Tag: LifeCare

Warm Space weekends at LifeCare

In response to the rising cost of living, thanks to funding from The Edinburgh Wellbeing Pact ‘Coorie in for Winter’ fund, LifeCare is opening a Warm Space for the community this winter.

We will be welcoming people to join us in our cosy cafe space at the LifeCare Centre in Stockbridge on Saturdays and Sundays between 3.30pm and 6.30pm. We will be offering free soup and hot drinks as well as board games and books to enjoy.

Everyone is welcome, just drop in.

LifeCare launches Winter Warmer appeal to support local older people

Stockbridge charity urgently needs funds to keep people warm and well this winter

LifeCare Edinburgh has launched an urgent appeal to raise vital funds to support older people living across the city this winter.  The renowned charity, which turned 80 last year, provides positive care for hundreds of local people but is struggling to cope with the increasing demand for its services. 

LifeCare’s personal and practical services include registered outreach and day-clubs, help at home, meals on wheels, unpaid carers support, and companionship activities. 

The charity runs a busy community hub and café on Cheyne Street in Stockbridge with all profits going directly to the running of its services.  Through its relationship-based approach the charity supports those living with dementia, isolation, reduced mobilities, mental health concerns, and those struggling on low-incomes. 

With over 85% of clients living alone, services enable each older person to live well and independently in their own homes for as long as possible.

Through the ‘Winter Warmer’ campaign LifeCare will extend its services this winter.   This will include setting up their community café as a welcoming ‘warm space’ offering free warmth, hot food, companionship, and activities to those that need it across weekends, but the charity needs support to offer this care.            

The organisation is calling on everyone, from individuals to local businesses, to join their appeal and give a donation to help deliver care to those that need it most this winter.

James Wells, Chief Executive of LifeCare said: “We are extremely worried about those in our community.  The cold, dark months are always difficult, and this year, with rising food and fuel costs, it will be devastating for many.

“Older people are still coming to terms with the aftermath of the covid restrictions; abilities and mobility deteriorated rapidly and enquiries for our help are rising, up 250% in some services. 

“Now hit by the cost-of-living crisis these same people, who are just regaining the confidence and motivation to get back to their communities, can’t afford to take part in activities or meet friends for food/drink.  On top of the ‘heat or eat’ dilemma they face this winter they are also at risk of serious social isolation.

“LifeCare has a long history of supporting and empowering older people to live life to the full, but as a charity we rely on donations to enable us to deliver our lifesaving and life-affirming services. 

” Thanks to our care, we will ensure that each older person receives the support they need.  We will make sure they are warm in their homes, they eat well, have company to look forward to and are able to get out and about to activities safely. 

“We are asking local people and businesses to consider giving a one-off or regular gift to our Winter Warmer appeal.  With support, LifeCare can deliver the positive care older people need to ensure they keep warm and well in body and mind.

“There are different ways people can help support.  One-off and regular donations can be made on our website or alternatively people can come along to our community café to pledge their support.  Even choosing to have your coffee or lunch from our café will help us to deliver the care local older people need.”

For more information about LifeCare’s services visit https://www.lifecare-edinburgh.org.uk/ or call 0131 343 0940 to chat with the friendly team.

Local projects hit the Lottery jackpot

Drylaw Neighbourhood Centre, Granton Youth and LifeCare are among today’s big winners

Over £11 million of National Lottery funding will help to keep vital local facilities and services running across Scotland, as 299 community projects today (Tuesday 1 November) share in share in grants from The National Lottery Community Fund.

The funding, made possible by National Lottery players, means that many community and voluntary sector groups will be able to continue their support to individuals, families and communities who have been disproportionately affected by increased cost-of-living pressures. 

Drylaw Neighbourhood Centre is one of the recipients announced today. Drylaw Community Association, the voluntary organisation that oversees the centre, has been awarded £94,000.

The windfall is welcome news for the cash-strapped organisation, which earlier this year was facing closure due to a funding crisis.

This grant will fund a variety of community activities within Drylaw which community members can engage with. This project will support 1650 community members and provide 150 volunteering opportunities for the local community over two years.

Granton Youth, currently based at Royston Wardieburn Community Centre, has been awarded nearly £128,000. The group will use the funding to work with 60 young parents and parents of teenagers within the North West of Edinburgh.

This project will also provide fifteen volunteer opportunities through the work of the
project. A range of support will be provided to parents and families which will consist of one to one support, group work sessions/workshops, counselling and family mediation.

Another youth organisation celebrating today is The Junction, who receive almost £150,000.

The Leith group will use the funding to provide a counselling service for young people aged 12 to 21 years, reaching 250 young people, supported by 30 volunteers.

There’s welcome news for North Edinburgh’s older people, too. LifeCare has been awarded over £180,000.

The Stockbridge-based organisation celebrated it’s 80th birthday last year and will continue providing support to isolated older people within Edinburgh by matching people over 60 years (known as VIPs) to volunteers with shared interests, creating friendships and improving wellbeing.

Group activities at LifeCare include a choir group ‘ Vocal Vibes, a Film Group, a Sewing Bee, and Bingo.

Over three years the project will support 420 older people and 450 volunteers.

Lothian Centre for Inclusive Living (LCiL) was established in 1991 to help disabled people to live independently and take control of their lives.

For over 30 years the organisation has provided independent advice, advocacy and support to disabled people and an award of £131,306 means this service will continue for another three years.

Callum Odgen, Disability Information Services Co-ordinator, LCiL, said:” This funding will allow us to build on our successful services and do more to support disabled people, people with long-term conditions and older people to live independently, access essential services and maximise their income through comprehensive advice and support.

“With the cost-of-living crisis adding to the existing social and financial impact of COVID-19 felt by people across Scotland, this award will help ensure that we continue to be at the forefront of providing support to those who need it in Edinburgh and the Lothians.”

Other big winners are The Welcoming Association (£140,000), Grassmarket Community Project (£80,000) and ACE IT (£198,000), while other local projects to receive small grants include Friends of Granton Castle Walled Garden, who receive £9999, Citadel Arts Group (£6600) and bereavement charity Held in our Hearts, who receive £4126.

Announcing the funding, Kate Still, Scotland Chair, The National Lottery Community Fund said: “This latest round of funding is one of the ways we are directing our National Lottery funding to support people and communities facing difficult circumstances.

“Our message to community groups across Scotland is that we are here for you and our role, as a funder, is to continue to listen and to be flexible and responsive to the challenges and pressures you are facing.

“It’s all thanks to National Lottery players that we are able to help give charities and community groups throughout Scotland greater certainty during this critical time.”

The National Lottery Community Fund distributes funding on behalf of National Lottery players who raise more than £30 million each week for good causes throughout the UK. 

To find out more visit www.TNLCommunityFund.org.uk 

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Val McDermid opens CafeLife

Val McDermid has officially reopened the revamped CafeLife community cafe on Cheyne Street.  Dubbed the Queen of Crime, the author has sold over 17 million books to date across the globe and is translated into more than 40 languages. Val met with café customers and fans to sign copies of her books brought along on the day.   

CafeLife is run by renowned local charity LifeCare Edinburgh and all proceeds from café sales go towards the organisation’s vital care services for older people living across Edinburgh. 

Val said: “Every community should have a resource like CafeLife. We’re lucky to have it. The LifeCare centre, and all the vital services provided by the charity, help support serious issues such as isolation and loneliness.

“I’m proud to be supporting LifeCare in its important work.” 

The pandemic forced the café to close its doors to its loyal sit-in customers in March 2020.  The closure was a real loss to the area as CafeLife is the only fully-accessible community café around, offering good value food and drink appealing to all generations and with lots of space for buggies and wheelchairs.  

Opened nearly ten years ago, the team took the opportunity to upgrade the café through the covid-closure. The charity secured emergency funding to revamp CafeLife’s interiors and the kitchen team have spent time creating a new and improved menu to appeal to all tastes and dietary needs.  

CaféLife will be running a series of promotions throughout the coming months to celebrate the reopening and to welcome everyone back.  

For more information about LifeCare visit https://www.lifecare-edinburgh.org.uk/  

And for Val McDermid visit https://www.valmcdermid.com/ 

Stockbridge in the spotlight

LifeCare’s monthly History Talk is about ‘Stockbridge through the archives of Historic Environment Scotland’ @HistEnvScot by Jackie Sangster.

On Tues 22nd Feb at 15:00 – 16:15 on Zoom.

If you would like to attend please contact us at alekspacula@lifecare-edinburgh.org.uk for the code.

£97,000 Lottery LIFT for Muirhouse Millennium Centre

Muirhouse Millennium Centre is among twenty-seven community groups across Edinburgh are sharing in a £717,108 cash boost from The National Lottery Community Fund today.  

The Millennium Centre receives £97,000 to ‘provide a range of community activities within Muirhouse Millennium Centre engaging approximately 150 local community members and four volunteers.’

Muirhouse Millennium Centre is also the base of LIFT (Low Income Families Together), who run a range of services from the Millennium Centre.

Thanks to an award of £53,463, Leith-based Fast Forward (Positive Lifestyles) Ltd will be able to continue their ‘Ask Dad’ project – a health education and training programme for dads and male carers across Edinburgh and the Lothians -for another three years.

Mark Hunter, Project Officer, Ask Dad, said: “Thanks to this support from The National Lottery Community Fund our ‘Ask Dad’ programme will be able to continue to support dads whose families are going through a period of difficulty. 

“We’re looking forward to developing our work to date, including our Good Conversations programme, supporting parents to have what they perceive as awkward, difficult, or embarrassing conversations with their children.

“We are looking forward to working on our new programme, ‘Dad: The Invisible Parent’ which will support better awareness and understanding by practitioners of the challenges faced by dads, to improve their engagement and communication with dads, towards better outcomes for their children. 

“In addition, by working with parents who feel ignored or unwelcome by service providers, we aim to improve their ability to communicate with services and to understand a service provider’s role and their limitations.” 

Better informed, more confident dads improve the wellbeing of the whole family. They also improve their children’s educational attainment. These impacts are even more profound in the communities affected by poverty and inequality.

An award of £114,344 means that Craigmillar Literacy Trust will continue to provide their support to local families with babies and children up to nine years of age for the next three years.

They will also be able to run their new ‘Express Yourself’ programme for older children and young people aged up to the age of sixteen using digital media and performance to support them to connect with literacy in a way that is more relevant to them.

Kara Whelan, Project Manager, Craigmillar Literacy Trust, said: “This grant will support our work with babies, children, young people, and families in Craigmillar though our early literacy, family literacy and young people’s projects. 

“Our work is relationship based and embedded in our community. We are looking forward to building on the strengths we have and to developing new and innovating approaches to supporting literacy in our community.”

Edinburgh Tool Library receives £9,500 to help with the costs of a Volunteer Co-ordinator who will deliver a bespoke training programme for volunteers as well as making links with other third sector organisations in Edinburgh and will help the group engage with new communities and neighbourhoods across the city.

Chris Hellawell, Founder and Director, Edinburgh Tool Library, said: “This support will allow us to reach communities that we haven’t yet spoken to before, help us enhance the support we give to our community and to produce materials to share with other organisations like ours across Scotland so we can amplify the impart of all the hard work or our volunteers in Edinburgh.  Thank you so much.”

More Edinburgh projects celebrating today include Ama-zing Harmonies, Big Hearts Community Trust, Leith Community Centre, LifeCare and St Columba’s Hospice.

Across Scotland 179 projects are sharing in £5,752,948 today. Announcing the funding, The National Lottery Community Fund’s Scotland Chair, Kate Still, said: “Local community groups bring people together to support one another through difficult times.

“Sometimes this is as simple as providing a listening ear and other times it can be a real lifeline connecting people who might otherwise be lonely and isolated. Each of the projects receiving funding today in Edinburgh remind us of the power of social connections and the difference that community projects can make to people’s lives.

 “National Lottery players can be proud to know that the money they raise is helping to support this vital work.” 

 The National Lottery Community Fund distributes money raised by National Lottery players for good causes and more than £30 million a week is raised for good causes across the UK.

Thanks to National Lottery players, last year we awarded over half a billion pounds (£588.2 million) of life-changing funding to communities across the UK. Over eight in ten (83%) of our grants are for under £10,000 – going to grassroots groups and charities across the UK that are bringing to life amazing ideas that matter to their communities.