We run summer camps for parents who grew up in orphanages and their children, where we give intensive support for their parenting skills. We have no safe washing facilities at the moment and urgently need to reconstruct our traditional Russian banya or bath-house. This will mean that we can continue to offer a warm welcome at our rural log-cabin. This simple, but beautiful spot has seen so many families' lives changed but we can't continue without a bath-house.
In rural Russia we use the traditional sauna to wash, but our bath-house needs totally re-building. The wooden floor and one wall is rotten, the stove is unsafe, the water tank leaks (we're not on the mains), and it isn't big enough for the 25 people who need to use it in the summer. Basically it needs rebuilding so that we have somewhere safe to wash and do the laundry during our summer camps.
By rebuilding the bath-house and enlarging it we will make it possible for us to continue running our summer camps for parents who grew up in Russian orphanages and their children. We have already raised almost half the amount we need locally and volunteers will help with the building. We are able to help families more during a summer camp than we can in many weekly sessions because the experience is so intense.
When the parent child bond is strengthened, the child's whole development improves: their health, their communication skills, their behaviour. Parents learn to take responsibility for their family and are motivated to find and stay in employment. Overcoming their lack of confidence, they are also more likely to seek help from other agencies, and to take their child to kindergarten, which sets them up to achieve more when they start school. Best of all the families stay together happily.
