The Sunshine Club

🍫 CHRISTMAS DONATIONS 🍫

Another successful collection for Summer’s mission completed and delivered…

Thank you so much to all parents who supported Summer’s Christmas Appeal by donating selection boxes for this incredible cause. We appreciate your kindness during this special time of the year 🎄

Thank you once again to all our families! And well done, Summer, you are an inspiration! 🩷

Summer was so excited to be the chosen to receive this amazing harvest collection donation from The Sunshine Club for her Christmas mission, this will go towards helping lots of children and their families over Christmas. Thank you so much to Jackie, Mags and all the children and their families who have donated.
🤶🥰🎄

🥫HARVEST DONATIONS 🥫

Thank you to all children who brought in tins, cans, packets and boxes of non-perishable foods for our Harvest celebrations! We are so grateful for your kindness!

This morning, Mags and Jackie delivered all the goods to Summer’s mission to support 9-year old Summer on her quest to fight poverty and make sure no child is ever left behind. We are so proud to be able to contribute towards such worthy cause! 🤎

✈️ VISIT TO RUNWAY VISITOR PARK ✈️

A throwback to this time last week when the sun was shining and the excitement was bubbling… during our Holiday Club week, we visited the Runway Visitor Park at Manchester Airport.

The day couldn’t have started on a better note when we were stopped by blue light and sirens the second we got off the coach, as a police car came screeching down the road… PC Baldwin greeted the children with a huge smile and a very interesting Q & A that the children engaged in.

Whilst in the park, we got our clipboards out to see if we could spot everything on our Scavenger Hunt; it didn’t take us long to tick off the Control Tower, a Ryanair plane, an airport fire engine, a private jet and lots of other things. We took it in turns to go and see the Concord and find out many interesting facts about it.

After a delicious picnic and a quick ice lolly refreshment, we walked across to see the Ni**od airplane and the Avro museum plane. To finish the day off, it was time for a quick playground visit before heading back to school.

The children and grown-ups had a fantastic day. Roll on the summer holidays when we can plan more exciting adventures again!

🏙️ WHIT HOLIDAY CLUB - Week 2 🏙️

During the second week of our holiday club, we continued our journey ‘Around the World’ and focused on life on the Farm 🐮 in the City 🏙️ and on a Desert Island 🏝️. We also visited the Wild Wild West 🤠 and the Airport 🛫 through lots of amazing activities:

🐷 baking ‘Pigs in Mud’ chocolate cupcakes
🐮 animal face painting and farm animal piñata fun
🌉 recreating the famous Brooklyn Bridge landscape
🌆 going on a scavenger hunt in Altrincham town
🌭 making hot dogs on a BBQ
🪢 creating roping rodeo name art
✈️ plane spotting and recording destinations on the map
🛂 making our own passports
🏴‍☠️ following clues to find Captain Hook’s treasure
🌵 making edible cacti for our snack

On Thursday, we went on a very exciting day trip to Runway Visitor Centre… more on that to follow! 🛄

🏖️ WHIT HOLIDAY CLUB - Week 1 🏖️

This holiday club, we have been determined to make it ‘Around the World’. During the first week we visited the Beach 🏖️ Space 🪐 ventured out into the Jungle 🦁 and into the Mountains ⛰️

As part of the individual themes, the children took part in some fabulous activities:

🏰 team competition in building cardboard sandcastles
🌊 making ocean discovery bottles
👽 designing aliens from planet Mars
💫 artwork of shooting stars and chalk nebulars
🪴 making terrariums with tropical plants
🔍 becoming rainforest explorers at King George’s Pond
🔥 making S’mores on the campfire
🎨 rock art and watercolour mountain scenes painting

On Wednesday, for our space theme, we had an incredible workshop delivered by WonderDome who brought in their very own planetarium into our hall and put on a fantastic show for us all about space. ☄️🪐🚀👩‍🚀🌍

🌲 Holiday Club - BUSHCRAFT & SURVIVAL 🌲

After an incredible week, we certainly finished off on a massive high… on Friday, we ventured out to Into The Wild in Ashley!

We started off our adventure by getting suitably prepared with camouflage painting on our faces! The sun was finally shining for the occasion and having packed our rucksacks with delicious picnic, it was time to go…

After walking down to the woodland, we couldn’t help but start in the fantastic play area, which truly tested our physical abilities… whether it was walking across the wobbly bridge, crossing the bog on the rope bridge, zipping down on the zip line or swinging on the tyres, we loved it all! 🛝

Quick 10 minutes recharching and refuelling in the tipi (whilst enjoying a yummy hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows 🤫) it was time to venture out deeper into the forest where we practised our den building skills… the children worked as a team to carry heavy logs and branches, and this resulted in some wonderful dens and shelters being erected for hedgehogs and other woodland animals 🦔

By this time, we were all starving so we found a cosy spot amongst the trees and tucked into our sandwiches and snacks 🥪

After 4 hours of fun, no one was ready to go home… what an incredible day!

🐣 Holiday Club - NEW LIFE 🐣

Our Thursday’s holiday club was all about observing the changes in the environment that comes with the transition between winter and spring as the children explored new life.

With the weather being a bit more dry (but not less muddy!) we ventured out to King George’s Pond with our fishing nets looking for frog spawn whilst talking about the lifecycle stages of a frog. We saw lots of other animals and minibeasts coming out of their winter hiding in the warmer weather 🐞

The children created some fabulous 3D art of a chick in an egg and explored lifecycles of a frog and butterfly further through using loose parts pieces 🦋

Making the most of the dry weather, we took part in team games in the playground and got very competitive cheering each other on during the obstacle course races 🏃🏼

To recharge our batteries we created some very delicious ‘Hungry Caterpillar’ kebabs which we got to enjoy for our afternoon snack 🍉

🌸 Holiday Club - FLOWER POWER 🌸

On Wednesday, we revisited the wonderful 60’s era through our Flower Power theme and brought out our inner hippies. The children chose some fabulous face paint designs and tattoos!

We took part a large scale flower art using real flowers by making patterns on sheets of paper and created some lovely designs! The children explored their creativity even further through making their own spring flower wreaths to hopefully finally welcome this beautiful season 🌺

Our artistic skills were challenged even further through recreating a watercolour painting on our canvasses; the children painted some fantastic masterpieces to hang up on their bedroom walls! 🖼️

The weather wasn’t on our side as we got a bit wet during our visit to Stamford Park, however, this did not spoil our fun as we played lots parachute games and enjoyed other team games around the park. We saved our picnic until we were safe and dry back in the club! 🥪

🐝 Holiday Club - MINIBEASTS 🐝

Tuesday was all about the little creepy crawlies as we explored all the creatures that come out in the warmer spring weather!

We took part in a team paperchain challenge creating the longest centipedes whilst focusing on working effectively together and delegating tasks 🐛

The children explored their culinary skills through baking ladybird and butterfly cookies which they got to enjoy as a delicious snack after tea 🦋

We got creative whilst designing our very own peg bees and dragonflies, utilising different craft materials to put them together 🐝

But most exciting of all, we welcomed Mags from Creature Ark who delivered a fantastic workshop and taught the children some very interesting facts about the animals that she brought. The children got the chance to hold / stroke Crunchy Nut the snake 🐍 Spinderella and Rose the tarantulas 🕷️ Benjamin the Rabbit 🐇 Beatrice the Hedgehog 🦔 Matilda the tortoise 🐢 and Slytherin the snail 🐌 What an incredible experience for them!

🧘 Holiday Club - SPRING WELL-BEING 🧘

On Monday, we kicked off the first day of our Spring holiday club focusing on well-being.

The children made themselves well and truly at home in our Sunshine Beauty Spa, relaxing with eye masks, giving each other massages, having foot spas and putting on yoghurt and cucumber face masks 🥒

We talked about kindness and and positivity through designing our very own gratitude flowers and affirmation pebbles, where the children got the change to explore their positive traits and what makes them the unique human beings that they are 🌸

The children learnt about looking after our body and feeding it good foods that give us strength and keep us healthy; they made energy balls whilst discussing how foods like that give us slow-releasing energy and why they are good for us 💪🏾

To top it all off, we welcomed Rachael from Balance and Bloom Yoga who delivered a Mindfulness session to all the children, practising breathing, getting into all sorts of different yoga poses and learning about the importance of relaxation 🧘‍♀️

What a fantastic start to our holiday fun!