We have had a very blessed few months, praise God for everything he has provided us in 2024.
It costs roughly £37k a year to run Love Dereham and all of its projects, we have been funded by lots of different people and grants in 2024, enabling our work to flourish. 😊 Thank you!

The Community Fridge continues to get between 20 and 35 visitors a day, many of whom are experiencing food insecurity. The volunteers in there work hard collecting food at all times of day, supervising the opening times, sorting through the food, making sure visitors are welcomed and offered free drinks and/or a listening ear if things are getting them down.

We also support people feeling socially isolated which is why we run our lunches, and the December one was thoroughly enjoyed by all. We decorated the hall and hosted a quiz to start with, then 70 guests plus 15 volunteers had a 2 course Christmas dinner cooked and served by the Love Dereham volunteers! Thanks to some funding we'd received, Love Dereham gave each guest a Christmas present of a gift card for coffee and cake in town. Also we are very grateful to DBC for giving us some of the "advent" books to give away to everyone.

Our Christmas Toy project, in partnership with Lidl, gave (new) presents to 73 children within 29 families in our community who were struggling to afford presents for their children. One mum said "Your support during this time was a true blessing. Thank you for your kindness and for being there when I needed help."

Over the last three months we have given out 50 emergency food parcels (in partnership with the local food bank) to support hungry and desperate people on Tues/wed/thurs when the food bank is closed.

We have been distributing "warm packs" to the homeless and people in emergency housing as well as making and disseminating a timetable of all the warm places in town and what day/time they're open and what they provide.
We give all kinds of bespoke support to people who come through our door. If you are interested in volunteering, or need some help yourself just send me a quick email and we'll see what we can do.
Athena Poole, Coordinator. athena@lovedereham.org.uk 07749 687 981
Please be aware: the epicenter of our charitable work is the town of Dereham in Norfolk, and we reach as far as the village of Swanton Morley to the north; Honingham to the East; Shipdham to the south and Little Fransham to the west. We do not accept requests for help outside of this. Thank you. However, you can use any community fridge, no matter where you live. So please come along to ours and see what you can make use off.
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