The Great Big Belle Isle Breakfast … day 2 of The Great Big Walk
Health for All proudly hosted Team Scotland in their Great Big Walk at Belle Isle Family Centre on Tuesday 29 May 2017. They are walking all the way from Batley to Scotland in partnership with the Eden Communities Project and the Jo Cox foundation.
The walkers, Josh The Tartan Explorer and Selina Hayles founder of Refuweegie have taken on this massive challenge in order to shine a light on some of the fabulous community projects and meet some of the ‘powerfully ordinary people’, doing extraordinary things for their communities and chose to come and visit the team at Belle Isle Family Centre!
TV Presenter Charlie Webster came along and was delighted to meet the families, saying about the centre:
“It’s so important to have family centres like this … this one is remarkable, you can feel the buzz and the atmosphere from everyone coming together.”
Josh added: “This is really what it’s all about, meeting the real people in the UK who are doing amazing work in communities.”
Health for All were delighted to support the event and invited along some of the groups based here at the centre to meet the walkers, share their stories and offer their support. As always, it was a real family affair, we had dads and their children from the Young Dad’s group, representatives young and old from the Chinese Family Group and families representing Blossom our kinship care group.
It was an amazing morning with lots of different ages and cultures coming together under one roof, cooking the walkers and their support team a delicious breakfast including full English and traditional Chinese dumplings and sweet rice balls, making banners and messages of support and evening doing a bit of singing to welcome them to the centre! The TeenSpirit Girls Group also prepared and baked delicious homemade flapjacks for walkers to take on their journey which went down a treat!
Health for All staff members Gayle, Tom, Amy and Sharon joined the walkers on their walk from Leeds to Otley to tell them a bit more about the work they do in the community and offer them our support. Sharon has recently started walking to and from work and set herself a personal challenge of walking 5 miles with the walkers, but surprised herself by competing the full 16 miles! We are all so proud of her!
She says “If I can do it, anyone can do it! It doesn’t have to be miles and miles, even 10 minutes round the block in the fresh air, so good to clear your head!”
On the walk Josh, a suicide survivor who has made it his mission to raise awareness about mental health issues, truly believes in the benefits of exercise for a healthy body and healthy mind. He says how much it has helped him to maintain positive mental health and was really interested to find out about the free walking group that Gayle runs on Wednesdays in Middleton saying:
“That’s what it’s all about, not just the exercise but meeting people in the local community and getting support and companionship from each other, that’s how people get fitter and communities get stronger”.
Selina added:
“Team Scotland are walking from Batley to Scotland and on our first little leg we walked to Belle Isle Family Centre and they welcomed us amazingly. Thank you so much to the young dads who made us the most phenomenal breakfast; to the teen girls who made us the flapjacks with cashew nuts and marshmallows apparently – amazing. We loved spending time at the centre, it’s exactly what this is all about, community, getting together and seeing what we are capable of. Thank you so much for having us, we’ve loved it!”
Fancy getting out for a walk but don’t fancy going alone? Join our walking group! Details below.
The Great Big Walk is linked to another amazing Eden Projects – The Big Lunch and the Great Get Together, which aim to bring people together in communities to share a cuppa and some food and get to know each other! Health for All staff will be supporting The Great Get Together in honour of Jo Cox at the Dewsbury Road One Stop Centre on Saturday 17 June 1-4pm. Come along to this free event! Free food, excellent entertainment and new friends!
Join us at our regular events:
Saturday Dads Group and Tuesday Dads and Lads Social – for more info contact Tom Senior on 0113 277 4819
Middleton Walking Group meets every Wednesday at 2pm at the Post Office in Middelton contact Gayle Graham for more info: 0113 270 6903
Blossom Kinship Care Group meet Mondays 4-6pm at Belle Isle Family Centre- contact Kam Benton on 0113 270 6903
TeenSpirit Girls Group meets at Belle isle Family Centre on Thursdays 4-5.30pm – contact Farhat Hussain
Chinese Families Group- contact Hua Liu at Beeston Village Community Centre 0113 271 7231
This post was written by Amy Clelland using our Create an article for South Leeds Life page.
