Once again another year has flown by, it’s not until I write this report that I realise how much we do in 12 months.

We started off the year with a healthy committee of 9 people and of course we remain in a strong position financially.

MAY 2018. Swimming party at Beau Sejour, about 25 people came including a new family. This event is great fun and seems to be enjoyed by the younger children. It was decided to do the swimming again in 2019.

JUNE 2018. GDCS Camp. 29/6 - 1/7 Always a popular event, we had 2 new families join us, 19 children in total. This year Tracy purchased a huge box of toys which were a big hit with the children, we had freshly made pizza from the campsite on Fri night & a BBQ on the Sat night where some extra people joined us on site. We enjoyed the pool, had card games, arts and craft, bouncy castle, football, rock/ papers/ scissors game with pegs, all great fun. We received quite a few messages of appreciation after the weekend.

Karen stepped down from the committee due to her study workload. Leonie thanked her for her help with organising events.

AUGUST. 5th Herm trip. Amazing turnout - just shy of 50 people came. Very hot day. Started with a sand sculpture competition, very impressive creations in the sand. Food was pre ordered earlier in the day but took a while to serve which meant that some of us had finished while others were still waiting for their food, but we got there in the end. The afternoon was free to explore the island, enjoy the sun and have a dip in the sea to cool down. Some were lucky to see dolphins on the way home.

SEPTEMBER kayaking 8/9. 20 people put their names down but a few dropped out last minute, 12 came in the end - we had a lovely long paddle across Grande Havre, the younger paddlers got quite tired and needed towing back. Denise has cooked hotdogs for us for when we got back to the beach which was well received. It was suggested we paddle from Havelet to Fermain next year.

22/9 GHHA quiznight. Denise put in a team which did quite well. This event is very well run and we would recommended to anyone who enjoys a good quiz.

NOVEMBER 2/11 Dairy visit. Another popular event - we even had to turn people away as we were limited on numbers. Originally booked for 24 people 35 put their names down so it was agreed with the Dairy that 30 people could attend. Everyone enjoyed themselves, a good insight into how our Dairy operates, the children enjoyed lots of free goodies too.

Bonfire night 2/11. Again thank you to Healthspan for inviting us along to their bonfire event, lots of fun activities for the children and the fireworks were brilliant.

Xmas fayre 18/11. Very enjoyable but very hard work and a long day. We had lucky dip, reindeer food, Santa keys, lolly game, balloons and balloon modeling from the very talented Lawrence. We raised £240.41

DECEMBER 8/12 ice skating. Very relieved to say most people stayed on their feet, the ice was very wet due to heavy rain so you knew if people had fallen as they would be soaked, some children were showing no fear.

Accessible shopping evening. Some of our children performed some signing to jingle bells along with the choir. I hope they organise another one this year as it was a lovely evening.

FEBRUARY 18/2 observatory. We were split into 2 groups, one group went into a telescope/ observation room and the other went into a classroom for a presentation on our solar system. Halfway through the evening we swapped round. Very informative for both adults and children, we were so lucky - it was cloudy all day but the clouds cleared away allowing us to see the moon, seven sisters Orion’s Belt and the andromeda galaxy. Over 30 people put their names down for this event.

MARCH we lost another member of our committee. Paul had decided to step down, a sad loss, both Paul and Karen are always welcome back.

APRIL. Swimming 27/4. Again well attended and seems to be enjoyed by the younger members.

While these events are happening there is lots going on in the background. As we decided at the AGM last year that Facebook was possibly not suitable for everyone, we are now using e-mail too having contacted everyone we could by email to find out their preferred choice of contact. Safeguarding - we now have a safeguarding officer, Denise kindly agreed to take on the role, she will now be the point of contact should anyone have any concerns about any of our children. Website A huge job started by Jon and Elliot, James soon joined in and has done a fab job of putting together the page. We did have a website but it was not fully set up and we had no passwords so no way of managing it, which meant we had issues trying to get hold of the domain which Elliot managed to sort out for us. We now have Letter heads and Compliment slips with our new logo. We have had a few requests for equipment from parents, Lawrence has also requested some funding for equipment. We have new T-shirts with our new logo as well as a banner kindly donated to us by Dowding signs. We have attended meetings on Data protection, and have re-affiliated with NDCS. Not to mention the man hours to organise some of the events eg the Xmas fayre, we had hundreds and hundred of presents to wrap up for the lucky dip. Camp entertainment and shopping for food.

Future. Leaflets are next on the list now we have an email and website up and running. Constitution of GDCS will need to be amended to reflect new laws being introduced in Guernsey.

Events to look out for 40th party 18th May, Camp 28th 29th June, Kayaking, iris and Dora painting Xmas decorations, ice skating, post office.

To summarise - a great year, this wouldn’t be possible without the support of such a great team, they have all done their bit. All the events were successful, well attended, having 50 people in Herm was a huge number, certainly the largest I have seen in my days at GDCS.

Thank you also to the parents for all their support and thank you again to my fellow committee members. Here’s to another good year. Go team GDCS!

Leonie Burrows.