by Anne Draper

Poetry in the Park Tenby

This Sunday, February 20, there will be a gathering in the Old Chapel in Lower Frog St at 3 pm to share poetry. Everyone is welcome to come along, you can bring along a poem of your own, or a favourite one, or just come along to enjoy hearing some poetry. This month will hopefully be the last indoor meeting and on the third Sunday in March, the gathering will be back in the Community Garden.

A homemade face pack

Here are some recipes for natural face packs – remember to check them on a little patch of skin first just in case you are allergic to them. Mash a ripe banana, add a teaspoon of honey and mix together. Smooth it on to your face, avoiding the area around your eyes. Leave on for ten minutes and then wash off. Or, separate an egg to get just the yolk, add 3 tablespoons of honey and 75g of oatmeal. Mix together and use as above. Or, mix 2 tablespoons oatmeal,1 tablespoon of olive oil, 1 tablespoon of lemon juice,1 tablespoon of brown sugar, and 1 teaspoon of honey. Use as above.

Tenby and District Arts Club

There is no meeting tonight at the Arts Club, but next Friday, February 25 at 6 pm, Susie Brooks will be giving a talk on the Silk Road. This will be £5 or £3 for members, including tea/coffee and biscuits at the end. Everyone is welcome.

Make a wind chime

These started being used in India, and then China. At first, they were for scaring away birds from the garden, and also scaring away evil spirits. In Feng Shui, they are used to attract good luck to a home. You can make your own using either things you find around the house, beads, bells, little ornaments – or you could make some from air-drying clay. You can also use things you find outside – pebbles, twigs, shells. You need a plastic lid or a bigger stick to hang everything from, and some string to attach it with. You can either wrap the string around the items, or make a little hole in them with a skewer or scissor blade to thread them on with – be careful, though! Make a knot either side of the hole to keep the item in place. Tie the pieces of string onto the stick, or through holes in the plastic lid. Hang in the garden where it will catch the breeze.

Tenby Community Fridge

The Fridge now has two reconditioned commercial fridge freezers courtesy of the Hubbub National Community Fridge network, so there is plenty of space for all the food which comes in to the fridge to be rescued from waste.

As everyone is doing so well helping to save the surplus food from going to waste, more volunteers are needed to pick up the surplus food from the local supermarkets. This needs to be in the evening, about 9.30pm, there is the Co-op, Tesco’s and Sainsburys to pick up from each evening – and the fridge is open 5 days a week, so that’s a lot of volunteers. If you or anyone you know is able to do one pick up at one store per week, any day from Monday to Friday, that would be great. Get in touch on [email protected] or message the Facebook page @tenbycommunityfridge, or phone Anne on 01834 844002.

Please keep coming to pick things up from the Fridge at the back of the Old Chapel in Lower Frog St, it is open Tuesday to Saturday 10 to 4 – and maybe stop for a coffee in the community café while you are there, and pop a donation in the box to help keep everything going. Thanks!

Fairtrade Fortnight

This starts on Monday, and the theme this year is ‘Choose the world you want’. Fairtrade is about social, economic and environmental justice. A root cause of the inability to adapt to and mitigate climate change is poverty. More money in the hands of farmers is needed if they are to adapt and survive the climate crisis. Choosing Fairtrade fights for improvements in producers’ livelihoods with collective strength through co-ops and their bargaining power, the protection of a Minimum Price and Fairtrade Premiums. Buying Fairtrade is a good way of being able to directly help some of the most disadvantaged producers in the world.

Tenby Edible Community Garden

This has survived the winter well, and vegetables are starting to appear with vey little assistance! Thanks to everyone who has carried on popping in to look after it all through the winter. If anyone has some spare seeds or seedlings, the volunteers would be happy to plant them in the garden – or please plant them yourselves – just leave us a note in the box or on the noticeboard or put a label in so that people know what is growing where!

The National Park and Mind ‘Roots to Recovery’ project has started work in the garden putting in raised beds so even more people will be able to help with the gardening. They are hoping to also make some bird, bat and hedgehog homes, so keep an eye on the garden over the next few months. The Tenby Project is aiming to go to do some work in the garden every Monday morning, so if you would like to garden with some company, aim for then. Otherwise, please come along and do some gardening whenever you are able to – the tools are in the box behind the park bench at the back. And remember – if there is anything ready for harvesting, please harvest it if you can use it!