Godfrey Care services have been getting into the festive spirit with various Christmas activities with the homes and outside. The staff and residents have enjoyed getting the homes looking like Lapland as everyone has worked hard in the run up to the big day! 

Never passing by an opportunity to get the Christmas jumpers out residents from both homes had the chance to get together and spend a lovely day enjoying each other’s company and take part in festive activities, which proved a big hit for all! 

We also arranged for a Santa’s breakfast day out for residents to get the chance to see the big man himself and ask him directly for their Christmas wishes this year. This did prove to be challenging for him with how busy he was but he made an exception and came out to see us and have breakfast with residents which went down a treat! 

We want to wish you all a happy Christmas and look forward to the New Year!

At Godfrey Barnes Care, supporting our residents to take steps towards more independent living and being involved in their local community is one of the most rewarding aspects of what we aim to do. The path to this is not always smooth and there are usually some bumps along the way, which makes the sense of achievement even more so when individuals take these big strides in getting towards achieving greater independence.

In our newly opened service, Ashby House one resident MM showed an interest in getting a job. The team at the home worked with MM to look at what possibilities there were in the local area and made contact with several shops and made appointments to go and see them with MM. MM showed a particular interest in a local charity shop called Sense in Burton on Trent town centre. Since the beginning of September MM has been volunteering there for 3 days a week helping sort and display items for sale in the charity shop.

MM said “I really like helping in the shop and enjoy meeting all the new people that come in”.

At Godfrey Barnes Care we help all our residents get the opportunity to participate and make positive contributions to the community they live in and that this is an integral part of each individuals dignity. Maintaining contact with families and having opportunities to meet new people to form lasting relationships is therefore an important part of ensuring each resident being socially inclusive in their own communities. Promoting social inclusion in turn also goes a long way to promoting equal opportunities and eliminating discrimination, whilst promoting equality and diversity in our communities.

To help facilitate this we held an open day at Field House with a BBQ and many outdoor activities on the 22 of August for other service providers and their residents in the local area to attend and share resources. The day was an outstanding success with a lot of positive feedback and many other service providers looking to do similar days in the forthcoming months.

Godfrey Barnes Care is delighted to announce Ashby House has opened. With our commitment to the local community within Staffordshire and the success we have seen at our founding home Field House, this steps marks a milestone in our groups ambition to role out high quality care in our local community. The 6 bed residential home is within walking distance of Burton on Trent town centre and has access to the picturesque countryside surrounding the home. The new homes manager Sarah Lycett has an extensive background of leading successful teams providing care for residents with a learning disability. The service will employ in excess of 25 full time staff who will all be trained in specialist NAPPI techniques  as well as having specialist training in Autism and Epilepsy that will ensure they can offer positive influences on each service user and minimise the levels and frequencies of challenging behaviour.

To mark this milestone day we held a open day that was attended by members of the local community and also the Mayor of East Staffordshire Chris Smith and his wife the Mayoress Jane Smith to help with the cutting of the ribbon ceremony. It was a brilliant day enjoyed by all and marked with great weather and food that allowed everyone to take full advantage of Ashby House’s wonderful garden settings.

We are really proud of the team work and effort by all involved in the design and build process and a huge thank you goes out to the whole team for all the hard work and passion shown to get this house looking like the home it will be in the future! Our next steps will now to be working with the professionals from the local authority team and identifying people that would benefit from the extensive knowledge and services that we will be providing at Ashby House.

We were delighted when two of Field House’s service users went to watch a celebrity football match in aid of BACT (Burton Albion Community Trust). Soap stars, TV favourites and pop artists were among the celebrities who played in the special challenge match at the home of Burton Albion where the two sides where captained by non-other than Calum Best and Jake Wood. Both EL and DJ had a fantastic day out in the sun and got to watch many recognisable stars provide an afternoons worth of sporting entertainment. In addition to the entertainment provided for the afternoon these kind of meaningful activities play a massive part of what we do at Godfrey Barnes Care in laying the foundation for service users to take real steps in becoming more independent and have a greater stake in their local communities. Additionally the confidence this helps develop will be crucial in allowing service users to take strides in more independent futures that they aspire towards.