Every Wednesday morning in the town of Mapleton, one local craft group has been making differences far beyond their humble artisan beginnings for 30 years.
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Craft members at work - photo Georgia Beard
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HORSE WISDOM FOR LIFE g and Equine Assisted Learnin Riding with Awareness
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he Mapleton Craft Group, founded in 1990 by Eileen Brownlie, welcomes retirees, stay-at-home mums and other locals to connect over handcrafts. But their artistic efforts have proved more than pastimes, reaching lives and aiding welfare services in regional and international communities.
These achievements are worthy of recognition as the tight-knit members celebrate the group’s 30th anniversary this year. Since their early stages in the old Mapleton Community Library, once standing on the corner of Obi Obi Road and Post Office Road, the group has expanded in more ways than one. Mapleton Community Library 1990
Founding members Valerie Zwart, 90, and Lilian Warren, 88, remember the group as a fledgling collection of older women searching for a way to connect and keep active. Valerie described how at first, several women were meeting in the small library and crafting on a long table. Then, “by the time there were 12 of us on that one table working, we couldn’t move our elbows.” “You couldn’t go anywhere until it was time to go, and then you used to shuffle out,” Lilian said. Faced with increasing members and dwindling space, the group moved to the Mapleton Bowls Club several months later.
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Lilian called it, “the best move we ever made … because there’s lots of space and we’ve got everything we want there.”
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Now the group receives around 60 members, who meet regularly to socialise, develop their skills in arts and crafts and contribute to the local community.
Siobhan Hamson | 0438 454 703 horsewisdomforlife@gmail.com www.horsewisdomforlife.com
Lilian explained that new members, “can have morning tea, and you can go around to every table and talk to people, and then if you see something that you would really like to do, that person is obliged to teach you.”
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