Posts Tagged :

Easter

Egg-cellent Easter activities for all

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Seasonal holidays such as Christmas or Easter can often be a difficult time for families with a seriously ill child and managing illness or spending time in hospital often means that families are not able to do all the things they’d like to do. At Spread a Smile, we try and bring a little bit of fun to these times, when it’s really needed, and for Easter 2025, we organised a range of exciting activities to support children and young people in hospital and at home.

🐣Easter treat drop – Thanks to generous support from our friends at Hain Daniels, we delivered thousands of chocolate eggs, cuddly toys and games to all of our NHS hospital partners for staff to give out to seriously ill children on the wards.

As always, the lovely team at DPD UK supported us with the deliveries, and we’re grateful to them and everyone who donated eggs and gifts including ABC Bridging, All Aboard Charity Shops,  Alt HAN Co, ICAB, Garden House School, Hasbro, Mouse House, Rob Key and Scor.

🐰Easter bunny visit – The Easter bunny hopped along to join our team of entertainers on hospital visits to University College Hospital, London, Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH), Evelina London Children’s Hospital and St Mary’s Hospital, giving out gifts and helping to bring a little bit of Spring happiness to the wards.

🎈Egg-cellent virtual visits – We also organised some exciting virtual sessions for families to enjoy at home, including biscuit decorating, balloon modelling, Easter art and a new collaborative dance workshop with I Can Dance UK, for young people with additional needs.

Thank you again to everyone who has helped make all of the above possible and please do get in touch by emailing fundraising@spreadasmile.org if you’d like to support our seasonal activities in the future.

Easter tea party at Corinthia London

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To kick off the Easter holidays, 18 families joined us at the beautiful Corinthia London for a delicious Easter themed afternoon tea.

Upon arrival, the families were greeted with glittery welcome drinks in Spread a Smile colours before being shown to their tables to enjoy a tasty afternoon tea with sandwiches, scones, cakes, hot chocolates and more.

In true Spread a Smile style there was entertainment from some of our magicians, singers and fairies, along with lots of Easter crafts and a scavenger hunt with the end prize of a personalised apron for each child to take home.

We are extremely grateful to our friends at Corinthia London for hosting us so beautifully and treating our guests like royalty. As one family told us,

“The afternoon tea was absolutely delicious and on another level. Thank you always so, so much for thinking of everything and being so kind to us all. We honestly had a fabulous time, and it was such a special treat to be able to take the kids (and us) to somewhere so luxurious. Thank you as always for the amazing magic, face painting and singing. Jacob and Kaitlin were in hysterics at the magician, and it was so funny to watch.” Love the Youens family.

Our family events and outings support young patients, their parents, carers and siblings and bring moments of respite, joyful experiences and enduring memories at the most challenging of times.

To find out more about our work and how you can get involved, please click here.

Easter egg-xtravaganza

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Each year, we spread a little joy to children in hospital during the Easter holidays by collecting and sending out Easter eggs to all 27 of our NHS hospital and hospice partners.

The eggs are kindly donated to us by our supporters purchasing eggs from our Amazon wish list and also generous companies either collecting eggs from staff or funding larger quantities of eggs.

Thanks to this support, we’ll send out over 3,000 eggs to be distributed to seriously ill children. It’s a huge task organising, packaging up and distributing so many eggs.

“Easter holidays spent in hospital when other children are out enjoying Springtime can be really challenging for young people on the wards. Receiving an Easter egg from Spread a Smile can make such a difference. It helps make the children feel included and special, bringing Easter fun into hospital so they don’t miss out.”

For a child stuck in hospital or hospice over the Easter weekend, receiving an egg can really help to spread some joy and springtime cheer. We have also planned a brilliant week of virtual Easter themed sessions for the children we support and their siblings. From biscuit decorating, to Easter art and a live session with Zoo2U, we hope to spread as many smiles as possible to families up and down the country.

We’d like to say a huge thank you to all of the individuals who generously bought eggs from our list and the following companies who have helped make our Easter initiatives possible including:

  • Enra who made a generous donation which not only enabled us to buy eggs and also fund additional Easter holiday activities;
  • WUKPG who made a considerable donation;
  • Uncommon and their clients for collecting and sourcing loads of eggs;
  • Also our friends at Downing LLP, TritonExec, BRE Group, ICAB, Koda Staff, Totes, Fitzgerald House, Little Learners, Chancellor’s School and Handyman Ltd for their kind donations.

Happy Easter to you all!