A message from the Chairman, David Cook
and the Board of Trustees- 2017-18
As of December 2018, Grace House became the only
Short Break provider in the City of Sunderland. This
marked a particularly proud moment in the development
of Grace House and is certainly something the Trustees
have been delighted to witness. This was only made
possible because of the fantastic partnership we have in
place with Sunderland Care and Support. This means
that Grace House is a happy, active and thriving short
breaks facility; with children and young people being
able to access the amazing facilities here.
A summary of the kind of things the children can expect
to experience at Grace House include-
Trips to the football match and exclusive visits to the
changing rooms.
Gardening activities including growing fruit and
vegetables
Soft play
The Sensory room
Cookery classes- always popular with all the children
Trips out to the local farm, the beach and parks
The Trustees vision has been to ensure that Grace
House is a place where all the family can feel supported
and this is an area we have developed over the last year.
In addition to the free holistic therapies and counselling
offered to parents we have been able to commence
delivery of counselling provision to siblings and the
children and young people with additional needs. The
counselling being offered to the children is a unique
provision and is something we will be looking to
develop.
2019 sees the end of my tenure as Grace House Chair
and I have been honored to be so closely associated for
so many years, with this wonderful charity. I will miss
the day to day contact, but I will remain in touch, as I am
excited to see what the future will bring for the families
at Grace House. I wish everyone associated with Grace
House much luck and happiness.
There has been a number of positive developments
over the last 12 months within Grace House short
breaks.
Grace House has merged with Sea View Road,
which has resulted in over 60 children and young
people now using the short break service.
We have welcomed over 50 new children in to
Grace House over the last 6 months as well as
some new staff.
Through this fantastic expansion we have been
able to build positive friendships during the
children’s stay with us as well as giving the
children new experiences such as trips to
museums, cinemas and attending a disabled Nurf
tournament.
In November 2018 Grace House had its
annual Ofsted inspection resulting in Good
rating overall. Ofsted commented on how
“the staff are very nurturing and very
aspirational for the children in their care”
Keep active has continued their support with
us and the children really look forward to
these visits. It has led to interest in not only
cooking but shopping for ingredients. This
has given us the opportunity to teach the
children about money and how to buy items
at the shops.
Comments we have received
“Just wanted to say a very big thank you for looking after my child recently when he wasn't well. As I dropped him off I knew that he was really struggling and previously this would have been a hospital admission. He feels really secure at Grace House and you must have given him very careful support because his health was significantly improved when I picked him up .... thank you so so much!”
“Thank you for the thought you have put in to my child’s Transition Plan to adult services. You really do know and understand her needs. Thank you for making it a year long process and being so personalised.”
“Hey just seen some staff with a few of the kids in the metro centre and I must say how fantastic they are. I’ll be reading up on the charity next week.
Keep up the good work 😃”
“Grace House has been my choice of a respite provision for my child before Ofsted gave the thumbs up. I love everything about the building, what you offer, activities done with the kids and especially the staff you have working there. They are a crazy bunch, fantastic with all the children as well as me the parent. They make my child’s stay an enjoyable one and I can relax knowing he's being well looked after”
Family Activities
During the year we heard many parents telling
us about the lack of family activities in school
holidays that would be suitable for families
who had a child with a disability as part of the
family unit. To address that we hosted two
sessions run by the Workers Educational
Association, one offering craft based work and
the second an African Drumming workshop.
We hosted a cookery based family activity
session run by Kreative Kitchen. Feedback
from all activities was extremely positive e.g.
“We really enjoyed the cooking class
today. There was something for everyone to
take part in and the teacher was really good &
gave lots of helpful advice, cooking tips &
shopping suggestions - good money saving
ideas too. We also got to take the recipe
sheets home - so we could make the meals
again. Great that we could take our meals
home too!
The project saw another large increase in
parent carers making use of the provision, with
over 240 people registered with the project by
March 2019.
The holistic treatments on offer were extremely
popular, with all available appointments being
taken, the most requested treatments being
either some form of massage or Reiki. To
emphasise the benefits of Reiki one project
user commented “Before coming in for Reiki I
used to take painkillers almost daily for
headaches but since I’ve been coming in I
haven’t needed to take any painkillers and I feel
so much better”.
Our adult counselling service was also greatly
appreciated, an example of the benefits of the
counselling service was given by a client “I
would just like to thank you so much for
listening to me with empathy and compassion
when I was feeling at my lowest!!”.
Following the success of our adult counselling
service we wanted to extend our counselling
offer both for children with disabilities as well as
non-disabled siblings.
Whole Family support at Grace House
The 2018-19 reporting period saw a continued
growth in the number of families accessing
Grace House for the increased range of support
on offer. Every aspect of our support offer for
parents and other family carers has been
developed based on need and demand with
suggestions being gathered through our regular
consultations with project users.
Children and Young People’s Counselling
For children with additional needs we were
successful with a funding application to the DM
Thomas Foundation to enable us to offer 100
counselling sessions for that group. It is a
unique offer and service and initial feedback
has been very positive. For sibling counselling,
we began working with two counsellors on a
voluntary basis to trial the service and again
early feedback is very encouraging.
Thank You to our Supporters
… And Corporate Partners
An Audience With…
Thank you to Stewart Donald, Charlie Methven, Tony Davison and Kevin Ball for their
help and support at this event held at The Stadium of Light in September. It brought
together twenty former Sunderland AFC players who shared tables with ticket holders.
The Fans Museum showcased their memorabilia and the evening was a great success.
Networking Events
Grace House is now holding regular
networking events which are proving
popular with businesses in the local
area. These meetings are relaxed
and give our supporters a chance to
meet other companies who they
might be able to do business with,
whilst supporting Grace House. We
offer supporters the opportunity to be
a guest speaker at these events
helping to inform fellow supporters
and raise their profile.
Christmas Jumper Day
Christmas Jumper Day
2018 was a huge success
with over 18 businesses
wearing their Christmas
Jumper with pride to raise
funds for Grace House.
Thanks to everyone who
took part, nearly £2,000
was raised!
Roll Call of Honours
• BNI Centurion
• BNI Promenade
• Honest Boy Darts Team
• Wearside Golf Club Ladies
• Our amazing GNR 2018 runners – especially Steven Garrigan who raised over £3,000 for us!
• Mercedes Benz
• Discover Edventure
• Eco Logic
• RTC North
• ACA Financial Services
• HLA
• Towergate – Bishop Skinner
• Inspire Holistics
• Three Horse Shoes
• Margaret Rose Events
• Simon Berry Optometrist
• Holiday Inn Washington
• Green Trousers
• Gentoo
• Liberty Brown
• Macdonald Martin
• Durham Extravaganza
• Brewlab
• Highly Efficient Heating
• Town Centre Automobiles
• Activ Technology
• PG Legal
• Hays Travel
• NC Insurance
• Croner
• Colliery Tavern
• Sunderland AFC
• Sky
• All those who took part in Snowdonia challenge
Grace House wants to say a huge heartfelt thank you to all of those mentioned and anyone else who has supported us with a fundraising activity.
The Grace House Gardens
We received some exciting news in April 2018, with confirmation of
grant funding from Children In Need, which means we can extend the
gardening activities we are able to deliver with the children and young
people.
The children take the lead in this project, deciding with the team what
they want to grow and what fun activities they would like to participate
in. This year they have turned old car tyres into plant pots and are
growing flowers in them, growing pumpkins then turning them into
lanterns at Halloween, growing vegetables has continued to be
popular.
The children enjoyed making Bird Houses, which were put up in the
gardens.
The Sensory Garden
The development of this area has continued following the design from Sean Murray and funding raised by Green Fingers. In 2015 Sean won the BBC/RHS 'The Great Chelsea Garden Challenge' Television competition and designed and built a garden on main avenue at Chelsea Flower Show. Sean’s design for Grace House will mean when the children look out of their bedroom patio doors, they will see a beautiful garden with lovely bright colours. In the garden there are many colours, smells and textures for the children to experience, there is a water feature and shaded areas for the children to play in. We have been grateful for the support of the Washington Holiday Inn as they provided us with a group of volunteers who assisted in the planting and weeding of the garden.
Work Experience Placements
In the last year we have been delighted to have been working with young people from;
• Portland School
• Springboard
• Sunderland College
The Young People have been on work placement with Grace House, so whilst they have been here the tasks
they have helped us with are;
• Reception
• Gardening
• Admin
• Designing and distributing our Volunteers newsletter
• Creating a Grace House calendar
• Taking minutes of meetings
• Organising refreshments for our meeting rooms
• Shredding
• Data inputting
There are many other duties they have helped us with
which are too numerous to mention.
New Team Members
Grace House were delighted to welcome two new Patrons to the Grace House team.
Matt Wylie MBE
Matt is a local lad, born and raised in Sunderland who has cerebral
palsy and underwent a series of operations between 2004 and
2007 after a tumor was discovered on his leg. Following medical
advice, he took up swimming as part of his recovery. After success
in the European Championships in 2014 and 2016 he then went on
to win a Gold Medal in the Men's 50m Freestyle S9 competition at
the Rio Paralympics in 2016.
Matt is an inspirational figure and has demonstrated what can be
achieved through his courage, determination and hard work.
Therefore, we were delighted that Matt agreed to become part of
the Grace House team and support us as a Patron.
Jayne Secker
Jayne is a busy TV journalist, working on Sky News’s lunchtime
programme as well as travelling around the country reporting on
big stories.
Jayne was there at the outset in 2000 when Kathy Secker,
Jayne’s Mum and the founder of Grace House, first came up with
the idea of starting the charity, and she has watched it grow from
an idea at the family kitchen table to the busy place it is today.
Kathy was inspired after meeting families like the Jones’ in
Sunderland with their daughter Grace who the charity became
named after. Grace sadly passed away in 2018.
Jayne explained, “She had supported a number of charities over
the years and saw the affect very poorly children could have on
families. Because of their complex medical needs, it was not easy
to hand over care to someone else. Most parents and siblings
had never had a day off. Mum thought why not build a place the
children could come and have fun and be happy and safe, while
the rest of the family could get some much-needed respite. Even
24 hours off could make a massive difference.”
In a recent visit to the North East Jayne popped by the charity,
Jayne said “I last visited Grace Hose in May 2016 and it was just
finding its feet, I can’t believe how busy it now is. It’s brilliant to
see so many children using all the facilities. I can remember mum
spending hours deciding what cheerful colours the bedrooms
would be and what could go into the sensory room. Seeing these
spaces really being used is so satisfying”.
Case Study - Lisa
Lisa is a single mum in her 50s with a teenage son Matt with a range of severe physical disabilities. They live in
the north of Sunderland, Matt is the only child in the family. Due to the range and severity of Matt’s disabilities
he requires frequent operations and is often in considerable pain. Lisa also has a range of health problems
including fibromyalgia, depression, asthma and a weakened immune system.
Lisa became aware of the services offered by Grace House at an event organised by the Sunderland Parent
Carer Forum and immediately wanted to register with the One Place, Your Space project. Over the last few
months she has accessed the adult counselling service and has benefitted from receiving 10 counselling
sessions. She also regularly attends for holistic treatments with a number of our therapists.
The feedback received from Lisa has been extremely positive and she has described Grace House as an oasis
in her incredibly busy and pressurised life. As a result of accessing the project Lisa has reported improvements
in:
• her physical health;
• her mental health;
• the quality of her family life;
• the amount of tension experienced within the family;
• her social networks;
• her previous feelings of isolation and loneliness.
Matt is now accessing the counselling service being piloted for children with disabilities and is part way through
his allocated sessions. The feedback on the process so far is very positive and he is opening up far more in
relation to his issues that he has previously done.
DM Thomas
Rolls Royce
Gentoo Aspire
Hospital of God LEAF
St James Place
National Lottery
Community Fund - OPYS
We are grateful to the following grant giving Trusts and Foundations that have supported our work this year:
Awards for All
Children in Need Hadrian Trust
SIB
Rothley Trust
CLLD
Children in Need
WCDT
Victoria Brown Review of April 2018- March 2019.
We are a small staff team and we rely
heavily on the efforts and contribution of
our volunteers and supporters.
The volunteers help with so many tasks
including reception, gardening, DIY,
driving the minibus, and help with
fundraising. Since the start of the Grace
House campaign the commitment of the
volunteers has added so much passion
and determination to our efforts; without
them we wouldn’t be the busy thriving
Charity we are now.
We are hopeful the coming year will
bring further positive development for the
families of Grace House.
Grace House has had another fantastic year;
we are now the only short break provider in
Sunderland; which supports children and
young people with complex disabilities aged 5
to 17 years and 11 months old. We were
delighted to receive news at Christmas time to
confirm the National Lottery Community Fund
are going to support another project, this will
provide support to families to reduce isolation
and opportunities to enjoy family activities. We
have also started to offer counselling support
to the children with additional needs.
I want to start my review
of the year with a
sincere thank you to
everyone who has
supported Grace House
over this last year and
more.