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.
Not many photos today due to the changeable weather but lots of good work done by a small bunch of volunteers.
The Cinema bed was given a really good tidy-up, the ornamental flowerbeds and War Memorial beds were trimmed, weeded and tidied too and lots of leaves cleared - although you would hardly notice due to the wind constantly bringing more down. More work was done on the tidying of the perimeter footpath too.
With the Remembrance service getting even closer we swapped over the flags - raising the Union Flag on the memorial pole and asked the councillor on surgery duty if the driveway to the park can be cleaned before the Remembrance weekend.
Our Timeline Display commemorating the lives of Marple's WWI fallen on the railings in front of Hollins House is now underway and will be updated over the coming months and years in "real time" as we reach the 100th anniversary of each man's death. We hope that this will help local people understand the devastation of the Great War on the community 100 years ago.
Thank you to park users, who donated over £28 in our collection bucket today.
With Remembrance approaching there was a lot of focus on the ornamental flowerbeds during today's task day. It's really important to us that they look the best they can for the service in November and we only have one more task day before that takes place. We also planted bulbs from Lyme Park at the top end of the Park and did some light crown-lifting to the perimeter footpath alongside the canal, selectively removing branches at eye level to keep them out of walkers' faces.
Returning to Remembrance - our project to commemorate the lives of Marple's WWI fallen with a temporary display using the railings in front of Hollins House was approved by Marple Area Committee on Wednesday. We've cleaned and repainted the railings in preparation for this and we're excited about this new project that will begin towards the end of October.
Thank you to park users, who donated over £26 in our collection bucket.
Unfortunately everything was too wet for painting, so today's efforts focused on work to shrub beds and flowerbeds. There was also some crown lifting to trees in the park, a tidy-up of the wall bordering the canal towpath, cutting back of ivy on the toilet block and a litter-pick throughout the park. It was also good to chat with folk from Compstall who are thinking of setting up a new Friends Group for a small park in their area.
Painting the Infants Play Area fence with NCS Challenge!
Today 13 young people from NCS with The Challenge and their supervisor Lisa joined Friends of the Park to paint the Infants Play Area fence. Thankfully the weather was kind to us, with just a brief shower, and the young people even finished our challenge early allowing them to relax with a few games of French Boules before setting off home.
We'd like to extend a big thank you to the young people who helped us out today with in the region of 42 hours of free labour in the park. We'd also like to thank Sara at The Challenge for contacting us about this and for the £100 contribution towards the painting materials too. Thanks also to park users, who donated just over £11 in our collection bucket while we were there.
A busy day with treatment of benches and preservative applied to Midnight the Tree Sculpture, weeding and clearing of paths, pruning of hedges, litter picking and weeding and pruning to the ornamental flowerbeds too. Marple Allotment Association were also in attendance keeping their bed in good order and engaging with the public.
Thank you to park users, who donated nearly £11 in our collection bucket.
More wonderful weather and great effort from our volunteers ensured lots of work was done in the park today. This included litter picking, treating of benches, continuation of painting to the Infants Play Area, wire-brushing, sanding and painting of the circular Coronation Bench and of course the ongoing battle with the weeds to keep the flowerbeds looking their best.
Thank you to park users, who donated over £21 in our collection bucket.
Thanks to Terry Wood and Gavin Eyquem for the photographs.