Home Start Watford. & Three Rivers. Home-Start Watford s Family Day Out

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1 Home Start Watford & Three Rivers July 2015 Newsletter Home-Start Watford s Family Day Out Inside this issue: Family Day Out Fashion Show 2 Launch Event 2 Emma s Blog 3 Afternoon Tea 4 Home-Start Petition Easy Fundraising 4 4 Paradigm 5 John Lewis Tokens Become a Volunteer Dates for your Diary Every year Home-Start Watford and Three Rivers provides a family day out to give the families we support the opportunity to visit an exciting attraction. This trip means so much to our families as many of them do not get a holiday or even a break during the summer holidays. This year we are taking them to Paradise Wildlife Park on 19th August. We could not do this without the support of others and this year we would like to thank Warner Bros for funding the trip and The Hilton Watford for funding the picnic lunch for our families. Paradise Wildlife Park is home to a whole host of unusual animals. From big cats to tiny birds, from the tropical rainforest to a fun farmyard and reptiles and mammals galore. With a wide variety of talks and encounters as well as bird shows and feeding displays this really will be a day to remember. The children (and parents) are guaranteed to have a fantastic day out and enjoy spending some quality time together. homestartw3r Please like us on Facebook and share as many of our posts as you can. This will greatly increase the number of people who see them. Thanks To all our volunteers - could you please ensure your families fill out the invite they received and return it to us asap. Places are allocated on a first come first served basis. You are welcome to come along even if you are not with your family as any help on the day will be appreciated and some families might not have their volunteer with them. A copy of the booking form and letter is on our website

2 Newsletter Page 2 Fantastic Fashion Show! The Home-Start Watford and Three Rivers charity show on Thursday was a fantastic success. It superseded all expectations in terms of attendance, amount raised and good old-fashioned entertainment. very lucky to have the Lovely Laura from Heart radio to compere, and had upcoming singer Connie Constance performing as well as 10 year old B-Boy Beastie showcasing his breakdancing skills. There were various themes throughout the show such as vintage, prom, animalistic, and 9-5 with music to complement each scene; from Dolly Parton to Tight Fit. The models did a fabulous job of keeping to time with super-quick changes of clothes and performing like professionals to strut their stuff on the catwalk. The clothes included labels such as Forever 21, Next, Monsoon, Karen Millen, DKNY, ASOS, Zara, Soul Cal to name but a few.home-start was There was definitely a frisson of excitement when the 82 year old male model swept down the aisle as Lady H. There were over 100 people in the audience and the feedback was all positive with a lot of people asking when the next fashion show will be. Over 700 was raised for Home-Start Watford and Three Rivers which will be used to help local families get much needed support in their homes. MY STORY OUR FUTURE Launch Event - Save the Date This year our AGM will take the form of a corporate networking event. It will be held at Bushey Country Club on 23rd September 2015 from 11am - 2pm. Invites will follow shortly, in the meantime, please Save the Date. This will be an opportunity for local businesses and corporations to find out more about how Home-Start impacts on children who are our future generation and ways in which they can support them.

3 Page 3 Emma s Blog Well here we are already in July with school holidays fast approaching; lets hope the sunshine stays with us. The office has been very busy and as you can imagine we are all still reeling from the decision taken by Herts County Council recommending not funding a Home- Visiting Service. Disappointed as we all are, cuts to funding were inevitable and it has galvanised our Home-Start team into making positive plans for a more sustainable future. I would like to reassure all of our volunteers and families that we are not planning any immediate cuts to the service we provide. However, that said, I do strongly disagree with the decision taken by Hertfordshire County Council and I think they have completely underestimated the impact Home-Start has. Herts County Council have presented the amount of families that were supported by Home-Start as 270. This is not a true reflection of the numbers of families actually supported by Home-Start. Out of 9 schemes in Hertfordshire our scheme alone supported 120 families! Out of those 120 families we supported last year 89 families cited social isolation as an issue for them. Social isolation can take many forms including children's behavioural problems, disabilities (both adult and children), language barriers, mental health issues to name a few. The effects of social isolation can be devastating for a family and can increase the risk of family breakdown. I always think it is worth remembering that being socially isolated can happen to any family regardless of who they are, background or income. If a family is, or becomes socially isolated who can they reach out to? Who will come into their home and give peer support? Home- Start volunteers help families overcome problems like these. Even the simplest things like going with them to the park or to a toddler group can give so much confidence to a family. I have worked with children and families for over twenty five years and I firmly believe in Early Intervention, and I know through experience and practise successful early intervention works best holistically with the whole family, in a family s home and with a trusted role model. That s what we do. Brilliantly! Cuts in funding are hitting all early intervention services hard with Children Centres also managing with reduced budgets after their transition into clusters with new lead agencies. Children Centres have always been great partners to Home-Start and I am so concerned how across Hertfordshire they will cope with an increased workload as some Home -Starts will close due to loss of funding. A recent report by Oxford University found that Children Centre staff were concerned about losing their ability to identify families right on the threshold of needed intensive support (cypnow). Which is our point exactly. Just to conclude in the first quarter of this year we received 26 referrals from the professionals shown in the pie chart, I will leave you to make your mind up if a Home-Visiting Service is needed or not

4 Newsletter Page 4 Afternoon Tea for our Volunteers at Shendish Manor Home-Start Watford and Three Rivers will be hosting an afternoon tea to thank our volunteers for the tremendous contribution they give to Home-Start. This is booked for Shendish Manor on the 9th Sepember at 1pm. If you would like to attend please call the office on to book your place. Please note this event is limited to 30 people and will be allocated on a first come first served basis. Easy Fundraising Please consider us when shopping. It will take less than 2 mins to sign up and you only have to do it once :) Please click the link causes/hswatford Many Thanks Home-Start Watford s Petition The full council meet on the 21st July where the petition will be presented. This is a public meeting, so if you can, please show your support. Without a home-visiting service many families will suffer behind closed doors.

5 Page 5 Paradigm Foundation make a generous donation Paradigm Foundation made a donation of 6000 to Home-Start Watford and Three Rivers to support residents who live in their houses. The funds will be used to support 5 local families who could be facing pressures caused by isolation, mental ill health, multiple births, bereavement, disability, poor housing or financial stress which can all have a devastating effect on parents and their children. John Lewis Tokens Escape the heat and go for a nice cold drink at the John Lewis Watford air-conditioned cafe! This will also benefit Home-Start as we are one of their chosen charities for 3 months - collect the green tokens when you shop and place them in the Home-Start box. John Lewis will then kindly donate money to support local families. :) Registered Charity No:

6 Page 6 Newsletter Dates for your diary Thursday 16th July 9.30am 12pm Safeguarding Training for Volunteers H O M E - S T A R T W A T F O R D & T H R E E R I V E R S 7 Lord Street Watford, Hertfordshire WD17 2LL T; F; Enquiries@home-startwatford.org.uk twitter.com/ homestart2 Don t forget about our face book page /HomeStartW3R Wednesday 19th August 9am 4pm Families Outing to Paradise Wildlife Park Wednesday 9th Afternoon Tea at Shendish Manor Wednesday 16th September 10am 11.30am Volunteer Support Group Wednesday 23rd September Holiday Fun AGM theme My Story Our Future Wednesday 17th November 10am 11.30am Volunteer Support Group Thursday 19th November 9.30am 12pm Baby Brains Training

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