mhs homes help box up goods for Blythswood Care

Eleven members of staff from the mhs homes Supported Housing team helped sort and pack boxes of jumpers and wellies for Blythswood Care as part of the housing associations Day for Medway scheme.

Staff from mhs homes sheltered schemes and young persons foyers joined forces for one day to help Volunteers of Blythswood Care pack donated items into boxes to be shipped as a special project to flood related areas such as Serbia, Kosovo and Albania.

Jill Pinter, mhs homes Key Support Worker helped coordinate the day. She said, “I’ve volunteered at Blythswood Care before for the shoebox appeal and think the charity do an amazing job. Our Day for Medway Scheme provided the perfect opportunity for a group of us to volunteer our time to help. We’ve worked on a rota basis so everyone can get involved if they want and still provide cover for our sheltered schemes and foyers. We also ran an appeal at work for staff to donate woollies and wellies and were over the moon with the response we got. It’s been a really worthwhile experience seeing exactly what happens with everyone’s donations and speaking to the volunteers who do a fantastic job.”

Blythswood Care Volunteer, Ray Avenell said, “Having the help of the mhs homes staff has been great. They’ve sorted and packed all sorts of donated items which means we can get items like clothing to people who really need it more quickly. The faster we fill the pallets with the boxes of donated items the quicker we can get the lorries out to countries that really need our help.”

The community driven initiative “A Day for Medway” enables staff of mhs homes to join forces with local community groups and projects for one whole day to give staff a wider knowledge and experience of local projects and to give charities and organisers who really need it a day of help, totally free of charge. The projects can range from building repairs to helping out with reading classes at schools; doing odd jobs for the elderly, helping with administration work or fundraising for local charities.

(November 2011)