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Last weekend Chris and I headed out for an evening of murder and mystery but most of all fun! It was a local event organised to raise funds for a small but vital local charity.

Let me tell you about them:

Reach Up Reach Out is a small community project based at Farnborough Grange Infant School. Their aim is to support families who have preschool aged children with additional needs, and to provide opportunities to aid the development of these children. They would like to help the children to reach up to meet their full potential and the families to reach out for help and support. The group is run by Liz (Early Years Support) and Victoria, a parent of a child with additional needs.

They meet weekly during term time, and offer music therapy fortnightly, something that they are constantly fundraising for. They have seen amazing progress from the children as a result of the therapy and have had some very moving moments, it is not a therapy that is easily accessible to many. They also have a volunteer to help and advise with ideas to aid language and communication development. The group also provides twice termly sensory sessions at a local sensory suite which requires fundraising to over costs.

Something that is often daunting especially when you have a very young child with additional needs is knowing what help and support is out there and where and how to access it so a large part of Reach Up Reach Out’s role is signposting for parents and carers. Many of the families have not yet received a diagnosis, making specialist support difficult or impossible to access.

Looking into the future, the charity would love to provide communication sessions with a qualified speech and language therapist, this type of therapy is often difficult to access on the NHS but is absolutely invaluable to the children and families.

So Saturday night arrived and we headed to the school. Before entry we had to have our fingerprints taken which was a lovely extra detail! We were the greeted by the characters all in 1920s costume and waited for the mystery to unravel!

We were given time between scenes to examine clues and chat amongst ourselves. We enjoyed a fish and chips supper midway through the drama. Victoria was really helpful with my dietary needs and I loved my cheesey chips 🙂

Trying to decide on the killer and motive was so tricky! As a table we only ruled out 2 characters but it was so fun hearing everybody’s ideas.

Next was the raffle. I bought a lot of tickets and was super lucky to win 5 prizes (one of which I gave away to a friend on our table as it was starting to get embarrassing!)

We didn’t guess the correct murderer and motive but that in no way spoiled the fun. It was an excellent evening and all for a great cause. If you would like to make a donation to support this brilliant charity please contact me via Facebook and I will pass your details to Liz and Victoria.