this.