November news 2022
Five weeks to go to Christmas – 2022 has passed by very quickly, probably down to the vast number of projects we are all involved in! Here is this months’ update on some of the jobs we have completed or are knee-deep in. Do please come and join us in the Oasis Academy Putney and be part of thi community effort – you don’t have to sew, there are plenty of non -sewing tasks to undertake, but we do always need people who can sit at a sewing machine too!
Support for Ukraine continues:
We are continuing to work and finish off camouflage nets for Ukraine – if you can spare some time to do some work on them that would be most welcome. On the back of finishing the last consignment we set up a donation day with our link to Ukraine, Olga, and spent a weekend sorting, collating, repairing, and bagging up the mountain of fabulous quality, very generous donations we received. A huge thank you to the academy community and to the Parish of Putney for publicising the event and driving donations. We were already sending scrubs and camouflage nets to Ukraine, so this initiative was to fill space in our truck already going across to make it worthwhile and achieve the greatest benefit to those at the sharp end of this conflict. Some of you also wrote letters of hope to send with the practical items so that the Ukrainian recipients know they are supported. Ivanna, one of the nuns from the Catholic University volunteer Corp, took it upon herself to personally ensure the items were delivered to the front line and the letters of hope were translated to show support from our community to theirs.
Thank you so much for an incredible effort all round. We despatched approximately 75 huge bags of donations and filled a large transit van – some went on the Friday and the remainder went on Sunday. We are indebted to Save the World for the loan of a van – we had not banked on having so many donations so had to find a second van to transport it all.
Due entirely to our connections here and in Ukraine and our relatively small size we can be entirely reactive – as it happens all our donations were routed to the newly liberated Kherson which is tremendous as they have suffered so much.
Thank you seems inadequate, but it would not have been possible without the especially hard work of Lindsay, Cat, Daniel, Suzanne, Carrie and Gill. To everyone who either donated, mended, sorted or just supported in their own way, thank you! Over the weekend between the collections we managed to repair dozens of garments, new zips in jackets, buttons on coats, and refurbishing linings, so that everything went in tip top condition.
Some of the other projects we have been extremely busy with in November:
Wellbeing bags
As mentioned last month, we had just completed assembling the large request from St Bartholomew’s Hospital Trust for wellbeing bags and these have now been delivered to the following departments and teams there:
Junior doctors Obstetrics and Gynaecology
Junior doctors Paediatrics
Larch ward
Community Midwives
Maternity and Diabetic team
Acorn team
Paediatric and Neo-natal consultants
Governance
Screening
Immunology
Student midwives
Diabetes admin
Clarks ward – maternity services
ANC and MBC
Senior maternity team
Obstetrics and Gynaecology consultants
MAU triage
CDS
Administrators NUHT
Birth centre NUHT
Group practice NUHT
BCBC NUHT
IMU NUHT
Community admin
This was a total of 478 bags. Quite a logistics challenge but the team managed it all. We have received many messages from grateful recipients, such as.
"Hi, I recently received a goody bag donated by your charity to Newham Hospital where I work. Thank you so much! It was a lovely, thoughtful gesture that really made my day."
We also supplied wellbeing bags to St George’s A&E Department.
We sent 56 handmade sleep masks to Rebecca who is the Co-ordinator for United in Kind in Chelmsford, and they have asked for a further 400, which we will fit in as we can. The masks are to be used at the Broomfield Hospital and two others within Chelmsford, for patients who struggle to sleep in the bright lights of the unfamiliar environment. Please do look up www.unitedinkind.org it’s a fascinating idea to bring simple acts of kindness into the community drawing us all together in kindness and mutual support. Rebecca's initiative is called ‘Sleep Well’ — because getting a restful nights sleep enables our bodies to recuperate and recover. Yet, when we're in hospital, as hospitals are such busy working and caring environments, going to sleep is often easier said than done.
She writes…
"Thank you so much Rosie, appreciate your thoughts. I am blown away by how wonderful and kind you are. I'm so pleased as I feel it's such a worthwhile project and it will really make a difference for people. I'm so excited and hoping to launch at Broomfield hospital on the 25th Nov.. They're very excited about it and I feel that it'll feel really special to the patients and the nurses, a beacon in the very clinical environment, particularly at the moment.
…
Hey Rosie, I have just had a moment to properly look at you and the Scrubbery!! I was blown away when you sent the masks, I felt so overjoyed but things were pretty crazy here at the time so, whilst I did look, I don't think I really comprehended what you were doing! You are a force!!! How amazing you are. I absolutely love it, you're very special indeed.
…
I cannot believe that you have made so many things for the NHS, I love the whole thing, it's so community minded and the NHS really needs our support. I'm a social worker by profession (I left years ago) but I really just can't get away from the passion for people and the coal face."
We will be making more eye masks in the Scrubbery, but if any of you have spare sleep masks and don’t know what to do with them, please choose us!
Thank yous due this month include but are not limited to:
O’Mara books for another generous donation of adult colouring books for mental wellbeing and the perfect size for the bags.
Thanks to Charl Oberholster from The Curtain Tailor, who donated a large amount of surplus fabric that has now been used for wellbeing bags and cushions for the Oasis Academy staff room.
Do you remember Rosie was selected to carry the baton for the Commonwealth Games in June. Well on Friday she took delivery of a replica baton – do come and have a look at it - it is in recognition of all our hard work at the Scrubbery during the pandemic and beyond. A lovely token of appreciation.
Putney Oasis Academy and us.
Being part of the community at the Academy involves us taking an active role in the daily life at the school. This was never more so the case than in the last month – we have become heavily involved in setting up and sorting out the library. Luckily we had the benefit of Hazel, the librarian at Dulwich college junior school, to ensure we got it right – she has provided an enormous amount of information and best practice advice, as well as gifting us book covers and a spinner for the paperbacks. Its an ongoing project but we are sorting through all the books, backing them in plastic, stamping them and cataloguing them - the core team managing this massive task are Rosie, Suzy, Lindsay and Vanessa – great work ladies!
Any books that were surplus were redirected to Little Village, Wild About Play, Vulindlela Guardians and the Children’s Book Project.co.uk, all fantastic groups, where the books will make a difference.
Rosie has been making what she calls Slow Cushions for the staff room at Oasis Academy. Slow, because they aren’t made very rapidly, just in spare moments as time allows. The cushions are made, of course, from donated fabric and cushion inners, courtesy of the lovely Curtain Tailor and his team.
DBS clearances
If you haven’t by now sorted out your DBS clearance with Terry, please can you now hold off until January. The school is very busy in this Christmas Term and so we are putting a hold on new DBS Clearances until January. Volunteers are not allowed to work in the school without this enhanced DBS clearance, please speak to Rosie if you have any questions.
Christmas Gift Bags for HMP Wandsworth
As you know, Rosie has been establishing a relationship with HMP Wandsworth for prisoners to make scrubs. In light of our developing relationship we would like to highlight their Christmas Gift Bag Appeal. The Anglican chaplains at HMP Wandsworth would like to give a small Christmas gift bag to prisoners.
The following items have been cleared by the prison to go into each bag:
A Sachet of hot chocolate
A Sachet of cappuccino
A Chocolate bar eg Mars Bar, Twix
A Christmas decoration with a message on the back if you like, but no names please
Bags can be paper or plastic but should not be sealed and left open at the top.
Separately and additionally, we are looking for Christmas decorations to attach to the tree in the centre of the prison. We will collect these at the same time as the gift bags.
All items must be delivered to the Scrubbery before the 8th of December.
