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Accomplishments

Our major achievements so far, beside our correspondence with the grannies in South Africa is to raise money for the Alexandra clinic attended by the Gogos.

Listed here, as a way to give ideas to others looking for fund raising ideas are

Norma Geggie at right preparing okra.

Several fundraisers were organized

A Play reading at a well-known local pub:

"A fairly recently formed community theatrical group - The Wakefield Players - offered to put on a ‘reading’ of two plays - our now-famous Black Sheep Inn offered their premises, the ’playwrights’ waived their royalties, our group cooked African finger food for us to serve at intermission.

On a Monday evening with one of the heaviest snowfalls of the season, our fundraiser filled the premises to capacity, the fingerfood looked inviting (if an acquired taste), and we raised just short of $2,000. We realised that we were more than a small group of women, we had an entire community behind us. "

A Concert held on Wakefield covered bridge

"Our second fundraiser was posted as The Great Grannies Concert—held in September on our covered bridge. We approached several professional musicians with a connection to the Gatineau, who without hesitation offered their services- African dancers, a 60 voice choir, and two instrumentalists."

A Quilt Sale

The ’Tooth Fairies’ are a group of five quilters who are committed to supporting grass root community development projects through the sale of their baby and children’s quilts, along with other small sewn articles. They chose to support the Wakefield Grannies as 100% of the funds raised from the sales would go directly to the grannies in south Africa. In December 2005, a sale was held in the home of one of the Wakefield Grannies and $1400 was raised. Many thanks go out to the quilters who donated the materials, their time and their incredible skills.

A Second Great Grannies’ Concert

September 10, 2006 - Grandparents Day across Canada - the Wakefield Grannies celebrated the day with another concert on the covered bridge: their Second Annual Great Grannies’ Concert. It was a true celebration of community spirit and an opportunity to enjoy a wonderful day of food, fun and music.

The May Day celebration

A full day of activities beginning with a garage sale and followed by a marketplace, food court, workshops and dancing around the May Pole. The Wakefield Grannies with their popular CD exchange and a new table with donated jewelry were joined by 11 other Granny groups from the Ottawa region who were also selling their fundraising crafts and food.

Participation to Angels Share Concert 07 & Angels Share Concert 08

The Wakefield Grannies were invited to participate at a December 2007 fundraising event in Chelsea, Quebec. And again in 2008. Brilliant and wonderfully touching concerts.

Sale of the Spice Mix ’Gogolaka’

Plant Sale Days 2008 and 2009

The Wakefield Grannies enjoyed much success in 2008 with their Saturday Plant Sales. This venture entailed kind folk donating plants from their gardens and visitors to the market giving donations for them.

Three Grannies Visits Alexandra

Brenda Rooney of Rooney Productions along with Norma Geggie and Linda Gorka came home on March 18,2008 after a highly successful trip to South Africa. They were guest of the city of Johannesburg where they gave a workshop, presented several screenings of The Great Granny Revolution and visited our Gogos in Alexandra. For a first-person account of the trip, click on the title of this paragraph.

2009 Dare to Remember

A ’sweet’ event to raise funds for the Stephen Lewis Foundation.

2011 Christmas Bazaar

The Great Granny Bazaar in the new Community Centre in Wakefield was, predictably, a fantastic success.

A 2012 visit to South Africa by three Wakefield Grannies

Sharing Awareness

The Wakefield Grannies have also been doing their best to inform others of the African Grannies’ plight through their OUTREACH team

After their experience at the Grandmothers’ Gathering in Toronto, four Wakefield Grannies have formed a specialized team of speakers that has since given numerous public and private presentations.

In September 2007, the Wakefield Grannies as member of Canadian Grandmothers for Africa: A National Network, participated in the organisation of the Grandparents Solidarity March an event to give voice, visibility and support for HIV/AIDS in Africa

On March 6, 2009 several Wakefield Grannies were part of a group of Grannies presenting a petition to the Canadian Parliament asking for fairer aid share for Africa.

The Great Granny Revolution in Rome On September 18 2010 Wakefield Granny Brenda Rooney and her partner Robert Rooney flew to Rome to present their film, The Great Granny Revolution at a special fund raising Gala hosted by the Canadian Club of Rome and the Canadian Embassy

Inspiring Others

We never set out to inspire but our actions did snowballed and we feel at the same time humbled and proud to have inspired young people and older ones alike to get involved and care about Africa.Read bout it in Our Loyal Supporters.


This section's articles

2011 Grannies Christmas Bazaar

The Great Granny Bazaar in the new Community Centre in Wakefield was, predictably, a fantastic success. Predictably because once again our local supporters showed a lot of generosity both in donating items and coming in force to shop on the bazaar day. Not only did we reap thousands of dollars for our ongoing support of grandmothers in Alexandra Township and Natal, but the extravagant abundance of items donated to us allowed us to price things attractively, from fine art, antiques, to jewellery and unusual smaller items. One table of un-priced items allowed young and old to select (...)

Dare to Remember Granny Dessert Auction

A Fundraising Event for the Stephen Lewis Foundation
The Wakefield Grannies were delighted to be part of the Stephen Lewis, Dare to Remember challenge during the week October 17-25 and invited anyone who wanted to be part of the evening to join them at Molo’s Restaurant, Riverside Drive, Wakefield for Appertizers and refreshments and then a Silent Auction bid on Desserts. The Restaurant had been decorated to give a warm and welcoming African ambience with African print tablecloths, seasonal flowers and candlelight. When the guests arrived they were given slips of paper displaying an African proverb that they had to attempt to (...)

December 2007 Fundraiser and Launching the Gogolaka Products

On December 15, 2007 the Wakefield Grannies were invited by the Aids Brigade of Chelsea (ABC) to participate in the fundraising concert Angels Share at the Chelsea United Church in Chelsea, Quebec. The Angel’s Share concert is an annual event that is hosted by Ian Tamblyn and friends. The ticket sales for this concert go towards the Chelsea United Church Building Fund, which helps keep their little building humming and they also invite an organisation to raise funds with them at this even. This year the ABC who are a group of children between the ages of 8 and 12, chose The (...)

Fourth Annual Ian Tamblyn and Friends Angels Share Concert

The ticket sales for this concert went partly to The Sparrow Village project, a South Africa initiative much admired by the Wakefield Grannies. A few Wakefield Grannies (and some friends) have visited Sparrow and are spreading the word. The Sparrow Village project is South Africa’s first AIDS village providing: a hospice for the dying, a training center for the living, and a base from which to educate the public about HIV/AIDS — All while caring for children with AIDS This year’s line-up for the Ian Tamblyn and Friends Angels Share Concert featured Chris (...)

Grandmothers welcomed Elizabeth Mataka in Ottawa on September 8, 2007

Grandparents Solidarity March
The Canadian Grandmothers for Africa: A National Network welcomed Elizabeth Mataka, to her first official visit to Ottawa. Ms. Mataka, who is successor to Stephen Lewis as UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, was born in Botswana and lives in Zambia. She is a grandmother, a social worker, and the vice-chair of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Two grandmothers from Africa (Darlina Tyawana and Zodwa Ndlovu), Ilana Landsberg-Lewis, Executive Director of the Stephen Lewis Foundation and hundreds of Canadian grandmothers and their families joined Ms. Mataka in a (...)

MARCH 6, 2009...Parliament Hill - The Grandmothers of Canada make history.

It is official!

One of the most successful petition efforts in Canadian history was tabled in the House of Commons on behalf of the Grandmothers for Grandmothers advocacy work. The petition carried over 32,000 names and addresses of people calling for the government to do three important things: to immediately set a timetable by 2015 to meet its obligation to the 0.7% gross national income development goal; to contribute a fair share to the global fund for AIDS and TB; and to make legislative changes that are necessary for Canada’s access to medicines regimes. The Honourable MP Paul (...)

OUR LOYAL SUPPORTERS

Recently, Emma Thompson celebrated her twelfth birthday with a ski party at Vorlage, when her guests were invited to bring a donation to Wakefield Grannies in lieu of a birthday gift. Emma proudly presented us with over $200, this being the fifth birthday she has held in support of work with the Alex Gogos. Emma and her friend Marley Kinnely were our first ‘out-of-the-blue-supporters’ when, at age 7, they baked cookies and sold them to their neighbours, so that they could contribute to our funds. Thank you young supporters, you lift our spirits and those of our Alexandra friends. (...)

The 2nd annual great Grannies’ Concert

The Second Annual Great Grannies’ Concert was held on September 10, 2006 in Wakefield, Quebec. The concert opened with the drumming of Kathy Armstrong from Baobab Tree. The group Immaterial, featuring Brian Sanderson, Nathan Curry, Denis Drouin and Oren Hercz interpreted a line-up of songs chosen by the Grannies and were followed by Bethan and the B-Boys featuring Bethan Nodwell on vocals, Rob McFadden on guitar, Jean Maisonneuve on drums, Miles Howe on harmonica and Peter MacGibbon on bass. There were some new and exciting aspects to the day as well as the return of a few (...)

The Great Grannie Concert

Our second fundraiser was posted as « The Great Grannie Concert »—held in September on our covered bridge. We approached several professional musicians with a connection to the Gatineau, who without hesitation offered their services-African dancers, a 60 voice choir, and two instrumentalists.

The Great Granny Revolution in Rome

On September 18 2010 Wakefield Granny Brenda Rooney and her partner Robert Rooney flew to Rome to present their film, The Great Granny Revolution at a special fund raising Gala hosted by the Canadian Club of Rome and the Canadian Embassy. The event was a great success with over 260 people attending including the House Chairperson of the South African National Assembly, Obed Bapela MP and the South African Ambassador to Rome Anthea Joubert. The morning of the event, September 22nd, the Canadian Government announced that it would continue to support the Global Fund in the amount of 540 (...)

The OUTREACH Team

After their experience at the Grandmothers’ Gathering in Toronto, four Wakefield Grannies have formed a specialized team of speakers that has since given public and private presentations in 2006. Through their Outreach team The Wakefield Grannies aims to: play a role in informing other groups or individuals that they can have a voice and that their voice can reach their community to raise awareness of the immeasurable needs of HIV/AIDS orphans and their grandmothers in Africa and tap resources within that community to raise funds to contribute towards remedying the crisis (...)

The Spice Girls at Work

The Gogolaka spice is a unique creation of the Wakefield Grannies. Created as a fusion of South African and Canadian cooking tradition, the spice is delightful mixed into cream cheese or yogurt for a vegetable or natcho dip. In fact two of our Grannies were overheard the other day saying they had tried it in chocolate and thought it added zing. It is sold at Molo’s Café in the village of Wakefield and at all Grannie events and plant sales.

Three Grannies visits Alexandra in March 2008

“Three of the Wakefield Grannies, Brenda Rooney, Linda Gorka and I went at the invitation of the City of Johannesburg to participate in a promotion of the Grandmother Support Groups in South Africa. Robert and Brenda Rooney’s Film, The Great Granny Revolution had been shown to leaders within the City of Johannesburg when they recognised the possibility of being able to develop a support mechanism for these deprived and distressed victims of the Aids pandemic-the grandmothers left to care for their orphaned, and at times, HIV-positive grandchild. They launched an awareness (...)

Tooth Fairy Quilters

The ’Tooth Fairies’ are a group of five quilters who are committed to supporting grass root community development projects through the sale of their baby and children’s quilts, along with other small sewn articles.They chose to support the Wakefield Grannies as 100% of the funds raised from the sales would go directly to the grannies in south Africa. Last December, a sale was held in the home of one of the grannies and $1400 was raised. Many thanks go out to the quilters who donated the materials, their time and their incredible (...)

2012

Visiting Grannies

In September 2012 three Wakefield Grannies,Ruth Salmon, Lindy Ranger and Carol Faulkner spent two weeks visiting Gogos in South Africa (SA). Petronella and grandaughter Wakefield Grannies relationships with their partnering Alexandra and Natal region Gogos in SA are nurtured mainly through letters and occasionally through visits. Once three Gogos (Petronnella being one of them) came to Wakefield and many people living near Wakefield had the chance to meet them. The Great Granny Revolution by Wakefield Granny Brenda Rooney and her husband Robert was filmed both in Alexandra and in (...)