The key to our Christmas work is helping families early.
The stress and pressure felt by all families to provide a ‘perfect’ Christmas for their children is huge.
For families experiencing challenges with their finances, this worry is multiplied ten-fold.
We start talking to parents about their situations in September to evaluate if they need support. This prevents families from panicking and perhaps getting into debt. We have either worked with the families directly or have had them referred by one of our partner schools.
Because of this, if you’d like to donate a gift, new unwrapped items can be delivered to us at the Allia Future Business Centre, Kings Hedges Road, Cambridge, CB4 2HY up until Friday 2nd December 2022 or you can meet us at the Cambridge Bike’s Santa Run drop at 10.30am at Trumpington Park and Ride on Sunday 4th December.
GIFT APPEAL NOW CLOSED – but please do consider making a donation if you can, we can use funds to make sure children are warm and safe this Christmas period.
Thanks to the generosity of those who support us – our experienced and checked staff are likely to deliver gifts to over 120 families – before the kids finish school! Gifts must be unwrapped as we need to check the items are appropriate for the individual child we are helping – but we welcome donations of wrapping paper too.
We are unlikely to be short of gifts, so if you can, please do consider supporting our work through a donation to fund our crucial work year-round – preventing families from falling into crisis and getting them back on their feet.
Throughout the year, our highly skilled and experienced team intensively supports families 121 across CB4, for on average 6-9 months. We help the family tackle the underlying causes of problems, connect them to their community and build their resilience and independence. In addition, we support a multitude of families through our outreach activities – drop-ins, trips and courses as well as deliveries of food and essentials in a crisis.
If you’d like to also purchase a gift for a child, we have a list of suggestions which you can view below, or download as a PDF
We also have an online Wish List here.
Or we have an Amazon Wish List if you prefer.
At Christmas time, it’s all too easy for us all to feel pressurised into the commercialisation of Christmas. Guilt can take over, and many families are at risk of being drawn into debt because they want to make Christmas special for their children. We want to avoid that.
Most of the families we work with are struggling with the rising cost of living. Sadly, even families with two working parents can struggle to make ends meet in Cambridge which remains one of the most divided cities in the UK. Many are on zero-hours contracts, are on reduced hours, or have been made redundant or separated as a result of the pandemic.
We work with primary schools to bring children in need under our wing. We help families to deal with all sorts of issues that get in the way of children thriving in school. And we help over the long-term. We started speaking to families we know are struggling in Setpember, to offer them assistance with a Christmas present or two for each of their children.
If you’d like to donate a gift, new items can be delivered for our attention to the Allia Future Business Centre, Kings Hedges Road, Cambridge, CB4 2HY until Friday 2nd December 2022 or meet us at the Cambridge Biker’s Toy Run drop at 10.30am at Trumpington Park and Ride on Sunday 4th December.
You can donate funds at any time.
Thank you so much!
Here’s a clip of us last year sorting the gifts and talking about why we do what we do.
