On Sunday 18th September the sun was shining as once again Priory Park hosted Run Reigate 2022. Now in it’s ninth year, this popular running festival is a highlight of the Stripey Stork calendar and once again #TeamStork were out in force with runners, supporters and volunteers all coming together to raise vital funds.

Drumroll please, the amount raised to date is a fantastic…

*total amount minus costs and race fees

£ 0

We are so grateful to our incredible runners and supporters. The money raised at Run Reigate 2022 enables us to help many more local families at a time when our help is needed more than ever. Check back in the coming days and weeks the total continues to rise.

Team Stork

This year we had 53 runners making up Team Stork, taking part in the 5K, 10K, half marathon, the kids’ race and the Teens’ 5K. Whatever their distance, our runners were all united in their goal- making it across the finish line and raising as much money as they could for Stripey Stork. Conditions were perfect, the sun was shining, the sky was blue and only the supporters felt the early morning chill. A huge thank you to all our runners:

Half marathon – Chris, Jon and John

10k – Kevin, Sam, Jackie, Holly, Luke, Louis, Debbie, Claudia, Stu, Ben, Kirsty, Simon and Neil

5k – Becky, Tracy, Megan, Hannah, Xavier and Ed

Teens’ 5k– Mia, Alice, Leyla and Issy

Kids’ race – Grace, George, Phoebe, Max, Eddie, Bethany, Thomas, Evie, Anushka, Sophie, Lexi, Jamie, Ben, Max, Milo, Sophie, Joe, Prithvi, Orla, Saoirse, Henry, Oscar, Lucia and William

Our heroes

All our runners are incredibly important to us but this year there were two stories that really touched us.

Sam and Jackie have become legends at Run Reigate and ever year they delight us with their fantastic costumes. In the build up to this year’s event, the outfits from Sam and Jackie were once again a closely guarded secret. We all wondered how they could follow last year’s Stripey Stork superheroes. Well, they did it! Introducing the greatest cheerleaders Team Stork could ever have!

This hasn’t been the easiest year for Jackie as she’s just finished chemo and radiotherapy for breast cancer. However, she was adamant that she would be running the 10k for Stripey Stork. With Sam by her side, this was by far the hardest run either of them had ever done. Pushing through the tears and the painful moments, they both crossed the finished line and have raised over £1000 for Stripey Stork. We are so incredibly proud of them.

Your hardest times often lead to your greatest moments in life. Keep going, tough situations build the strongest people

Sam West

Another of our superstars is Edward, a self-confessed non-runner. Edward has Asperger’s and volunteers with us weekly as part of the Surrey Choices employability scheme. Big crowds and attention are not his thing, and we don’t take for granted what a challenge this was for him. A huge congratulations to him for completing the 5K. Edward, you smashed it!

Turning Priory Park orange

Dressed in bright orange t-shirts, our runners were easy to spot all around Reigate and once again we turned Priory Park orange.

A big shout out to some of our most dedicated supporters – Jon from Celtic Contractors and his lovely family. Jon undertook the half marathon, while Saorise and Orla took part in the kids’ races – Saorise flew round the course dressed as a Stork! With lots of cheers and smiles she did a fab job of being our young ambassador and Orla made sure Stripey got lots of cuddles.

It was fabulous to see the Jones family out in force at Run Reigate 2022 and supporting Stripey Stork once again. Chris is one of our referral partners and knows first-hand how much this support will help us with the work that we do in the local area. Congratulations to Neil and Holly for running the 10k and a huge well done to Chris on completing the half marathon.

Starting the day and finishing the day at the Stripey tent felt like coming home – so warm and welcoming!

Chris Jones

It was lovely to see Mia, Alice, Leyla and Issy who have all just started volunteering with us as part of their Duke of Edinburgh Award.

Corporate Partners

Big thanks to our friends at Osborne for getting involved once again this year – John and Kirsty did a great job and their friends and colleagues at Osborne generously supported them.

We were grateful to Simon from Willis Towers Watson who took on the 10K once again.

A class of their own

We couldn’t have been prouder of these Year 2 children – all from one class at a local primary school – who chose to run and raise money for Stripey Stork. It was the first time many of them had taken part in Run Reigate and they did a brilliant job.

Fun for all at our Stripey Stork stall

Our team of volunteers were out in force in the event village – you couldn’t miss us with our bright orange gazebo and orange t-shirts! We welcomed our runners back with hugs and smiles. There was much fun and laughter as our winner’s podium was out once again and lots of people enjoyed dressing up and striking a pose. It was amazing to catch up and celebrate with our runners and their families, as well as meet new people from the local community.

Our runners each received a goody bag as a well done and as a token of our appreciation. 

Our volunteers

Of course, none of this would be possible without our team of dedicated volunteers. Thank you for giving up your time for us, whether that was helping at the stall, taking payments at the car park or helping behind the scenes in preparation for the event. This truly is a team effort.

Thank you to Ann, Chris, Pat, Nicola Fiona, Rowena, Emma, Sam, Jenny, Sam B, Lois, Jo and Sophie.

Finally, we can’t forget a big shout out to Micaela who project managed Run Reigate 2022 for Stripey Stork and ensured it all went smoothly. She did a fantastic job!

Thank you

Charlotte from Zapphire School of Dance, who hand made the gorgeous rosettes that each of the children received for running in the kids’ race.

Morr & Co hosted their fabulous R&R tent once again this year and collected donations for Stripey Stork. We were grateful that they invited some of our runners to relax at the R&R tent after their race.

Goody bags

Squires Garden Centre Reigate for donating an assortment of seeds for our goody bags. Puzzler for providing lovely puzzle books for our adult and child runners – a great excuse to relax after a hard race!

The Soapy Zebra for the gorgeous hand-made soaps – what a treat for our runners.

And of course a big thank you to Dave, Lisa, Jodie, Karen, Nicola and all the fabulous team at Run Reigate for once again organising such a fantastic event.

Run Reigate 2023???

We’ll let you catch your breath of course, but if you’re interested in signing up for one of next year’s races you can do so here , or send an email to events@stripeystork.org.uk to express your interest in joining Team Stork – we’d love to have you on board.

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Stripey Stork supports families across Surrey, providing practical items for children up to the age of 16 including prams, cots, clothing, toys and toiletries. We believe that all children deserve the same start in life, and that by sharing the items our families have outgrown we can support local families in a practical and meaningful way.

We were so happy that these young people wanted to support the work that we do. The project was entirely student-led and over six months they worked to raise awareness of Stripey Stork. This included holding lunchtime events, creating a quiz about Stripey Stork and holding a raffle to win a chocolate bar. Lucy even crocheted a baby Stripey!

At the end of the project, each group delivered a presentation about their chosen charity before the rest of Year 10 and a panel of judges. The winning pitch would receive £1000 for their charity. Donna, our Partnerships Manager was pleased to be invited along to the presentations. She described it as inspiring, saying:

“It was clear how much work the groups had put into researching and raising awareness of their chosen charities and the pitches were all of a very high standard”.

After listening to all the presentations and taking time for some careful consideration, the judges chose the Stripey Stork pitch as the winner! Our congratulations and thanks go to Lucy, Alice, Lydia, Emma, George, Izzy and Eliza for all their hard work and for being such enthusiastic Stork ambassadors. A big thank you also goes to Ashcombe School for getting involved in this initiative and helping to raise awareness amongst their students of issues affecting our community.

We love hearing about different ways that people support us, if you have a fundraising idea, please get in touch with us by visiting our fundraising page.

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At Stripey Stork we know how important it is that children have the right equipment for school, not just for practical reasons and in order to help them feel positive, motivated, and confident at school. The month of June saw our biggest ever request for school bags and it was a great example of partnership working with our friends at Jigsaw (Woking) to deliver such a positive result for families across Guildford, Aldershot and Woking.

Surrey Baby Bank Forum

One of the Stripey Stork strategic objectives is to be available to all families who need us in Surrey, and last year we established a Surrey Baby Bank Forum to connect organisations who do similar work across the county. By working together and sharing resources we can help more families and respond to the growing need for our services.

Stripey Stork's Bags4School project

At Stripey Stork we have been successfully running our Bags4School project for several years. We have researched products and built up a database of stockists who offer us the best prices. Making sure we have the right equipment is key, and we have worked with young volunteers to document what should be included in the bags for each age group.  

Jigsaw, who are part of The Lighthouse family in Woking, also help families prepare for school with PE kit, sun caps, underwear and school shoe vouchers. Working together we were able to provide a complete bundle of items for the 464 children who had been referred to the Jigsaw team. This is the highest number of requests that either organisation have had to respond to and is a sad reflection of the level of hidden need that exists here in ‘affluent Surrey’.  

The school bags and contents are all brand new as we know how important it is for young people to fit in with their peers and to have something their can call their own. The school bags are age-appropriate (packed for pre-school, infants, juniors and senior school ages) and each bag contains: 

• Pencil case 
• Notebook 
• Writing pen/pencil 
• Colouring pens or pencils 
• Highlighter pens 
• Eraser, ruler and pencil sharpener 
• Activity/puzzle book 
• Water bottle 
• Maths set (added to junior and senior school bags) 
• Scientific calculator (added to senior school bags) 

Our volunteers pack these bags with thought and care as we know that by providing children with the essential tools they need for school we reduce any anxiety around being ill-equipped. We want to ensure that every child starts school as an equal and that any financial struggles are not visible. We also aim to make sure that every child knows that they are not alone, that they matter and that they have the same rights and opportunities to education as others. 

We are lucky to have lots of local supporters who help ensure that this project is successful.  We’re grateful to Jane and Catherine Babbage for their ongoing support of the project, and this year we have also received funding from Trinity Church in Sutton and Croydon Whitgift Rotary.  

The Jigsaw team held a giving event at the end of June, and they were kind enough to share feedback from the grateful recipients. 

This was a huge effort by everyone involved and we are grateful to our supporters, our volunteers and to the team at Jigsaw. If you would like to get involved and join Team Stork, then please visit our volunteering page on our website. 

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On Tuesday 17^th May 2022 we attended the Surrey Choices Celebrating Success Awards at Denbies Wine Estate. These awards highlight the achievements of the young people and adults supported by Surrey Choices and recognise employers and organisations who have created opportunities for their clients to develop their skills.

Surrey Choices provide a range of support services to improve the independence, confidence and life skills of people with a range of disabilities and support needs, whatever their age, in their local community.

It was therefore with great pride that we accepted the ‘Working in Partnership with Employers Award’ alongside Rural Life Living Museum. To be recognised for our work with Surrey Choices means a lot to us and we work hard to ensure that our volunteer experience is as inclusive as possible. The judges commented that:

 

“Stripey Stork are extremely understanding of the needs of disabled and autistic people. People can volunteer when they want, and they make adjustments to allow people to do this. They use visual aids to help volunteers know what tasks to do. The signs are there to ensure no one becomes confused or forgets what to do. The team listens to the needs of each volunteer and comes up with solutions to ensure that everyone can join in. The judges were impressed at how this organisation is seeking to create an inclusive workplace for people of all abilities. They found the use of visual signage particularly inspiring.”

Through our relationship with Surrey Choices, we have been able to match some of their young people to placements with us for work experience and regular volunteering. It has been a pleasure to see how they’ve become involved with our work in the community as well as in the warehouse, contributing to our campaigns with their friends and families. You can read about how Stripey Stork helped Michelle progress to paid employment and how Edward made a difference in his community

Thank you to Surrey Choices for this recognition, and to all our team and volunteers who create the welcoming and supportive atmosphere.

If you are interested in volunteering with Stripey Stork then please visit our website and get in touch, we would love to hear from you.

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On Thursday 23rd June we were delighted to get everyone stripey for Stripes4Stripey again! We celebrate this annual charity event, asking everyone to wear Stripes and donate or fundraise for Stripey Stork.

The money from this campaign is used to buy the new items of clothing that we like to add to the pre-loved clothing packs that we give out all year round, including pants, socks and pyjamas. We feel some items, such as underwear, should be bought new and sometimes buying in bulk offers discounts which are opportunities too good to miss. Our Stripes4Stripey fund means we can take advantage of any deals throughout the year.

Our aim was to raise as much as we could this year and we cannot thank our supporters enough, as their generosity has raised a total of…

Stripes4Stripey fund*

£ 0

* Including offline donations and gift aid.

Don’t worry, if you haven’t yet donated, there’s still time to donate via our Local Giving link. We appreciate your unwavering support and love seeing how enthusiastically you get involved.

Getting the Stripes4Stripey day underway

It’s always fun to kick-start the Stripes4Stripey day with the team and our volunteers showing off their stripes at the warehouse. #TeamStork never fails to go wild and impress with their elaborate range of stripey attire – this year we had stripey dungarees, a stripey necklace, plus t-shirts and socks aplenty!

We especially love to see that our referral partners get into the stripey spirit when they collect from us. The sun was shining on us all week and the day continued to be full of summer vibes.

Curry and Quiz – a test of the best general knowledge

This year we were excited that the day extended into the evening with Reigate Manor hosting a delicious Stripes4Stripey Curry and Quiz night. The atmosphere was amazing, and everyone had a lovely time. Thank you to our Quiz Master Chris and the Reigate Manor team for hosting us, you did a marvellous job. It was a wonderful evening to celebrate and see who knew their movies and their music, their history and geography, plus there was even a stripey category!

Thank you to all the fabulous teams getting involved, including our corporate partners. We were joined by The Belfry, Celtic Contractors, Reigate Grange, Natural Baby Shower, the Mole Valley Family Centre, plus lots of our wonderful volunteers, community supporters and staff. This incredible evening raised over £1,600.

Thank you to everyone who came and supported, and special thanks to the events department Chris and Holly, and the team at Reigate Manor, who really know how to put on a fun evening.

The deserving winners were The Belfry Brainiacs, although it was a tight finish at the top! The Baby Brains commiserated in last place, although they were still smiling all the way to the end and secured themselves the wooden spoon. Although, we have to say the real winner on the night was our supporter Anthea, who took home the biggest teddy bear ever!

Stripes4Stripey fun - the kids get creative with our Art Competition

This year we were delighted to run a special Stripes4Stripey  Art Competition for the children. The task was to create an A4 masterpiece on the topic of ‘Stripey Stork’. We knew the children would have many ideas, so left it a broad topic, open to their imaginations. Would they draw a stripey superhero, create us a new stork logo, or design some new pants?

Our amazing long-term supporters at The Belfry Shopping centre in Redhill helped us create a magnificent wall display to showcase the children’s art. We hope you’ve had a chance to see them on display, they are truly delightful. What budding young artists we have in the community! If you haven’t seen them yet, do pop along whilst they are still there.

The Deputy Mayor of Reigate and Banstead Cllr Rosemary Absalom had the difficult job of judging them on Thursday 30 June, to choose a winner from the two categories, infants and juniors. The lucky winning entrants will receive vouchers from Toy Barnhaus.

• Our lucky infants winner was Emily – The Deputy Mayor loved ‘how accurate her stork was and how she had included a washing line’. Second place went to Thea – The Deputy Mayor loved the inclusion of the baby’s crib in the writing.
• The winner in the juniors category was Rosie. The Judges loved how eye-catching her picture was, with lots of stripes. Second place was awarded to Isla. The Deputy Mayor was really impressed by the details in the picture showing how Stripey Stork help families.

Well done to all the artists who took part! 

Thank you so much for getting involved, there’s more fun activities over in our Kids Corner.

Workplace Stripes4Stripey – in the office and on zoom

Our social media went super stripey, with the teams at LexisNexis Risk Solutions (LNRS) sharing their selfies and photos, whilst donating to our campaign. Some of them changed their profile backgrounds to match creating a super stripey effect!

LNRS once again kindly donated £5 for every member of staff that shared a stripey photo.

Stripey got out of the warehouse to visit the staff at Puzzler, where they were enjoying some wonderful cupcakes.

Stripey continued the morning by visiting our valued supporters at Osborne, where the balloons were up and the fun was in full swing.

Our friends at Celtic Contractors joined in the fun too and it brought us a lot of joy to see the Stripey chicks, Ella and Bella having the time of their lives with two of our favourite young Stork supporters.

There were lots of stripey online team meetings and it was great to see everyone getting involved.

Stripey and the local community

We love to see the kids joining in, and it’s easy as stripes are so much fun. Stripey had the pleasure to see the children at Furzefield Primary. They enjoyed a mufti day and boasted the best collection of stripey socks ever! They looked fabulous.

The Mayor, Cllr Frank Kelly and Deputy Mayor, Cllr Rosemary Absalom and their consort enjoyed a stripey day, sharing their photos for us to see!

Did you see the fabulous stripey skirt that Vicki at George and the Giant Pledge was wearing? That takes some beating, thank you!

We were delighted to hear that the Unison Choir were donning their stripes and collecting at their rehearsal. We are sure you could hear them singing for miles.

Merstham Cricket Club turned their usually white kit to stripes for their Friday night training and raised £55 for our campaign. Thank you.

The 2nd Banstead Brownies unit had a great time completing and earning their charity badge and fundraising for us. They baked delicious cupcakes, and each created a masterpiece for our art competition.

Stripey’s heartfelt thanks

We round up this year’s fun and send our biggest thank you to all our supporters who got involved and helped ensure our Stripes4Stripey campaign was a success. It’s not just every penny that counts, it’s every share, like and save on our social media platforms too – thank you for spreading the word!

Special thanks go to:

• The Belfry Shopping Centre – for showcasing our kids’ competition artwork
• Reigate Manor – for hosting their curry and quiz night
• The Deputy Mayor of Reigate and Banstead, Cllr Rosemary Absalom for judging our art competition
• Love Reigate – for their support and raffle prize
• Crumbs Brewing – for their raffle prize

Our partners:

• Osborne – for getting stripey and donating
• LexisNexis Risk Solutions – for donating £5 for every employee who wore stripes and posted on Twitter/LinkedIn
• Puzzler – for their cake baking and fundraising
• Celtic Contractors – for joining us at the quiz and also donating £250
• Signature @ Reigate Grange
• The Natural Baby Shower – joining in with our fun quiz and getting stripey
• Unison Choir – raising funds at choir practice
• Merstham Cricket Club – for swapping their kit to stripes at training
• 2nd Banstead Brownies – for earning their charity badge for their wonderful art work and cupcake making!
• The Soapy Zebra – for their charity duo bath salt promotion

Local schools, referral and charity partners

• Furzefield Nursery & Primary – for holding a mufti day, raising funds
• Merstham Primary School for raising £120.20
• Welcare – for getting stripey, one support worker even dyed her hair stripey!
• Sals Shoes – for joining in and sharing their stripey fun
• I Choose Freedom – for supporting and joining the fun

See you next year for more stripey fun - the date for your diary is Thursday 22nd June 2023!

If you are interested in supporting our campaigns, there are lots of ways to get involved including volunteering, corporate volunteering, and fundraising. We would love to hear from you: partnerships@stripeystork.org.uk

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This year, a new category had been included – The Charity and Social Enterprise award.  Sponsored by The Surrey Chambers of Commerce, the award recognised  charitable organisations focused on benefiting local people and the area. The criteria that the winning organisation needed to demonstrate were: strong leadership and a capable team, sustainability, clearly outlined social goals and objectives and that they were making a real impact in the local area. We were thrilled to have been nominated, alongside YMCA East Surrey and Active Prosects UK.

When the day arrived, The red carpet was out at Reigate Manor and we were delighted to be able to mingle with other local businesses.

After a delicious 3 course meal, it was time for the Master of Ceremonies Ortis Deley to announce the winners. Drumroll… we won!  It was an honour to be recognised in this way and we are so proud of what we do.

We couldn’t do what we do without our great team and fantastic supporters. . Our volunteers are the heart of Stripey Stork, they have their sleeves rolled up, aprons on and they’re ready to tackle whatever job awaits them – and they always do it with a big smile on their face and a cup of tea nearby!  The following day it was lovely to be able to celebrate back at the warehouse with them – with cake and a glass of non-alcoholic fizz!

If you are interested in volunteering with us and becoming part of Team Stork then find out more about volunteering and please do get in touch.

We’d like to thank Reigate Manor and the organisers for a fantastic evening, and to congratulate everyone who took part.   You can find out more about the Reigate and Banstead Business Awards here

If you are a local company or brand and would like to find out more about how to support Stripey Stork, please visit our website.

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He hasn’t had the easiest start in life, having been diagnosed with a very rare genetic condition which affects his lungs.  It has caused lots of respiratory infections and he has spent a lot of the last seven months in hospital.  He is always connected to an oxygen tank and he is fed via a tube into his stomach for 22 hours of the day.  Every three weeks he spends 3-5 days in hospital receiving intravenous medication to improve the function of his lungs so his Mum and doting Grandma have a busy schedule of hospital appointments and round-the-clock care for this little lad.

J is under the care of the wonderful nurses from the Children’s Hospital at Home team in Croydon, a regular referral partner of ours.  They contacted us to ask whether we were able to provide a cot and bedding bundle for him and tentatively asked if we might have a buggy that could accommodate all his medical equipment.

A very generous donation

As it happens, a few months ago we were contacted by the great people at Bugaboo, who had heard about what we do and wanted to make a product donation.  Bugaboo make award-winning, quality pushchairs so we were thrilled to accept the 39 brand-new Bugaboo Donkey pushchair sets they were keen to share.

Our resident buggy expert, Graham assembled the pushchairs and commented that they were a joy to put together, very simple and great quality.

One of the things that makes Bugaboo pushchairs so practical is the storage they offer which you can see on a Bugaboo Donkey with its luggage basket alongside the seat.  While this is a useful feature for every parent, this storage is ideal for children like J who have essential medical equipment to transport. These pram systems are a great solution but sadly often outside the price range of a family already struggling to balance work with full-time medical care.

It was great to be able to provide one to J and his family with best wishes from Team Stork and his brilliant nurse Jacqui was delighted to collect it.

Working together

We needed some temporary extra space to store the pushchairs, so we contacted our friends at Toy Barnhaus who we partner with for our Christmas campaign, Santa Stork.  They have a warehouse locally and kindly agreed to store the pushchairs for us, delivering them as and when we needed them. Great partnership working and we thank them for their kindness.

We were keen to ensure these pram systems would get to the families who could really benefit, so we worked with our friends at Baby Basics in Englefield Green, The Extra Mile, First Days and Ten Little Toes to fulfil some of their referrals too. Families across Surrey and beyond benefitted from this kindness.

Freedom machine

We were thrilled to be able to provide J’s mum with a brand-new Bugaboo.  His oxygen tank fits neatly into the compartment so they can get out and about.   There is no known cure for J’s condition, but his nurses are hopeful that things may become a bit clearer as he gets older.

Our referral partner got in touch to say that Mum is ‘so appreciative of the Stripey Stork donations and looking forward to the potential for enjoying some fun over the summer when J is well enough to go out in his pushchair.’

His family are doing their best to give him the care-free and fun-filled childhood that all children deserve.   We’d like to say a huge thank you to Bugaboo for playing a part in making this possible.

If you are a company or brand and would like to find out more about how to donate items to Stripey Stork, please visit our website

*(Photo shared with parent’s permission).

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At the start of 2020, we were delighted to be chosen as Reigate Hill Golf Club’s Charity of the Year by the incoming Captains, Kate and Roger.

They invited us along to the Captain’s dinner to tell the members all about Stripey Stork and we enjoyed a fantastic evening.  Reigate Hill Golf Club is set in the beautiful grounds of the Surrey Hills and has a proud history of supporting charities.  We were enthusiastically welcomed by their members, there was a great sense of camaraderie and we heard about their legendary golf events where players raise money for charity by taking part in raffles, auctions and receive fines for rule-breaking!

We had big plans for the partnership, but none of us could have foreseen what would happen next.  Shortly afterwards, the country went into lockdown.

Supporting us through lockdown

When the restrictions came into place, Stripey Stork saw a huge increase in referrals almost overnight.  Many of the families we support live month-to-month and don’t have a financial buffer.  Lots of people who had previously been coping suddenly found that they had their hours cut, were placed on furlough or lost their jobs completely.  They didn’t have the means to buy resources for home-schooling and there were shortages of essentials like nappies and toiletries.

Following government guidelines, we closed our warehouse to volunteers while the core team continued to work away behind our closed shutters, responding to the increased demand.  Unable to accept the pre-loved donations that we usually reply on, we set up a Covid-19 appeal page to enable us to purchase new items.  This was shared with our supporters and our new friends at Reigate Hill enthusiastically supported it, and sent us some lovely messages thanking us for the work we were doing to support the community through this difficult time.

Volunteering

Ladies Captain Kate had previously volunteered at our warehouse, helping out when we moved in.  A fantastic ambassador for us, she encouraged her members to get involved too.

When Jacqui was furloughed from her role in the airline industry, she got in touch to find out how she could help us and ever since that initial contact, Jacqui has been an absolute star – helping out with our campaigns, running errands and when the golf club held fundraising events she made sure she was there with a Stripey Stork T-Shirt, brandishing raffle tickets and a collecting tin!

Another member, Barbara kept herself busy during lockdown by knitting some beautiful baby blankets for us.

Stripes4Stripey 2020

As the world started to open up again, events were able to go ahead in a socially distanced way and Kate and Roger organised a weekend golf event in June in support of Stripes4Stripey.   The weather was terrible, but golfers are a hardy bunch – they turned out in their stripes anyway and enjoyed a fantastic day.

Santa Stork 2020

When we launched our Christmas campaign, Santa Stork, we were able to secure some match-funding meaning that every donation was doubled.  We told Kate and Roger about this great opportunity and once again they shared it with their members, who enthusiastically supported the campaign.

With their help, Santa Stork 2020 was able to distribute 5,168 Christmas gifts to local families after an extremely difficult year.

Captain’s Charity Day and Events

In September the club traditionally holds a Captain’s charity day and the auction is a big draw.  Not ones to be deterred by restrictions, Roger and Kate came up with a virtual auction with some incredible prizes which was a huge success.

As well as supporting our campaigns, we were so impressed with the many creative and fun ideas that Kate and Roger came up with to raise money for us – including “buy a yard” (offering golfers the opportunity to pay to get themselves closer to the hole), a sock and ball sweep (with stripey socks, of course) as well as numerous raffles and golfing competitions.

Networking

In March 2021, we were contacted by the Ladies’ Captain at Reigate Heath Golf Club who wanted to support us as her charity for the year.  We introduced her to Kate and these two lovely ladies were able to share their insights and fundraising ideas, and of course they managed a game of golf or two along the way!

Extending the partnership

We were thrilled to hear that due to the disruptions from Covid, Kate and Roger had chosen to extend our partnership for a further year.

Run Reigate 2021

In September a group of took part in Run Reigate.  Kate led the way with her characteristic drive, winning the accolade of fastest lady in her category!

Santa Stork 2021

In November 2021 we undertook our biggest Santa Stork yet and we were thrilled that the ladies came to help at Santa Stork HQ, becoming Elves for the day and meeting the Mayor.

Bringing their A Game!

In March 2022, 2 years after the partnership started, Kate and Roger invited our partnerships Manager along to the Captain’s dinner once more and presented her with a cheque for £17,170.63!

Partnerships like this one are so valuable to us – as well as raising much-needed funds to support our valuable work, they help to raise awareness of what we do.  We are grateful to the members of Reigate Hill Golf Club for their enthusiastic support throughout the two years and we’d like to say a special TeamStork Thank you to Kate and Roger for all their hard work.  They certainly brought their A Game!

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Most of the families will arrive with just a few belongings that they were able to fit into a small bag. A terribly sad situation and we have been told that 90% of the refugees are women with children.  Having left all their familiar belongings behind, they will need clothing, bedding, cots, buggies, equipment, toys and books.

Our community generously responded – so many of you got in touch to ask how you could help and donated items from our wishlist, as well as donating to our appeal page to enable us to buy things we need to complement the packs of pre-loved items that we give out.

Helping our first host families

Our first host family got in touch to say that they were expecting a mum and her 2-year-old daughter, Veronika.

When they came to the warehouse to collect the items they needed, little Veronika stole our hearts!  We had prepared clothes, shoes, toys, a high chair, bed guard, potty training kit, nappies and toiletries for them. We really wanted Veronika to be able to also pick her own toy. We showed her upstairs to our toy section and couldn’t believe our eyes when she picked out a doll exactly like the one she had to leave behind. This was such a special moment and there was not a dry eye around.

We cannot begin to comprehend what Veronika and her family are going through but to have been able to put a smile on her face and make life a bit easier for mum and the host family is just priceless

Stripey Stork in the news

This story really touched us and we wanted to share it with our supporters. There was lots of interest in Veronika and the work we are doing to support Ukrainian families arriving in Surrey and the story was picked up by national news outlets.

Our CEO and Founder Nicola was interviewed on BBC Breakfast news – available to view on our YouTube Channel. The story was so popular that it was the third most viewed story on the BBC website.

It was lovely to be able to share details about helping little Veronika, and to explain more about the work that Stripey Stork does all year round.

How you can help

The coverage has generated many messages and we really appreciate every offer of support.   Over 700 families have now been matched across Surrey so we’re expecting an increase in referrals over the next few weeks.   Our volunteers have worked hard to make sure we are ready – our warehouse is well stocked and we’re delighted to be able to help.  If you would like to help, there are several ways to do so including making a donation to the appeal page, donating items on our wishlist, volunteering or organising a fundraiser.

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