Two leading local photographers have joined forces as part of a major national fundraising drive for the Jack & Jill Children’s Foundation.
Gerry O’Gorman and Neil Warner are appealing to people to avail of a mini portrait session and a free desktop size portrait for €25 tomorrow (Friday ) and Saturday at the Lane Studios (behind Eason’s Bookshop ). All the money collected during “Happy Faces Day” goes directly to the charity.
The promotion is part of “Happy Faces Day” an event organised by the Irish Professional Photographers Association which this year has selected the Jack & Jill Foundation as its charity.
The foundation provides direct funding (up to the age of four ) to more than 300 families of children who are born with, or develop, brain damage. The money enables them to buy home respite care.
The foundation gives these families the gift of time, time to do the things that we so often take for granted like shopping, taking their other children to the park, a night’s sleep, etc.
Jack & Jill is facing a major shortfall in its funding due to a drop in public donations and failure to secure the full HSE grant it required for 2011. The charity wrote to families recently informing them of a 20 per cent cut in hours funded.
The foundation was set up in memory of Jack Irwin who was born on February 29 1996 in Co Kildare. Shortly after his birth he suffered a trauma and was brain damaged. He was blind, deaf and unable to swallow on his own. He lived for 22 months and required constant care. After he left hospital his family realised there were no services in Ireland available to a baby such as him.
He was cared for at home thanks to an “incredible” community response from neighbours, friends, and those working in the Irwins’ business. It was the difference that this in-home care made in Jack’s brief life that inspired this parents to establish the Jack & Jill Children’s Foundation.
“My wife and I swore that no other family in Ireland should go through this again,” his father, Jonathan Irwin is reported as saying.
“When we started the Government had no database on the number of children with such needs in Ireland. Today, we have settled in around 320 families. We bring early home nursing and respite care to babies wherever they live in Ireland in their own homes. It doesn’t matter if they are in Donegal, Wexford or the inner city. They will be looked after by Jack & Jill.”
His short life showed his parents the ideal way in which children like Jack can be nursed. From their experience evolved the early intervention home respite care that has now been offered to more than 1,400 children and their families throughout Ireland.
The foundation not only raises funds of €3.6 million yearly it also acts as an advocate for it’s families help them secure entitlements, such as a carers’ allowance, a medical card, suitable housing, special equipment or a primary medical certificate.
Since Happy Faces Day was first launched in 2006 the IPPA has raised almost €280,000 for its chosen charities. Each year, its members all over Ireland donate their time, skills and materials for the benefit of Irish charities.
To book an appointment for a portrait session and help this worthy charity telephone the Lane Studios at (091 ) 567938 or go along on the day.
