Thank you to all for your time, energy, running, knitting, donations and support for our work in Buckingham, Milton Keynes, Berkshire and with children and women in the Mathare slums in Nairobi, Kenya.
Thank you to Tracey, Glynis, Isabel, Sue, Beverley, and Julie for the knitting and so many baby hugs.
Thank you to Trish for constant donations and to everyone who gives their time and money to ensure that Fi Hugs happen to children. Every single hug makes a difference and cares as if Fiona was there.
We continue to work with Tushinde providing Fi Day Care and are working hard to develop a project that monitors nutrition in Fi Day Cares across the area.
Across the world,149 million children under five years of age are malnourished slowing their development and harming their health. This means they start life disadvantaged.
In Fi Day Care our research shows we prevent malnutrition through our food programme. With your support, we are making 30 children’s whole future much brighter and their families much healthier.
Ellie and Izzi ran in the Landmarks Half Marathon in London in April 2023 raising money for our Fi Day Care in Mathare.
We needed £3000 to fund another year and, through the sponsoring from nurses, police officers, friends and family, we raised well over that. 30 children and their mums will get the help they need for another year.
We do not have a place to run in 2024 (yet). Our mission to run (around) the world is therefore at risk.
So far our sponsored run around-the-world campaign has been in Zambia in 2019, New Zealand in 2020, London and Norway in 2022, and London in 2023.
We received a donation from a kind person who wanted to sponsor some training related to children.
In June, we used this as an opportunity to get Mercy Ndirangu to train the team on the new Kenyan Children’s Act and care reforms.
These new laws are all about putting the child at the centre of any care plan (and introducing the concept of care plans to Kenya). Making it easier for foster care placements, and lots of other new guidelines that look hopeful.
If you’re interested in the details of the training, it’s available here
Thank you to everyone who supports our valuable work!
During 2021 our Fiona Foundation for Kids care work has been both local and international and has been all about sharing Fi hugs rather than fundraising. Thank you to all of you who have been busy knitting squares and blankets. Thank you also to all of you who have shared your expertise to enable us to keep going.
Along with everyone else, we have adapted what we do and are looking forward to 2022. COVID meant we could no longer send the squares to neonatal units across the world and so we, as many charities have, have adapted.
What are we doing?
Locally around Buckingham, and Milton Keynes.
Throughout 2021 Fiona Foundation for Kids has helped local Milton Keynes babies, and Kenyan families and will soon be helping Rwandan premature newborn babies to stay warm and well.
Our knitted squares have been turned into blankets and those blankets have gone to local newborn babies who need them via a local charity Baby Basics.
Local Health Visitors and Social Workers identify local newborn babies in need, Baby Basics make up a three-month care package containing everything needed for those first few months. Our blankets and cardigans go into these care packages.
Thank you Helen Thorpe at Baby Basics for linking up and taking the bags and bags of blankets.
Tracey Russell has made more blankets than the rest of us. Emma Jenkins made loads, and Emma’s sister Sarah Mack made some beautiful fleece blankets too.
Our star knitter Tracey says “ I have always enjoyed knitting, but even more so now, knowing that what I am doing is helping out babies in need.” These newborns all now have a metaphorical Fi cuddle and hug.
In the summer of 2021, Milton Keynes welcomed Afghan refugee families. William and Maz did what Fi would have done and volunteered at the reception hotel. Fiona Foundation for Kids helped more than 500 people get the clothes, shoes, healthcare and toiletries they needed. Some of our blankets went to the two babies who were born there during their 10-day stay.
International Kenya.
We have not stopped this completely We have still been able to support families living in the slums during lockdown in Nairobi, Kenya. This funding supported food packages. We also helped to buy new mattresses for children to replace beds lost in a huge fire in the slums, and even a dental ‘moment’. We funded removing a tooth which at £6 sounds a little but enabled the recipient to avoid infection and return to work and so providing for their children.
International Rwanda
We are proud to say that one of our Trustees Nellie Reynolds has gone global and moved from Great Ormond Street Hospital to Rwanda. She has taken up a volunteer fellowship in neonatal care and is now in Kigali. She has taken some of the baby hats knitted by the team with her. They will be put into packages taken by medics to pre-term births and used to keep these babies warm.
The team.
A huge thank you to all of you including but not limited to Jane, Trish and Ivor who have donated funds and to those who gift their time too. Thank you Heidi Fuller for keeping our social media presence going, Adam Bennet for keeping the governance going, Sarah Fisher for keeping the administration going and we welcome Izzie Reynolds and Ed Laidler as Trustees.
Finally, Virgin Money has closed its charity arm so we now have a new online method for donating with WONDERFUL.CO.UK.
A very happy and healthy Christmas to you all Marion x
Lovely friends and volunteers at Fiona Foundation for Kids have been knitting baby bonding squares. These tiny comforters are used in hospital baby units as Dr Aoife Hurley a UK based Paediatrician explains:
“Bonding squares are used in Neonatal units as a way of helping mums bond with their babies. It is a small square of knitted wool that the mum places next to her skin for a time, so her scent is then on the square. This square is then left next to the baby.”
We have given the baby bonding squares and clothes out in Zambia. In total, there were 333 squares which equates to about 1000 hours of knitting or crocheting to help babies who need to feel loved, feel loved.
The nurses translated and explained to the mums what these knitted squares are for.
The day we gave them out 82 babies in the unit had a little more warmth, settled easier and felt closer to their mother thanks to this simple but effective comforter.
Thank you to everyone who has helped so far. Keep knitting!
We have had amazing support from people across the world for our projects to care as if she were there. Thank you to our Fiona fundraisers and helpers. Here is an update on 2019 activity and an idea of what 2020 will bring.
Zambia fun and fundraising 2019
My colleagues in Zambia raised £1000 by running the Livingstone half marathon. We all lived together for six months whilst working as volunteers in the health system in Zambia. Fortunately for me, they are very fit and friends and families from across the UK contributed. It was great to be part of their training and the 6am boot camp eventually became fun.
Brill School and Alfie the hero
Thank you too to Brill School and Alfie Fiona’s godson who was keen to help with our quest to raise funds for kids in Kenya. Alfie had already donated his toys and wanted others to know about Fi Day Care. Alfie organised a cake sale, a street collection and for Marion to talk to the whole school about life for kids living in the Mathare slums in Kenya. The talk focussed on life as a child without food or shelter.
Fi Day at the Woolpack, Sept 2019
Thank you to everyone joining us in the pub to celebrate Fiona’s life and loves. Thanks to the Innovations team with whom Fiona worked in 2016 who made jewellery, lights and bags filled with wool and needles. They wrote knitting instructions and put Fi flowers on everything. All of these Fi products sold out. Thanks to Emma Jenkins and Ian Murrey for the great entertainment, even managing to sing through a power cut, to the Woolpack for the room and to all raffle contributors. A quick word about cake, Tracy Burnett made an amazing Fi Cake and cupcakes which went down a storm. Just what was needed to keep the energy and dancing going.
Zambia 2019
Baby Bonding Squares.
Our project in Zambia was started by Dr Aoife Hurley and Rachael Talbot both of whom were volunteers in the neonatal unit University Teaching Hospital. Here in the unit, there are up to 100 babies shared about 30 incubators with only 10 nurses to look after all of them. The babies were sick, 25% do not survive.
The babies often got stressed because they were not able to be with their mothers other than for feeding. They also got upset because the babies they were sharing their incubator with were crying.
What are they?
Baby bonding squares are hand-sized knitted squares (30 stitches or 6 inches by six inches, any colour, any wool).
What was the project?
We aimed to encourage people across the world to knit squares and give a baby a Fi Hug. We have had squares coming on from all over the UK and Ireland. These come from groups of knitters, groups of friends, people living in care homes and people who wish to share some kindness and keep connected to others doing the same. Share and care as if she was there.
How do they work?
The squares provide the baby with the scent of the mother and the mother with the scent of the baby. It works by having two squares; one is on the mum and one is on the baby and these are swapped each 12 hours. The scent of the baby helps a mum’s milk come through, the scent of the mum helps the baby feel safe and calm.
What has happened?
We set a target of 1000 baby bonding squares in a year. We received 333 in the first three months and worked with the staff in the unit to teach mums how to use the squares. We have since received 450 more and have sent these with colleagues to Zambia to continue the work. More are on the way.
We need a bigger plan.
1 million Fi Hugs Bonding Squares!
Kenya update – the children and our partners Tushinde
Our work in Kenya has continued the provision of daycare for children so that their mums may go to work. Jo King a Health Visitor from Buckingham and friend of ours always wanted to help kids and families in other places abroad. We joined forces in December 2019 to answer the request for training from our partner charity Tushinde.
Fi Day Care supports children to stay with their families, we now also need to make sure that those homes are safe. We provided training on managing domestic violence and addiction. We introduced the social worker teams to some tools to help identify those at risk and then help families cope.
We helped the Tushinde team develop a plan for referral and data collection as well as providing some communication tips for the team. It was also great to see the poster from previous work on analysing the children’s health in a prominent place in the office.
Of course, we also visited the children to play as if Fiona was there.
As we were in Kenya we were also able to join with the Nursing Now 2020 campaign. We were asked to speak at an event with government leads, managers and senior nurses about the benefits of community care, nurse-led services and universal health coverage.
Abandoned babies and kids with nowhere else to go.
Fiona always looked after those with no one else to care.
Whilst in Kenya we also took donations of handmade clothes to the Nest in Nairobi. The Nest is a home for abandoned babies or for those whose mothers are in prison and they welcomed the jumpers from the Buckingham schools. The babies were well cared for and they enjoyed the help at feeding time as well as all of the lovely clothes.
Fiona Volunteers
We could not do this without the help of the Fi Volunteers. All of the work that goes into this foundation is from volunteers and all of the money raised goes directly to causes we support.
Thanks go out to Heidi Fuller of Shareworkers.co.uk for all of the social media and website work. Friends since the 1970s, she has a heart of gold and media and marketing skills too.
Also to Chris and Christine Diaz who put up with us in their home in Nairobi. Thank you to St Joseph Catholic Church Derby for their collection and donation.
Thank you to McAuley Catholic High School Doncaster sixth formers for your contribution too.
We were fortunate this year to secure a grant from Emirates Airways to provide our flights to Kenya. This means that there is no cost to the charity at all for the trips. Every penny you give goes to the kids.
Plans for 2020
Our work in the slums of Nairobi is hard. We have supported Fi Day Care for two years. The evaluation of the programme shows that it started well but has not continued to provide the quality of care we started with. This is not unusual in new programmes where we start in the most difficult places with the least support. We have therefore changed our approach for 2020.
We are still going to support Tushinde to expand a daycare facility and work with one that is working well and expand this to have a Fiona room. This site for daycare provision is still in the slums and is the location of the original academic work undertaken to analyse the children’s health. We know it works and works well. We know the quality of the staff and the facilities are high. All Fi funding will be spent on the children and food directly.
We are off! Whether you wish to do something good for Children in Need or Christmas we can help. I am thrilled to announce that Emirates Airways has donated the flights for us nurses to go & help the Fiona Foundation for Kids in the slums in Nairobi, Kenya.
We have accommodation too, staying with Chris & Christine our friends in Nairobi. As always every single penny you donate goes to care for the kids and to care as if Fiona was there. Look out for news of us delivering a training programme in Mathare Slums this December.
If you have any Christmas presents to send (light & useful) we can take them with us. Emirates has given us extra baggage allowance too!! (It comes from passengers donating their air miles) Colouring books, pencils, appropriate children’s picture books, blankets, or donate here
