Page 47 - The Rifles Bugle Autumn 2019

Welfare matters
Sjt ‘Rob’ Bason was the driving force behind decorating the community centre for the families’ Halloween Party. It looked amazing and everyone enjoyed the party games, especially turning mum or dad into a ‘Mummy’ with several rolls of loo roll. The Youth Club visited a local farm for a ‘spooky’ Halloween treat. In the lead up to Remembrance Day this year we hand-made our very own ‘sea of poppies’ for the Chepstow town centre memorial. The children learnt about the importance of Remembrance Day, and seeing our display in the town centre made us all feel immensely proud of our efforts in remembering the fallen. The Rfn of 1 RIFLES and the welfare team raised a personal best £6874.29 this year during the Poppy appeal for the Royal British Legion. Thank you to our local Chepstow community, who donated their hard-earned money for a great cause.
The Christmas event was an outdoor market. Local market traders attended and provided some festive bargains. Mrs ‘Kat’ Peterson provided a fantastic feast of Hog roast and stuffing, also making the best mulled wine the UWO had ever tasted but was unwilling to share the recipe! Community spirit, bargains, great food, washed down with some fine wine and multiple other tipples, topped off with real Christmas trees and an outdoor ice rink, made for a great day.
While the Bn prepared for and deployed on Op TORAL 8 it was an exceptionally busy period for the welfare team. The team have been fantastic in all aspects of providing help, assistance and support; especially with the production of the deployment packs for the families and NOK, providing them with hard copies of all the information delivered during the multiple deployment briefs.
1 RIFLES have organised a variety of different activities for the families during the deployment. So far we have enjoyed a Valentine’s disco, Easter egg bingo evening, and Mothering Sunday lunch - a 3 course Sunday roast with no cooking or washing
up, topped off with a potted plant for all the mums that attended. SSVC gratefully supplied the ‘Movie Machine’ to Beachley Barracks and brought the cinema experience to our doorstep. We watched Captain Marvel and Dumbo, only a day after it was released! I would recommend this fantastic asset to any unit.
A ‘Roaming Reptiles’ created a spine tingling and educational afternoon which culminated in, if you were brave enough, being able to hold and pet the ‘creepy crawlies’. For the budding artists and potters, we visited a local shop called ‘paint on me’ where the families unlocked their artistic talents conducting craft projects and decorating an egg cup each to take home and enjoy their future boiled egg breakfasts.
Future events during the deployment period will include pamper sessions, multiple trips to farms, activity centres, Morris dancers, scarecrow trials, multiple external visits to parks and attractions. However, I am particularly looking forward to the festival weekend of camping, BBQs, roasting marsh- mallows on a camp fire and live music to celebrate Armed Forces day.
Capt Chris Mills Unit Welfare Officer
FUTURE EVENTS DURING THE DEPLOYMENT PERIOD WILL INCLUDE PAMPER SESSIONS, MULTIPLE TRIPS TO FARMS, ACTIVITY CENTRES, MORRIS DANCERS, SCARECROW TRIALS, MULTIPLE EXTERNAL VISITS TO PARKS
THE RIFLES
FIRST BATTALION 45
Families information and deployment packs with useful info and contact numbers
Popcorn in hand and ready for the film