OPAL Services

Farndon Food for Thought celebrated Great British Pea Week! What do you mean you’ve never heard of it?! They had a (slightly silly!) Pea themed quiz and a delicious pea-inspired dish from volunteer Sue; gnocchi with Pea, spinach and pesto and a crème fraiche sauce – some members had never had gnocchi before and everyone had seconds! Fliss made a very unusual cake … Pea and Vanilla… all the members agreed it was lovely

We had a great time getting in to the spirit of Wimbledon at the club! We played our own game of balloon tennis (which got a bit competitive!). It wouldn't be Wimbledon without some fresh strawberries and cream would it?

Our carers group had a wonderful day out on board the train, with entertainment from The Time Bandits. Followed by lunch in the pub! A wonderful day and a great turn out!

Our Food for Thought groups have been reminiscing about favourite recipes. It was fascinating to see a recipe book belonging to one of the members mothers from when she got married, it must be over 100 years old!

We have enjoyed eating lots of cake this month and saying a massive THANK YOU to all of our wonderful volunteers. Without the support and dedication of each and every one of them we wouldn’t be able to do what we do! Thank you all! 💖

HAVE YOU GOT YOUR TICKETS YET?
The last few tickets are still for sale for the amazing Decibellas concert on Saturday!
Tickets are still available on the website www.decibellas.co.uk/boxoffice or from Stitch on Tarporley High Street. We hope to see you there!

Here are the dates for our GoOnline sessions throughout July. There is no need to book, you can just drop in. 💻💿📱

⭐️⭐️Its our lotto-versary today ⭐️⭐️

Our weekly fundraising lottery has been running for 3 years today!

In 3 years, our supporters have raised a staggering £3871 for OPAL.
Our lucky winners have won over £1878 between them, £725 of this has been very kindly donated back to OPAL.

That's a total of over £4,500!!! All of which goes straight into helping to reduce social isolation for older people across rural West Cheshire!

So a massive thank you to each and every supporter who buys a ticket each week!
👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

If you'd like to support OPAL, tickets cost just £1 and 50p of every ticket goes to OPAL.
One of our lucky supporters wins a cash prize each week too (the more tickets the higher the prize!). Every ticket is also in with a chance to win the national prize jackpot of £25,000 !!!

Click on the link to get your tickets today!

https://www.onelottery.co.uk/support/opal-services

July has some great activities for the carers and their cared for person. Get in touch with [email protected] if you would like to find out more!

Would you like to join us at the wonderful Decibellas concert on 13th July?
You can purchase tickets from www.decibellas.co.uk/boxoffice or from Stitch on Tarporley High Street.
Decibellas will kindly be having a cash collection to support OPAL too.

Our Tattenhall members have been beavering away over the last month. Tattenhall OPAL club have entered 3 different art projects with the theme of “green” for the village display in July and August around the village. We hope you will be able to see them displayed!

This week we have GoOnline Drop-In Sessions on Wednesday at St. Philips Church in Kelsall 10am-12pm. On Friday we will be at Helsby Methodist Church 10am-12pm. We hope to see you there.

Tarporley enjoyed celebrating D-Day and reliving a lot of memories that our members had. We measured out ration and discussed meals that were cooked but luckily the menu was just a joke as there was uproar at lunch time. We even got an aptly timed (unplanned) flyover!

D-Day celebrations meant a lot to many of our members who have a lot of memories from the time and who lost family members. Frodsham group were treated to fish and chips from Frodsham Town Council, this was a war time favourite that wasn't rationed. Thank you for this special treat! Thank you also to Valerie and Lynn for coming to sing!

JOIN US AT OUR GOONLINE DROP IN SESSIONS! This week we are in Malpas on Wednesday at The Victoria Jubilee Hall from 10am-12pm. On Thursday we will be at The Lounge at Oakmere from 10am-12pm. There is no need to book, just pop in!

JOIN US IN FRODSHAM! We have our GoOnline session in St Laurence Parish Hall, Frodsham tomorrow (Thursday). Drop in between 10am and 12pm for help with anything digital!

We always love a four legged visitor. We certainly enjoyed spending some time with Purdy the puppy in training and Mike. A big thank you to Frances from Guide Dogs for bringing them to visit us! 🐾

😃Make someone smile this summer!😃

At OPAL our aim is to reduce social isolation in older people.

We are looking for volunteers to support our popular home befriending service - Good Neighbour.

No experience is necessary, we care a lot more about a smile and a desire to help others.

Contact [email protected] 07592 464856 to find out more

If you or someone you know needs help with anything IT related you can pop in to one of our GoOnline sessions… These sessions are Drop-In so there is no need to book! Tomorrow (Thursday) we will be at The Lounge & Kitchen at Oakmere from 10am-12pm

🥳Volunteers’ Week 2024 !🥳

From all the staff and trustees at OPAL we’d like to say a heartfelt thank you to every single one of our 200 volunteers.
You are all absolutely amazing.

We’re looking forward to seeing you all at our celebrations at the different services throughout June and July.

Happy Volunteers’ Week !

We have a great line up of events for our carers and cared for members throughout June. If you would like to attend any of these contact [email protected]

We have an exciting opportunity to join our fantastic team as a Carer Support Organiser.

This service provides unpaid carers with regular social opportunities to meet other unpaid carers in similar situations. They also co-ordinate a team of volunteers to visit older people in their own homes.

Get in touch to find out more information and an application pack.

Closing date for applications Monday June 10th, 5pm

https://www.opalservices.org.uk/staffvacancies/

We have an exciting opportunity to join our fantastic team as a Good Neighbour Organiser.

Our Good Neighbour project helps physically and/or mentally frail older people, who are socially isolated.

This is achieved through linking them with local volunteers and organising social visits, trips out, shopping or lifts to a medical appointments (to name a few).

Closing date for applications Monday June 10th, 5pm.

https://www.opalservices.org.uk/staffvacancies/

Our wonderful volunteer Emma created this lovely spring flower craft activity for the members. The colourful flowers put a massive smile on everyone’s face! 🌸🌺💐

Do you fancy a chance at winning some money and supporting our charity at the same time?
You can join our lottery here… https://www.onelottery.co.uk/support/opal-services

Tarporley club enjoyed a special treat of fish and chips for lunch! We also had a great time making each other newspaper hats from the newspaper table cloths! We are urgently looking for volunteers to support our clubs! Please contact [email protected] if you can spare some time to volunteer.

REMINDER: We will be at the Manley Knoll Open Garden event THIS SUNDAY 19TH MAY. We would love it if you could join us for a look around the wonderful gardens and support our tea and plant stall. Open from 12-5pm.

Do you need help using a computer, tablet or mobile phone? OPAL Go Online will be at Malpas Victoria Jubilee Hall from 10am-12pm today (15th May). Feel free to drop in, no pre booking required.

If we can't take you to Australia, we will bring Australia to you! Our volunteers at the Frodsham club arranged an Australian themed session. They had a didgeridoo, flags, souvenirs, a talk about aboriginal art and the state flowers! It looks like a lot of fun was had!

We would like to say a massive thank you to Mark Holden from Barlows who kindly donated a microphone and amplifier to help those members who struggle to hear. It has helped everyone to hear Alison announcing that lunch is served! A thank you also to the volunteers who arranged this, along with all the other wonderful things they do to help!