Category Archives: Fund Raising

Mini Teslas for Hospitals in the UK

Back in 2019, some Tesla owners in the UK received Mini Teslas as part of a referral program from Tesla. Some owners generously decided to donate those cars to local hospitals. The community of Tesla owners, led by Tesla Owners UK, got together to raise money for more cars. Even Elon Musk got involved with a donation from the Elon foundation and Radio Flyer who produce the cars gave a generous dicount. As the money from the group came in, the Christian Blandford Fund offered to help in order to collect and the manage the funds and claim gift aid on the donations. Will Fealey, the president of Tesla owners UK, joined the CBF as a trustee.

Since then every single children’s hospital in the UK has been offered one  and most have accepted. They are now being used all around the country. ITV ran a story about it this week about one of the many hospitals who are using them…

 

Deryn Harvey from Tesla owners UK has managed the program with impressive efficiency, not only providing the cars but looking after them as they need work over the years.

To quote Deryn – “TOUK have our own repair/refurb facility. Some of the originals are developing faults and Pete Smoothy and Nick Goldring take them into our very own “repair workshop.” Where a hospital has one which is very well used we use the parts and supply a brand new one to the hospital. Here are some ready to go out again.”


The Christian Blandford Fund are delighted to have been able to help and play a small part in this incredible project. We’d like to thank Tesla Owners UK, particularly Will, Deryn, Pete and Nick for not only making this happen but for maintaining the project during the many inevitable ups and downs.

We’d also like to thank all those who donated over the years and RadioFlyer, Elon Musk, and all the incredible NHS staff who helped get the cars onto the wards so they could help make a difference.

Posted in Fund Raising, Things We've Done. Tagged with , , .

Goodbye Brenda

Brenda Trenowden

 
 
Brenda Trenowden and her wonderful husband Mark (Trend) have been one of Peter and Claudia's closest friends since we were all young and fun as new parents in Clapham. They were very loving and supportive all those years ago when Christian was ill, frequently visiting us at The Royal Marsden and St George's, often bringing some delicious soup, and always a bottle of wine. We all remained great friends and they moved to Sevenoaks not long after us, following that well trodden path from Nappy Valley to Kent life.
 
 
While Trend looked after the home and their wonderful kids, Teddy and India, Brenda's career flourished. Brenda believed in her work and her passion led her not only to personal success, but to have genuine influence in the lives of many others. Trend's importance in this success can not be underemphasised, there is a great interview on the BBC i-player where Brenda called Trend, "The chief household officer", and I know how much Brenda depended on Trend's perpetual support.
 
 
 
Brenda has been one of the UK's most prominent diversity champions having been chair of the 30% club from 2015 to 2018. During her tenure, Brenda set the deadline for the campaign's initial aim of women making up 30% of FTSE 100 boards. In 2018 she was awarded a CBE for services to the financial sector and gender equality.
 
Brenda went on to be a partner at PWC, a trustee of The Royal Marsden and the senior independent Director on the England and Wales Cricket Board, I love how this position demonstrates how Brenda could walk the walk and well as talking it!
 
The extraordinary thing is that much of what Brenda achieved, she achieved while coping with a horrible and rare form of cancer which was diagnosed in 2016. While many of us would have folded and reverted into a spiral of self pity, Brenda didn't. She worked, she raised her family, she supported others, she partied and she lived her life. Brenda and Trend chronicled her journey in her blog Brenda won't back down, it remains as a fitting testament to a truly wonderful person.
 
Brenda's influence reached far and wide, but also close to home. Her passion, work ethic and ambition fed through to Teddy and India who, as well as being lovely human beings, are both smart, driven and have achieved excellent academic results.
 
Very few people leave this world inspiring and improving the lives of as many people as Brenda has. We are touched, honoured and humbled that Trend has decided that all donations in lieu of flowers should be given to The Christian Blandford Fund.
 
Thank you Trend, Teddy and India, and thank you Brenda, for fitting so much into an unjustly short number of years.
 
 

Registered Charity number - 1139614

Posted in Blog, Fund Raising. Tagged with .

Incredible gift for James Bond Fans! Only 1000 ever made.

We are very lucky to have been gifted an amazing item by Bob Ford and Greg Williams photography. This is usually a money can't buy item so we have decided to list it on e-bay with 100% of the proceeds going to The Christian Blandford Fund. If you know anybody who would be interested please share it with them. We would also really appreciate it if you could share this on social media as we have 5 days to generate as much interest (and as many bids) as possible. Daniel Craig’s Bond by Greg Williams is a limited edition, money-can’t-buy celebration of Daniel’s incredible 15 year tenure in the role of James Bond, with exclusive photographs (mostly never seen before), spanning from Daniel Craig’s original screen test through to his final poster shoot on No Time To Die. The book represents a comprehensive review of the hundreds of days Greg spent on the James Bond sets and the result is a highly personal and candid insight into Daniel Craig’s portrayal of 007. Limited to 1,000 hand numbered copies and made possible with the support of Omega.   EBAY LINK HERE     
Posted in Fund Raising. Tagged with , , , .

Claudia’s Christmas Fair

Claudia hosted a fantastic Christmas fair yesterday which everybody enjoyed and appears to have been even more successful in fund raising than previous years.
The raffle prizes were bigger and better than ever so we have decided to sell the last few remaining tickets online to allow people who did not attend a chance to win. All the prizes were donated by wonderful supporters which means 100% of the money given will go to the charity.

Donate £20 here to get 5 chances to win one of these amazing prizes - you can donate more for more chances!

  • A luxury beauty hamper From Kat Farmer from Does My Bum Look 40? - worth £1500
  • An incredible unique hand blown glass artwork from the very  talented  Anthony Scala from his impressive Turbulence Collection. Similar pieces fetch £1250 at the Vessel Gallery in Notting Hill.
  • For James Bond fans! - A stunning studio stamped limited  edition Bond print (chosen by the winner from here). This will be signed by the famous photographer Greg Williams who has been the official Bond photographer for all of Daniel Craig’s 15 year tenure. Valued at £550 without the signature. Thank you Bob Ford and Greg Williams for your generosity.
  • A beautiful ladies watch from Swiss brand Frederique Constant worth £750, thank you Mark Robinson and Frederique Constant UK
  • A stunning hand knitted scarf by Chloe Gustard
  • Candle from Space NK
  • Candle from Mint Velvet
  • Champagne from Waitrose
  • Voucher from Sweaty Betty Sevenoaks, thank you to the manager Hazel brown
  • Framed Sevenoaks print by the artist Susie West
  • £50 voucher from The Bull Inn Limpsfield thanks to the manager Danny Parish
  • Voucher from Cryojuvinate, thank you to the managing director Ruth Hyde
  • Archers Express cleaning voucher
  • Cook Sevenoaks voucher
  • SPN fitness Gift Card for 10 free studio classes, thank you to Jaime Cooke
  • Generous gifts from the stall holders on the day including Coco Cuscino La Península use VIP access code - ISKEOM The Square Salon in Riverhead Rock & Lily Moho Jewellery Passionate about Pashminas Nourish by Naomi www.diylampshadekits.co.uk Bella De Luca's fabulous lamp shade kits soon to be available online
Thank you to the wonderful stall holders who came and maintained energy and enthusiasm all day, despite spending all of it on their feet! If you haven't bought raffle tickets yet, please do, we are hoping this will be our most successful raffle ever! You can download hi-res versions of these photos without watermarks here Due to COVID our regular stall holder CrashBangKids was unable to attend the fair.  Lulu has very kindly set up a code CHRISTIANB on her website.  This allows you free postage and gives The CB Fund 10%.
Posted in Blog, Fund Raising. Tagged with , .

Some exciting news from The Christian Blandford Fund

It’s been a busy few months at The CBF. We have been finalising a very exciting project that we have been working on for the last 2 years.
The fabulous news is that we effectuated a new Clinical Psychologist for the teenagers and young adults at The Royal Marsden Hospital .
The psychology team at the hospital provide support for the TYA’s and have seen a huge increase in referrals in the last year, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic.  They were seriously overstretched and did not have the capacity to offer the psychological support that the unfortunate teenagers seriously needed during cancer treatment.
The new member of staff will be part of the outreach program so will help teenagers and young adults at other hospitals in the South East including St George's.
This is not something that The CBF would normally support as we try to avoid financing projects which we feel should be paid for by the NHS. We tend to focus on the extras that are not covered by central government funds. Claudia was the main driver for this project and persuaded the rest of the trustees that, although it is expensive, it very much fits our mandate to improve lives of children and their families during prolonged stays in hospital.
We are delighted that this new resource is now in place and would not have happened without our financial help.
Our contribution of £45,752 will pay for the psychologist for a year. After this time we hope and expect their value to have been demonstrated and the psychologist to be retained through hospital funds.
We have also started to prepare for Claudia's terrific biennial Christmas Fair!
Today we received our first donation for the raffle – a stunning print of The Stag Theatre in Sevenoaks by the artist Susie West.
Susie is an artist who is painting her way around Britain’s cities, towns and villages.  Please do have a look at her website https://www.artistsusiewest.com/ or follow her on Instagram “artistsusiewest”
If you have a local shop and would like to be involved please contact Claudia for further details. Here are a few pictures from the last event.
Posted in Blog, Fund Raising, Things We've Done.

Fully Charged Live – Mini Tesla Appeal

On June 7th, 8th and 9th over 150 Tesla owners from Tesla Owners UK will be collecting further funds that will go towards our Toy Tesla cars for Children's hospice and hospital appeal at Fully Charged Live 2019. To date 160 of these cars have been delivered (at no additional cost to the charity) by the superb volunteers at Tesla Owners UK. For anyone wishing to donate towards this campaign please visit Virgin Money Giving or if you're attending the event please use our new state of the art contactless card donation devices. Or donate via bank transfer: Account Number: 00019565 Sort Code: 40-52-40 Reference: Tesla Cars Payee Name: Christian Blandford Fund If you’re able to help us claim GiftAid please follow these instructions:
  1. Download & fill in the GiftAid form
  2. Save it and forward the completed form to:
  3. peter@christianblandford.com with email subject ‘GiftAid Form’
Posted in Fund Raising.

An amazing 8 year old girl’s initiative to help the environment and raise money for the CBF

Emmy with the money she raised Emmy Pop is at school with Jessica, Christian's sister. She was concerned at the amount of old shoes going to land fill when children grew out of them, often when they were still in good condition, so Emmy had a great idea. Why not collect these shoes and sell them at the school fete? This way she could raise money and do her bit to reduce unnecessary waste. We are delighted to say that Emmy chose The Christian Blandford Fund as a recipient of her fund raising and are absolutely amazed at the initiative and determination that Emmy has shown. Not only did Emmy sell second hand shoes but she wrote to Russell and Bromley who kindly donated 10 pairs of new shoes for her to sell. So far she has raised over £300, thank you Emmy you are a star!
Posted in Fund Raising.

The guy who surprises everybody at that airport piano!

The Blandfords have just returned from holiday and were delighted to find two checks for the Christian Blandford Fund. One from St George's Church in the Weald for £747 and another from LVS Ascot for £743. We would like to particularly thank Luisa Northing and her friends in Coburg House at LVS who took part in a giant cake sale, a 'splat the teacher" event and a student leg wax!

Lu and Christian, many years ago

  While waiting at Geneva Airport for departure, we spotted a piano...  
Posted in Blog, Christian's Story, Fund Raising. Tagged with , , , .

Organic pear juice to benefit The Christian Blandford Fund

Our good friends Robin and Bee have kindly donated their entire production of incredible organic pear juice to benefit The Christian Blandford Fund.

So we now have 550 bottles looking for a good home and we need your help to sell them!

a bargain at 

£10 for 3 bottles 

£18 for 6 bottles

the bottles are a full litre

The pear juice is 100% organic, no pesticides were used on the trees and they have no additives at all. The juice has been lightly pasteurised, which means it will last for 6 months if sealed but other than that, it is as fresh and natural as you can get. The pears were all grown  and cared for locally and harvested by Robin himself and we are very grateful that he and Bee decided to donate the result of all this hard work to The Christian Blandford Fund.

The juice tastes amazing...

  • on it's own or with ice
  • 50:50 with water as a sports drink
  • with gin or vodka as a cocktail!

We need your help, can you help us sell it?

The pear juice is £10 for 3 bottles or £18 for 6, with all the profit after bottling costs going to the Christian Blandford Fund.

Do you think you could sell some for us?

Could you send an email to your kids' class parents group for example?

Any other ideas for places to sell them?

We are planning a prize for the person that sells the most bottles, so please join in the fun and help us sell this incredible and heathy batch of organic pear juice.

Thank you!

Update

The wonderful Fidelity Weston at Romshed Farm will be selling the pear juice for us at their pop up shop on the 1st Dec. The Blandfords buy nearly all of their meat from there and highly recommend it , it is local, organic, ethical, delicious and surprisingly good value when bought in bulk.

If you wish to pick up some juice with your order please tell Fidelity before you pick up, some will be available on the 1st for those who forget!

Romshed farm

Posted in Blog, Fund Raising.

The Greatest Showman Sing Along in Sevenoaks!

THE STAG THEATRE SUNDAY NOVEMBER 4TH 4 – 6.30PM £15 per person, includes: Popcorn and a choice of soft drink (bar open) In aid of the Christian Blandford Fund – raising money to refurbish the children’s ward at St George’s Hospital, Tooting For tickets please contact: Ruth Bussey or Kym Herregods Thank you so much Kym and Ruth for organising this event for the Christian Blandford Fund,  we can't wait to go along and enjoy what promises to be an amazing night!
Claudia, Kim, Leyla and Ruth returning from the CBF triathlon
Posted in Blog, Fund Raising.