It was a full house for our Christmas dinner on 17th December; we welcomed members of Shepperton Rotaract Club and Rotarians from Woking and Walton on Thames.

The stewards Brian Hewes and Liz Shard deserve a special mention, they did a sterling job of booking everyone in and taking the money - thank you both and very well done.  

The traditional Christmas meal of turkey with all the trimmings was served. I must say it looked pretty good to me and I'm a vegetarian.

We had two birthdays to celebrate past President Bob Boyle and guest Pat Elliott. It was Eric's birthday as well, but he and Joy were in Brussels enjoying the local cuisine.

Nick Walters' donation of a bottle of brandy to the proceedings was appreciated, especially by Stuart Carpenter who took advantage of the fact he did not have to drive because Alan Barber was taking him home.

Alan Barber announced another successful collection for Chernobyl Children when he addressed the Rotary Club of Shepperton' s Christmas meal meeting.  Alan was very impressed with the generosity of the contributors.  This year he and Gaynor had helped with the wrapping and labeling process.  

Balham Rotarian Steve Mowbray traveled to Belarus earlier than usual this year to distribute the presents to the sadly large number of effected children who really appreciate this kind and thoughtful initiative.  Steve told Alan that this was the best year in terms of the number of gifts collected and hence the number of children helped.

Left: Alan Barber (standing) addresses the club on the Chernobyl Children's Life Line Christmas appeal.

At the end of the meal we gave a Christmas Box to the staff at The Anchor to thank them for looking after us so well throughout the year.  

The raffle went on for ever; there were lots of prizes and each ticket drawn was accompanied by loud complaints about the numbers being the wrong ones.

Brian Hewes hadn't worked hard enough as a steward and ran a Santa drive (a Beetle drive adapted to suit the season of good cheer).  David Campbell-Burns, a visitor who was introduced to the Club by Pat Wallage of Egham, won with a very high score.  I must ask him how he did it.

We finished at about 10.30 p.m. with lots of Happy Christmas wishes.