December is by far the busiest time of year for the ECCH volunteers.  We are always overwhelmed by the number of people who contact us wanting to make Christmas special for the children living in the care home.

Here we´d like to share with you just a few of the wonderful things that they are doing.

Sponsored Walk

On Saturday 16th November Barney’s Dog Rescue volunteers Violet, Lyn, Hilary, Eddie and Dale walked from Torre del Rico to Pinoso and back, a total of 20 kms. in aid of ECCH raising the fabulous sum of 1,130 euros.    Well done all and a special thank you to all our sponsors.

The main photo shows Hilary receiving a thank you certificate from ECCH volunteer Pam Edwards.

Barneys Dog Rescue Charity was founded by Violet and her husband Terry 10 years ago and since then they have rescued and rehomed hundreds of abandoned dogs in the Pinoso area.  Their charity shop is at Calle Principe de Asturias 14, Pinoso.

Quillows and Quilts

Pictured below are a sewing group from Pinoso, Liz. Elaine. Donna. Margaret. Ann. Meg. Anne. Sue. Along with two other ladies, Margaret and Gill, they made the fantastic “Quillows and Quilts” shown in the photo.  They set a target of making 24 of the handmade personalised gifts in time  for Christmas, one for each child currently living in the home.

The intention is that the children keep these when they leave the home which means they will have an heirloom to possibly pass to their children in the future.  When they found out that children leave the home and then someone else arrives on a regular basis, they decided they would like to give a quilt to every new arrival. So they would like to continue making them to have ready for new arrivals.   If anybody is interested in joining this project or donating materials please contact us on info@ecch.es.

Once again, a huge thank you to everyone who so kindly volunteered so much time and materials to make the quilts and quillows.

Catral Ladies Group

Pictured below are Mavis Clinton, Jo Snodden and Christine Robinson from Catral.   Christine contacted me a few weeks ago to ask if she and a group of her friends in Catral could buy presents for the children.   I gave her a list of the children’s names and within no time she had contacted me to say that they had individual gifts for each of the 24 children currently in the home.

I took some of the ladies to personally deliver the presents and they were greeted by sub-director Andres who gratefully received the presents which will be given to the children on Three Kings Day.

Charity Xmas Lunch

On Sunday, 8th December, along with 16 other ECCH volunteers, I attended the charity xmas lunch being held by Diane Clarke from Cafe Vienna.   We were made very welcome and had thoroughly enjoyed our lunch.

Diane held a raffle to be drawn the following week, and whilst I was there she told me that her customers had already bought all the gifts on the Xmas Wish List for the children and she introduced me to Yvonne Farquar, one of her customers, who had been knitting and selling finger puppets throughout the year.

Yvonne had donated the proceeds of 300 euros to buy the remaining 10 gifts to complete the list.  How amazing is that!