Hey everyone!
Can't believe yet another holiday has passed. It was a great start to the week - sunshine and a feeling of Spring in the air. We baked bread outside, sat around the camp fire and ate our fill.
We loved 'bird day', and the children went home with bird feeders and little bags of bird food tailored to the varieties of bird that they might find in their gardens at home. 
Camp building day was a great hit, and I was amazed at the different styles of camp that the children produced. And I must thank Roger for sawing and hammering away and making such a great frame for each child to get their camp started.
It was an interesting holiday, with a few ups and downs, and as a result we have made an effort to allow the Secret Garden to evolve and become even more efficient and exciting for the children and us. It's very exciting! I'll list below some of the changes which we have made.
But please don't worry, there will not be any changes that you need to be concerned about, and all future bookings are secure.

• We have decided to operate as a provider of Environmental Education throughout the year, offering Summer School and other holiday workshops - nothing will change for you, except that we will be able to take children from 5-14 for as many days as we wish without being required to register on any of the Ofsted registers. This is a move away from being purely 'childcare' which is required to register with Ofsted if offered to under 8's for more than 14 days per year. We are fully conversant with Ofsted regulations, and are in communication with them. We'd just like to stay uncomplicated and independent for as long as we can. And as everything we do is linked to Environmental Education, it makes total sense to be what we are!
• Another difference you might notice is the way we structure the days. We had a little experiment last holiday, and we discovered that contrary to what we expected, the days when we had 12 children were much more successful than when we had, for example, 6 children. The larger numbers allowed us to play a greater range of games, the children seemed really considerate of the need for order and behaved really well when they were in bigger groups. So we will be continuing to look carefully at groups and structure. We will decide what works best for all of us. We will also be employing at least one further member of staff in order to ensure that we are able to address the needs of all our little visiting peeps!
• You will notice a new page on the website too, which I'd really appreciate you reading to your children - it just reiterates our rules and sets out our expectations in terms of behaviour etc. As children come on different days and arrive at different times, it's easier to present this information via the website before they come. We just can't practically sit them down as a group to go through it. Thank you so much for helping us in this way.
  

As we grow and evolve, we never lose sight of the fact that without you and your little peeps we'd be nothing. We continue to uphold our philosophy that the children in our care will be treated just as we treat our own. We continue to develop our site and resources to ensure that everybody has the best of fun every day! Thanks for making our dream come true. I hope we can do the same for you :)

Hello Peeps!
Not much peeping coming from these big old chicks! Yes the Buff Orpingtons grew very fast over the winter, and now look very beautiful and handsome. 
Children coming at Feb 1/2 term should be able to still see them running around the garden. And with any luck we should experience the first egg at any moment. It will be very exciting checking every morning to see if it has happened!!!!
By Easter the big old chicks will be living with Ruby at the bottom of the garden in a special new house. Ruby is looking forward to this time, when she gets company around the clock again.

The practical news we have to share with you is the redesigned situation with the lunches. It has become quite complicated to ensure all children have a hearty meal at lunchtime, and with the inevitable differences in taste, and as we've often felt obliged to provide alternatives and have also seen good food sometimes wasted, we have decided to streamline our lunch system and provide a menu for each day in advance. Children can opt to bring packed lunches, but at only £1 per lunch here, we feel it is still the cheapest, yummiest and most convenient option.. 
The new system will apply to breakfast (served to any child who books one and arrives before 9am), lunch (times vary for group lunch depending on activity - but any child on the premises between 12 and 2 can have lunch with us) and tea (also known as supper, served to any child who books one and is still here after 5pm), but snacks and drinks will still be provided free of charge as before. 

Menus will be posted on the website with a Facebook link sometime during the  week before the holiday club commences. You can let us know which meals you require, and pay for them on a daily basis. No advance booking required. It will be a bit like the way they do it school - we'll do a meal register each day so we all know where we are. 

I hope that this new system makes everyone's lives easier - for us it will mean that each child has been made aware of what is on offer in advance, and thus should be happy eating what is on the menu (or they will have brought a packed lunch) - it will save time and prevent waste. And because it saves waste, and reduces our overheads it means that we can keep our very competitive rates the same despite the rising cost of living. And thus we will all be very happy peeps :)

There are still some spaces especially on Monday 18th. Book while you can. They go very fast once the banner goes up - and that's my next plan for today.
Happy February dear friends. I'm hoping for a lovely spell of mild dry weather and a half term outside building camps and chilling out (not getting chilly!!) by the campfires. 
Best wishes from us all x x x