Befriending Our Neighbours at Home

Everyone needs a friend, and Penny Appeal at Home has been there to spread friendship and joy to sick children and the elderly since 2016! Our staff and volunteers are committed to making sure no one feels left out of the community, and that our neighbours know they have a friend in us.

If you’d like to bring similes to children in hospital or have a friendly chat with an older person living in a care home, sign up today to be a Team Orange volunteer at home!

Our Care Home Work

Working with older people is an important programme for Penny Appeal at Home because thousands of elderly people throughout the UK unfortunately experience loneliness and have been cut off from society, especially those over the age of 75. Without the aid of community programmes, such as ours, older people’s quality of life has the possibility of gradually getting worse over time due to loneliness and social isolation.

Through our work with the elderly, we want to help alleviate the factors that cause loneliness and social isolation by hosting tea parties at care homes for the residents. We provide them with tea, cakes and biscuits, as well as engaging in conversations with residents with the help of our Team Orange volunteers.

We’ve worked with care homes in Rochdale, Leeds, Wakefield and Sheffield, providing a helping hand, good company and a listening ear to all those who attend our tea parties. We also provide residents at the care homes with some sort of entertainment to lift moral and spirits and create an uplifting and enriching environment during our visit.

Penny Pals

Penny Pals is our pen pal programme for the elderly that allows older people living in isolation due to the coronavirus pandemic to reach out and engage with people in the community through letter writing and email exchange. We’re combating isolation by bringing older people together with others that have mutual interests, hobbies or that are just looking to be a friend.

Our Penny Pals programme is completely free, and guaranteed to bring a smile to an older person’s face. Letters are exchanged at least twice monthly, giving our Penny Pals plenty of time to get to know each other.

Age UK has reported that 17% of older people said they are in contact with family, friends or neighbours less than once a week and that 11% said contact is as infrequent as less than once a month. Be becoming a Penny Pal, you could help alleviate loneliness for an elderly person in our community and be a real friend to someone in need.

If you’re interested in writing letters to an elderly person or are interested in becoming a recipient, then please fill out an application form below! If you have any further questions about this programme please reach out to [email protected]

Click the name of form you would like to fill in, Recipient Form or Volunteers Form.

Gifts for Children

Penny Appeal at Home and our volunteers regularly deliver toys and presents to children and young adults in the community. From visiting sick children in hospitals and hospices, such as The Royal London Hospital, to delivering Eid gift at hostels and women’s shelters in Birmingham, we’re committed to spreading cheer to children!

Our visits to the children’s wards are either full day or half days, and each volunteer spends time walking through the wards, visiting all the children there. In addition to distributing gifts to the children, we also make sure that entertainment is provided for these brave young people.

In 2020, we worked together with Birmingham Women’s Aid to bring presents to women and children who had fled domestic abuse as part of our Winter Emergency campaign. We deliver gifts every winter, and each Eid, to make sure that children and young adults feel the love of the season. Recently, we have also been working to deliver COVID-19 support gifts in addition to the food and hygiene packs we distribute in order to keep spirits high throughout the pandemic.

If you’d like to make a donation towards gifts for the children, they would be over the moon! You can donate online now or if you’d like to hand pick the toys out yourself please contact [email protected] to get in touch.

'Thank you so much Penny Appeal for their amazingly generous donation! The gifts will be very appreciated by our patients, especially at this time of the year when children should be on their holidays and celebrating the festive period.

These gifts spread so much joy and we couldn’t do it without the support of donations like these. Thank you for your continued support Penny Appeal, Happy Holidays!'

Lucy Wootton, Clinical Lead - The Royal London Hospital