Author: Lorraine

Last week a team from Avidly UK & Canada took on the Yorkshire 3 Peaks Challenge, as part of their ongoing support for Milly’s Smiles.

The 3 Peaks consists of a 24-mile (38.6km) round trip route, and includes a 1585m (5200ft) ascent taking on the peaks of Pen-y-Ghent (694 metres), Whernside (736 metres) and Ingleborough (723 metres), with the aim to complete the whole challenge in under 12 hours.

This amazing group experienced some very gruelling weather throughout the day, but they did fantastic and managed to complete the 3 Peaks in just 11 hours! One of the team, Elle, took a Milly Smiles elephant along for the ride, and got a great photo at the top of each peak!

The challenge raised just over £1300 with more donations still coming in, this is almost 90% of their total target for the year.

Huge well done to the team and their support crew, we hope you have managed to have some well earned rest after such a physical challenge.

We really do feel very lucky to have such committed support from you all.

A huge thank you to Megan who along with her sister Paige recently organised a fundraiser for Milly’s Smiles.

Megan’s son received a Milly Bag when he was admitted onto Ward L31 at Leeds Children’s Hospital.

A Cocktail event was hosted by their good friend Katherine at her home, and was based on a western theme and included raffle prizes and auction items. Everyone got into the western spirit on the day with some fabulous costumes on display.

The day raised a fantastic amount of £1,000, which included a donation of £200 from Pinehurst Contracting Ltd. This amount was then match funded by Lloyds Bank taking the total to a fantastic £2,000.

Every single penny that we receive makes such a difference to us, and when families whom we have supported with a Milly Bag fundraise for us, that means the world. Thank you so much to everyone involved, we are more than grateful for this support.

At Milly’s Smiles we have a wonderful team of knitters from across the whole of the country. They sit quietly in the background, not asking for anything just wanting to support us in the best way they can.

One lovely lady is Debbie who has knitted a total of 128 elephants for us over the last few years, which is just incredible. Debbie came to the unit this week to bring her latest herd and she told us why she finds it so rewarding supporting us….

“Milly’s Smiles provided us with a touch of comfort just when our family needed it the most, during the difficult time when my granddaughter was diagnosed with a brain tumour.

Their thoughtful bag contained everything my son, his wife and their daughter needed for their hospital stay.

The support we received was incredible, and knitting more rainbow elephants is the least my daughter and I can do”

Milly’s Smiles feel very blessed to have this support, the elephants are the first thing to be seen when the Milly Bag is opened and we know they are loved by everyone no matter what their age they are.

If anyone is interested in knitting for us the link to the pattern can be found on the website. If any of our knitters would like to get in touch to tell us their story we would love to tell it for them.

In May of this year The Davies Partnership in Chester held a Charity Golf Day in which colleagues, clients and friends came together to support Milly’s Smiles and The Brain Tumour Charity.

This was done in memory of a very special young man, Bobby Spencer. Bobby was diagnosed and treated for a brain tumour at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, and it was there that he received his Milly Bag. Bobby’s brave family chose Milly’s Smiles as one of the charities they wished to support.

Our Chair of Trustee’s Gemma went along to the event to represent the charity and to talk about our work and the difference we make to families like Bobby’s. Gemma was fortunate to meet Bobby’s parents and she was left with a lasting impression of how incredibly brave and dignified they are in dealing with their loss of their precious son.

The actual day was blessed with lots of sunshine and 21 teams took to the course. Following on from the golf there was an auction where there was an exciting battle to win a Jurgen Klopp shirt!

It was clear to see how much hard work and organisation went into the event, and we were very blessed to have been supported by this amazing team.

Last week Gemma and I met up with Tony and Jessica from The Davies Partnership where they handed over a cheque for £13,055, we also received a donation of £500 which was match funded by Lloyds Bank. A further donation was received from Radium Security Systems taking the grand total raised to an incredible £14,310.00!

A huge thank you to everyone involved, this is just incredible and will allow us to now start looking at securing another hospital to support. Every penny really makes such a difference to us.

A special mention goes to Bobby and his family, whilst we are incredibly grateful for this support, it comes because a family has lost their precious son, and that can never be celebrated. We send all our love and support to Bobby’s parents and siblings and we will always keep Bobby in our hearts and thoughts.

Earlier this month ABC Sound Healing held a wonderful Healing Sound Bath and Cacao Ceremony at Padiham Unitarian Chapel, this fabulous evening was brilliantly organised and run by Mandy.

The evening offered relaxation, rejuvenation, and a sense of peace, as well as numerous benefits associated with drinking cacao chocolate. Everyone immersed themselves in the soothing tones of crystal singing bowls, gongs, and chimes, whilst being guided into a state of deep relaxation and tranquility.

We would like to say a massive thank you to Mandy for raising a wonderful amount of £300 on the night. Mandy very generously donated all of her takings to Milly’s Smiles, for which we are extremely grateful.

£300 will fund 2 of our Milly Bags, which is wonderful and will give 2 families support at a time when they need it most. Thank you to everyone involved, this means such a lot to us.

We had our third team of bag packers in the unit last week. 4 lovely people from Avidly UK & Canada spent the afternoon making up Milly Bags for us. We kept them very busy and by the end of the afternoon they had made up a total of 30 bags.

The support we have had this year from this brilliant team has been outstanding, they have packed Milly Bags, supported us at our Spring Fair (without them we really would have struggled), they set themselves incredible challenges whilst raising a fabulous amount of money for us along the way.

On arrival, one of the team brought along a very cute herd of knitted elephants, which her mum and friends had knitted. They were absolutely perfect and quickly found themselves packed into the bags ready to head off to one of the hospitals that we support.

We feel very blessed to have such amazing support from Avidly we absolutely love working with them all.

Manchester was our destination this week, when we took a delivery to Ward 86, at The Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital. We are so very proud that with today’s delivery we have now provided 900 Milly Bags, since we began supporting the ward in March 2016.

We will always wish that there was no need for our bags, but sadly there will always be a need.

Milly Bags are the bags that no parent ever wants to receive but when they do, they are always extremely grateful.

It is and always will be a huge privilege to support children and their families during one of the most frightening periods of their lives.

We know that none of this would be possible without the support of so many people who donate, fundraise and volunteer for us. This is a massive community and team effort, and we thank every single person who supports us.

An extra thank you to Graeme and John for taking the delivery and doing a great job as always.

We send love, strength and understanding to all the families who have had a Milly Bag in the past and to all the families who sadly will receive a bag in the future.

During their 12 months in office, the Mayor and Mayoress of Hyndburn, Councillor Terry Hurn and his lovely wife Jean have been tirelessly fundraising for a number of amazing charities and good causes. Funds have been raised throughout the year by holding various events, including the Mayors Ball which saw more than £15,000 being raised on the night.

We were thrilled to be invited along to a cheque presentation recently at Haworth Art Gallery, where we were presented with a cheque for £5,000. It was such a lovely afternoon where we also got to to meet all the other charities and good causes.

A huge thank you to Terry and Jean who have been wonderful to us throughout their year, they have attended our events and supported us in so many ways, it has been a pleasure and honour to be part of their mayoral year.

A huge thank you to local firm @Napthens LLP who recently invited us to meet them for a cheque presentation. We were absolutely thrilled to be presented with a cheque for £1,000.

This was such a lovely surprise for us we never take donations for granted and every single penny is very gratefully received. The money will go towards supporting children who are newly diagnosed with cancer and admitted into hospital.