Coffee, cake and conversation build community bonds at Aldeburgh House
The individuals supported at Aldeburgh House, in West Mersea, love being an active part of their local community and are always keen to explore new ways to meet and make new friends. That’s why their support team thought it would be a great idea to support them to develop new relationships within the community by organising and hosting a coffee morning at the Women’s Institute, with an open invitation to come along and join in the fun!
Stacey Hayley, Team Leader at Aldeburgh House said, “The people we support enjoy participating in a wide variety of different hobbies and activities, ranging from art and drama, to water sports and walking, so we thought a great way for them to meet people with shared interests would be to approach local community groups and personally invite them to attend.”
We also hand-delivered invitations to our neighbours, which enabled us to introduce ourselves to those we had not yet met and personally invite them to join us. In addition to this, we also invited individuals supported at other Consensus services within East Anglia so that they could increase their social circle and make new links within the community too.”
As the event approached, the team were thrilled to received confirmation from several local people that they were looking forward to attending!
“The people we support were keen to help in any way they could, and we began excitedly preparing homemade cakes and biscuits and decorating the hall so that it looked warm and welcoming,” said Stacey.
“On the day of the coffee morning, we eagerly waited for people to arrive and were delighted when we saw so many people coming in to join us. The tables soon began to fill, and the room was buzzing with conversation and laughter as people got to know one another.”
“It was absolutely fantastic to get such a positive response to our coffee morning from the local community and we were delighted that so many were able to come along. I am so proud of the people we support and the rest of the support team at Aldeburgh House who put in a huge amount of effort to make the event a success. We are really looking forward to keeping in touch with all our new friends and are looking forward to hosting another coffee morning very soon,” Stacey added.