by Val | Nov 8, 2011 | Val's blog
Tuesday 8th November 2011
Just thought I would let you know I worked yesterday. Today I will have a look at the web to see about bus, etc. And jobs on my to do list.
Wednesday 9th November 2011
I have a meeting 10.00 a.m. in Whiston as we have been invited to do a Christmas grotto. This year this will be just for advertising ourselves and be seen in the community as so late in the day to advertise to get a good response so I think it will be just passing trade. I have another meeting with Jay at 12 noon who is working on a DVD for our ball and pictures I want to use to advertise us on the event.
Thursday 10th November 2011
Thursday is my day off.
Friday 11th November 2011
I will be dropping some stuff off at Alder Hey. Meeting at 1.30 p.m. in Southport regarding the Ball.
Saturday 12th November 2011
Saturday is the Executive Meeting.
Val Frew
A very proud volunteer of CHA
by Val | Nov 6, 2011 | Val's blog
My secondment started 1st November and I had been looking forward to this for a good few weeks.
On my very first day I had a meeting at Alder hey with Ian Atkinson manager of Cardiac, ICU, HDU, k2 and 01 clinic, Jamie Hester who is doing project work from Uni and Becky Cartwright, a member of CHA and also a parent governor at Alder Hey.
Our meeting was to meet and see how we could help each other. Ian is very keen to show us support and help us more to get promoted around the hospital and make sure families know where they can get help.
Ian has agreed we can have more space to bring alive our brand and be seen much more visibly. He has also committed to himself or a member of his team coming to our branch meetings at Ronald Mcdonald house at Alder Hey each month which is a big commitment and something we have never seen before which in itself is a huge success. This I believe would not have been possible if it was not for my secondment as I just would not have had the time to go to daytime meetings as I would normally be at work. Ian has also asked me to join the Northwest Congenital Heart Network to find out more about what can be done to support more families and to have a say about what we think will help others. Again this is something I would not have been able to do as meetings are at Manchester Children’s hospital during the day as a direct result of my secondment I am able to take this on and hopefully be able to help even more families.
After that meeting I went to see the cardiac liaison nurses in 01 clinic and agreed Becky and I will update the notice boards and see what they need from us and where we could put up more publicity.
On Wednesday I was doing pick up’s for our charity shop which is coming up this month, and also met with a mum who needed to have a chat, just for support as her son is 15 and she saw a documentary on TV about a child who had grown up with a heart condition and is now around 22 and needs a transplant and it upset her a bit. So I went round for a chat.
On Thursday I met with my sister Michelle (mum of Matthew), Michele Casey, Lisa Welsh and her mum, Carole, at our storage unit as we needed to get prizes sorted and wrapped for our Ball on November 19th. We received donations from companies and split them into Auction, raffle and tombola prizes. We then needed to list them too. Incredibly this took 6hrs as I had to get stuff out the unit into the corridor so we could pull stuff together. Michelle had to go after 2 and half hrs as the school phoned to go pick up Matt as he was not well. He has been sent home from school a number of times lately due to not being well. Because I could do this from 9.30am it also meant after I had finished I was able to go and see my other nephew Will play football after school which was lovely, his team won 5-4. It gives me more time to myself as in previous years when we have done this we have met at 7.30pm so you can imagine it’s very, very late when we left the storage unit for home and sometimes had to go to someone’s house another day and finish off.
On Friday, I took more stuff to the unit that people had donated for our shop and got my house in order as there was stuff in my house that I just hadn’t had the time to take, so my house is now looking much more like a house and not a storage place. It’s about 30 mins to drive to the storage place so I need an hour just for driving for a round trip excluding any time I spend there. I also looked at some bigger units as I plan to do more fundraising e.g. charity shops and book sales and need more space to hold more stuff as I hope people will be even more generous and donate even more stuff to make this possible. I also booked 5 charity shop weeks for 2012
Saturday morning we had a ‘Taking CHA Forward’ meeting. The meeting was over breakfast and a big success 17 people attended which was a good turn out. It’s one thing discussing what we can do, it’s another committing time to do the things you say you will do when you work. Now I have a “to do” list and next week I will start following those actions we spoke about. The meeting was 10am till 2 so a lot has come out of it and it gave people chance to meet others who they may not have met before.
Tonight I have had my brother Billy over to show me how to attach pictures to emails something I am learning about and never done before. Impressed myself if this works.
So as you can see I fitted a lot in my first week alone and look forward to the challenges ahead and helping others.
If you haven’t tried being a volunteer before for a local charity I can highly recommend it. It give you a great sense of giving something back and being able to help other less fortunate than ourselves. So why not think – can I donate even 3 hrs a week to your local chosen charity. There are so many charities out there that could benefit from your help, The people you meet are usually great as they want to be there – thats why they have chosen to do voluntary work so it’s not a chore its a choice so you find people are usually much happier in their work
Val Frew
A very proud volunteer of CHA
by Val | Nov 1, 2011 | Val's blog
Hello,
My name is Val Frew and I work for More Than in Liverpool, part of the RSA Group.
In summer 2011 a charitable secondment was announced and Vera Reynolds in my office came straight over to see me to make sure I was made aware of this as Vera thought it sounded the perfect opportunity for me to do more work with the charity I am Chairwoman for – The Children’s Heart Association, Alder Hey branch.
As soon as I read the details, I knew it was exactly what I wanted to do.
The secondment was offered by RSA to all employees worldwide to work with a local charity for up to 3 months. I put in my application and chose to work with the Children’s Heart Association if I was successful with my application.
I have done voluntary work with CHA for around 10yrs and CHA is a big part of my life. I got involved because my nephew, Matthew, who is now 12 was born with a major heart condition called hyper plastic left heart. I wanted to be able to help others who go through what we have been through and make a difference for other families. I was asked to take on role a volunteer chair for Alder Hey branch and at first I agreed to it for 6 months, Ten years later I am still chair of Alder hey and now Vice Chair on National Executive Committee too.
We are a support group for families of children who have a heart condition, or have had a heart condition. We have no paid workers – everything is done on a voluntary basis.
We have branch meetings and we arrange trips and fundraising events.
I was successful with my secondment and was granted the full 3 months off work with pay to do more.
To say I was delighted would be an understatement. I really do appreciate being given this opportunity and I know I will be able to do more to help others. I have a real passion to help children and their families.
Val Frew
A very proud volunteer of CHA
I plan to keep a record of all my activities during my secondment and they are recorded pages to follow….
