Thank you everyone for coming to the AGM, it was lovely to see you and to know we do have some supporters.
We had a very interesting year, with a couple of small challenges.
The Market Place redevelopment took far longer than we all expected, and then we had the cutting down of the trees the day before our judging which was a little distressing and ended up with us on Radio 2 talking to Jeremy Vine! But luckily, we were not actually judged on any of that and in hindsight I think it actually gained us a few points as the judges were impressed at our resilience and enthusiasm regardless.
We had wonderful flowers again from Old Milestone Nursery, and thank you to Mike and Nigel for planting and looking after them and for all their hard work throughout the year in and around the town. I'll take this opportunity to welcome our new Town Warden David Elms too.
Thank you also to students from Lackham for topping us up at the last minute with extra plants and to Bloom members for planting them.
The Library beds had a makeover by Bloom members this year, lots of old and dead wood and weeds taken out and new shrubs planted, they are looking so much better, so thank you for that.
The Prince of Wales garden was given a good tidy, some fresh shrubs planted and Nigel repaired the seat round the tree.
The War memorial had some maintenance done on the back wall with fresh compost being added in, there are more plans afoot for this for next year.
We started a great flag making project and managed to produce about 20 flags that were hung in the town centre. Thank you to everyone that took part in that and we hope to continue this for next year too. The judges were particularly impressed with these and that we had used them in places that were not suitable for hanging baskets so they had filled some empty spaces that were crying out for some colour.
Town Tidy days have been held on the first Sunday of every month all year and I'd like to thank the volunteers that have given their time and energy to help keep the Town and close surrounding areas looking good.
We were very honoured that the BBC chose Melksham to feature in a new documentary about Britain in Bloom towns called 'Blooming Marvellous' which will be on your TVs in the spring. Several filming sessions took place which were fun but very hard work. Thank you to everyone who helped and participated in any part of that.
The weather leading up to judging day in July was unbelievably hot .. and almost unbearable on judging day. Thank you very much to everyone who braved that with us.
And a huge thank you to Clare for being thrown in at the deep end taking over from Miriam as our secretary in April and pulling together a great portfolio for us.
Thank you everyone, without you all, we could not have achieved the GOLD!
- Kathy Iles