Our community: St Christopher's Hospice

We know it is helpful to people moving home to have an insight into the community they are looking to move into. So we have already started a series of postings about local schools, and we will be writing about other things including, on this occasion, a very deserving charity.

St Christopher’s is the first modern hospice, founded by Dame Cicely Saunders in 1967. They say that:

"Our vision is of a world in which all dying people and those close to them have access to appropriate care and support, when they need it, wherever they need it and whoever they are."

Comedienne Jo Brand joined the recent Midnight Walk

"We care for around 650 people on any one day serving a population of over 1.5 million in the London boroughs of Southwark, Lewisham, Lambeth, Bromley and Croydon. Our services include palliative care from specialist doctors and nurses, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, social work, bereavement and psychiatric support, creative therapies, complementary therapies and spiritual care. We also carry out extensive research and education, training over 12,000 health and social care staff a year."

"To continue these services costs £15 million each year, around £10 million of which must come from fundraising activities. The St Christopher’s Group comprises St Christopher’s Hospice in Sydenham and Harris HospisCare in Orpington."

We also asked for a few words from the people the hospice helps.

“I feel safe, I love it. Before I came here it took me a while to accept what was wrong. I was very frightened. When I came here all my fear went, I completely changed. You forget that you’re ill, it’s nice not to be thinking about being ill. The only day that my family don’t worry about me is the day I come here” (patient)

“I have been lucky enough, following the death of my wife, to have received bereavement counselling. I would just like to register my thanks for your help in easing me through a very difficult period of my life. Whilst my grieving continues I now feel much better equipped to face all of my tomorrows” (widow)

If you have any time to spare to raise money for a good cause, remember this one.

Website here, Facebook here, Twitter here

Harris Hospiscare website here, Facebook here, Twitter here

Our team: Hayley Mortimer

The latest member of our staff to be featured in this blog is Hayley Mortimer, who joined us in Summer 2012.

Hayley pictured at her desk

Hayley is based in our Tulse Hill Branch in the role of administrator, providing support to one of our Directors, John Adamthwaite (himself yet to be featured in our blog, but you can read about him here).

Hayley attended Bullers Wood School in Chislehurst through to Sixth Form. Hayley went on to further education at Orpington College, leaving to enter the IT Recruitment world. 

Hayley lives in Bromley with her 3 year old daughter, who keeps her very busy and highly amused. 

Useful post: South London local online

At Edward Ashdale we enjoy communicating and being part of local life.  One of the nice things that you can do with a blog is to be helpful, which is why we already have posts giving information about local schools - we will be updating those and adding to them -, and a "property related services to consider" post.

This "South London local online" post combines social media (well, we are 21st century estate agents) and local communities. It's not always easy to find the online communities where people get together online in South London, so we thought we'd offer some helpful links here. Want to find local people socialising and contributing to local life online? This is a blog post to add to your Favourites, and if you think we should add an online community we've missed, let us know. More will be added as we discover them.

In alphabetical order:

Beckenham

Beckenham Town us - Website here, Twitter here

Crystal Palace

- Crystal Palace People - website here, Twitter here

Norwood

- Virtual Norwood. Website here, Twitter here

Orpington

- Orpington Community. Website here, Twitter here

Tulse Hill

- Tulse Hill Forum. Website here, Twitter here

In the news again

With the publication of the latest Bromley and Bexley Property Mart magazine, we're in the news again.  Following one of our properties being on the cover of the magazine earlier this year here, and the last issue carrying a featured property, this time there is a profile which talks about the way we work, and also about our innovative (and fun) series of community-inspired, recipe card leaflets.

You can view the magazine here. The page pictured to the right, together with our latest page showcasing our properties for sale and lettings, is on pages 20 to 21. 

In an exclusive to this blog, we can confirm that the next recipe flyer will be a recipe for cheese biscuits from the Cookery Club of the Worsley Bridge Junior School in Beckenham.  We're grateful to the Head Teacher, staff and pupils of the school for helping us and we're already looking forward to testing the recipe for ourselves. 

And we must again thank the Blackbird Bakery of Herne Hill, Crystal Palace, East Dulwich Grove, and West Norwood, which contributed the lemon tart recipe which was in the leaflet that included the tasty picture in the Property Mart page above. And also for the use of their brand to the left, which moves!  Just watch it closely.

Why not drop into our branch in Bromley or Tulse Hill and pick the recipe leaflet up? If you need to find us, just look at our website.

And of course, we're here for you if you need to buy, sell, let or rent a property or if you require a property management service.  As the Property Mart said, we're a Recipe for Success.