Each year we have held around 4 or 5 bingos at the hospital and on each occasion had virtually a “full house”.  Our prizes are great and we provide a very friendly welcome to players, regular and new. At Christmas we were very pleased to offer all of our guests a complimentary mulled wine or juice and mince pie to boost the Christmas Spirit before getting down to the numbers and sending home a lot of happy folk laden with hampers and other goodies.

In 2018 and again this year bingos have been very successful and we are now looking forward to the Autumn Bingo in September 2019.  See details under current events. Do join us!

The Friends 5^th Annual Charity Golf Day at Ashley Wood Golf Club was on Friday 14^th June.  Although the rain had been torrential throughout the week, a few light showers did nothing to dampen the spirits of the very generous golfers and the sun finally came out on the 18 teams.  In excess of £2350 was raised to support the Charity’s projects at the Hospital and throughout the local community.  The Charity would like to thank the club for allowing them full use of their fantastic facilities, all of the local businesses that offered sponsorship and prizes, the volunteers who helped organise and run the event and of course the golfers themselves  who were so generous whilst enjoying their day.

The overall winning team this year represented Blandford Taxis and was made up of (Left to right) Jacob Jeal, Brian Dunn, Tommy Duffey and reclining with his Pimms, Charlie Sutton

The winning Ladies team was (left to right) Robine Pope, Val Scott, Vicky Kardas and Sue Gibson, and finally the overall best mixed team was (left to right) Mike Jones, Janet Jones, gill Parsons-Fox and Jim Bird

All of these photos were taken at the 18^th Hole whilst enjoying a drink with our volunteers.

Next year’s event will again be held at Ashely Wood on Friday 19^th June 2020 and team slots can be reserved now.”

2018 was a record breaker of a year for an event that has grown and grown in popularity locally.  The event (including the associated Grand Raffle) generated income of £10,027, resulting in a net profit in the region of £9200.

More importantly, the Autumn Fair takes our charity in to its home town.  Council Members and volunteers received countless compliments on the Fair itself but also, and most importantly, on the work of the charity both in supporting our wonderful community hospital but also the services we are able to provide locally.

To quote one visitor, “Your Fair is the best event in the Corn Exchange all year and we look forward to it every year”!

Many a visitor had to make a return trip to the car or the cashpoint with their bargains and advance Christmas Shopping!

This event is a prime example of teamwork and how important it is amongst the Friends of Blandford Hospital Volunteers.  Over 60 volunteers are involved over 2 days to stage the event and many of those put in countless hours throughout the preceding months gathering and pricing goods. Without that teamwork the event simply wouldn’t happen.  Without a wonderful team, all working so hard and happily together for the cause the charity would simply not be the same.

Next year we do it all again on 19th October. We hope to see you there!

Our Sturminster Shop team really enjoys taking part in the Sturminster Newton Cheese Festival and in 2017 our pop up shop appeared once again.  The weather provided it’s challenges but that didn’t stop our volunteer team and they raised £700 over the weekend. The photo is taken in the sunshine as we opened up on Saturday morning.  It wasn’t quite such a pretty site in the wind, rain and mud of a very challenging Sunday but our volunteers were still smiling and doing their best, in the very best of humour.  Mud washes out after all and the show must go on!

The Friends of Blandford Hospital held their “New to You” Fashion show in The Exchange, Sturminster Newton on Friday 16th March.  The event, organised by a team of volunteers led by Linda Prior, was very well supported and proved to be a most entertaining evening.  Previous volunteer models were joined by some very entertaining debutants to the cat walk to show a wide selection of clothing.  Everything on display had been donated to the Charity’s very successful shops in Barnack Walk, Blandford and Innes Court, Sturminster Newton. The Clothing and accessories, and much more, was on sale after the show and also on the Saturday morning.

Not only was the event a great opportunity to showcase just what the hospital charity shops have on offer every day, it was a very profitable weekend for the charity raising in the region of £1750.  As with all of the Friends of Blandford Hospital events, it would not be possible without the support of a great number of volunteers working as a team and the Charity would like to thank everybody that was involved in so many ways.

We are delighted to say that the Affordable Art Exhibition recently held in our Blandford Forum Charity shop raised an incredible £1427.25.  All the pictures and greetings cards were locally painted and mainly contributed by Joan Capron who is a volunteer in the Charity Shop.  Joan’s work was priced from 30p to £30 so to reach that grand total involved a huge amount of work in so many different styles.

We would like to thank Joan, her friends and volunteer colleagues who made the exhibition such an overwhelming success.  The monies raised will be used to support the valuable work done by the “Friends” to support the hospital and throughout the local community.