The January lunch meeting of NFU Ladies Monmouthshire was held at the Foresters Oaks, Llandevaud and attended by 78 members and guests.

Prior to the lunch the President, Clare Jones, brought attention to forthcoming events including the proposed trip to France in September and the coach trip to Stratford and lunch at St Pierre (Marriot) Golf Club in April.

Grace was said by Yvonne Morgan and an excellent two-course meal was served.

The speaker for the day was Elizabeth Haines from Magor, who vividly illustrated her 34 years of working in the manufacturing industry, producing clothing ranging from uniforms to underwear!

After a college course in design and pattern cutting Liz worked very closely in the construction of beautiful uniforms for the Yeoman of the Guard, Household Cavalry and other military and police uniforms, using hard-wearing high class materials. All the uniforms were individually cut for each person, sewn and then finished to extremely high standards.

The stunning red guardsmen’s uniforms were embellished with the special gold braids and emblems following hundreds years of history and tradition.

Unfortunately, Liz’s enjoyable thirty years carrying out this creative, fabulous work terminated, when the contracts were sent from Newport to Morocco!

The last four years of her interesting career were spent in another field of creativity - by pattern cutting ladies lingerie in Merthyr Tydfil, designing and creating attractive, dainty underwear from soft, colourful materials, supplying well-known high street labels in the world of underwear.

Yet another sign of the times loomed when again the company closed for the products to be manufactured abroad, thus terminating a long-established institution in the area.

Samples of materials and equipment, fabulous finished jackets and glamorous underwear were displayed to the members as well as photographs showing a wide range of skills employed in this production industry which sadly have been lost from South Wales.

A sincere vote of thanks was delivered by Margaret Prosser.

In February the NFU Monmouth Quiz was held at the Royal Oak, Monmouth, when the NFU Ladies team came a creditable fourth for the third year running! Must try harder next year ....

The next lunch will be at St Mellons Golf Club on March 16 when the speaker will be Nora Burns on the subject of Colour Analysis and Image.