One of the first recipients of Bluebird Care Mendip’s community grant was the Active and In Touch group based in Frome.
Active and In Touch Frome is a voluntary befriending project, run in partnership with Somerset You Can Do, that reaches out to isolated and lonely people living in Frome and the surrounding villages.
Beneficiaries of Active and In Touch find joining a group or mixing with other people difficult, but at Phoenix House accompanied by volunteers, they are able to come to a safe and friendly place where they immediately feel secure and comfortable.
In awarding the grant director of Bluebird Care Mendip, Masen Naidoo said, “The group is an excellent example of passionate and dedicated volunteers working tirelessly to provide much-needed social interaction to the elderly in our community.”
Active and In Touch Frome’s active Wednesday group runs every week at Phoenix House in Frome for beneficiaries to come along, meet other beneficiaries and volunteers, and to take part in a number of different fun activities together. Each week different activities are put together, along with guest speakers or going on an organised trip. Just last week the organisation arranged a trip to Crockerton Garden Centre for a special birthday celebration.
Lucia Chadwick (volunteer coordinator) was ecstatic to be chosen for the inaugural community grant and said, “Funding from organisations like yourselves’ really help us with our work in the community. It is much, much appreciated.”
Lucia shared some plans for the grant, “We would like to use the funding from Blue Bird Care to help towards the payment of the transport costs for our special boat trip along the Kennet and Avon Canal for all our volunteers and beneficiaries in September.
“We are also planning a special lunch in honour of one of volunteers, who recently passed away. The volunteer helped on our allotment and we would like to cook up some of the vegetables he had been growing for us all to enjoy. The funding would be used to help pay for a caterer to cook up the lunch, which would be a celebration of his life.”
