A local community in Rochdale has come together to donate hundreds of gift boxes to residents in the borough’s care homes ahead of the festive period.
The project is the brainchild of Heywood resident Richenda Mather and her 14-year-old son Ady.
Richenda – who works with her daughter as a hairdresser and was forced to temporarily close her business due to the second national lockdown – launched the heartfelt idea with a social media post earlier this month, and it has since resulted in thousands of pounds being raised, as well as almost 200 festive gift bags being distributed to care home residents, many of whom haven’t seen their families in months.
The pair said the festive gifts would simply cheer the care home residents up, and it doesn’t have to cost much to “make someone very happy”.
In true Greater Manchester spirit, the local community quickly rallied around the idea, and people were soon dropping gifts off at Richenda’s house, sending her money toward putting gift bags together, and one of her friends – who works as a train driver for Northern Rail – even managed to raise an impressive £1,000 in just 24 hours for the initiative.
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Each bag contained a variety of pick-me-ups including chocolates, sweets, scarves, blankets and perfumes.
Richenda also asked a group of childminders if they would consider asking children to make homemade Christmas cards too and in total, the mother and son duo managed to pack around 180 gift bags, which they successfully delivered to four local care homes last week.
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How brilliant is this?
Richenda Mather
Speaking to the MEN on the initiative, Richenda said: “We saw something on telly where there was a nursing home and nobody had seen their family since March [and] my son said, ‘why don’t we do some Christmas gift boxes for these people?’
“So we went and made one and I asked on Facebook whether anyone else wanted to get involved and it just went absolutely mad.”
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Care homes to benefit from Richenda and Ady’s festive gifting project include Springfield Park Nursing Home, Springbank Nursing Home, Beech House, and Tudor Court, with staff sending their thanks for brightening the residents’ days and saying the community coming together in such a way to provide the donations “brought a tear to the eye”.
If that wasn’t incredible enough as it is, the pair even borrowed elf and penguin outfits to dress up in when dropping the gifts off, waving at residents through the window.
“I got a message from the nursing home and they said they are going to go out and buy an elf outfit for the residents as they loved it so much,” Richenda added.
Richenda Mather
Expressing his gratitude to the community for supporting residents, Michael Jones – Manager at Springfield Park Nursing Home – said: “I wanted to say thank you so much to her and her friends and colleagues who have donated to our residents at such a difficult time.
“They are missing out on family and friends visiting and this will be such a great boost for them. It was a massive surprise [and] we weren’t expecting it at all.
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“It has put a smile on their faces.
“There are handmade cards from children in the local area too – they are so heartwarming [and] it brings a tear to the eye. It’s amazing to know that they are not forgotten and that people are thinking about them at this time.”
Richenda Mather
It wasn’t just festive gift bags and boxes donated though.
Enough money was even raised to be able to buy a tablet device for one home, so that residents could stay connected with their families, and staff at the homes also had a surprise too as Richenda said: “At the end of it all, I think we had about £50 left, so we got the staff a bottle of vodka each and some chocolate and thank you cards, as we thought we can’t leave them out,”
After all their hard work, Richenda and Ady have said they would like to send their thanks to anyone who has donated to the successful initiative. She said: “It wasn’t just me who’s been doing this – everyone in Heywood has been contributing,
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“One woman dropped six gift bags off – it really has been madness.”
“It was so worth doing – it was a stressful week but we managed to do it all… I’d like to say a big thank you to everyone [as] I couldn’t have done it without everyone else.”
She continued: “Usually this is my biggest time of the year, so I don’t know if I’d have been able to do it otherwise, but I am thinking about trying it again next year as I have really enjoyed it,
“But with a bit more help dropping them off.”
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From everyone here at The Manc, to Richenda, Ady and the local Heywood community who played a crucial part in contributing at a time when it is truly needed most, we take our hats off to you.
Thank you for helping to keep Greater Manchester great.
Trending
Coronation Street and Emmerdale set for special crossover episode
Announced on Tuesday, 13 May, ITV confirmed that work on the first-ever Coronation Street and Emmerdale collaboration is now underway.
The flagship serial franchises both have huge nationwide followings in their own right, attracting more than 8 million viewers every week.
Moreover, with both Manc’s much-loved Corrie and its Yorkshire counterpart having faced financial struggles in recent months, this announcement couldn’t have come at a better time.
Writing in an official joint press release, the two shows revealed they will “join forces in an unprecedented, one-off special episode to launch the broadcaster’s new power hour of soap, which begins on ITV1 and STV in January 2026.”
The ‘power hour’ is part of the channel’s plans to readjust its approach to its regular programming laid out earlier this year, with this serving as an eye-catching way to promote the new schedule.
Put it this way, provided they keep the crossovers up North and avoid you know where, this is the kind of thing we can get behind…
Corrie characters reacting to the mere thought of heading to London 🤝 Manc parents whenever one of their kids mentions leaving 0161. 😂
The statement goes on to read: “The distinctive worlds of Emmerdale and Coronation Street will merge for one night only in a ‘mash-up’ of our two favourite communities.”
ITV believe they have come up with an “ingenious way of linking the two universes” before having them return to Greater Manchester and the Dales, respectively.
The episode will be a self-contained one-off special, but one that sees them canonically grounded in the same entertainment world forever and, you never know, if the idea is a hit then it could be the first of many to come.
As if that wasn’t enough, to make the prospect even more interesting, the producers are inviting members of the audience to choose which two characters they would like to meet and interact with in the scene – keep your eyes peeled on their social media for more information.
Coming in January 2026 (specific release date yet to be confirmed), this is not one you want to miss.
We’re also glad to see the pair of long-standing soaps and institutions of British telly have got off to a strong start this year, raking in 124 million streams on ITVX with each episode now available on the streaming platform ahead of each night’s episode.
You can expect a big viewer spike when this one goes out, that’s for sure.
If you saw footage of a ‘mini tornado’ ripping through Manchester online this past weekend, no, your eyes weren’t deceiving you: it did happen and, turns out, it’s a pretty strange and rare phenomenon– at least in this part of the world.
They say 0161 has everything but a beach, and now we seemingly have little twisters of our own, they might just have a point.
In all seriousness, footage went viral on social media, being met with equal surprise and alarm as most were understandably confused at how this could even happen in the UK, given our climate isn’t typically used to these kinds of weather events.
For those of you who haven’t seen it already, here’s what it looked like…
Did you see the mini Manc tornado that passed through Ancoats last weekend? 🌪️
We’ll admit that when first heard a so-called tornado had been spotted in Manchester, we pictured a little spiral of leaves and crisps packets in a supermarket car park, but as you can see, it really was much more significant than that.
Reported as having towered as high as 30 metres along Great Ancoats Street, various people saw the startling city centre sight and quickly began querying what the hell they were seeing online.
Despite many dubbing it a tornado, we can confirm it was something slightly different.
What caused the ‘Manchester tornado’?
What you’re looking at is what is colloquially known as a ‘dust devil’; put simply, these are small, rotating columns of air that pick up dust and debris from the ground and obviously resemble a tornado at times, especially when they manage to become as wide and tall as this one did.
As explained by the Met Office, “A dust devil forms due to irregularities caused by temperature contrasts on different surfaces, which then causes rotation of the air and, when there’s dust and debris, you can get these columns of air.”
Here’s another angle:
WATCH: MASSIVE Dust Devil in Manchester, England yesterday!#tornado
We don’t need to tell you that it’s been pretty warm of late (bloody gorgeous, in fact) and, as a result, the chances of creating a proper dust devil are much greater than usual.
The Met Office went on to add: “Unlike tornadoes, dust devils grow upwards from the ground, rather than down from clouds. In the stronger dust devils, a cumulus cloud can be seen at the top of the rising column of warm air.
“They only last a few minutes because cool air is sucked into the base of the rising vortex, cooling the ground and cutting off its heat supply.”
It’s not the only strange meteorological event seen around Greater Manchester recently, either. From the likes of ‘supercell thunderstorm’ and the eerily silent ‘heat lightning’ in late 2023, to the UFO-like swirl seen across various parts of the globe earlier this year.
Emily Sergeant -
19th November 2020 
