Icklesham

CHURCH NEWS: The service for the second Sunday after Easter will be at 9.30am and will be Parish Eucharist, led by Rev. Canon Father Robin Whitehead. The Annual Parochial Church Meeting, - APCM - will be held at 10.30 am on 17th April. This will be immediately after the morning worship. There are 65 people on the Electoral Roll of the church, and it is hoped that as many as possible will be able to attend this meeting. The Bishop of Lewes will be visiting the Benefice on 12th April to meet the Vicar, Churchwardens and Treasurers of Winchelsea and Icklesham to get a feel of how the Diocese perceives the future developments of the parishes. Advance notice of the special service to celebrate the 90th birthday of Her Majesty the Queen. There will be a joint Benefice non-denominational Service of Thanksgiving at St. Thomas’s Winchelsea at 6pm on Thursday 21st April. This will be followed by refreshments in the New Hall and lighting of the Beacon at 7.30 pm. We commemorate Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Lutheran Pastor and Martyr 1945, on 9th April.

WEATHER: Well, there are certainly April showers about. And the sun is warmer, so growing conditions are improving. But did we have to have a thunderstorm thrown in for good measure? And there was a hard frost last Friday night. Notwithstanding, many people are cutting grass now. Once you start, there is no stopping until the autumn.!

HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY: The quantity of entries may have been down on previous years - might have been something to do with storm Katie - but the quality of the flowers was very good. As visitors walked round they were able to see many very pretty flowers and there were some wonderful smells from the hyacinths. Congratulations to the Trophy winners. Judy Foster won three cups; the Janette and John Ireland Trophy for most points in the daffodil and tulip section ; the cup for the best home-made compost, kindly sponsored by Kate and Syd Mylrea of Manor farm Oast; and she also won the cup for the most points in the show. Ann Osborne won the cup for most points in classes 14 - 24, and Pam Lee won the certificate for the best in the cookery section for her decorated chocolate sponge cake which also gave her Best in Show for this. Thank you to Barbara for going round with the judge and doing the raffle. Thanks also to Kim and Mags for the teas, Judy and Helen for running the Tombola, and everyone who helped to tidy away after the show. Grateful thanks to Jane who presented the cups. The next show will be on Saturday 6th August. Let’s hope the weather is kind to us so that there will be a nice lot of flowers and vegetables to exhibit. Many thanks to Christine for this report. All proceeds from the Show will be donated to The New Pavilion Fund. This Spring Show donated £115, much appreciated.

NEW PAVILION UPDATE: Thanks to everybody who turned up at the Parish Annual Meeting at Winchelsea on Wednesday 30th March. The village and clubs were well represented. We were told that the Parish Council Chairman, Icklesham Trust Chairman and Parish Councillor Nick Warren had met on the proposed site a few days prior to the meeting. taking the zip wire and required working areas into consideration. The information gathered was plotted onto a Google earth map to scale and shown to the audience on a screen. This was an excellent method and made it easy to discuss any areas of concern. There were no objections to the proposed plan. The ultimate decision will now be made at the next Parish Council meeting scheduled for 11th April at 7.15pm in Icklesham Memorial Hall. It would be appreciated if there was as much village support as possible for this meeting . The duration shouldn’t be as long as the Annual Parish Meeting.

MINI BUS: The place to be on Saturday 9th April is Five Villages House from 11 am. Why? Because the brand new Minibus will be delivered. This will be smaller than the existing one, only an 8 seater which gives much more flexibility. The purchase of this wonderful amenity has been made possible by the amalgamation of Five Villages Minibus Club and the Friends of Five Villages House and the closing down of the Social Club, and receiving a great price for our old minibus from Hastings Van Sales; also funds have been raised from the Car Boot Sale, raffles, bric-a-brac sales and other events arranged by the committee. The new name for the ownership of this spanking new bus is The Friends of Five Villages’ House Minibus Club. Refreshments will be available and you may even be able to have a ride !! There are so many people involved that no-one will be mentioned for fear of missing someone out and causing offence. But THANK YOU to everyone for your hard work and valued friendship. All this exciting information came from Martyn Kilbey, the Minibus Chairman.

QUEEN’S HEAD: The live music this coming Sunday will be played by Titus, playing Folk music.

CONTACT: Please keep information, previews, reviews, snippets of information and general gossip coming my way. Remember that any event will have free publicity. Pop round or use the e-mail.

AND FINALLY: We had the March winds, now we are having the April showers, so presumably there will be lots and lots of May flowers. Haven’t the daffodils lasted a very long time this year? If you remember, some were out before Christmas. Enjoy your week.

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