Lockdown salt dough keepsakes

We have seen that so many of you have been busy creating rainbow pictures/paintings and crafts in honour of our NHS and keyworkers. This is such a difficult time for so many people, including our children. Why not use this easy salt dough recipe at home to create a keepsake for your child/children to remember this strange time of ‘staying at home’?  Just dry the dough out overnight or pop in to the oven on a low setting for a couple of hours before you decorate them. Please tag us on our Facebook page if you take part and we will share your creations…let’s brighten up Bromyard and the surrounds with even more rainbows!

Due to the current Covid-19 outbreak, we have had to make some changes to our services. We have tried our best to remain partially open but this is no longer a possibility. Most staff are currently now not working and so for more details please see below.

Early Years:

As of Wednesday 1st April 2020, our EY provision will be suspended due to the current Covid-19 outbreak. Like many other providers and businesses, it has proved financially impossible for us to stay open. We have taken this step to safeguard the future of the provision and be able to open up again quickly for the families and children in the future with the same team of the staff. All EY parents have been sent a letter advising of this via Tapestry.

Bromyard Children’s Centre:

We continue to offer support for children and families in the Bromyard community. Heidi Mulholland continues to deliver this service offering programmes of support where possible and also information and advice and guidance. Regular information and activities will be posted on Facebook so please check out this page and the Hope Fam Sup page. She can be reached via mail at Heidi.mulholland@hopefamilycentre.org.

Child Contact Centre:

Due to the outbreak it is not possible to offer contact sessions to families and children at present. We will update all families when the services and centre are able to reopen. The email for this service is contactcentre@hopefamilycentre.org if you need to get in touch

For all other services and any other information our general info@hopefamilycentre.org email is also still available for enquiries and information and we will do our best to reply as quickly as possible. Our phones are not currently available while the centre is closed. In this new way of working we intend to keep Facebook, Twitter and our website page updated with any new developments that we want to share with you.

All the staff at Hope send our very best wishes to you and the children and families in the community to remain safe and well and look forward to seeing everyone again in the future.

The staff team at Hope will be working from home from Monday 23rd March 2020 until further notice. We have taken measures to make sure families can contact the Early Years, Children’s Centre and Contact Centre teams and details of the numbers to use will be available from Monday. The Centre will be closed from Monday for the foreseeable future.
The Early Years department only will be open between 9 and 4pm daily from next week for children whose parents/carers are key workers.
We appreciate that this will undoubtedly be hard to manage for us all but hope you understand that we must follow guidance and do what we must to minimise the impact upon the community. We hope that all our families and children remain safe and well.
Updates to the situation will be made on our social media platforms and website. If you want to get in touch, however, our email info@hopefamilycentre.org will be operating as normal during office hours.

Department contact number from the 23^rd March 2020

Early Years (During stated opening hours only)
07851 962461

Children’s Centre
07395 959240

Contact Centre
07956 275636

CORONAVIRUS STATEMENT

March 17^th 2020

This statement supersedes the previous March 13^th statement, updated in view of government advice issued on 16^th March.

Owing to the situation we find ourselves in, we fully understand that everyone is potentially worried about the immediate future.

We can assure you that we at the HOPE Centre are doing all we can to keep the setting clean and open.

We will not close until we are forced to, but, with immediate effect, all offsite groups and home visits will cease. Whilst the Centre remains open, we will try to retain as many services as possible. However, the following services and activities are affected:

• Our Bingo, Easter Bunny, Weaning Workshop and Saturday Softplay events are cancelled.
• Baby Massage and Baby Yoga will not run until further notice (check the Baby Brain website for online support).
• Wriggles & Giggles is cancelled until further notice.
• PWP classes with Cathy Williams on Tuesdays will continue for the time being. Cathy will contact you if the situation changes.
• Let’s Play Bounce and Rhyme will not be held at the Halo Centre Library on Friday but will continue in Oscar’s Café if there is demand.
• Baby Let’s Play will continue on Thursdays but without a Health Visitor in attendance.
• Oscar’s Café and Softplay will remain open but we have removed the ball pit for hygiene reasons.

To help us stay open we request that the government guidelines are followed: if you or a member of your household shows any symptoms or have been sent home from school or work, the household must self-isolate for 14 days.

We thank you for your continued support and trust you all stay safe and well.