Yesterday (Sunday 7th July 2019), I went to the Caudwell International Children’s Centre, Staffordshire, public open day. I went in the car, it was inside the Keele University grounds and it was all signposted, it was very easy to park and get access to the building. The building itself was amazing, it was big and futuristic. As I went inside it was lovely, clean and bright, the décor was minimalistic and spacious.
I walked around the centre and went in all the different rooms like the creative play suite, garden view rooms, the music and media suite, the family room and courtyard rooms. Every room had a different activity or information which was brilliant, in the middle of the rooms they had a lovely courtyard area, I only went in the one off reception area which was filled with photographs of the building, staff and the children that Caudwell support. In the creative play suite, I decorated a rock with Mow Mow, this is an app where you decorate a rock and hide it somewhere which was really fun. After, we went outside and we watched a power chair football demonstration by St George’s knights and Greenbank Sports Academy, it was amazing, I even got to try the power chair football for myself. The chairs were super fast and agile, they turned around dead quick and I was able to join in on the training. Then we went to the 1000 trees plaque unveiling, this was outside on the car park; a man called Jason did a little introduction speech with a mascot, then handed it over to Trudi Beswick to do the unveiling. I helped with a few other children to pull the cloth off the plaque to show the amazing sign. I received my certificate of appreciation for sponsoring a plant within the project. I had a lovely photo with Trudi before moving onto the next activity.
We went to explore a bit more and found a wheelchair swing, Dad pushed me onto the swing and I was able to pull the rope and make the swing move by myself, which was brilliant to do independently. Then we went a walk around the playground and went on the ramp, over a sort of bridge and onto a viewing deck, in my chair I was a bit too low to see over the fence but if you was higher you would have been able to see all the side of the building.
On the car park they had attractions like the fire brigade, the police and an ice cream van, I talked to John Caudwell and had a photograph with him which was cool.
I had a tremendous day at The Caudwell International Children’s Centre Open Day. The whole building was totally accessible and the staff there are a credit to the organisation.
I would like to say a huge thank you to everyone that made my day so brilliant!
Caudwell International Children’s Centre is incredible, it meets the purpose of what it was intended to do, which is fab!
Cheers for having me!
Myles x
