Monday 17 January 2011

Barn Dance - a great success

How many people came to the Barn Dance on Saturday 15th?

Well the Elizabeths and Mary  cooked 81 potatoes.

I counted 12 potatoes left before people came for seconds - that makes 69 people at the meal.

You can see 64 people in the picture.. A few left before the meal, one couple to escape flooded roads.

Annie Park, the caller from Kendal, is a Scottish Country Dancing teacher. She showed us some excellent easy dances. 14 people came from Scottish Dancing classes in Settle and Ingleton came and three people came from the English Country Dancing group at Langcliffe. She kept us on our feet dancing all the time..

To continue the Scottish flavour, it being only 10 days away from Burns night, I and Michael Cullingworth processed in, with me carrying haggis and neaps (including veg haggis) and Michael reading Burns' poem.

Just before the beginning of the dance, just as people were arriving and we then only had about 40 people, I asked everyone

"Go and find a person you don't know - at all, and ask them their name, where they come from and ask them to tell you one interesting thing about themselves."

Whilst one or two people groaned at this, most took it up enthusiastically -

.. so we each learned a new person's name. I recommend it.

We served Cool Earth Coffee - I never had time to announce it - but people enjoyed the coffee. And I put the Greetings cards out in the adjacent "primary room" and a few people enjoyed looking at them and 3 bought some, but most were too busy dancing.

A big thanks to the Elizabeths and Mary for  cooking the chili, chili veg and mince,  and to all the people from different churches who brought deserts - from pavlova to trifle to gateaux to shortbread.. and to the helpers who blew up the balloons, collected the money, sold the tickets beforehand.

We raised £109.06   for the Rainforest Fund and £109.06 for Churches Together

If you wish to try out a Scottish dancing class we meet at 7.30pm each Thursday evening - except February 3rd when there is no class. Annie Park will be taking the classes for a few weeks.- .

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