Charity Registration number: 1003675

www.caft.co.uk

Charity Registration number: 1003675

COVID-19 has had a huge impact on the charitable sector with many charities desperately trying to alter their support services to fit ever changing guidelines. After witnessing the incredible resilience of the CAFT team this year, it came as no surprise to us that COVID-19 may have cancelled their Christmas party, but it certainly would not be cancelling Christmas all together at the farm.

A Christmas trail was created in place of their usual Christmas party for families to attend safely throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ian Eccles, Children’s Adventure Farm CEO – “We are very pleased and proud to have been able to reorganise our way of working to be able to continue supporting children and families during the current situation. Our outdoor Christmas experience has welcomed 16 school groups and 468 families. To be able to help so many children make magical Christmas memories at the end of this strange year, has been truly heart-warming.”

The trail began with each family receiving a map and visiting the outdoor animals. This included goats, alpacas, sheep and a new addition to the animal family called Truffle. A very large, very friendly 3-year-old pig!

The dark evenings created a wonderful atmosphere on the farm as fairy lights turned on to guide the children through the magical trail. After visiting the animals, the families were taken to an undercover section of the Woodlands. Here, the children made reindeer food and Christmas decorations to take home.

There was a fire pit for toasting marshmallows, a stage with music and a cheeky Elf Hunt! At the end of the trail the children met Santa Claus and received a special gift.

This year has brought isolation and anxiety to many of these families. The Children’s Adventure Farm however, brought them the magic of Christmas and memories to treasure forever.

www.caft.co.uk

Charity Registration number: 1003675

Covid-19 has had a devastating effect on the work carried out by many of our charity partners. Unfortunately, as the first nationwide lockdown began, the Children’s Adventure Farm had to cancel all of their residential programmes.

However, the determination of their team and the continued support from their many volunteers meant that they were able to develop a new programme. A programme that enabled three families to safely visit the farm at one time while also adhering to the new social distancing regulations.

For these children, a visit to CAFT provides a much-needed opportunity to have fun, laughter and to simply enjoy being children. The new programme allows them to explore the woodland, attend the forest school, make use of the incredible playpark and even visit some of their favourite animals. Since the end of May, 690 families have visited Children’s Adventure Farm, a much needed support system during these isolating times.

One mother had this to say: “It has to be one of the most relaxing trips out we’ve had in a long long time. He loved doing his own thing in each zone and it was great to see him having so much fun and the freedom to run around. Thank you for such an amazing day, I haven’t seen him smile like he did for a while now and we all had an amazing time.”

www.caft.co.uk

Charity Registration number: 1003675

The Brooks family are a perfect example as to why the Children’s Adventure Farm and the work that they do is so vital. Mum Suzanne, Dad Chris and their four children Rachel, Joseph, John and Sarah recently visited CAFT for a weekend break.

Sarah was born with a hole in her heart and has spent much of her young life in and out of Alder Hey hospital, undergoing open heart surgery several times and suffering poor health due to her complex cardiac difficulties

In the weeks following her birth, Suzanne stayed with Sarah at Alder Hey, much to the confusion of her other young children who couldn’t understand why their Mum wasn’t home to tuck them in at night. Throughout all this time Chris drove over to Liverpool every day whilst trying to keep life as ‘normal’ as possible for their other children.

Holidays were impossible for Sarah and her family who were surviving on one income, having exhausted their savings and re-mortgaged their home. They were ever so grateful to recently visit Children’s Adventure Farm for a weekend break as a family.

Sarah and her siblings had a weekend full of activities, from feeding the animals that live at CAFT to creating all sorts of messy and wonderful crafts in the crafts room.

Suzanne comments:
“The weekend we spent at CAFT was fantastic, giving me and my family far more than anything money could buy. It gave us laughter and magical memories. It gave us precious time together as a family without having to think about anything other than enjoying ourselves and it gave us support and friendship when we were going through our most frightening times.”

www.caft.co.uk

Charity Registration number: 1003675

The Children’s Adventure Farm Trust is a Cheshire based charity who provide essential respite for children who are living with difficulties on a daily basis that most of us couldn’t comprehend. CAFT give these children the opportunity to play and laugh, as is the right of all children regardless of illness, disability or social circumstance.

The farm is abundant in activities, ranging from educational play times with the animals, slip and slides on the park to fun games in the sports hall. Each child is treated as an individual in an environment where disability is never seen as a barrier to participation.

Children’s Adventure Farm aim to significantly increase the impact they have both in terms of quantity and to the range of children they help. They currently run an amazing outreach programme to establish links with hard to reach groups and families, who would otherwise never even be aware that their facility exists for their benefit.

Making new friends on the Children’s Adventure Farm!

The team run fun activities with these groups and families in their own communities before bringing them over to the adventure farm for day visits or weekend breaks, building trust with these beneficiaries whose circumstances may make them nervous is crucial.

The Kentown Wizard Foundation are delighted to support the Children’s Adventure Farm with a grant of £460,000, spread over a 3 year period. This will fund staff salaries and in turn help to increase capacity and allow them to reach out to many more children with serious illness and disability.