Friends of Memorial Park Task Days in 2009
Here are details of our task days in 2009.
The weather was very kind and contributed to a very busy and productive task day. The Beaver Scouts came along to help us by clearing one of the flowerbeds and taking the plants home for their own gardens. They also planted bluebells and snowdrops in the woodland area behind the library and some small plants in the war memorial beds. Thank you Beavers! While they were doing this we installed our new interpretation panel for the French Boules Court and also rubbed down and treated the three seats near the court and Jim Heald's bench near the library. In addition, we treated apple, pear, acorn and beechnut ground sculptures and gave "Midnight" the owl a coat too. So busy there was little time to take photos but we did manage a few..........
A day of mixed feelings - it was inspiring to see the magnificent new granite bench installed by the family of Cpl Danny Winter in his memory in the sunshine and distressing to discover that one of the recently installed memorial benches near to the Boules Court and our interpretation panel for the Breathing Place behind the library have been vandalised. We were able to fix the interpretation panel and have removed a section of the bench for repair. Apart from these unexpected activities we stripped the sunflowers from the main circular ornamental bed and had a good tidy-up around the council offices.
More weeding of the Memorial beds was the main task this month. It's amazing how quick those weeds grow and we wanted the beds to look good for the Merchant Navy Day Service next weekend. We hoisted the "Red Duster" Merchant Navy flag and it will fly in the park all week in remembrance of the merchant sailors who lost their lives during the war. There was also time to do a bit of weeding and pruning in the rose bed near to the bowling green.
We managed to find a weather window in between the recent downpours for our July task day, when the main project was to install the last of our tree sculptures, an apple and pear created for us by Andrew Frost. Andrew actually did these at the same time as the main tree sculpture and ground sculptures but unfortunately the apple was stolen from the Brabyns Park Depot before they could be installed. After a long wait because he was so busy Andrew kindly replaced the stolen apple free of charge and at last we have now managed have the fruits installed installed in the park. In addition, the more mundane task of weeding the War Memorial flowerbeds was completed without getting rained on once!
This month we prepared the Boules Court for the Locks Festival on 5th July by raking, weeding and trimming the grass around the court and under the new commemorative seats. A similar job was done on he Bowling Green to ensure it is also looking its best for the festival. During the task day family and friends of Danny Winter, the Royal Marine killed in Afghanistan earlier this year, laid a wreath in his memory below his dedication on the memorial that was added recently. Unfortunately they will have seen that the memorial has been defaced with graffiti, which we have reported to the council and hope it can be removed quickly. Some additional plants were also added to the war memorial beds to replace some of the specimens that have not survived the recent re-planting.
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The main task this month was to rub down and re-paint the Coronation Bench, installed in August 2006. It has fared pretty well over the last three years but was certainly ready for a lick of paint. After that all hands were turned to helping Bob and Adrian clear the formal beds ready for summer planting. A glorious day for it, lets hope we get many more this summer!
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