CHAIRMANS CHATTER & PREVIOUS SPEAKERS
Below is the past Chairmans Chatter for you to peruse
Chairmans Chatter Number 3 March 2026
Hello All,
So, another year has begun and we have definitely said goodbye to what has been a very wet winter. As I am writing this the sun is shinning so fingers crossed for a nice Spring and beautiful Summer, allowing everyone to enjoy their gardens and allotments but more importantly giving us a lovely warm day for our trip pout in May!
We have had a lovely start to our gardening club year, as in January we welcomed Caroline Halfpenny. Caroline is a regular speaker at the club, and her talk Dishing the Dirt kept us busy and interested thinking about best mediums for growing . We look forward to when Caroline returns.
In February we had our AGM which was very well attended, I introduced the new registration forms for members, which includes an emergency contact number as it was agreed that when we go on trips and even at our monthly meetings we often have members visiting on their own and if someone should become poorly we need to be able to let relatives know. If you were not at the AGM and have not updated your information on the new registration form, can you please speak to Leigh as soon as possible, especially if you are coming on our trip in May!
We had a vote for the committee and Digital Dave now has a new title of Deputy Chairman, although technology remains his speciality, and on that note, he is busily applying for grants to purchase a nice new sound system to hopefully make things sound wise more comfortable for our members. Thank you, Dave, for all your hard work !
We also welcomed Liz Fox back onto the committee as Deputy Treasurer and thanked her for all the help she gives Leigh with the often-difficult job with the accounts.
Once the business was completed we all enjoyed a lovely Cheese and Wine evening with an amazing spread of different cheeses all arranged by Leigh and Wendy and set up by our super volunteers and committee members in the Kitchen. Thank you ladies another fab evening.
March was super busy with two speakers who were so interesting to listen too and an absolute inspiration to us all. Our first speaker was Sue Kent, who had travel down from Wales to join us for the evening. Sue spoke about growing fruit and vegetables and her experiences both on and off of the TV. Sue was such a natural speaker and we all really enjoyed the evening.
On our normal meeting on 13th March we had two visitors, we were joined by the super energetic and very passionate gardener Tom Hart-Dyke. His passion for plants definitely held our attention as he talked his way across some very hot climates to talk about plants that he came across on his travels.
Following Tom we had a brief introduction from Cherry about her plant/art project she has just launched called the Hoo Hedern. Cherry has a real passion for helping people understand how to be successful in planting seeds on the land and turning them into feasts on our plates. Members were able to visit the Hedern (mobile kitchen) in the car park and take seeds to plant themselves. Cherry kindly cooked 68 cookies for the group and they were delicious; this was evaluated by the fact there was not a single one left!
I have been contacted by Springwood Corner Care Home in Gravesend as they have a number of elderly residents who are keen gardeners and they are just about to start a gardening project at the home. They are keen to have someone from the gardening club visit the home to share knowledge and experience and talk to the residents. They are also keen to join us with some residents at our meetings. We welcome them to Chalk Gardeners Club and look forwards to meeting some of them soon. If you would be interested in talking to the residents about gardening, please do contact me on 07738416183 and I will liaise with the home to arrange.
We are busily sorting out our next trip to Wisley on 7th May. Please ensure you have booked your place with Leigh. Costs this year are £25.00 per member and £30.00 for visitors. All are welcome. Money will need to be paid at our April meeting.
If you have not already just a gentle reminder that Subs and 50/50 are due.
Hope our crafters are busy making for our Summer show, as you may remember we are hoping to expand this section of the show, so let your friends and family know. We can’t wait to see what you have all been busy making.
Upcoming speakers and events for the year are as below.
10th April – James Hughes – MDCV Silver Hand – Vinyard Growing in Kent
8th May – Fergus Garretts – Great Dixter – Succession planting for a long season
12th June – Richard McKenna -Provender Nurseries – Commercial growing of plants
10th July – Sue Marshall – Growing for Chelsea
14th August – Allen – Woodland Trust
4/5 September – Annual Show
9th October – Josh Fenton – His life background, show gardens, what’s next?
13th November – Helmsley – Conservation Centre -an animal life
5th December – Christmas Social
Kind Regards,
Sandra
Chairmans Chatter Number 1 September 2025
Hello All,
I thought it may be nice to put together a few key memories of the year so far and to pop down key dates moving forwards so that everyone is kept in the loop.
If people are happy with these, I am looking at sending them out four times a year to keep you all updated, but these will not replace Julies updates she also sends out to remind us all of imminent speakers and events.
So following on from our AGM last year we were pleased to be able to present a cheque for £346.50 to Ellenor Hospice courtesy of the 50/50 club. It was a pleasure to pass this money onto such a worthy charity and one I am sure that has touched all of our lives in one way or another.
This year we will be putting slips out onto members chairs so they can help to nominate a charity and we will be looking at then sending a proportion of 50/50 club takings to a charity whilst keeping some back for the club to help subsidise events that we put on for our members.
Thank you to all members who contribute to the 50/50, if you would like to take part in this please do speak to Leigh who will be able to advise you re cost etc.
Our next adventure saw us all heading off to Hyde Hall to explore their lovely gardens, unfortunately the weather was not too kind to us, not sure how many umbrellas turned inside out!!! But we did not let this put us off. In true garden club style we dodged the showers , utilising the cafes for protection and got out to walk and explore as soon as the rain eased up, we all still managed to have an amazing day, sometimes it is also about the company as well as the venue that makes a day good!
Throughout the year we have had some amazing speakers and some that well may not have been quite as good, but it is good to catch up with each other at these meetings, so we can forgive the ones who don’t quite hold our attention (as long as we don’t snore to loudly ).
We would love to hear your feedback on the speakers. Is there something you would like to hear more about, someone you would love to hear from? Please speak to Julie or myself and we will see what we can do.
We have just all recovered from our Annual Show and how amazing was that, we had in excess of 311 entries which was amazing, and 256 people visited us on the day. I must say a huge Thank you to the Committee and all of our Volunteers who gave up their time on the day to make it such a success. Special thanks to the Sea Cadets who provided stalls and help during the afternoon bringing interesting activities for the younger visitors that we had. It is lovely to see parents bring their children along to the show, especially as they will potentially be the new gardeners in years to come and will hopefully keep the group going.
Next adventure was our trip to Kew Gardens, where 49 members and friends joined us, the journey there and back ran very smoothly giving us plenty of time to explore. Luckily on this trip we only had one real down pour which happened when some of us were up on the very high Tree Walk, that I must say was very interesting. Again, there was so much to see, the glass houses were amazing, and the flowers were glorious. My favourite apart from the Palm house was the lovely Water lilies so big and beautiful. Thanks again to Dave for organising the grant for this trip and doing his tour guide duties to ensure everyone was counted on and off the coach making sure we left no one behind. and Leigh for sorting the monies etc, Feedback for this trip was very positive with some requests for a re visit soon!
Dates For your Diaries
10th October – Normal Meeting – Steve Edney – The kitchen Garden
22nd October – Wednesday – Chris Beardshaw (Normal Meeting Times)
7th November – Normal Meeting – Alison Marsden
27th November – Afternoon Meeting -2.30pm Alpacas
Sat 6th December – Christmas Fish & Chip Social -Leigh is now taking £5.00 deposit, returnable when you arrive at the event. Please book your place ASAP.
Hope you enjoy flipping through my chatter and look forwards to seeing you all soon.
Kind Regards,
Sandra
Chairman Chatters No2: December 2025
Hello All,
Well, what an amazing year we have all had at the Gardening club, we have had some amazing speakers throughout the year with Chris Beardshaw being the little gem in October that kept us all on the edge of our seats with his amazing talk about the Unique English Garden.
We have enjoyed two lovely trips out, well one was a little dryer than the other but we didn’t let the weather put us off as we marched around Hyde Hall with our brollies blowing inside out , laughing and discussing how typically British we all are. Kew Gardens however was a much dryer day with only one downpour, so we were more able to take in the gorgeous gardens and the famous palm house.
Our Annual show on the 6th September was another resounding success with more entries than we have had before, although next year we would love to see the craft section expanded , so please do encourage all your crafty friends to enter their hard work, it would be great if we could have more for our judges to look over. We had a fabulous response this year to the Show offer re – new membership with 19 new members joining on the day. The Sea Cadets provided fantastic activities for the younger attendees at the show, and our very own woodman Paul was there selling his lovely woodcraft to raise money for the hospice.
6th December saw us all enjoy our Christmas Social with digital Dave as your host for the afternoon, providing us with much fun and merriment, (especially when the panic hit halfway through bingo when the IT decided to let him down!) but in true Dave fashion he styled it out and all was not lost. We had a lovely Raffle with prizes sourced by Brenda, thank you Brenda for sorting that out for us, The Fish and Chips were brilliant again, Livingstone Road Chip Shop really does do us proud, it is no mean feat getting 85 hot portions of food transported and it all still tastes fresh and hot. Thank you, Leigh and Wendy, for sorting that for us and for your trips to Bookers and various other supermarkets to ensure we get the best possible deals.
Thanks to Jo and Linda for all the arranging and sorting in the kitchen, making sure you all had everything you needed to enjoy your meals.
Finally thanks to Melvyn, James, Julie , Paul, Max and Sarah for setting up the hall and ensuring everyone had a seat with pretty folded serviettes which took a while to complete.
As Chair I am so proud and very grateful for the help we have both within and outside of the committee, this is what makes Chalk Village Gardening Club so special and such a lovely place to be supporting.
It is really lovely receiving your feedback re our events, thank you to everyone that sent feedback as it helps us to ensure you all get the best experience you can.
So now onto next year how can we possibly be nearing 2026! We have a jam packed programme thanks to Julie’s hard work with some really good speakers.
We will be welcoming everyone back on :
9th January – Caroline Halfpenny – Dishing the Dirt
13th February – Is our AGM and Cheese and Wine Evening – We will be looking for some new committee members, so if you can spare just a few hours a year we would love to hear from you.
6th March – Sue Kent from Gardeners World – The quest for easy fruit and vegetable growing.
13th March – Tom Hart Dyke – My Story
10th April – James Hughes – MDCV Silver Hand – Vinyard Growing in Kent
8th May – Fergus Garretts – Great Dixter – Succession planting for a long season
12th June – Richard McKenna -Provender Nurseries – Commercial growing of plants
10th July – Sue Marshall – Growing for Chelsea
14th August – Allen – Woodland Trust
4/5 September – Annual Show
9th October – Josh Fenton – His life background, show gardens, what’s next?
13th November – Helmsley – Conservation Centre -an animal life
5th December – Christmas Social
We have two trips planned for the year
Wisley in early spring
Sheffield Park in early Autumn watch
Just a gentle reminder that your subs are due from 1st January 2026, we will not be able to accept cheques moving forwards, so please speak to Leigh if you would like to complete a bank transfer.
Provender Nurseries have an event on 24th January if people would like to visit our membership number is CHV0028-1
So having departed all that information and given everyone a little round up of our year I think all that is left for me to do is wish everyone a Very Merry Christmas and Best wishes for a healthy, happy and safe New Year.
Kind Regards,
Sandra
2026
9th Jan – Caroline Halfpenny – “Dishing the dirt”
Our past speakers are listed below:
2025
10 Jan – Kevin Tooher – “Conifers for the garden”
14 Mar – Chris Collins – “Small spaces, Big ideas”
11 Apr – Dr John Hughes – “Preparing for the show”
09 May – Chris Spree – “The first Ten years in a walled garden”
13 Jun – Laura Brady – “The Wonky Parsnip Market Garden”
11 Jul – Sophie Leathart – “Growing flowers for cutting”
08 Aug – George Lockwood – “Plants to encourage wildlife”
10 Oct – Steve Edney – “The Kitchen garden”
22 Oct – Chris Beardshaw – “A most unique English garden”
07 Nov – Alison Marsden – “How not to kill your houseplants”
2024
12 Jan – Darren Everest – “How i grow sweet peas”
08 Mar – Martin Gurdon – Doing Bird
12 Apr – Caroline Halfpenny – Bulbs
10 May – Jean Griffin – A Question & answer session
14 Jun – Judith Hathrill – Ponds
12 Jul – Sally Channon – Planet Earth
09 Aug – Neil – Brogdale: The national fruit collection
12 Oct – Tom Hart Dyke – Lullingstone castle
2023
10th Feb – AGM – Cheese and wine social
10th March – Alison Marsden – How to have a great front garden
14th April – Derek March – Story of your daily pinta
21st April – Nick Bailey – The road to Chelsea
12th May – Darren Everest – Dahlias
9th June – Andy Garland – The National Garden Scheme
14th July – Steve Edney – A horticultarists home garden
11th August – Caroline Halfpenny – Climate change and your garden
13th October – Chris Collins – Growing an organic allotment from scratch
10 November – Martin Newcombe – Bats in the belfry and badgers in the bypass
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