TREASURE FOR THE HONEYPOT

Rotarian George Stephens and his wife Anne came to the assistance of the Honeypot charity again.  Honeypot is devoted to giving help to children who are carers to their parents, particularly giving them respite breaks at Honeypot House near Blackfield. When children leave after a stay there they take away a memory bag full of items to enjoy and to remember their visit there. Part of the contents if of course 'treasure'. George and Anne collected and delivered the treasure from Rotarians and from six local schools and the Magellan Explorer Scouts  (Copythorne). 

See the pictures on this site and also read the thank you letter below which gives a fascinating picture of the work of the charity. 

THANKS FROM HONEYPOT -

"Dear Steve, Jeremy, George, Anne and everyone at the Rotary Club of New Forest,

On behalf of the staff and children at the Honeypot Children’s Charity, I would like to extend my thanks to you all for once again co-ordinating the collection of gifts to Honeypot from local schools and the community. We are so grateful for the many years that you have generously supported Honeypot and would especially like to thank George and Anne Stephens for all the time, energy and resources that they put in to this collection. We are delighted that the collection of “Treasure” for memory bags has resulted in so many bags of gifts this year. Thank you

Honeypot’s Wrap-Round service aims to alleviate social isolation, support young carers’ emotional wellbeing, and help them build the confidence and skills they need to succeed in education. Our services include respite breaks, learning breaks, creative virtual workshops, memorable days out and the Wellbeing Fund. We support over 2000 young carers aged 5-12 a year from Honeypot House, including 57 children from across the New Forest. We often receive feedback from young adults who have ‘graduated’ from Honeypot reminiscing about their respite breaks and many of them mention the memory bags they received as they were leaving Honeypot House containing small gifts, toys, certificates and phones.

They say they enjoyed taking something home with them to play with when looking after a loved one, reminding them of the fun times they had on their last Honeypot respite break and enabling them to look forward to the next visit to Honeypot House. Thank you for helping Honeypot create happy childhood memories for young carers aged 5-12.

We know that half term and school holidays can bring additional stress for young carers, because they feel more isolated with no interaction with friends and adults at school and spending more time at home in a caring role. So, we’re busy this week at Honeypot providing young carers with respite opportunities for them to look forward to and enjoy. The children who are coming to Honeypot for their annual respite breaks will be excited about all the activities that happen on our beautiful fun-filled 7 acre sites – treasure hunts in the grounds, zipping on the zip wire, bouncing on the trampolines, playing pool in the playshack, riding bikes, go carts or scooters, creating works of art in the art studio, eating food that they haven’t had to prepare themselves and sitting down for a ‘family’ meal all together, trips out to the beach (if it’s not too windy) or Paultons Park and generally having a great time with their Honeypot friends (both children and staff).

We are also providing online activities for the children to join in with from home, lead by our staff. These include Baking (Biscoff Cup Cakes or Raspberry & White Chocolate Blondies); Arts & Crafts (Recycled crafts, Build a Bumblebug Hotel or Make your own Dreamcatcher); Science – Lava Lamp Laboratory; Fitness – Interactive Games; A Taskmaster Challenge session. There’s lots going on!

 Thank you for helping Honeypot continue to provide a variety of respite activities and memorable experiences therefore helping to build brighter futures for young carers.

With very best wishes

Viv Carter

Mrs Viv Carter Community Engagement.