This is a short entry to update you on our Christmas schemes and to share something one of our Pals parents has said.

Firstly thank you to everyone who has volunteered to be an Elf or Reindeer (see previous entry for details), we now have enough Reindeers but are on the look out for more Elves. Also, please ask your friends and family when they are doing their Christmas cards if they could spare a couple of minutes and do one or two more for a Post Pal child, it’s amazing the difference it can make, which this message shows.

Jack B is having a very difficult time which sadly won’t get any easier and his Mum sent us this message.

Despite everything his moment of happiness has not been deprived to him… that moment being when ‘the postman’ arrives. More than ever we now appreciate the cards that are still arriving. In an effort to keep that sought after smile, we have taken to ‘drip feeding’ him the cards. A few in the morning after breakfast, a few more at lunchtime and few more in the afternoon… It is the little things in life that give the most pleasure. Those cards mean much more to us than most could realise. They keep us – his parents – alive too. While Jack was having his MIGB treatment he got cards AND more cards and AND more cards – it was great fun reading out the messages and working out how best arrange their display. Thank you to everyone who sent them in – I wish there were words to describe how much they are appreciated. The broke the boredom, the monotony, and towards the end of the week when Jack became sickly and lethargic, wanting only to lie in bed, his one bright moment was the arrival of ‘the postman’. I hope it is suffice to say that each card he received will provide us with a very precious memory, we intend to keep every single one.

Look out for an update soon with details of Stephanie W’s exciting “Extra Smiles” or should that be “X factor Smiles” taking place this week…

Hello, we are running our Christmas schemes again this year with the option for people to be Elves and Reindeer.

An Elf is someone who is assigned a child who they gather gifts up to the value of £15 for and sends them off in early December.

A Reindeer is someone who is assigned a young child and sends 9 cards during the month of December, one from each reindeer talking from the reindeers perspective ie talking about the sleigh getting full, getting ready for the big night etc.

In the past both schemes have proven very popular – one girl believed that the reindeer wrote to her because she helped her mum look after her disabled brother, and a little boy was reassured as the reindeer had written to him at the hospital which meant Santa knew that he was there so wouldn’t get missed out.

The Elf scheme always brings about huge smiles, Nikita loved her Elf parcel which she recieved a couple of weeks before she passed away last year.

If you would like to be an Elf or Reindeer (or both) then please drop us a line stating your name, email address and how many children you would like to be an elf or reindeer for and also please let us know if you are happy to do an elf box for teenage boys as volunteers for this age group is hard to find.

It would also been a great help if you could forward this onto your address book please, post on blogs and message boards as we have 105 Elves to find!