Apple Pressing Day

Do you have a pressing engagement this weekend?

One means of judging the quality of the life of a village might be by looking at the ways in which its residents join together for whole-community events. By such a measure, Tarvin would come out well – we have our fete, Remembrance Sunday, the Christmas market, the horticultural show, the craft fair and a whole raft of activities based on or run by the Community Centre. And, certainly, having more events that could involve large portions of the village must be a good thing!

With the motto of "By the community for the community", Tarvin Community Woodland Trust is always going to be very much concerned with strengthening the communal life of the village. However, it dawned on Trustees that, if we are to do this, it requires more than just providing a pleasant place for folk to play, sit or walk. Rather, there ought to be whole-village activities based within the woodland. To an extent, the Tarvin Wildlife Watch Group does this already, but we felt that we should do something on a much larger scale – and for all the family.

On his travels round the village, Peter Maiden, our tree warden, has noticed how many apples are left under trees each autumn. He has long had the idea of running an apple-pressing day in the woodland, where people could bring their surplus fruit (those windfalls would work well) and see it pressed to produce apple juice – which can then be drunk.

Such a good idea, with its potential to involve so many people (especially all our families), deserves to be given a try and so Trustees are inviting everyone to come (complete with apples, if you can bring them) to the woodland (Crossfields side) between 10.00am and 2.00pm on Saturday 3rd October 2015. As well as apple juice production (and consumption!), there will be lots of crafty activities for youngsters (run by Tarvin Wildlife Watch) and an apple peeling competition (run by Cheshire Wildlife Trust). Hot drinks and hot food (burgers and hotdogs – well, it will be lunchtime!) will also be available – and these are the only things for which there will be a charge made – just to help cover costs.

Writing on the previous Monday, at the end of September, the weather forecast is fair for the weekend (now, that's tempting fate, isn't it?) and we hope that, with good weather, this will be a fun way to spend a couple of hours. If it turns out to be a popular event, we would be prepared to consider making it a regular part of the village calendar – perhaps another way for Tarvin village to come together?

Do come along and join us – we hope the day might have a-peel and that you might even be im-pressed!