Volunteers in Telford have raised a mug to a donated kitchen area.
The hard-working gardeners at the Friends of Telford Town Park (FOTTP) are now able to easily have a cup of tea and a sit down after maintaining and improving the Chelsea and Maxell Gardens during their twice-weekly sessions.
The group were donated made-to-order kitchen cupboards, drawers and worktops worth over £2,000 by Kitchen Depot, a fridge by A.O and a sink by a member of the public after an appeal on Facebook.
Volunteer and carpenter Adrian McNamara then installed it all at their base in the Chelsea Gardens in the award-winning town Park.
Adrian Smith, chairman of FOTTP, said it was a huge boost.
“We have always had to keep our supplies at home and bring them to our sessions each week before now,” he said.
“But having a kitted-out kitchen area is a huge boost to our volunteers who definitely deserve a cup of tea or coffee and a biscuit after all the hard work they do during our gardening sessions.
“We are very thankful to Kitchen Depot, A.O and the public for the kind donations and very grateful we have the carpentry skills among our volunteers who were able to install the kitchen and get it up and running.
“Hopefully this means we can spend less time moving supplies and hot water urns around and more time drinking tea – which in turn will give us more energy to keep working on the gardens at Telford Town Park!”
Pete McCay, whose parents set up Kitchen Depot in Telford 23 years ago, said he and the company were only too happy to help.
He said: “The volunteers were very kind and genuine and we love to help out local businesses. We’d heard of them and the great work they do, so we found out what they needed.
“I have access to the stock list at our base in Glasgow so I saw we had what was needed in stock and arranged for it to be delivered.
“We always try to help out when we can and we’re so pleased this will make a big difference to the Friends.”
The volunteers have recently completed a project to reopen the dipping pools at the Withy Pool in the Town Park and created a forest school area by the Grange Pool, as well as replaced the Crannog bridge and habitat work to encourage basking lizards and snakes in the local nature reserve.
The group is also investigating ways to raise money to replace the wooden walkway in the Japanese Garden in the Maxell Gardens and has almost completed a revamp of the sensory garden in the Chelsea Gardens.
There are 25 members of FOTTP, and gardening sessions are held each week on a Wednesday morning and once a month on a Saturday morning.
They welcome volunteers from local businesses to join them as part of employee wellbeing or volunteering schemes.
To keep up to date with their work follow their Facebook page, Instagram page or visit their website www.friendsoftelfordtownpark.org.
You can also support them by signing up to the TWINCL lottery to help raise money for the work they do. Anyone can do this by visiting www.twincl.co.uk and choosing FOTTP as the cause to support.
