Etchingham

Sunday March 15th is Mothering Sunday (Mothers Day), the church has the monthly Family Service on that day. It is intended that the service will be one of commemoration and thanksgiving for the old school which will have just closed after 150 years service to the village. Anyone who has been a pupil, parent or staff member at the old school is invited to attend this special occasion.

As part of the service we are planning to have a display of school photos from past years. If you have any photos that we can borrow please get them to me as soon as possible to give plenty of time to organise space, make sure you name is on the back of all pictures so we can get them back to you after the service. All photos will be displayed in a way that does not damage the pictures and returned afterwards.

If you have photos that could be borrowed for a display in the Church on Sunday March 15th please get in touch as soon as possible.

I already have in my collection a selection of school group photos from the 1920’s and 1930’s, would like to borrow any you have to make a decent display.

We will also be interested in borrowing items of memorabilia, such as old exercise books and similar items, let us know what you have as soon as possible.

Deliver to Colin Boylett, 2 Park Farm Close 01580 819532 [email protected] or leave in an envelope with your contact details at the Post Office or the Shop & Deli.

Look out for details of the service on posters and the website www.etchinghamvillage.co.uk/church

MOTHERING SUNDAY SERVICE: On Mothering Sunday, March 15, there will be a special Family Service in the Church at 11am. The Service will take the form of a celebration and thanksgiving for the old school, after 150 years of service to the village, as the present pupils and staff settle in to their brand new premises. There will be a display of photos and memorabilia, see item above, as well as the usual posies of flowers for Mothers. Refreshments will be available after the service, providing a chance to chat and reminisce. Tell your old school friends and anyone who has been connected with the school over the years, everyone welcome.

LENT LUNCHES: Following the success of the Lent Lunches last year, you are invited to join in the lunches again this year on the following dates and venues. All dates are Tuesday, February 24; Annette Childs, Mistletoe Cottage: March 3; Mary Barnes, The barn, Burgham, Sheepstreet Lane: March 10; Barbara Thomas, Meads, Oxenbridge Lane: March 17; Alison Vernon, Sevenacres, Sheepstreet Lane: March 24; Caroline Kenny, Russets, Straight Mile. Each meal will be a simple one, consisting of soup and bread & cheese, starting at 12.30pm, with a donation to a charity to be confirmed. Numbers are limited for each meal, there will be lists in the Church to sign up for a meal or contact the relevant hostess direct.

CHURCH WEBSITE: The Church now has web pages built into the village website, with information about the Church and services, the address is www.etchinghamvillage.co.uk/church

ROAD CLOSURE: The A265 will be closed at the level crossing from 10pm March 14 to 5am March 16 for Network Rail engineering works.

COMMUNITY SPEEDWATCH: With the school about to move to the new buildings we have been asked if we will be doing speed checks outside the new site.

The answer to that is yes we will be running a lot of sessions at that location, and we have started, however we will only be able to monitor traffic leaving the village towards Burwash because we do not have Police permission to monitor traffic entering the village past the new site because it is too close to the start of the speed limit.

We have now run 18 sessions at the location totaling 19 hours and recorded vehicles at speeds between 36mph and 50mph

Over the next couple of weeks we will run a lot of the sessions from there and plenty of regular sessions over the coming months.

We are limited to the time availability of our volunteers as to how often we can run sessions, with more volunteers we could operate more sessions.

More volunteer operators are always welcome, it is not difficult and you can give as much or little time as suits you, for more details go to www.communityspeedwatch.co.uk

NEW SPEED DEVICE: The Etchingham Speedwatch group would like to thank Etchingham Parish Council and de Etchingham CIC for providing the funds to enable the purchase of a speed device just for the use of Etchingham. This will give the group more flexibility and enable sessions to be run at times that best suit the volunteer operators, target the worst times for speeding and remove the need to pick up and return equipment from Battle Police Station.

NEW GROUPS: The new community facilities will soon be in full use, so it is quite likely that in coming months there could be new groups and organisations formed and making use of the new facilities. If you are starting up a new organisation in the village send me the details so that I can tell everyone about it here, also send the details to [email protected] so that the details can be added to the Organisations section of the village website.

ETCHINGHAM CLUB: The Etchingham Club has new opening times, Mondays and Wednesdays, 7.30pm to 10.30pm. Fridays, 6.30pm to 11.30pm. Saturdays, 7.30pm to 11.30pm.

For more information on Etchingham Club, email [email protected] also on Facebook www.facebook.com/etchinghamsocialclub

MOBILE LIBRARY: The Mobile Library now visits Etchingham once every three weeks, on Tuesday mornings 9.55am to 10.35am.

From march the library future will be at the new village hall.

You might like to put these dates in your diary; March 10, March 31, April 21, May 12, June 2, June 23.

If these times are not convenient, or you miss the Library when it visits, it will be at Hurst Green village hall, 1.30pm to 2.15pm on the following dates; March 12, April 2, April 23, May 14, June 4, June 25.

ETSR EVENTS: ETSR fundraising is ongoing to equip and maintain the new hall.

Look out for details of the next Quiz Night with Steve and Terry in the new hall March 28.

Put the date May 9 in your diary, that is when ETSR will be hosting a Barn Dance with the ever popular Catsfield Steamers. Now we have fantastic new facilities, the village will be able to host a lot more events, fundraising needs to continue to ensure the running and maintenance of the new halls. If anyone is interested in joining the fundraising team for the new facilities please contact Nicky Menzies.

VILLAGE WEBSITE CALENDAR: The village website has a calendar for village residents, groups and organisations to post details of their events. You need to add the details yourself, this will not be done by the website admin. To add an event, first go to the village website www.etchinghamvillage.co.uk and click on the link to access the calendar and follow the instructions. To protect against spam postings you will need the password to complete your entry, it is the same for all groups, if you have not been given the password send an email [email protected]

PROMOTE YOUR ORGANISATION: Do you want to get new members for your group or organisation? Want to tell people what your group does? If you are connected with a village group or organisation send me some details and I will publicise your group in this column. Send me details of what your organisation does, when you meet, how to join, who to contact and any other details that you would like to add, I will then add details of your organisation, as space allows, over the coming weeks.

INFORMATION: If you have given me details of your event to put in this column, please remember to send me some details after the event so I can let your supporters know how successful the event was, how much you raised, interesting facts etc. Your supporters will be interested to know how you did. Get information for this column to me as soon as possible, if you have a diary of events planned for the year let me have the dates and I will put in a list of village events for the year so that people can put the dates in their diaries. There are several ways to get your info to me, but email is preferred because there is less chance of errors during copying. I need information by 10pm on Monday to be sure it will be in time for inclusion, I can sometimes add extra items on Tuesday morning, but this cannot be guaranteed. Just a little reminder, I get plenty of information about events that are taking place, but I get very little follow up information, after your event try and remember to send me brief account of how successful your event was, it can be as simple as a thank you to those that attended and how much money was raised etc. You can deliver to 2 Park Farm Close, telephone 01580 819532 or 07941 786244 or email [email protected]

Colin Boylett

2 Park Farm Close