Meeting 1186 "Superstitions"

 The meeting theme was "Superstitions."  Eoin, with his Irish background was the perfect choice to act as Toastmaster for the evening. He had a supply of Irish myths and superstitions to segue through the segments of the meeting.

Peter, substituting for President Chris, welcomed first time guest Lisa and returning guest Karen as well as Josh (a former member who is rejoining our club.

Eoin

Peter

Josh

Jonathon

Jonathon proposed a toast and also introduced the word for the evening, "Auspicious"

This was followed by Round Robin about superstitions. Everyone including guests took part.

Peter. Josh. Christiane, Paul.

As Christiane, John and Helen will be competing in the speech contests at the Area 8 Conference on Saturday, Christiane and John delivered their speeches as a practice run and received feedback from everyone. (Helen was not present at the meeting.)

Narelle introduced Christiane's International Speech and led everyone in a Round Robin Evaluation.

Christiane

Paul introduced John's Humorous speech and led the evaluation session.  Everyone had some good suggestions.

Paul

John

Marlene Introduced Christiane's Humorous speech and invited all to comment.

Christiane

Marlene

The Timekeeper was Arun.

Arun

Gail presented a raffle which consisted of a book of Australian Ghost Stories, a spooky mug that changes when hot water is added and a box of Roses chocolates. The lucky winner was Arun.

Raffle

A generous supper was provided by Christiane and Jill.

Amy had some superstition themed table topic questions for Christiane, Karen and Jill.

Amy

Karen

Christiane

The Table Topics were evaluated by TJ.

Narelle presented a "Who am I?" quiz. Jill was quick to guess it was Kermit the frog.

Paul conducted a General Evaluation of the entire meeting.

Award winners were Paul (Best Evaluation,) John (Best Speech,) Eoin (Most Improved,) and Jill (Best Table Topic - not in photo.)

 

Award winners 28 Nov 2025

Our next meeting will be on the 11th November.

Area 8 Conference Saturday 1st November at the Corso, North Lakes.  Contact Gail if you want to attend. 

Meeting 1185 Evaluation & International Speech Contests

 Contest nights are always exciting. President Chris opened the meeting and handed control to Contest Toastmaster Jonathon.

President Chris

Contest TM Jonathon

There were 7 contestants in the Evaluation Contest - Christiane, Helen, Maddy, Peter, Paul, Narelle and TJ.    

Evaluation Contestants

Test speaker Sue from Bracken Ridge presented a speech, then all contestants except the first one were escorted outside and brought in one by one to evaluate Sue's speech.

And the winner was Christiane with Helen second and Narelle third.

Helen (2nd) Christiane (1st) Narelle (3rd)

Maddy introduced her raffle - which was a $30 voucher that can be used in various places. She was kept busy during the supper break, selling tickets.

Madeline - Raffle

Sue - Test Speaker

Maria & Sue

 

A delicious supper was provided by Helen and Eoin. It was a good time to chat.

Supper time 

Sergeant at Arms TJ called the meeting to reconvene and Jonathon introduced the International Speech Contest. The three contestants were Helen, Christiane and Chris.

Contest TM Jonathon

And the winner was Christiane with Helen 2nd and Chris 3rd.

Helen (2nd) Christiane (1st) Chris (3rd)

Trish delivered a farewell speech, advising us that this was her final Toastmasters meeting. She told how she had joined Sandgate Toastmasters over 30 years ago as a shy introvert and now has a thriving business and has written 22 books. But she has decided the time is right for her to leave Toastmasters. She received plenty of hugs and well wishes.

Trish

Helen and Trish

Special thanks to our judges, Chief Judge Jenny, Suresh, Chris, David, Mark, and Maria and to our test speaker Sue who gave their time and talent to make our contest possible. 

Our first and 2nd place getters in the contests will compete against other clubs at the Area Conference in North Lakes on the 1st November. 

Next meeting will be held on the 28th October.

Meeting 1184 "Nature"

 Maddy handled her first time role of Toastmaster with great aplomb. She had chosen the theme for the meeting, "Nature."

President Chris welcomed everyone, including our guests Karen and Josh. Chris also proposed a toast to "Our waterways."

Maddy 

Chris

Word Master Narelle gave us the word "Brown." It was used many times during the evening.

Trish presented the Round Robin asking for our thoughts on "wisdom and nature."

Jonathon, Trish and Paul

Jonathon gave an explanation and helpful tips on the Evaluation contest which will be held next meeting.

Jonathon

Erin's moving Icebreaker speech "The Power of the Voice." was evaluated by Chris.

Erin

Helen presented a Level 3 speech "A Work in Progress." in the Presentation Mastery path. It was evaluated by Christiane.

  

Helen

The Timer was Trish.

Jill provided a raffle consisting of a Lego set, tic-tacs, car freshener, & voucher for a car wash.  It was won by Trish.

Jill's Raffle

Supper was provided by Narelle and Trish.

Chatting over supper

As well as being a member of our club, Gail is also our Area Director. She had some information about the forthcoming Area Conference and other matters.

Chris followed up with a talk about our succession plan for the next Toastmaster year and called for volunteers for the (non binding) future executive roles.

 

Gail- Area Director

Chris

Table Topics Master Helen called on Narelle, Josh, Jill, Karen, TJ. and Paul to give a 2-minute impromptu speech on the topics she had chosen.

Helen

 

The topics (paraphrased) were:

What can animals teach us about humans?

How much do you love Camping?

Nature best therapist

Should humans rewild themselves?

If nature could speak, what would it say to us?

Birds - majestic creatures or feathered jerks?

Paul took longer than his allotted 2 minutes to tell his very funny story about being attacked by a Butcher bird.

The table topics were evaluated by Marlene and Gail.

Marlene

Gail

Chris gave a General Evaluation of all that had not already been evaluated. 

The award winners of the evening were Karen (Best Table Topic,) Erin (Best Speech and Most Improved) and Chris (Best Evaluation.)

Karen, Erin and Chris

Since there are 5 Tuesdays in September, it will be 3 weeks until our next meeting on the 14th October. (No meeting on the 5th week this time.)

Next meeting will be our International Speech and Evaluation Contest. (There is still room for more contestants!) Winners will go on to compete at the Area Conference at North Lakes on the 1st November.