Friends of Marple Memorial Park Task Days
The Friends hold regular task days in the park on the last Saturday of each month in the winter and the middle and last Saturday from March to November. Everyone is welcome to join in for as long or as short they wish during the specified times. Please note that children and young people under 18 must be accompanied by a responsible adult.
If you are interested becoming a volunteer with us please get in touch and we will add you to our Task Day notifications.
We like to keep a record of what we get up and here are details of past task days.
Task Day 25 November 2023
Cold start to a glorious day day in the park!
It was a very cold start but we soon warmed up in the sunshine as we began working and it was a lovely day to be in the park.
Due to the frost we left flowerbeds alone and focused on tidying around benches (and the stocks) which now require extra work after we persuaded the council to stop using weedkiller around them earlier this year. We also swept the paths on the main drive into the park, tidied the Reading Circle and did our usual litter-pick.
Task Day 14 November 2023
A mini-task day to secure the wreaths around the War Memorial
We usually manage to secure the wreaths around the war memorial after the Remembrance Sunday service but it was a bit wet, cold and blowy, so we waited for a more favourable weather-window. That arrived today and we got the wreaths anchored down. Hopefully they will stay in place until it's time to remove them, which we usually do in January.
Brollies out at the Remembrance Service on Sunday 12 November 2023
Task Day 11 November 2023
A stunning Remembrance Day in Memorial Park!
The park was beautiful in the early mist this morning, which was burned away by glorious sunshine in time for 11am. There were lots of people in the park for the two minutes silence and we orchestrated this informally using a recording of The Last Post and Reveille that was quite moving, despite the (insert your own word) talking through it on his phone.
In terms of tasks today, we planted several hundred bulbs supplied by the council behind the benches overlooking the Bowling Green, did some work in the Infants Play Area, picked litter and put the finishing touches to our preparations for the Remembrance Sunday Service tomorrow. We always like the park to look its very best and we've been well assisted in this aim by TLC's park maintenance operatives too, who have also put in a lot of extra work during the past week. We thank them for their efforts on this.
After tea break we headed down to the Lock 10 entrance to dismantle some large branches that someone had dragged into the park from the canal.
Task Day 28 October 2023
Remembrance is approaching and we like the park to look its best!
Today we focused on tidying the main flowerbeds and edging the paths on the approaches to the war memorial as we head towards the month of Remembrance. We also added topsoil to the Sensory Garden opposite the Scout Hut and did a litter-pick around the park. It's clear some park visitors are picking litter too, and we thank you for that!
We met with Zoe from Marple Mutual Aid for a photo shoot at the Covid memorial and you will hopefully see an article about this in the Marple Review soon.
Boules court maintenance is underway too
We also had an inbetweenie task day recently to begin overdue maintenance on the French Boules Court - it looks like we have a big job breaking out with tired sleepers!
Task Day 14 October 2023
A beautiful autumnal morning allowed us to crack on with park maintenance
Tasks today included transferring new topsoil to the Band Room garden, a good tidy-up of the allotment beds, plus regular maintenance on the main beds and war memorial beds.
Due to the amount of rain over the last few days it was too wet to treat benches but our dedicated bench volunteer wasn't lost for a job and got stuck into tidying bases instead.
Outdoor Exercise Equipment
We are sure many of you will be wondering what's happening with our outdoor exercise equipment project. Installation should have been completed a couple of weeks ago but unfortunately the Mag Bells unit was installed incorrectly. Thankfully we spotted this before tarmacking and work was stopped for investigations. The Mag Bells unit has now been removed and gone off-site for refurbishment. We understand it is due to return soon and then the final stages of the works can be completed and everything will be ready to use.
Task Day 30 September 2023
Great to have two new volunteers join us as we begin to focus on getting ready for Remembrance
We turned our attention mostly back to the main flowerbeds and war memorial beds as Remembrance seems to be coming at us rather fast this year! Other work included our regular maintenance at the Band Room garden, sanding and treating benches, and cutting up of a large fallen branch in the canal-side woodland to create some extra wildlife habitat.
Thank you to park visitors who popped almost £30 in our collection bucket!
