We are raising money to start an autism group for young children between the ages of 5-11 years.

In 2013 our beautiful son Gabriel was diagnosed at the age of 4 with autism. With early intervention and great support at home and school Gabriel has done amazing but unfortunately now at 10 years old Gabriel's struggles socially are becoming more obvious with his peers and he now spend most playtime's alone.

We decided that maybe it was time for us to find a group for him where he could be with other autistic children his age where he could go without having to worry about being accepted and being able to spend time with children who may share the same interests that he does.To our amazement and disappointment we learnt that there is almost nothing regular out there local to us for children on the spectrum between the ages of 5-11 years old. 

We find this extremely sad that there isn't more out there at such a time in these children's lives when their peers are starting to notice differences.There is a huge gap which needs to be filled for these amazing children so my husband and I have decided to start a group ourselves where autistic children between the ages of 5-11 years can come every week, make friends and hopefully help their confidence grow in social situations.

Although we are super excited about starting a group as a family having 3 young children and the fact that our group will be completely voluntary run and unfunded we are relying solely on contributions and support from the community to help get us started.Through social media we have managed to collect from some amazing beautiful souls lots of donations of Lego, books, toys and some art supplies and after sending out lots of letters to businesses for various things we had 1 reply with a donation of 5 beautiful beanbags. Unfortunately though we were unable to collect any sensory toys/tents/lights and a lot of other stuff on our list so are still in desperate need of these things before we can get started as it is important to us that our children are able to feel completely comfortable in group and have the the right equipment that they need.

We are hoping to raise around £600 in order to buy the rest of the equipment that we need so please help us by donating whatever you can to give these kids the support that they need and deserve. We would be  extremely grateful for your support.

Thank you.