Halloween: Fire Safety

Halloween offers a fun opportunity for both children and adults to dress up in fancy dress

costumes. Whether you buy your costume and decorations or get creative and make your own, it's important to keep yourself safe. Keep in mind these tips to ensure your Halloween isn't scary for all the wrong reasons.

Costume Safety:

1. Choose flame-resistant materials Many Halloween costumes are made from synthetic fabrics that can ignite quickly. You should be looking out for a UKCA or CE marking and the manufacturer’s name which will mean that the outfits meet safety standards.

2. Avoid long trailing fabrics Where possible avoid capes, skirts, and sleeves that drag on the ground that can easily brush against candles, or open flames.

3. Be cautious with homemade costumes Be mindful of the materials you use when making your own costumes. If you are going to be around candles or open flames, avoid flammable items like cotton wool, tissue paper, or plastic bags.

Halloween Decorations and Open Flames

1. Use battery-operated candles

Instead of traditional candles in pumpkins or lanterns, go for LED alternatives. They’re safer, reusable, and just as spooky!

2. Keep decorations away from heat sources

Ensure that hanging decorations, cobwebs, and paper props are kept well away from heaters, radiators, and candles.

3. Check smoke alarms

If you're hosting a party at home, make sure your smoke alarms are working properly. It’s a simple check that could save lives.

Keeping your home warm

As the temperature continues to drop it's important to keep a warm home whilst keeping your energy bills down.

Robert Heath have provided a list of things you can do to help warm your home.

As our heating contractor, Robert Heath offer advice and support from a dedicated team of call handlers 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Keeping your home warm in the winter

Draw your curtains at dusk and shut your doors.

Opening your curtains in the day will allow the sun to heat up the room. Once the sun starts to set, you can close your curtains to keep the heat from escaping through your windows making your home warmer for longer.

Tuck your curtains behind your radiators to allow the heat into the room.

Leave a gap of at least 6 inches between furniture and the radiators.

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Ensure your doors and windows are draft free.

Please give us a call if your windows feel very draughty. They maybe due a service or need adjusting.

Having a draft coming through your doors and windows can make your room a bit colder. If you can buy a draft excluder to keep the heat in your room it will definitely help, especially if you are heating only one room in your house!

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Turn portable heaters off when leaving the room or going to bed.

Portable heaters can help heat up one room in your house, we recommend the room that you are all congregating in. As useful as these are, they can also cause problems if they are faulty or damaged. To reduce the risk of a fire, turn them off when you leave the room or you are going to bed.

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Leave your central heating on for short periods of time throughout the day.

It is important to keep your home warm. Living in a cold home can affect your mental and physical health. Therefore the rooms you spend most of your time should be between 18c and 21c .

Energy saving tips and tricks

Switch off lights when not needed.

This one is self explanatory but if there is nobody in the room, switching off the lights will help you save energy.

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Use energy efficient lightbulbs.

LED lightbulbs in your home can help you save energy and money. Not only do they use less energy when they are lighting a room, they also last a lot longer. When your lightbulbs break in your house, consider buying LED blubs going forward!

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Switch off appliances or unplug them.

A lot of appliances still use energy when they are on standby, so when you have finished watching TV or washing your clothes, consider turning off the appliance from the plug on the wall or unplug them.

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Use your washing machine at a lower

temperature like 30°C.

"Washing clothes at 30 degrees rather than higher temperatures will save around 40% of the energy used each year. Modern washing powders and detergents work just as effectively at lower temperatures. Wait until you have a full load before putting on a wash." - Energy Saving Trust

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Save water by showering rather than a bath.

It's pretty well known that showers use less water and energy than baths. If you have a 5 minute shower you can save up to £25 a year on your energy bills according to the Energy Saving Trust

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Only fill your kettle with the amount of water you need.

Not only does this save you money but it also saves you time. It will take less time to warm up the water for a cup of tea.

By following some of these tips, we hope you're able to keep your home a bit warmer during the winter periods whilst keeping your energy bills low.

If you you need to contact us, please call us or email in:

Call: 02920703758

Email: customerservices@fcha.org.uk

If you have an issue with your heating you can contact Robert Heath directly:

Call: 0333 0141000

Whatsapp: 07700 160200

Email: cs@robertheath.co.uk

FCHA Sports Day

The weather was bad but the atmosphere was electric at USW Sports Park for the FCHA tenants sports day!

Over 60 people and their support staff joined us for a day filled with activities and sports that they could try in the hopes that it inspires some to continue with a sports based activity as a hobby.

Boccia	Cricket/Table cricket
Yoga	Bowls
Tennis	Dance with Rubicon and U DO IT!
Golf	Circus tricks
Rise, adapted sports	Sensory engagement room.

Boccia

Is a Paralympic sport that involves throwing, kicking or rolling balls towards a target ball called the jack. It's played indoors and at the sports day, we were joined by Tom who is the Boccia Coordinator for Disability Sport Wales who gave tenants instructions on how to play the sport. Find out more about Boccia here

Cricket / Table Cricket

Cricket was set up to get tenants to practice swinging the bats and hitting the balls! This included points for those who hit the green wickets.

Table cricket was also set up in the gym. This involves up to 7 people around a table! one rolling the ball, one batting and then the rest move these white and red sliding pads on the edges of the table to try and stop the ball from hitting the ball. If you manage to block the ball by making it hit the red area of your slider they're out!

You can find out more here

Bowls

What looks relatively easy turned out to be the biggest competition of the day! The guys at Bowls Cymru set up a challenge: roll the bowls into the holes, highest score wins! Little did they know how competitive some tenants were as people queued up to get first place! The bowls, however, were not spherical, which made the task that much more challenging.

You can find more here!

Tennis

Not your usual tennis, this included more sensory objects to hit with bats and larger bats and balls to give everybody an opportunity to get a great rally going!

Thanks to Caerphilly Tennis Club for organising this!

The Dance Groups

Two different dance groups joined us on the day, one in the morning (U DO IT! Dance Foundation) and one in the afternoon (Rubicon Dance) each with their different styles of getting tenants involved, and did they get involved! Every tenant spent some time dancing to their favourite songs. You can see how much fun they had in the photos. Can you spot the FCHA staff member?

Golf

Tenants and Staff enjoyed a little practice at some golf thanks to Golff Cymru! A tee was placed on the ground and tenants could hit the ball into a net! There was also a target to keep score. You can find out more about Golf here

Circus Tricks

TK Arts provided circus tricks such as juggling and plate spinning to get tenants to test their fine motor skills! There were at lot of people at this stall learning to juggle and having a whale of a time!

Rise Activities

Rise Life set up some activities in the afternoon to get tenants moving through adapted sports. The more popular one was with pool noodles and a balloon! Seated, tenants would hit the balloon into the opponents goals. Lots of laughs and yells in excitement could be heard coming from here! Find out more on the Rise Life website here!

Sensory Room and Yoga

Finally, upstairs, tenants could relax and settle down with some musical instruments, a sensory room and Yoga. If the activities downstairs in the hall were a little too strenuous, this was where you could go to relax.

Overall, the initial feedback from tenants has been incredibly positive! Hopefully we can continue to do sports days like this in the future. Who knows? Maybe next time the weather will be a bit better and more could be done outside!